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Old 12-04-2011, 03:01 AM
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Tapcho Tapcho is offline
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1878 British Obelisk Transport Barge

I bumped to this peculiar desing by accident. If someones interested it can be found here. Walden models have many other interesting footnote type of shipmodels too. Check their site, it's worth it. This one is a Kartonbau.de exclusive edition and can be downloaded fron there aswell (old site).

The model pictures a barge that was designed to transport an obelisk from Egypt to be erected (as it eventually happened) on the banks of Thames. Americans got one too and it can be seen in Central Part I believe (correct me if I'm wrong, but that's another story with another kind of ship too).

The obelisk was presented 1819 to the English nation by viceroy Mehmet Ali to commemorate the victories of Lord Nelson in the Battle of the Nile and Sir Ralph Abercomby in the Battle of Alexandria. British coverment accepted the gift but declined to pay the transportation costs and so it took several years until a viable solution was found.

Engineer John Dixon and Sir Erasmus Wilson eventualy teamed up (equivalent to Rutan-Branson operations nowadays ) and took up the task. The barge was built in England, then sipped in sections to Egypt and litterally assembled around the obelisk and then towed to England. Fantastic plan and it worked.

The kit can be built as a solid model or presenting the inner structure with the obelisk. I don't know yet wich version I'll do. Building starts now - it's a rainy day in Finland and this is a perfect project just now.

Tappi
Attached Thumbnails
1878 British Obelisk Transport Barge-thecleopatra.gif   1878 British Obelisk Transport Barge-kit_cover.jpg   1878 British Obelisk Transport Barge-kit_parts-1.jpg   1878 British Obelisk Transport Barge-kit_parts-2.jpg  
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