Roman Mile Fort

The Mile Fort that I put on my PayHip site as pay what you want turned out pretty good. I just received the pieces from a friend who printed them for me. I laid out the pieces on my desk and was pretty happy with them. I will likely get some more straight wall sections and two more L corners. I have also made a tower without the gate for the wall as well. But I want to paint out what I have first.

In looking at pictures of mile forts, I was looking at the images of the internal buildings. I decided to add an internal building to it.I have added it to the files. It is a rather basic one that would need additional work. I have no idea on how to make a pantile roof.... yet.

Anyway, this is where I am at the moment.

Roman Project Update

After having a change to sort through my found miniatures, I have a nice selection that have made their way to painting sticks for priming. This includes 10 dead Roman Auxiliaties, 13 dead Celts, 8 Roman Engineers, a Scorpion with 4 crew, three servants (holding shields and wax tablets), a mounted Decurio, a mounted Vexilarius, and nine Auxilia cavalry. This will round out my Roman force nicely. In addition, I have a Roman Engineer mule cart and two baggage mules. That should give me enough to field most of the support options for a game of Infamy Infamy.

There were a number of Celt miniatures in my find as well. There were some figures that would be useful as wailing women. just fully clothed. I also found some Celt civilians. These I believe are Blue Moon minatures that came with the village that I bought a while back. The village was nice but ended up on a shelf and never painted as I changed focus.

I have glued the pantile roof to the side sections of the Mansio. I am trying to figure out how to get the main roof done. I'm trying to decide how to paint these. I will duplicate that effort on the villa and watchtower as well. I am searching for videos that may help. I aam definitely going to rewatch an old video from Red Beard Baron on his Roman Houses. I may use this as the basis for all of it.

I received my PDF copy of Midgard over the weekend. I have barely started to read it. But I am interested if this could be used with Infamy to make for a larger campaign. Could be interesting.

I ordered some Celt miniatures a while back to add two units of Noble Warriors for my Celts. Those are still in the mail, possibly with my physical copy of Midgard. But the Celts are for later.

Terrain Time

I was able to spend some time working on my existing terrain for Infamy Infamy. I plastered the lower half of a watch tower. I finished the assembly of a Warbases Villa Gate. I also finished the assembly of a Warbases Mansio. I have started to put on some roofing material to match the watchtower. I have a few sheets of plastic tile roof that I am using. I plan on redoing the villa with that as well. I will also plaster the buildings and then base coat them. This gives some nice targets for a Celt raid.

I bought the full villa set from Warbases. With the gate completed, it looks pretty good. I will probably glue the separate buildings together and then plaster them. That should allow for a better join between the buildings.

The Mansio and its out buildings were a bit tricky to get together. There are internal floors but I don't believe I have them built correctly. I will likely try to base this and possibly the villa above too.

The watchtower was the building I purchased first and have done the least with. The plastering looks bad at the moment but I am hoping that it will give some texture to the model when I paint. While looking for a base to put my Roman Engineer work party on, I made a discovery. I found a number of figures that I had purchased and forgotten about. I now have enough Roman cavaly for at least one group. I thought Roman Cavalry was in groups of 8 but I reread the rules and see that they are in groups of 6. I found 8 Auxilia cavalry. Four had plain helmets and four had a small plume. I was able to cut off the small plume so all of them match. These 8 cavalry are old Corvus Belli figures. I also found some additional command figures that include some figures to support the commander. Then there was some cavalry command figures from another manufacturer. And a few more Auxillia infantry that have separate weapons. Not sure of the manufacturer.

This project is slowly coming together.

Engineers

I was able to get a few minutes of painting done. The Engineer team is coming along. I have a few minutes more painting to do and then I will have to base them. I am thinking of basing them as a group since they are less of a combat unit and more of a target or objective. All in all, I was happy with the progress. I need some more movement trays. I am still not happy with the movement trays for the Celts. I am wondering if there is a stronger sheet magnet that I could use other than the ones that I have currently. I also finished flocking the recently based group of Auxilia. At this point I have enough for two painted armies for Infamy Infamy. With possibly enough support for Midgard.

I am having a friend print out the mile fort for me with a few extra straight lengths. I will doubtlessly need more of the straight lengths. Once I replace the FEP on my printer, I might be able to print those myself. If I get two more of the "L" corners done, I can make a fort like Lochmule or one of the other smaller German Limes forts with it as well. It should prove to be fairly flexible and a good piece of terrain for the table.

I purchased a while ago, a Mansio, watchtower and Villa from Warbases in 15mm. The Watchtower and most of the Villa is assembled. I need to get around to painting it. Somewhere I have some round Celt Huts that i purchased as well. This should give me plenty of terrain to get started with. But the one item that I would like to have that was all across the Roman Empire is a bath house. I have an idea for how to make one. The original idea was to 3d print one but it would be a large building. This may end up just being a dream and never pan out.

I will start making my Briton force commanders up soon. The thought is that it is a raiding party that has come over the wall to attack the settlements below the wall. This is why I want the fort and walls. Hopefully, I can get a game in soon.

TinkerCad and a Roman Mile Fort

I have been messing around in TinkerCard and looking to make my own take of a Mile fort on Hadrian's Wall. I still need to make some doors but I think I may scratch build those with some scrap balsa wood. It turned out pretty well. The nice thing is that it could be used for a small fort on the German Limes as well by using additional corners instead of the T intersections. One part that i missed on was I have both ends of the pieces having an a raised portion on the battlements. That means when they are joined, they will have an odd looking battlement in places. Having not printed this yet, I don't think it will make that big of a deal. I need to make some buildings for the inside of the fort.

I decided to design my own after looking around and finding several others that were not exactly what I was looking for. Honestly, the old JR Miniatures fort was the one I really wanted. But with this i should be able to print out as many straight pieces as I want to stretch across a table for the wall. I built it for 1/100th scale (15mm miniatures). (Sadly, the corner pieces do not fit on my resin printer.) The way I made the grooves for the stones left come cavities inside the model that show up in Cura. It probably won't be a problem but who knows. To simplify printing in resin, I could make the hollow. But I haven't yet. The hardest part of the model was getting the stair case done. Fortunately, there is a few nifty sites online about how to calcuate making stairs. That helped a good bit.

