H.M.S. Colossus, 1879 - Page 2

**Don Boose** · #11 10-02-2008, 05:58 AM

Been away for a while and just checked in to see this splendid project underwa, Carl. I look forward to seeing the ships come to life and to the inevitable historical discussion that will ensue.

Don

**Golden Bear** · #12 10-07-2008, 04:38 PM

Just to show that I am still alive and working, here is a newer view of the 3D model. I'm looking forward to the paper cutting part soon. As a couple of notes:

I've tested its appearance with a cambered deck and am not certain that it is worth the trouble. The model, particularly as a kit, will be much easier to build cleanly without it.

Second, although I've built in the slope to the front of the model, I have not so far done it at the rear. It is not at all apparent back there, being much less of a slope than at the front, and doesn't seem to affect the appearance at all.

I've been able to extract loads of nice detail from a hi-res photo that Jim Baumann shared of a later version of Colossus painted in grey. The earlier black/white coloring hides detail efficiently along with the poorer quality of lenses and glass photo plates that were in use at the time.

Carl

**redhorse** · #13 10-07-2008, 05:47 PM

I am looking forward to this, and I do hope you make it into a kit.

**Golden Bear** · #14 10-10-2008, 06:36 PM

Eye candy. Shows my upgrades. I made the hull a little deeper. I tested a version with the stern lifted and decided it made no actual difference except to make the model possibly harder for a kit. Sorry that the ports are not visible in this version... it takes a lot of extra effort for each of the natty rendered details and I spent about 10 hours today doing real stuff... like remodeling the hull and remarking all the ports, etc. (simple lines don't show in the rendered view). I have a strong desire to lay down some paper soon so didn't spend too much time on pretty work.

BTW Don, I found a nice image of a restored or duplicated binnacle and will upgrade that for the real model.

I'm having an issue with the 6" guns now. Judging from the very blurry secition (RN) that I have and the tiny aft gunport, it may have been some sort of "crouching" (like disappearing but not quite) mount. I've been through five books of reference and cannot really sort that out. Also, the section clearly shows stairs going up to the back of the binnacle platform of ahead of the bridge but I cannot make any sense of that when compared to photos (I spend a LOT of time poring over zoomed in photos - I also tweak them for sharpness, contrast, etc. to bring out features). I may make a judgement call and move the blinking things forward. Ta...

Carl

**Barry** · #15 10-10-2008, 07:10 PM

If you filled in the centre section it would almost look like the forerunner of modern mass car transporters. It looks great even if it is one of the uglys of all time maybe after all she was not that bad looking.

To do a Don where are the ash chutes on this ship my Dad had all the tin cans filled with soot to sink them to avoid detection in WW2 and as this ship was in an era with no radar or anything else following an ash trail might have been fairly dangerous for the quarry. Just a thought hopefully Maurice will know as usual.

**Golden Bear** · #16 10-10-2008, 08:56 PM

Barry, you've put your finger on something that's been bugging me with this design. I'm thinking that those Tee shaped thingies are the chutes. Makes sense. The center of the ship is an armored citadel and the rest of it is the hotel. Well, looks like one. And it IS truly an amazing ugly ship. Ajax and Agamemnon may have been a little worse but I couldn't find enough plans for them... yet.

Carl

**maurice** · #17 10-11-2008, 04:17 AM

Barry
I am by no means an expert on naval refuse disposal in the late 19th century.
However it was a time when men did not fear to go down to the sea in ships and do business in great waters.
Nowadays that would bring them to the attention of a variety of maritime authorities.

Great work Carl.

**Don Boose** · #18 10-11-2008, 06:38 AM

Carl –

I’ve finally had a chance to spend some time with this thread (been playing catch up since I got back from the three-week Israel, Baltimore, Cape May hiatus – sent in the final comments on the bibliography, thus finishing up the book, Thursday and spent yesterday doing a copyediting job).

Anyway, the images are great (and I like Barry’s account of tin can disposal in WWII).

