Another one

I was just looking at my list and I see that I left off one boat. I am also working on a 1/32 scale model of a WWII motor torpedo boat. This is a kit, from Traplet Publications (the people who bring you Marine Modelling International magazine), and I decided to order both the plans for the boat, and their offered woodpack. This, I am hoping, will give me an easy build and help me get my arse into gear and get some building done. Over the last week or so I've built up the keel, added the frames, and on Wednesday night I cut some stringers from some 1/4" and 1/8" balsa stock. Two stringers have already been put on the boat.

This model is of MTB 379, which apparently was a prototype of a new design of MTB. A number of boats were made to this design, but I don't believe 379 ever saw service, though I could be wrong on that. Anyway, I was wondering if I could convert it to MTB 74, which was used in the commando raid on St. Nazaire in 1942. MTB 74 differed from other MTBs in that it carried its torpedo tubes on the bow in front of the wheelhouse, pointing straight ahead. With this design, they hoped to fire their torpedoes over torpedo netting in an attack on the German warships Scharnhorst and Gneisenau. When this attack didn't pan out, the boat was used instead on the St. Nazaire raid.

There are numerous challenges to doing this conversion, and I'm not sure I'm up to it. So, perhaps I'll just build 379 as is, and fit out the deck equipment a la 74. After all, it's just a model made for me to have some RC fun. I'm not entering it into any sort of model competition, and if anyone criticizes me for what I've done, I'll just tell them to fuck off.

Next step in this blog: upload some pictures of each project to show where I am in each of them. I'll try to do that this weekend. I'm new to this whole blogging thing so I'll have to figure out how to upload images and such. This being google, I'm sure they've made it pretty easy. I'll figure it out.