If anyone is interested, I will drop this on my PayHip site as a pay what you want item.

Productive Hobby Weekend

Well despite still not being able to get a successful print our of my resin printer, I had a good hobby weekend. I made significant progress with my Infamy Infamy armies.

I manage to rebase another group of 8 auxilia. They still need some flock and their shields repainted but they match the rest of the Auxilia better now. Next, I was able to base and flock a signifer, a cornicen, a legate, a centurion, and two Auxilia infantry. The two infantry completes a partial unit of Auxilia. I think i still need to repaint their shields to match but they are better. Then I was able to completely base and paint a medicus figure to be used in the games. It is one from 3D Breed miniatures. The figure is kneeling on the ground and has a wooden box of gear. I plan on buying some Donnington dead Romans at some point. One will be placed on the base with the medicus to show him doing his job. I am pleased with how this came out. He is based on a Flames of War medium base because that is what I happened to have at hand. Game wise, I don't think it will matter. I also started painting an engineer party that I had previously basecoated a few years ago. There is a armored figure as part of this group that probably shouldn't be there but he got a bit of paint anyway.

To complete my Romans, I need to get a few more movement trays and to paint one of the ones that I have. For the Romans, they are individually based on small 12mm square magnets. These stick nicely to the sheet metal movement trays that I am using. I have glued a small strip of wood to the front to be able to line the troops up against them. I would like to get a bigger one that I can use for skirmish or open order troops. But this is just an idea at this point.

I still want some Auxilia cavalry to round out the force. I am thinking I will get Khurasan Miniatures cavalry.I want to start with enough for two groups of cavalry and possibly expand them to four in the future. But for now, I have the figures needed for a base Infamy force plus some extra. I am getting closer.

For my British/Guals I also managed a bit of work. Most importantly, I was able to rebase a full group of levy and the group of slingers, a group of light cavalry as well as a few odd warriors that were just on washers. This gives me a fully painted force. I could use a few more leader types as I am not too wild about the ones I have but they will work. This gives me one group of Elites, four groups of Warriors, one group of levy, a group of slingers, a group with javelins, a group of noble cavalry, a group of light cavalry and command elements.

What I am missing are good movement trays for the Celts. The metal bases for the Romans works well. But the Celts are based on washers. I have a sheet magnet that I am trying to use but it is a fairly weak magnet. I have a thought. If I take a sheet of thin balsa wood and cut holes for the washers and glue the balsa to the magnet, possibly the miniatures would hold better. However, I think this will be prone to warping and curl the magnet. I just don't have a good option yet.

As seen above, I am starting to work on some terrain elements as well. I have the beginning of a limes fence that I printed over two printers ago. The prints are not great but serviceable. The plan is to Get these done and then print/paint some more. I ultimagely want 4 feet of it as well as some kind of gate for a trade road. That could make for an interesting scenario. I have a watch tower that I need to complete that will be perfect to have behind that fence. I know that there was a wall instead of a fence.

ACW Naval - CSS Forrest

The guys are East Coast Iron Clads helped me out and made a really nice model of the CSS Forrest for me out of a description of it as a former canal boat. The model is really nice but each time I try to print, the print fails. I have a few things I need to try as suggested by a friend. I really don't have enough experience troubleshooting the printer. The last print had the islands and part of the supports but the boat itself just plain failed. I am assuming that the print is just a blob on the bottom of my FEP.

At this point, I have workable models for most of the Mosquito Fleet. Some of these vessels are speculative as no images have been found for them.

For the scenarios, I need a better model for the Savannah and for the Perry. Both are sailing ships and I have stand ins that I can use from my AWI collections. I have the models for the matchup of the Beaufort against the Albatross. They are printed and painted too.

For the action where the Fanny was captured by the Raliegh, Curlew and Junaluska, I need to print the models for the Curlew and Junaluska still. By the way, the model for the Curlew is a modified model from Long Face Games. I reached out and he did the custom model for me. I am very happy with it but yet to have printed it. The Junaluska I can either use a generic tug or use the model I received for the Forrest as it too was a canal tug.

The bigger action will be that of Hatteras Inlet. This one I am trying to source the models for still. There are existing modesl for several of the vessels. Harriet Lane is availaible from Long Face Games and the Minnesota, Susquehanna and Cumberland are available from East Coast Iron Clads. (LFG may have versions of these but i already had the ECIC ones). What is missing is the Monticello, the Wabash and the Pawnee. I have modified a vessel to use for the Monticello. In working with ECIC, they recommended upsizing the Minnesota model by 115% to make the Wabash. But the Pawnee is still a missing vessel in this order of battle.

I would like to do this battle as a combined arms battle and have the landed troops attacking the forts and masked batteries on Hatteras Island. If I can figure this out, I will move on to the Battle for Roanoke Island. This had a ship battle as well as the bombardment of the forts and landings.

Right now, the only thing slowing me down is my printer.

Midgard - Infamy Infamy and trying to sort it all out

Continuing in my efforts to not stay focused, I spend more time working on my Romand and Celts for Infamy Infamy. This is inspite having just received a wonderful new STL for my ACW naval forces that I need to print out. It is a model of the CSS Forrest, a former canal boat that was converted to a small gunboat for the Confederate Navy. I have run it through the slicer so it is ready to print.

For the Celts that I will use as Britons, I have a force that is shaping up. I have a group of six light cavalry, two groups of two charriots, a single group of ten noble infantry,one group of six slingers, one group of six javelin skirmishers, a group of noble cavalry, a mounted noble, two nobles and a standard bearer, four units of ten warriors, and lastly three units of ten levy. Also at the bottom of the picture is some purchased dead guals from Xyston that I have not painted yet. This force largely just needs basing. The levy needs more help. Some are just partially painted. I have in a drawer of shame three more groups of ten warriors in various states and another group of six slingers.

