HMS Dreadnought

Started by Gdaynorm

12 updates 19 likes 33 comments 0 followers
Gdaynorm Opening post

HMS Dreadnought

Decision made. 1875 battleship Dreadnought to 1/96. Hoping for NMM drawings. Have two photos so far off Wikipedia. Wish me luck.

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Progress 12th January

Bridge structure nearing completion. Railings need some straightening and windows glazed. I assume the decks would be planked. This is one difficult unit to build! Anyone confirm that?
Liked by watson220 and figtree7nts
1 comment
  1. Smiffy
    Leading Seaman
    Hi
    I was just reading your build blog and realised that I had seen a picture of HMS Dreadnought somewhere - it was taken about 1888 in harbour at Malta and shows her with decks cleared for action. I don’t imagine it will help a lot with your build but might be of interest. (My original scan is the right way up but it looks as if it has been turned upside down when I attached it.) All the best
    Smiffy
    Liked by Colin H

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Frustration

Maybe I'm getting old, but I have never had so many 'don't like it make it again"! Part problem is the drawings I have don't always agree with photos. But there is progress.
Liked by figtree7nts and marky
1 comment

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Focsle

Progress at last, but have no info for focsle arrangement, winches etc. Assume would be similar to Nelson's, even though twenty years previous?
From what I can see, her guardrails were mounted on the deck planking rather than outside on the steel
Liked by Jerry Todd
2 comments
  1. Gdaynorm
    Warrant Officer
    Actually you sent me the bow shot some time back. What I am missing is the layout of anchor winches and anchor chain runs. I guess they will be similar to Nelson. Pity Greenwich has got SO expensive!

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Progress

At least she looks like a warship at last. I wonder if her anchor winches would be different to those twenty years later. She had multiple booms for torpedo nets. I assume they were mounted to the hull a few feet above waterline and swung out from there. Were they wood or steel does anyone know? Must have been quite an operation setting them out!
Liked by Jerry Todd and Donnieboy and
1 comment
  1. RNinMunichBronze
    Fleet Admiral
    They were wooden spars Norm, but removed a few years later when net cutting torpedoes rendered the nets useless, and just a time consuming encumbrance. Depends what you want to build: As built or As in Service.
    So far so good 👍 Cheers Doug 😎

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Winches

Doug, Have you any info on Dreadnought's anchor winches? She now has all,I think!, of her portholes, well over a hundred. Anchors next, then guard rails around the focsle.
Liked by Donnieboy
9 comments
  1. Gdaynorm
    Warrant Officer
    Really great, thanks. The view to the bridge is odd. Did she undergo a major refit. The entire bridge looks different.
  2. RNinMunichBronze
    Fleet Admiral
    Sorry Norm, Got a bit carried away 🤔That's HMS Hood, but I strongly suspect that the capstan / anchor chain arrangement would have been very very similar. After all Hood was only 10 years or so later and much from the Dreadnought was used again and/or improved.
    Suspect that, as you said, foredeck arrangements were virtually identical on the Nelson class. Cheers, Doug 😎
    Liked by marky

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Catheads

Hi Doug,
Your shot of the foredeck is great, but I cannot find any pics of the clump catheads. They must have had some sort of winch, so I assume they were just a heavy protrusion with the winch mounted behind it?
2 comments
  1. RNinMunichBronze
    Fleet Admiral
    Hi Norm,
    Why a winch?
    I believe the catheads are only there to hold the chain away from the side and stop the anchor bashing the hull until it is fully weighed. Hang over from wooden ship days.
    Or "Small projection from ship’s side just abaft hawser pipe. Used for suspending an anchor when cable is disconnected and used for mooring to a buoy." See pic of 1/192 version from John R Haynes,
    Cheers Doug 😎
    http://johnrhaynes.com/catalog/fitting-list/product/JRH18/?

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Ctheads etc

Hi Doug, What ship's foredeck was that? Hood maybe? Looking at the bow shot you put up I cannot see any catheads. From the drawings I have, which are not Admiralty, she had three capstains feeding the chains into only two lockers. Odd. There is also a very large capstan about twenty feet aft of them.

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Foredeck

Hi Doug,
How does this look to you? Still working on the guard rails.
2 comments
  1. RNinMunichBronze
    Fleet Admiral
    Hi Norm, not bad 👍
    Coupla points:
    1 Weren't the two capstans on the stb side mounted on the same base plate? See attached GA drawing.
    2 And there seems to be a slightly larger general purpose capstan on the centre line slightly forward of the anchor winches, and a few other 'doodads' dotted about the foredeck.
    3 The hawser pipes should be more elongated and angled towards the hull side.
    Neat work nevertheless😉 Cheers Doug 😎
    PS: the bollards on the port side seem to be just forward of the anchor winch.
  2. Gdaynorm
    Warrant Officer
    Thanks. Had not forgotten the big capstan, and there may have been four 14lb guns but difficult to tell from photos. I can alter the base plates for the anchor winches easily enough.

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guardrails

I have always painted guardrails to whatever grey the vessel is in 1e home fleet, mediterranean etc. But in one photo of Dreadnought they look darker, maybe black. Anyone have an opinion?
3 comments
  1. Gdaynorm
    Warrant Officer
    Odd query.
    Canvas dodgers. Grey or tan? Tan looks better on a model - gives some contrast to the eternal grey, but better to be correct.
    Liked by Rookysailor
  2. RNinMunichBronze
    Fleet Admiral
    Hi Norm,
    I believe they (splinter padding) were grey, but I have also seen tan on other ships. Mostly WW2 though, like the Flower class corvettes.
    Maybe tan in peacetime grey at war!?
    Cheers, Doug 😎

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