Italo-Turkish & First Balkan Naval Wars

[pierre the shy]

The rain has set in for the weekend here Sunjester, not going to be good till Monday.....you'll have to be patient  

I'm still drilling 1mm holes in my recently purchased 1/3000 ships with a pinvice as I like to add simple brass rod masts to the cruisers and capital ships. They really do make a difference visually at that scale.

Oh well good excuse to try and get the bases and labels done instead, and work out how exactly Paul's modification spreadsheet works - in between entertaining the kids   

[paulr]

Second & third batches washed last night

Both sides of the bases painted
Edges next

As Peter says the weather is not good this weekend
Misty drizzle at the moment, can't even see the tops of the nearby hills
Photography weather probably Tuesday, maybe Monday after work if the cloud cooperates

[Techno]

Misty drizzle at the moment, can't even see the tops of the nearby hills

Same here.......and fog......or, more likely, low flying cloud.

Oh......I'd forgotten.....I live in the Preselis......In Wales.

Cheers - Mr Sneezy.  (I mean...after everything medical I've been through, in the last few months....I just HAVE to pick up a frigging cold.) 

[paulr]

Edges on all the bases done

Got the magnetic vinyl glued on before continuing our Napoleonic game yesterday evening

Labelling & basing to do today

Forecast is for "Occasional showers. Light winds.", looks like some of the showers are going to be heavy
At this rate I'm going to have a major photo shoot on my hands when the weather finally improves

Also working on the scenario for the battle of Elli which will happen after we finish our Napoleonic game

[paulr]

Real life disrupted progress a bit today

Bases labelled
Revealing for the second time on this project that I can't count
Last time I was two bases short this time I have two large bases too many and four small bases too few
I try and sort it with the next batch

Sorted and prepared the next batch; Italians and Austro-Hungarians
Washing them revealed a bit more clean up is required on some ships. Also there are quiet a few masts to add

Completed the first draft of my Battle of Elli scenario and sent it off to Pierre the Shy to review

We had some nice sunny breaks , between heavy showers , with fast moving clouds so still no photographs

[paulr]

Did the extra clean up on the ships that needed it

Drilled all the mast holes
Including some of the more interesting ones on some of the Austro-Hungarian ships, a 0.5mm hole in a round lookout position 1.5mm in diameter, all went well

Cut up wire for masts and found I only had enough for about 30 masts and I needed over 40
Glued the masts into the ships and trimmed to length
Eight ships awaiting masts

I'll be calling my 'not so local' model shop shortly to see if he has any wire in stock

Weather is looking good for undercoating and photography today

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Sweeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeee....(gasps).....eeeeeeeeeee...eeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeët

[paulr]

My 'not so local' model shop had the wire in stock so after a quick trip out I have finished the masts and the undercoat is now drying in the sun

[paulr]

While waiting for it to cool down enough to base the next lot of ships I finally got the current lot photographed and post processed

The Greeks, two more destroyers to base and they are complete



Some close up examples







The Ottomans, so far...



Some close up examples













To give you a feel for scale the larger bases are 75x30 and the smaller 50x15

[paulr]

Updated my Battle of Elli scenario thanks to some really useful feedback from Pierre the Shy

[pierre the shy]

Looking very nice Paul....

The battle of Elli looks challenging for both sides - One of the Ottoman Ironclads has "dummy" main guns made of wood and Greek Navy bought their four new "big cat" destroyers but could not afford to buy the torpedoes to arm them.

Maybe they are a good command for me to run as it seems I can never infrequently hit my torpedo targets.  :-

We will see in a few weeks as no game this weekend and my brave French comrades seem to think that we can hold the British attack for another week next time we play. They haven't seen my flank close up obviously, though our Hussars still have the KGL Hussar standard that we took early in the game, much to the consternation of the enemy 
 

[Techno]

Very nice, indeed, Paul.

Cheers - Phil

[sunjester]

Looking really good. 

[fsn]

No! No! No! No! No! No! No!

NO!

Please, no! 

They're really, really attractive.

I now want some.

I don't need this in my life.

I have been considering a new (to me) way of doing naval wargames.  I always hated the look of battleships pinging away at each other from very short ranges. I pondered dividing the playing surface into 3. Force A on one side, force B on the other and a bit in the middle for destroyers to mix it up. Conceptually the two main forces could be very far apart, but the middle ground would be where you might actually get ships of both side appearing.

It's a Work in Progress that I haven't thoiught about for a while. Now, seeing these, I'm reaching for the book on Force H ...

I am, as the Scotsman said, Doomed.   

[Duke Speedy of Leighton]

Brilliant!
Think Leon might be a bit big, but it's nice you've made one he could actually fit in!