On the other hand, the miniatures are in much better shape for my Roman Auxilia. I have four movement trays completed that each will hold a unit of 8 Auxilia infantry. I have a group of bow armed Auxilia with a couple of extra figures. I have not made a movement try for the archers. I also have a couple more groups of Auxilia. I have one and a half groups based the same way. For command, I have a set of foot with a centurion, an optio, a signifer and a cornicen. I have another foot command set missing the centurion. All of these minis were from the old Corvus Belli ranges of Romans that i really like. Somehow, I don't have a centurion that I like for the second command group. I have one that I will probably paint and use. This one is in scale armor.

There there are the eBay purchases. I have a group that is mounted four to a small base that I will rework to match the others. Matching these, I have another group of four mounted in a strip and a command section mounted similarly. All of these will be rebased. I think I can get these done in a reasonable amount of time. That brings me to two more groups of Auxilia infantry. These are based in fours as well. But the shields and tunics are painted differently. They don't seem to match the others because of that. Also the shield design is quite different. I have painted the other shields to match that on display at the Saalburg Cohort Fort museum. I am not sure if I would use these are support from a different unit or repaint them.

There is another set of Auxilia infantry that I picked up on eBay. These are based in strips of three. They look like they are skirmishing and are painted differently than my other Auxilia. They are all in poses of throwing javelins. I have a total of 16 bases of three. On Carole's blog (Hippolyta's Tiny Footsteps), her review of Infamy Infamy points out some of the struggles of the Auxilia. They are not allowed slings and if they are mounted as skirmishers, they cannot reform. Given that, I am not sure how I want to treat these. Do I make a skirmish base for them or mount them on infantry bases? This last set will likely take a back seat and be ignored for a while. I also have some unpainted Roman engineers. They are on the to do list.

I am still missing some things that i want for these forces. For the Celts, I absolutely want to have another unit of 10 noble infantry. I am trying to decide which manufacturer. Part of me wants to just buy the Old Glory Miniatures Blue Moon minis in chainmail. That would give me enough minis for three more groups. The shipping would be cheaper as they are US based. Way more than I need or wanted but possibly more cost effective than ordering from the UK or Europe? I am also leaning toward Stonewall Miniatures for the Celts and the Roman Centurions on their site. Still undecided. I am also in need of Auxilia cavalry. For these I may look at Khurasan. I would buy the Rebel Minis but they do not offer a command element. I also want a mule train and an engineer's cart. That should wrap up my needs for troops.

As to terrain, since I am doing this project in 15mm, I have trees, swamps, rivers and the like. I had also purchased a few items from the Warbases 15mm range. Including the mansio, a villa and another one of their buildings. I also have a watch tower. This should be enough to keep me busy for a while. I also have a Blue Moon celtic hut pack with civilians that I had bought. So that should be enough for raids on either side of Hadrian's Wall.

To expand the project, I would add some legionares. I am not 100% certain I would use them but they could be a nice addition. Most importantly, I need to get this game on the table a few times. I have not played a game for fun in a while. All my hobby time was spent playtesting scenrios. It will be good to try to get in and have fun again.

Reviewing Older Projects - Looking forward to Midgard

With the upcoming launch of Midgard Heroic Battles, it made me break out my miniatures from both Dux Britaniarum and Infamy, Infamy. Both projects I really loved but didn't get enough chances to play.

For Dux, I have three armies. A Romano-British, Early Saxon and a Pict force. The Picts are not even a complete base army. I have a base force for both the Romano-British and the Early Saxons. Most figures for all of these are Splintered Light. I have a few reinforcements that are needed still. The Romano-British do not have any heavy cavalry. I could use a few additional sections of warriors and levy to flesh them out as well. i will be fleshing these out with Splintered Light minis.

My understanding is that Midgard forces are larger than those for Dux and Infamy. So, i don't quite have enough to pull it off yet for the Dark Ages.

My Romans for Infamy are closer to being ready. I have five full groups of 8 Auxiliary Infantry ready to go. I started to work on some movement trays for them as well. I have 6 of 8 of a sixth Auxilia infantry group painted up. I have a group of archers as well. What I do have is additional Auxilia infantry that I bought off of eBay. These are based 4 to a base and are not the same as my other minis. I have enough for three and a half more groups. There is another lot that I bought that are based 3 to a base for a total of 48 more figures. They would need to be rebased. I can separate these and build out six more groups of Auxilia. I would want to repaint the shields on these to match my existing miniatures. Mostly as i was modeling a unit based on the Saalburg Cohort fort in Germany.

What I am lacking is Auxilia Cavalry to complete out the unit. I really don't want to paint up cavalry. I am too slow of a painter and horses take a long time for me. I am looking through the offerings on eBay and am thinking that I may end up just painting my own. Most have spagetti spears that look like they could break at any minute. I really like Rebel Minis figures. However, their command figures are not great. They have no cavalry command to speak of. Peter Pig is an option. Old Glory 15s and Khurasan are also options to look at. I will likely make Roman Auxilia Cavalry my next hobby purchase.

My Infamy Celts are another story. I have loads of figures. I purchased a few years ago a lot of celts that were painted. However, most are only partially painted. I rebased many of them. I am trying to get them sorted on movement trays. I have enough for a base force. I play on using them for both Gauls and Britons. The Chariots are in rough shape. Most have either broken or come apart. With some TLC, I should have a huge Celt army. I am missing some figures to complete out cavalry. Mostly a command element. I have tons of chariots that i could have enough for two groups of 10 chariots. If i can get the broken ones repaired. I did have some fun finishing a Celt light horseman last night. It was good to paint something other than a ship again.

