HMS Suberb (1909) in 1/1250 scale

Here is the original HMS Superb, a Bellerophon-class battleship sailing at speed (20 knot maximum), featured in a photograph dated 1917.

HMS Superb displaced 18,600 tons and was armed with 10x 12 inch (300mm) 45 cal Mark X guns.

I have just taken delivery of my first 1/1250 scale WW1 warship by NAVIS. The model was purchased from Alnavco, the US licensed stockist of these German-made models. I am very happy with the model and the excellent service of Alnavco. These models are hard to come by. You see them adverstised "used" on eBay but I wanted a mint condition model. NAVIS also remakes the models from time to time and I wanted to be sure to get the newest version.

As you can see the sculpting quality is very high. The ship is minimally painted but is fully assembled out-of-the-box.

The eBay after market generally does not have these special boxes. The masts can get easily broken if not stored correctly.

Although NAVIS does not currently offer WW1 seaplanes, I wanted to see what their 1/1250 scale model Sopwith Camel looks like. As with the ships, it is a beautiful but tiny model.

The basic order comes as a flight of 3 aircraft in a special shipping/stowage box.

I am looking forward to gradually adding more pieces to this new collection. Highly recommended.

HMS Victory

On August 20th 2007, my cousin Andrew Grantham Davis and I were in Portsmouth Dockyard for a visit to HMS Victory. This was one of those rare occasions when there was little restoration work being conducted and very few visitors onboard. Consequently Andrew and I roamed the ship and I took many photos that would not normally be possible, showing details of the ship in all its glory. Andrew asked me to send him the photos and I thought I'd share them on my Blog since they show detail of interest to ship modelers. Since I am collecting the new Sails of War 1/1000 models just released, I will use some of the images to provide a little extra detail to the otherwise very nice out-of-the-box models.

There is no finer example of a ship-of-the-line. I have visited HMS Victory since a boy and have never tired of seeing her. She has never looked so good as on this overcast Summer day. Here are my photos, un-retouched.