Tom's E-Boat

[TomW]

It has been a long while since I've built a floaty kit (probably 13 or 14 years ) and there aren't very many of them in the stash; but there are a pair of German S-boats in 1/72. One each of the classic Airfix and the more modern Revell kits.

I've decided that I'll build the Airfix first and I might start the Revell one by the end of the GB.

Box Shots:










A quick parts examination reveals that the hull halves have a bit of warpage so the first challenge will be to get everything trued up neatly - should be plain sailing after that

Regards

Tom

[Dazzled]

Good choice Tom. It's a great kit, years ahead of it's time

[Clashcityrocker]

That's a nice kit. I notice the box top has it as an "E" boat, but the instructions have it as an "S" boat. Was there a difference?

Nigel

[Dazzled]

It was due to a difference of opinion about classification. In Germany all motor torpedo boats were called "Schnellboot", hence S-boat. In Britain the term "Enemy War Motorboat" was used, shortened to E-boat. Airfix brought out their original kit using the E-boat name and it seems to have stuck to a certain extent. Using S-boat seems to have become popular after Revell released their Schnellboot in 2001. I'm guessing that Tom's kit is from that crossover period.

[Stevehnz]

I'll look forward to this, I snaffled one of these in the Airfix sale late last year, so keen to find out a bit about any tips & pitfalls along the way.
Steve.

[TomW]

It was due to a difference of opinion about classification. In Germany all motor torpedo boats were called "Schnellboot", hence S-boat. In Britain the term "Enemy War Motorboat" was used, shortened to E-boat. Airfix brought out their original kit using the E-boat name and it seems to have stuck to a certain extent. Using S-boat seems to have become popular after Revell released their Schnellboot in 2001. I'm guessing that Tom's kit is from that crossover period.

Darryl is spot on with the explanation This boxing is from the mid 2000's and the latest ones in the red boxes now say 'S-Boat' on the box top. When the kit was first released no-one in Britain would have really known what an 'S-Boat' was as they had always been known as 'Enemy Boats'.

Regards

Tom

[TomW]

And we're off First order of business was to have a good read through the instruction book and then promptly decide to ignore stage 1 completely and move onto stage 2 Probably the most important stage of all as it is the construction of the main hull.

Only 4 parts involved but they are big ones:






I found this stamped onto the bottom hull:






So a true Classic British Kit in every sense of the word and the moulds have held up pretty well over the years with very little flash in evidence. Unfortunately there is some warpage to deal with in the two hull halves; the Starboard half is in great shape and fitted well:






But the Port half was a wrestling match to get into a roughly acceptable fit:





I'll need to get the filler out for that side but so far so good

Regards

Tom

[Dazzled]

Although it was a few years ago, I do recall having the same issues with the hull on mine.

Maybe the moulds are warped

[TomW]

Its quite possible that they've become a little out of true over the years but I expect its due to the size of the hull halves more than anything. Such big slabs of plastic are almost guaranteed to warp unless perfectly cool before removal from the moulds.

Regards

Tom

[Dazzled]

Its quite possible that they've become a little out of true over the years but I expect its due to the size of the hull halves more than anything. Such big slabs of plastic are almost guaranteed to warp unless perfectly cool before removal from the moulds.

Regards

Tom

Nah, bent moulds I tells yah


Actually, the one I built was a pretty old kit. This must be an inherent issue with the moulding process. It's still a nice kit though

[Clashcityrocker]

It was due to a difference of opinion about classification. In Germany all motor torpedo boats were called "Schnellboot", hence S-boat. In Britain the term "Enemy War Motorboat" was used, shortened to E-boat. Airfix brought out their original kit using the E-boat name and it seems to have stuck to a certain extent. Using S-boat seems to have become popular after Revell released their Schnellboot in 2001. I'm guessing that Tom's kit is from that crossover period.

Thanks for the information. I knew the "S" was for Schnellboot, or fast boat. I didn't know about the "E" designation.

Nigel

[TomW]

Made some progress on the S-boat this afternoon. The next stage of construction is to fit the deck to the main hull; unfortunately the warped hull halves had something to say about that:








Ouch As you can see the two worst points of miss-alignment are between portholes two and three and then between four and five.

I considered the brute force approach of levering the hull halves apart as I fitted the deck part but the ominous creaking sounds from the previously glued joins soon stopped that So I resorted to spacing the halves apart using hefty pieces of old sprue.

First one:




And then two:





The deck then neatly dropped into place with only a few bits of tape needed to keep it all aligned:









Now I'll leave all this to cure properly before removing the tape and moving onto the next stage.

Regards

Tom

[Marek]

Nice work with that hull spacers. I think you have just overcome only hurdle in this kit!

[jamesaw]

Looking good. I'll have to pick up a bag of those spacers!

[Dazzled]

Good idea to use the old sprue as spacers. An admirable bit of recycling