So, what I know is, my armies are too small for Midgard. With painting time, I have a large enough Celt Army. I lack minis for all of my forces. I had purchased a set of armed Dark Age peasants for use with Dux but lacked stats with the rules to use them. I was planning on working on some anyway just beacause I think it would be fun to have some really bad troops on the field to defend a village or the like. I figure I can try to use them for Midgard.

Squirrels Rampant

Like many people I have been looking at the new Reisswitz Press game Midgard Heroic Battles. I am looking to see if this will help dust off some projects. I would love to get my Dark Ages back out and get in some games. And Romans and Gauls for that matter. But this is a distraction from the ACW Naval games I am working on. But since focusing on any one thing is not possible, I managed to get some paint on a 1/700th Schooner for the AWI.

I can make some claim that the schooner would still be useful for the ACW as they were still around. But the next step away from this is I am searching for STL files for some ACW infantry to match my 1/600th scale ships. The thought would be to model some naval landings. I found some Thingiverse items from Simon Mann that look possible. The first one to look at is the battle of the Hatteras Inlet batteries.

Since my ACW Naval rules of the moment are Dawn of Iron, I saw that the author had started work on some land rules but as far as I can tell, they are unpublished. This leaves me to wonder if I could use something like Sharp Practice and twist it. The landings are much larger than what Sharp Practice was designed for but that never stopped me before.

The Confederate Forces for the battle are rather small. There are two forts (Clark and Hatteras)and a masked battery on Cape Hatteras. These were manned by the 17th North Carolina infantry Regiment, the Hatteras island garrison and some Naval volunteers. The total was around 900 men.

Besides the much larger Warships, the Union force contained elements of two regiments: the 9th New York infantry (220 men) and the 20th New York Infantry (500 men). There were other detachments including the 99th New York Volunteer Infantry Regiments (100 men), 2nd US Artillery Regiment (60 men) and some sailors and marines from the fleet.This would mean printing out some landing craft and some infantry. I have looked at Henry Turner's 6mm miniatures for this as well as Pico Armor. I may go with the Project Wargaming miniatures in the end. I am unsure if I would scale them up to 3mm figures or leave them at 2mm.

I went so far as to download the figures from Thingiverse that Simon Mann made and purchased the Project Wargaming ones. Just looking at the Project Wargaming minis, I will likely leave them at 2mm. Some test prints are in order. The Project Wargaming are set up to look like a company in formation.

Anyway, I am balancing a few things in my head and trying to figure out how to accomplish them.

Union Fleet off North Carolina 1861 to 1862

I did the Confederate fleet (NC Mosquito Fleet) already. I started on the Union as well. I have the fleet divided into three sections. The first is before the Burnside Expedition through 1861. Mostly they are vessels featured in actions. The second is the vessels participating on the Battle of Hatteras Inlet batteries. Then the next section covers the battles of Roanoke Island and Elizabeth City in 1862. A number of these vessels were also part of the Battle of Hampton Roads.

1861

Ship Name	Image	Model	Notes
USS Perry		Saturnalia Studios Brig	Sail Brig.
CSS Savannah		Hagen miniatures schooner	Sail Schooner
USS Albatross		ECIC	Custom miniature
USS Fanny		ECIC Tug boat	Same as the CSS Fanny. Captured Union ship.

Hatteras Inlet Batteries

Ship Name	Image	Model	Notes
Monticello
Harriet Lane		LFG Harriet Lane
Wabash			Use the Minnesota upscaled to 115%.
Minnesota		ECIC Minnesota
Susquehanna
Cumberland		ECIC Cumberland
Pawnee

This is still a work in progress. I will still need to update this as I go and will revisit this. I am interested in seeing if I can make this a combined arms game and include the infantry landings.

Battles of Roanoke Island and Elizabeth City

Ship Name	Image	Model	Notes
US Army Gunboats
Pickett			Smallest ship in the fleet. Flagship of Burnside's Expedition.
Vidette
Hussar
Lancer
Ranger
Chasseur
Pioneer
Sentinel
Zouave
US Navy Fleet
Philadelphia			Flagship
Southfield
Delaware *
Stars and Stripes
Louisiana *
Hetzel *
Underwriter *
Commodore Perry *		LFG Commodore Perry
Hunchback
Morse *
Valley City *
Commodore Barney
Whitehead *
John L Lockwood *
Henry Brinker *
Isaac N Seymour *
Ceres *
General Putnam
Shawsheen *
Granite

* - Vessels in the fleet for Battle of Elizabeth City.

North Carolina Mosquito Fleet of 1862

I am looking to make some scenarios featuring the North Carolina Mosquito fleet and their actions from June 1861 till their destruction in February of 1862. The actions tick several boxes on things I enjoy. They are largely erzatz vessels rather than purpose built warships and it is very early in the conflict before the tactics and technology truely caught up to one another. The Union fleets will be very large. But the nice thing is, many of the vessels match up with vessels that may already be in people's collections since they were involved in the Battle of Hampton Roads in March 1862. Two of the smaller vessels of the Confederate Fleet at Hampton Roads are survivors of the Mosquito Fleet - the only two survivors.

I started on the Confederate Fleet first. In total, there are eleven vessels in the Mosuito Fleet. Their job was to protect the North Carolina Sounds and supply the forts on the barrier islands. In order to get this done, i have been searching Wargames Vault and Wargaming3D for suitable models. I think I have much of it figured out. Maybe.....

Ship Name	Image	Possible Model	Notes
Sea Bird	None	LFG CSS Toscarora	Flagship
Beaufort	None	ECIC Generic Tugboat Set	Also part of Hampton Roads set.
Fanny		ECIC Generic Tugboat Set
Appomattox		TRM Union or Confederate Transport Modified	Original model is a stern wheeler while this is a screw steamer.
Ellis		ECIC Generic Tugboat Set (Modified)
Black Warrior	None	Hagen Miniatures Schooner
Forrest	None	????	Described as a former canal steamer.
Junaluska		ECIC Generic Tugboat Set
Curlew		LFG CSS Samson	A decent match but the main deck under the bridge needs to be closed in.
Raliegh		ECIC Generic Tugboat Set	Also part of Hampton Roads set.
Winslow	None	LFG Samson	Described as a sidewheeler tug.

