Taking the plunge: Dunkerque (Hobbyboss 1/350)

[amblypygid]

Hello, fellow Britmodellers. This is my first committed plunge into the wonderful world of shipmodelling (I usually restrict myself to things with wings), something for which I assign the blame to @Stew Dapple and @Jamie @ Sovereign Hobbies after seeing their stand and having a chat to Stew at Scale Model World 2018. Although not at all a result of said chat, after my visit to Telford, the modelling mojo fled and has only just returned. I imagine it went somewhere sunny and warm; no idea why it's come back to dank and dark Britain (I speak both meteorologically and metaphorically, of course). I've been mooching about, looking at my half-finished kits and realising that they're all at or very close to some stage that I fear, like painting white intakes on a Phantom. Anyway, yesterday I dropped into a local charity shop with my boss, who loves to pick up utter tat from there. I often find the odd book, or perhaps a game for my son, but yesterday there were two kits sitting on a shelf: Trumpeter's 1/350 Roma and Hobbyboss' 1/350 Dunkerque. Fate? Maybe. They both appeared to be entirely complete; certainly the parts in box were all sealed, so the only real risk was that a bag had gone missing at some point.

 

Last night I checked the Dunkerque box to see if it was complete (it is), and then thought I'd test the fit of the big bits (they fit really very well), and then I started following the instructions. So, looks like I'm committed, and damn the Phantom intakes! However, I really have very little idea of what I'm doing, so please please please let me know what I'm getting wrong! I'm not going outside the box on this one, so it's just the kit plastic and the included etch. Unless I find the guns look awful and plump for the Master Model replacements, I suppose.

 

@Shar2 did a very nice review of the kit here, which includes lots of photos of the parts that are far better than any photos I could take, so rather than posting pictures of the box and plastic, I would ask you to pop over to his review instead.

 

I think my starting point will be to paint the hull and the deck, which I hope to begin this weekend? In the meantime, I shall post this photo of what is, to my eyes, a very lovely battlewagon:

 

 

To those more knowledgeable than me (that's anyone reading this), I ask: what are the three parallel lines running horizontally above the boot? Are these the strakes to which Shar2 refers in his review?

 

Here's a shot of the lady's backside, with one of my favourite bridges thrown in for good measure:

 

Thanks for looking in! 

[Courageous]

Looks interesting, so I'll take a pew. 

 

Stuart

[amblypygid]

Nice to see you here, Stuart. I'll certainly find it interesting, but whether my clueless efforts will interest anyone else... 

 

Seriously, I expect to learn a great deal from this. Although the reviews I've read of the kit suggest it's a pretty decent effort with no major flaws, a 1/350 battleship is perhaps not the easiest kit to start out with. At least the French skimped on the AA armament, so I don't have to deal with scores of tiny guns.

[Nils]

I shall be following this tour with great interest. I’ve always been attracted to these frend oddies with their beatiful lines and strange gun arrangements (after all, they were french😊)

Equally beautiful and not less impressive were their successors the Richelieu class.

Edited January 17, 2019 by Nils

[Stew Dapple]

Sorry about that Chris  It's all that standing up we have to do at shows, it makes the blood rush to my feet which means of course that my brain pretty much runs on empty  

 

I stand ready to be corrected (as I'm sure it was clear from talking to me that I don't actually know anything about ships except that the pointy end is generally at the front), but I think the lower line above the boot topping is a degaussing cable to counter magnetic mines, and the upper two lines are just hull plating. Well, it will do in the event that you don't get a better answer...  

 

Hope you have a good build mate, it was good to talk to you at the show by the way  

 

Cheers,

 

Stew

[amblypygid]

If the pointy bit's at the front, Stew, then it means the tiny propellers are at the back, and surely it's not a pusher? I've not found the landing gear yet, either. 

Degaussing cable, eh? My limited efforts to find some online references have turned up nothing other than very general overviews of the class design and operational history, but sometimes ignorance is bliss!

 

I spent last night working on said screws, or at least the shafts for them (calling @CedB, come in please!) Slow going but satisfying. Despite looking rather fragile, I think they'll survive handling as they're well protected under the bulge of the hull. I also constructed the kit-provided stand, which I think may have been designed for an entirely different ship in 1/700, as it's nowhere near wide enough, and doesn't match the hull profile in any way whatsoever.

[gamevender]

Nils,

Wasn't their gun arrangement a nod to the German pocket battleships? If they couldn't quite catch them, at least they could bring all their big guns to bear. Something I heard somewhere. 

[Procopius]

1 minute ago, gamevender said:

Nils,

Wasn't their gun arrangement a nod to the German pocket battleships? If they couldn't quite catch them, at least they could bring all their big guns to bear. Something I heard somewhere. 

It had more to do with getting the maximum protection for the citadel with the least weight. 

[amblypygid]

My (as mentioned, limited online) reading, suggests that it was both. The class was designed to deal with German fast ships armed with older 11"/280mm guns; i.e., the Deutschland class. The French envisaged that this would take the form of an extended stern chase, so imitated the Nelson class by putting all firepower up front. Somewhere I read that the turrets were really paired twin mounts, but the weight saving compared to four twin turrets was something like 28%. Since they were struggling to meet the weight limitations imposed by treaty, that must have been attractive. The armour was then intended to defeat long-range hits from the 280mm shells, though I also understand that Strasbourg carried more armour than Dunkerque. I guess that might have been a response to the more powerful 280mm guns mounted on the Scharnhorst/Gneisenau, which were designed to penetrate Dunkerque's armour at fighting ranges.

 

Didn't work too well when 15" shells started hitting at Mers-el-Kebir. And I guess the Deutschlands would not have fared well had they been in combat with a Dunkerque

 

I find the outcome of these arms races fascinating. So much investment in vulnerable assets that are going to be outclassed within a few years of being commissioned, or that are intended for a very specific purpose. I guess it's about now that the gaming-oriented amongst us mention Rule the Waves: https://store.nws-online.net/ruwaddo.html

 

[Procopius]

53 minutes ago, amblypygid said:

I find the outcome of these arms races fascinating. So much investment in vulnerable assets that are going to be outclassed within a few years of being commissioned, or that are intended for a very specific purpose. I guess it's about now that the gaming-oriented amongst us mention Rule the Waves: https://store.nws-online.net/ruwaddo.html

 

A fabulous game.

[amblypygid]

Wow, how quickly did those weeks pass? I had made a little progress on painting the hull, but by 'eck these things are big, aren't they? Last night I made a start on the turrets. Here's what I think they're supposed to look like:

 

Aaaaannd, here's what mine look like. I did some basic light enhancement on the photo, hence the speckliness of the darker areas.

 

Looks like I've mispositioned the front set of steps. They're attached with varnish, so hopefully I can adjust without damaging them.