These were fascinating ships. Parkes says that, in addition to being the first British battleships to carry breech loading guns, they were also the first to have compound armor and the first in which steel was used for general construction (“only the heavy forgings like stem and stern posts being made of iron.” [p. 291]

He says nothing about scuttles or chutes or about the 6-inch guns. The rather simple drawing shows four of them peeping over crenellations in the bulkheads (as in your images) and the fifth in a conventional mounting with a gun enclosure mounted as a stern chaser.

The photograph in Parkes (in gray) clearly shows those strange-looking out-curving tall ventilators just abaft the funnel. It also shows the ventilators abaft the bridge/conning tower cranked outward in the same way, and so do the 1890-93 photos in Burt.

The boats on the aft platform are covered with canvas in the photo, and they appear to have ram bows as do the boats shown in Parkes's drawing (which also appear to have armored conning towers). I’d love to see what you would do with those, but unfortunately, they appear to have been a later addition, as the boats in the 1890-93 photos in Burt look like conventional whaleboats (or whatever the Brits called those boats).

About Ajax and Agamemnon “rolling horribly,” Park says, with their 9-foot metacentric height, that Colossus and Edinburgh “would be rather unhappy at sea was inevitable.”

He goes on to say, “As sea boats they can only be described as passable, with a quick deep roll, and carrying considerable weather helm with a wind on the beam or quarter. Owing to the gun ports being only 12 ft. above water, at 13 [degree] inclination the muzzles dipped into the sea when trained abeam, and when rolling the chases were submerged several feet by moderate waves.”

Did you do anything further with Mutsuki?

And I look forward to seeing the binnacle.

Don

**Golden Bear** · #19 10-11-2008, 10:25 AM

Goodie, a discussion. From poring through all my references (5 books plus some stray other bits) these boats seem to be mostly ignored. References are there but not in the detail as for even Ajax and Agamemnon. Often they are referred to as, "larger and better handling Agamemnons."

These are frequently considered to be the first all steel ships although, as you note, there were some pieces in iron.

The RN section shows the outline of the 2nd class TB and that may be what you are thinking of with the projecting bow. Most of the boats were whaleboats and cutters.

For ventilators, you'll notice that the photo in Parkes is of a very late incarnation of Colossus. In Burt the upper photo on page 25 shows multiple ventilators just aft of the bridge and the ones that are bent in the Parkes picture appear to be straight. See also the beautiful picture on p. 79 of Brown's book. I also have access to 6 difficult to obtain images of varying degrees of clarity. Those four ventilators aft of the bridge appear in many different guises. I'm considering one where the right rear one is bent but the others are straight but I'm convinced that originally they were all straight as shown in my model. Also, the ones at the forward end of the aft structure vary in count and size over the photos.

The only ventilators that remained constant in appearance are the two peculiarly shaped ones just behind the funnel. There is something additional that is peculiar about these two. I'll leave interested folks to discover it for themselves first before pointing it out.

These ships also show a variety of color schemes. My pictures show it is the ordinary black/white/buff. This basic scheme can also have a blue stripe through the white portions going from stem to stern. There is a version where the black continues up to a line just higher than the turrets. Another is like the version I'm showing but seems to have a darker strip from the deck to just above the ports and a stripe above it - that seems to be the version shown in Brown's book. And of course, later in life it was just a boring grey but there seems to have been a lighter grey and a darker. Finally one of Burt's photos shows it with the black up past the height of the turrets but with a white stripe near the top.

OK, time to wake up. Sorry about that. It's what happens when you examine photos with a glass during all your free time for a couple of months.

Carl

**Golden Bear** · #20 10-11-2008, 10:37 AM

OK, I'm back to bore again. Here is something that disturbs me. It appears that Colossus and Edinburgh had different sterns!!! I've looked for references to see that they were resculpted as were they were on Ajax/Agamemnon. They both had anti roll tanks installed but no mention of changing the stern. Also, although I only have a couple really clear photos of the stern profiles, all the other photos (mostly from more forward or aft) confirm this difference. Here are a pair of photos to show the difference. The first is Edinburgh from Brown, the second from a personal source and is Colossus.

Carl