Acronymns:
ECIC = East Coast Ironclads, they sell on Wargaming3D.
LFG = Long Face Games, They sell on Wargames Vault.
TRM = The Raft Miniatures, They sell on Wargaming3D.

The images above are taken from the Wikipedia articles for the vessel or from https://underbothflags.ncdcr.gov/ for the Appomattox.

Several models need modification in order to match the vessel more closely. The Ellis needs a cut down supertructure to match. These modifications may be what I go with to model the Forrest. The Black Warrior is a sailing schooner and the only vessel that is not a steam ship of the fleet. The Hagen Miniatures model is the only physical model in the above list. The rest are all STL files.At this point, I have built and painted only the Beaufort and the Raliegh. I have purchased the miniatures for the Sea Bird, Fanny, Appomattox, Junaluska, Curlew, and Winslow. I will buy the Schooner from Hagen at somepoint as I really like their miniatures. I have several for my Age of Sail games.

I will update based on any new findings. I did pick up a great book on the Curlew by Christopher Olson. He has drawings of the Curlew that makes the Sampson a good match for a model. The differences are minor enough that I should be able to modify it in TinkerCad, provided the model creator gives me permission.

A Big shout out to Thomas at The Raft Miniatures who did give permission to modify his model to make the Appomattox. I have purchased the model and now need to play with it in Tinkercad. Thank You!

I have a big thank you to give to East Coast Ironclads when it comes time to work on the Union Order of Battle.

Scenario Sale - Postponed Birthday Sale

I was pushing to get my AWI supplement completed to do my annual birthday sale. I didn't finish it in time. While that was disapointing, it is now done. So I will be running a birthday sale a month late.

On my PayHip store, please use coupon code Birthday2024 to get 50% off anything on the site.

This will include all of the scenario books. The sale will run from now (10/28/2024) till November 28th, 2024.

Thank you for taking a look.

USS Albatross - East Coast Iron Clads

I am working on some ACW naval scenarios that take place before the Battle of Hampton Roads. This includes several vessels that fought in Hampton Roads and focuses on the North Carolina coast. Once action was an interesting one between the USS Albatross and the CSS Beaufort. While not a conclusive fight, it took place on either side of one of the North Carolina barrier islands. Both vessels lobbed shells at one another across the island until breaking off contact.

The Albatross did not have an existing model available to purchase that I could find. Wikipedia offers some basic information about the vessel and includes the following image drawn by a crew member.

While looking for something similar, I reached out to East Coast Ironclads who sell on Wargeming3d. They replied back and sent me the STL file! I was so excited. I managed to get the file printed. I need to replace the FEP on the printer and had some issues. The masts that came with the vessel failed to print. I made some out of small dowels and added them to the vessel. I am not a very good painter but I really like how this came out.

The model makers for 3D printing ships have proved over and over to be very approachable and helpful. I can't thank East Coast Ironclads enough. This was quite a treat.

Two if by Sea has launched

I have released Two if by Sea on my PayHip store. Two if by Sea is a set of scenarios to be used with the TwoFatLardies rules Kiss Me Hardy using the changes for ships under the rate from To Covet Glory. The book contains ship stats for a large number of vessels from large Ship Sloops to the smallest cutters and Bermuda Sloops used by the Royal Navy and the American Continental Navy and State Navies (Georgia, South Carolina, North Carolina and Virginia).

The scenarios include twelve scenario sets. Each scenario set is one or more unique historical or fictional scenario from the American Revolution. The first scenario details the British Schooner Halifax in 1769 in an incident before the war started. The scenarios continue through July of 1781. There is also a guide on setting up convoy escorts or raids on the Atlantic, Caribbean, or Far East trade routes.

There are 59 pages of scenarios and 121 pages of ship lists. There is also a section noting the types of merchant vessels that were likely to be encountered on the waters of the Americas during the war. Lastly, there are notes on the available models in both 1/300 scale and 1/700th including links to the manufactures.

I will be releasing this on Wargame Vault as well and including it in the To Covet Glory bundle as well. I hope you will take a look.

New Product

I have uploaded some 1/700th flat boats to my PayHip store. https://payhip.com/b/c4jzL Flatboats were a common sight from the founding of the United States through the ACW. There are four variants. One is armed. Two have cargo loads and another has a tent. This represents many of the types that could be encountered from the South Carolina rivers in 1780 or along the Mississippi in 1862.

These were made to support a scenario for the Two if by Sea supplement for the AWI that I am getting ready to release. The scenario features the last vestiges of the Georgia State Navy coming across some loyalist shore batteries supported by an armed flat boat.

The other ones could be useful scatter terain in any naval game taking place close to the shore.

Finished! Well Mostly

The AWi Supplement is finally done. There are eleven battles, some with multiple scenarios, and a scenario generator for convoy raids across North American, Carribean and Far East Waters. Also included are 121 pages of ship stats for Ship sloops to cutters of the Royal Navy and the Continental and State Navies of the American Revolution. The book spans most of the war where small vessels made their presence known. The commerce raiding, attacks against Nova Scotia fisheries and privateers are represented within.

I am hoping to have a final review completed this week and publish it. I also included some notes on where to get some miniatures for the game. With the wide variety of 3D printed items available, the oportunities of some unique vessels for your table are nearly limitless.

Below is the current cover that I am working with. This still could change.

Progress At Last: ACW and AWI Naval

It was a good weekend for getting stuff done. I managed to paint a few ships for the ACW. I am only missing two vessels for the Battle of Hampton Roads. I need to print and paint the Jamestown for the Confederacy and the St Lawrence for the Union. As has been my norm lately, I had a painted version of the Jamestown and managed to completely smash it to bits by setting the cover of my 3d printer down on it accidentallty. Anyway, I did get a number of models painted up.

