R.F. Iéna, 1898, 1:250

[Golden Bear]

I can also point out the strange cranes used by both Marceau and Carnot. These consisted of a large box framework of trusses that spanned the entire width of the spardeck. Some portions ran on tracks to pick up the boats and then run them out into the ocean past the tumblehome.

Magenta had cranes which were inset into the tall side walls and which would tilt outboard to lift the boats over water.

It is an interesting topic.


Carl

[Zathros]

Have you every sold completed models? I would think that, is a properly displayed glass box,, you could get a fortune. I know it could never compensate the time and love you put into them, I just wonder. I have had friends offer me $20 dollars here and there for models and for my real close friends I just gave them the models. It is really funny to go into a friends house and see that 15 years later, he still has the model displayed on a shelf. She is a work of art!!

[shrike]

I wonder if the rotating crane arrangement has anything to do with the French concerns about boarding. I know the speculation that that explains the excessive tumblehome.
Is keeping the boats and cranes inboard part of that, or the belief that the rotating cranes would be able to act fast enough in an emergency to get the boats in the water almost as quickly as individual davits?

[Royaloakmin]

Sometimes I just think they love mechanical complexity

[shrike]

Or Gaulish contrariness. I did own a Renault once

[Wilfried]

... shiplovers of the pre-dreadnought area; don't forget to remember, those davits - please correct me - are handled by manpower ...

With lovely greetings
the Wilfried

[Golden Bear]

I've been rolling yards and working on diagrams so only a little bit of an update for now. I want to get the detailing out of the way and then get her rigged up. So the aft detailing is new.

The large cranes were manipulated by small motors that sat on the spar deck. Up to this point in time they had been steam driven. For Iéna they were a new design of "treuils" that were electrically driven. However, actual manpower still formed an important accompaniment - pushing boats into place, etc.


Carl

[Don Boose]

Beautiful! Those cranes really catch my eye now that you have told us about them, and about the way that the boats were handled. It truly was a fascinating era of naval architecture and of advancing technology being incorporated into ship design.

Don

[Yu Gyokubun]

I’m prone to change of mind when see superb presentation. Next ship will be predreadnought!

[Michael Mash]

Hello Carl,
Iena is looking terrific (if not almost complete) in the image. It also shows the framework for the canvas on the mast in fine detail. The auxiliary boats all look great. Those cranes above the boats are really a piece of engineering. Is it the angle, or do the tops of the turrets have a slight "dome" shape to them?
Mike