o gauge freighter/ cargo ship

[Anonymous]

I am retired from the US navy and am trying to include a small harbor in my layout. I can not find any 1/43-1/50 scale ocean or coastal freighters. Any ideas on where I may find any. I have been in google etc.. Thank you in advance for any help you can throw my way..

[e-mail]

[Bob Keller]

Unless you build your own, the closest you might be able to find are some boats (a tug and a couple of fishing boats) made by Lemax for their ceramic building line. In that a container ship can be larger than an aircraft carrier, it might be a tough scene to place on a layout!

[palallin]

The Scale Shipyard makes fiberglass hulls for a number of ships and tugs in 1/48 plus they market resin and metal fittings of their own ond other companies' manufacture.

http://scaleshipyard.com/Main%20Pages/main.html

[dwiemer]

I few issues back, OGR magazine has a article on building a freighter and harbor scene. If you have the time, it might be a project you want to tackle. Being that you have a personal interest, this may be right up your alley.
Dennis

[Anonymous]

Stacking containers in a canoe sounds about right as far as size. Think of it as a way to store the canoe in the off season in your basement with your layout.

[underworld]

I would recommend scratch building, that way you can get exactly what you are looking for. I will be doing that myself for some gauge I trains that I have.

underworld

aka The Violet

[:D][:D][:D][:D][:D]

[palallin]

Scratch-building is fine, too. In fact, I'm planning--at some hypothetical point in my life when I have more time--to scratch a 1/48 scale, waterline model of a WWII USN Admirable-class minesweeper. It won't really fit perfectly with the layout, but examples of these small vessels made it inland as far as Nebraska.

I'd LOVE to model the MoPac Mississippi river-crossing ferries, but the rolling ramps and aprons themselves would take up more room than my entire layout, let alone the boats and the approaches.

[jefelectric]

Unles you have a really huge layout I would think some form of selective compression would be needed. Even a relatively small freighter would be 10-12 feet long. If I recall correctly the one in OGR was about 4-5 feet long, but it looked pretty good.

[FJ and G]

Eric Alton, 757-399-8636; [e-mail] will build you any type or model you like. But it will cost you. Oh, and did I mention that it will cost you.

Eric fabbed our army.mil booth (pictured in my Austin blogg on this page). He and his team also designed models for Lockheed.

Otherwise, you'll need to scratchbuild (which to me is the most fun). If you don't have lots of room, just model a portion of the ship on one end of the layout; or, model 3 sides of it along a harbor backdrop (in effect, a "flat")

And be sure to share your photos with us!

[dwiemer]

Check out David's posting on the harbor that his friend is building. It is impressive. Also, You might want to look into some of the larger scale models offered by Hobby Surpluss, etc. and see if you can do some forced compression. It should be interesting however you make it happen.
dennis

[Anonymous]

check out model expo in florida (www.modelexpo-online.com) [phone].

they sell all those boat kits that the rich people have. all different scales, many in 1:48 & 1:50.