I still have to paint the shore batteries. I started on this task but the primer started coming off the models as I tried to paint them. I did something wrong with priming them. I will have to readdress this.

AWI Supplement

As to my To Covet Glory supplement, it made significant progress over the weekend. I was able to get in a number of games. I played with both 1/300th and 1/700th miniatures. They both worked well. There are eight more scenarios to work through. I am really happy with the progress that was made this weekend. If I can get any more time to work on it, I should be able to wrap it up in November. As soon as it is complete, I will be getting it uploaded to the PayHip site first and then to Wargame Vault. It will become part of the To Covet Glory bundle on both.

Painting Boats

I managed to finish two more of the Hagen Miniatures boats that I had purchased. One is a small sloop that still needs paper sails. The other is a small gun boat with a gaff sail. These came out well. I also managed to dinish the repairs on the two damaged ship-sloops that I broke trying to move them. According to USPS, I might get my clear bases today. I will need to figure out what the right glue is to use on these. I will be basing all of my 1/700th ships from now on. The bases from Litko arrived. I think they are large enough for most of my 1/700 vessels. Some of the larger ones would not fit.

Current State of the AWI Supplement

I was able to get some writing and editing done yesterday. I changed around the headings and now have it trimmed down to 187 pages. There is still significant work needed for the Virgina State Navy section that is left. I have names of ships and that is about it. I decided to limit the work to not include the vessels of the Northern Colonies at this point in time. I will probably pick back up with that with another supplement. I keep finding more scenarios that interest me and need to hold off on expanding this any more.

As far as ships go, I am not doing badly. I am experimenting with printing to try to get the masts to fit better in the mast holes without significant drilling being needed. Hopefully that will help. My printer needs a new sheet of FEB for the printer tub and I am looking to get a magnetic flexible print platform to make removing prints easier. I have them in my Amazon cart and am waiting to place the order.

This puts me at a place where I am getting pretty close to being ready. I will work on some more terrain items to complete some scenarios. I need scale trees. The nice part is that these can be shrubs for my other miniatures (15mm). I am still looking to use a layered approach for naval terrain. A blue felt sheet for the bottom layer. Some sandy patches to lay on top for sand bars. A clear plastic sheet for the surface and then other terrain on top of that for islands, rocks and the like. It should work well.

I can use this with both my 1/300 miniatures and the 1/650 or 1/700 scale minis. For ships that I print, I am liking the 1/650 more and more. They are chunkier but easy to print and paint.

I still have to finish the repairs on the ships I shattered. As you can see from the picture, The masts didn't fair well in the fall. I have some clamps that will help but I am not sure how much longer this will take.

I did get a shore battery completed recently. It came out OK. I also painted up a sinking 3rd rate. Both of these were from Hagen Miniatures. I really like these models. I painted up a Lugger from their line as well but I need sails and rigging as they do not come with it. I will probably do paper sails.

Here is the fleet thus far, minus the two shattered vessels.

You can see the sinking third rate and the shore battery in this shot as well as the lugger in the bottom right corner. These are Hagen Miniatures. The flatboats are ones I created in tinkercad. i will put them up on my PayHip for free. The three bomb vessels on the bottom left are all Saturnalia miniatures. The Cutter in the center is from Daitra productions. I may have that spelled wrong. The small bermuda sloop is one I created from a 28mm miniature that I shrunk down. The sails are paper. In the top center are more Saturnalia brigs and to the right of them are a pair of Black seas schooners.

Everything needs more work. I need rigging for the most part. But at least it feels like it is coming together. I have plans to print a few more ships and they I will look to print some ratlines for the vessels that I have.

Bad end to the weekend

started to move the minis that i have painted. in doing so, I managed to drop two ship sloops that shattered on hitting the ground. very frustrated. I have started the repair work but it will take a while.

I need to base these ships to help them stand up better.

Focused on Ships Again

I managed to complete the painting and assembly of a few more 1/700th ish vessels. Here is the current line up. They need more rigging done but I have not figured out how much I will plan to do.

These are from multiple sources. Starting with the back row, from left to right: a brig from Saturnalia studios (My Mini Factory), A Bermuda sloop that was resized from a 28mm one from Wargaming3d, A Ketch from Saturnalia Studios, a Ship-Sloop from Henry Turner Miniatures (My Mini Factory or Wargaming3d).

Next two rows are schooners from Black Seas. The back one painted as a Frrench Vessel with cleaner sails and the forward one painted more or less as an American vessel.

Next row is a Cutter/Sloop from Productions Diratia and a Ship Sloop from Saturnalia Studios (both found on My Mini Factory).

The front row is a Lugger from Hagen Miniatures in Germany. I still need to add sails to this vessel and some rigging.

These were great fun to paint up. Most of them were primed with the wrong primer. It added a gloss finish with it and the paint didn't always stick. I bought some Army Painter Primer for some of them that worked out much better.

I also have some others on the bench that could be in the same shape in a couple of hours of work.

On the left you can see four of the flat boats that I made. These are very simple models that I made in Tinkercad. They will work for some scenarios that I put together. Then there are two vessels from Saturnalia Miniatures. A Brig and a bomb ketch. Their sails are partially done. The masts didn't fit and I had to do some work to make them fit. Then another flatboat of mine. Lastly there is a small bomb vessel. It was the same model as the previous one but i will be rigging it as more of a cutter than a ketch.

I still have four more Black Sails schooners to paint up. However, these are very heavily armed vessels and much larger than most that I have found for the scenarios that I wrote. I also have some more Henry Turner prints that I am struggling with fitting masts with. I think I have painted most of my Saturnalia prints so far. I have two more Hagen models to paint (a gaff riged gunboat and a small cutter). I also have some wrecks and a shore battery to paint up from Hagen Miniatures.

I will be reviewing scenarios and checking on what models I am missing so I can finish up my AWI scenario book. I will use my 1/300th models as well but they work better for vessels smaller than ship-sloops.

Hobby Time

I managed to grab some hobby time today. I glued about 70% of a Team Yankee T-72 together. I also finished gluing and primed a BMP-2, also team yankee. Then I primed three T-55s (Old Glory), a QRF M60, some US Infantry (Khurasan I think) and some Russians (Khurasan maybe).

But I also did some brick work on the old Warehouse building that I put together years ago. I have finished the tin roof on it. I will add framing to the doorways, some lintels on the windows and then weather it as the brick work paper that I have looks a bit plasticy. The tin roof looks good but needs weathering as well. Looks too brand new at the moment. I am very excited about this as this building was a plain white with a black roof before.

The Team Yankee BMP-2 comes with the upper hull and turret to give you the options to make a BMP-1 instead. I glued together the turret and have the hull top. I am thinking of making a stuck in the mud version. It might make a useful objective at some point.

I have not started on the Merkava tank yet that I purchased. Nor on the M163 (?) Vulcan for the Israelis. I did get an unexpected auction win though. I placed a $1 bid on a Blue Moon corner tavern. Somehow, I won it. The shipping was expensive but still cheaper than the actual building by far. however, in double checking the auction, the picture was the saloon but the description was for building set #6. So it was still a bargain but not sure I am as happy about it. It will be fine.

I found my old documentation on how I painted my previous Cold War minis. Even found a business card with the Israeli infantry painting guide I had made. I am really looking forward to painting them up.

I still have a table full of ships that need painting. I just am not feeling it at the moment. Hopefully, I will get some time to work on this again. Or steal a few minutes daily and get this stuff knocked out.

Cold War continued

i got in two of my ebay orders. A Merkava mk1 speue and a 3d print of an M169 (?) vulcan.

The Vulcan came with some supports still attached to the cannonball they came off easily with nothing broken. Other than the banana yellow color, it is great.i will paint this for my 1982 IDF force.

Cold War Chain of Command

While I still have a bunch of ships to paint, I am being drawn to Cold War Chain of Command again. I have reviewed my miniatures again and am excited by what I have painted. I would like to paint up a second platoon of Soviets and at least another squad of US troops. I have some more armor but I have enough to start. I have some more miniatures in the cart at Brookhurst Hobbies to complete out my IDF platoon. I am just missing m203 gunners for the IDF platoon. I got some models from Wargaming3d for a Magach 6 that I want to print out. I also bought an ebay model of a Merkava mk 1 and a M163 Vulcan. This will provide some interesting support options against the Syrian T-72 that I still need to build. Of the five t-72s that I have, I will make two for the Syrians and three for the Soviets.

I picked up 3D models for a number of other vehicles. These include civilian cars, civilian trucks, T-80s, BMP-1 & 2, BRDM-2, BTR-70, BTR-80, T-55s, T-64s, T-72s, BRDM-1, M109, M1128 Stryker, USZ-469, Chieftan and HUMVEEs.

I started to print out a Magach 6. The print completely failed. I think there is an issue with my print bed. I need to sort that out. Once resolved, I think I will be in good shape.

Progress with AWI Scenarios

I have completed the Royal Navy ship list based on the information in Winfield's book on the Royal Navy of the period. The various state and Continental navy list is proving to be far more difficult as many list only the number of guns and not even the size of the gun let alone the vessel. State Navies are worse than the Continental. I purchased a new primer. The one I had been using previously was a cheap spray paint that wasn't allowing the paint to hold to it very well. I bought an Army Painter primer that I am trying now. I hope to find time this weekend to get some painting in.

New Scenario and making miniatures for it

There was a scenario that I wanted to include into the AWI book an interesting small skirmish between two vessels of the Georgia Navy and some loyalist militia. It featured a flat boat. These were vessels that were very shallow drafted and were used to transport cargo down the rivers to port cities for transport. In this instance, the Loyalist militia managed to mount a few cannon aboard the flatboat to engage the Georgia Navy.

The flat boat was used well beyond the American Revolution and would be seen on the waters of the Mississippi River during the Civil War and after.

This image is taken from https://peoplesriverhistory.us/blog/history-of-flatboating-and-a-charming-educational-film/.

Based on the image, I have guessed this flatboat to be about 12' x 36' in size. I was using an actual picture of a flatboat from closer to the Civil War for reference. These could come in a multitude of sizes as there was likely no standardization. Since the design was fairly simple, I decided to try to make a model in Tinkercad.

So I created this. An armed flat boat, an empty one, one with Cargo and one with a structure in the center. The armed flatboat that was referenced for my scenario had no details on how it was armed. My guess is a pair of six-pounder cannon. But in truth, it could have had one large gun mounted in the bow or a bunch of swivel guns. Since many actions of the American Revolutions occured near river mouths, having flat boats wouldn't be out of place on the table. I believe in the main TCG rulebook there is reference to the same.

With any luck, I will print out a few of these and see what they look like.

1/700th Models & AWI Scenarios

I am trying to figure out who all produces 1/700 scale models that are usable for To Covet Glory. In general, the models available in this scale are far more suited to Kiss Me Hardy as they tend to focus on those above the rate. But there are some stand outs that have some nice models below the rate. One item that I found was that Black Seas models are not true 1/700th. They can vary from 1/600 to 1/700. Saturnalia is listed as 1/650 scale. While Henry Turner makes true 1/700 vessels. Thus far, here are the ones that I can come up with.

STL Files

1) Henry Turner - He has webstores with MyMiniFactory and Wargames3d among others.

2) Simon Mann - He has a few models and they are on Wargames3d.

3) Saturnalia - They are on MyMiniFactory.

4) Productions Diratia - They are on MyMiniFactory.

Many of these can be purchased as prints by resellers on Etsy.

Physical Models

1) Warlord Games Black Seas lines - They have Brigs, Cutters, Schooners and gunboats.

2) Hagen-Miniatures - I just found this company. (https://www.hagen-miniatures.de/) They have some ideal vessels. They have a bomb ketch, a ship-sloop (18g), a galleass merchant, several arabic/Barbary vessels, a tartan, several gunboats, a lugger, a cutter, a ketch, a schooner and others.

3) Meridian - They can be found on https://navymodelsandbooks.co.uk/product-category/meridian-1700-scale-trafalgar-ships/. They have a limited line. They include the HMS Pickle. With some, the masts and such are separate from the hull. I have not ordered any of these models.

From Hagen-Miniatures, I have ordered a wreck marker, a shore battery, a gunboat with spirit sail, a cutter and a lugger. They are in the mail from Germany. I will likely order more.

I am adding another scenario to the book. I was searching for information on the last two ships on the Georgia Navy and discovered a new scenario that fit in. To it is added in as part of the other scenario I am working on. Currently there are 11 scenarios that are part of the book. Several of them are more than a single scenario. So far the list includes:

Naval Action off Fort Fredericka: April 19, 1778

Destruction of the Georgia Navy March to April 1779

Captain Howell, Georgia Privateer April 1781

Ocracoke Inlet, North Carolina September, and November 1780

Fair American’s Patrol: October 7th - 15th 1780

HM Schooner Halifax

The Battles of Machias

Voyage of the Vengeance

Sampson and the Swallow

A Convoy Raid

Bonavista Bay, Nova Scotia 1780

I have really been enjoying working on this again. The ship list has provided a number of interesting side tracks.

Progress! And lessons Learned.

I have finally something to show for my 3d printing efforts. I have made a number of prints but these are the first that I have gotten assembled and painted. I have learned quite a bit while doing this. I will not be adding masts and sails until after painting the components. Anyway, I have three built and painted if not rigged vessels.

Unlike my previous efforts, these are all in 1/700th scale. They come from 3 different places. The one on the left is not a print. It is a schooner from Warlord Games' Black Seas. I really like the vessel and have 6 more to do. I have painted the decks of two others.

The middle one is a model from Ash and Stone on Wargaming3d.com. The original was a 28mm model and absolutely huge. I rescaled it and built the masts and sails. The rigging was an attempt. The foresail was not put on correctly but I just let it go. It is tiny and fragile. I really need to consider basing my 1/700th models. Especially this one. I like how it turned out. I want to print a few more. Ultimately I think I want at least five of these.

Lastly we have a ship sloop. I am not 100% sure whose model it is. It might be one of Henry Turners or Saturnalia studios. It was one of the first vessels that I got a good print on the sails for. I made the mistake of gluing the sails in place before painting. In the process of painting, I broke off the main mast right below the sails. It is glued back but will need the rigging to hold it together firmly. I am not confident on how that will go.

IN printing smaller vessels (schooners, brigs and even small ship sloops) from Henry Turner, I am struggling with the sails. The masts tend to be bigger than the holes for them end up. I have a pin vise to drill them back out. But the dry fitting of the parts have led to multiple sails breaking. The detail of the Henry Turner figures is fantastic. But they are much more fiddly. The Saturnalia ones are good but the masts are chunkier which makes them great for gaming but less so as scale models. I have successfully printed a couple of bomb ketches from Saturnalia now. What I have found helpful is using warm or hot water to rinse the models. I am using a water washable resin. This helps in removing the supports. I am also letting the model air dry after that before putting them under UV lights. This has prevented some odd looking blobs showing up on the model.

This is how I spent my Memorial day. I am putting off further rigging. I will go ahead and prime some of the Saturnalia models that I have and paint them this week to get a good comparison point. I have 3 hulls printed for the HSM Pickle from Henry Turner. The sails that I have printed haven't worked yet. I have not been able to get the bowspirit to fit at all.

As such, I am concentrating on the Saturnalia figures. After printing, the mast holes are still too small. I am drilling them out to get them to fit properly. I have painted up a pair of bomb ketches so far. I have to glue the masts in place still. Should finish that tonight.

I did finish a second Black Seas Schooner as well. I used a painting guide I found online and painted it in more French like colors. I'm not sure I like it. I will get pictures tonight.

I also have an update on my AWI scenario book for To Covet Glory. I have finished with the ship list for brigs of the Royal Navy. I have also added another scenario to the book. I am working on the Brigs of captured French, Spanish and Dutch navies now. This leaves Cutters and schooners left to stat out. This puts the book in at 115 pages thus far. Of which, 45 pages are scenarios and campaigns. The ship list will be over 100 pages detailing Royal Navy vessels under the rate from Ship Sloops (3 masted ships smaller than frigates), to Brig sloops (two masted vessels with a square rig), to Schooners (two masted fore and aft rigged vessels) and cutters (single masted vessels). I will have partial lists of US Navy and State navy vessels. Some data changes the ship types from the To Covet Glory rulebook. Lastly, there is a single page of some gunnery changes that are optional. This was a thought I had to further differentiate between the smaller cannons. This section might get dropped.

3d Printing & Black Seas

One thing I am having issues with in 3d Printing ships are the holes for the masts being too small for the masts. I am not sure what I am doing wrong there. Sanding down the mast bases seems to help.

I have started to actually paint some 1/700th scale miniatures. I printed a small bermuda sloop that I scaled down from 28mm of all things.I also have a shop sloop of 18 guns that I have printed up. Both of these are on the painting bench. I need to do some rigging on the small bermuda sloop to get the rest of the sails on. The ship sloop has its deck painted. I am still deciding on a scheme.

I ended up buying the Black Seas Schooner Squadron. The ships are really nicely detailed. I have them primed and have painted one of them. The one thing I noticed is that some work with plyers is needed to get the sails lined up with the bowspirit. I have one that is painted and I am waiting on the glue to dry on the thread to being rigging it. Will see how it goes.

I am very interested in picking up the Black Seas Cutter Squadron. the problem is, I can't find any retailer in the US that carries it. Shipping for it from Warlord directly is $20. No one seems to be selling it on eBay at the moment. I would like to experiment with some different sail plans for them to give them different looks. I think it would be worth it.

The problem with both the Warlord Games models and the ones I am 3D printing is that they are light and tend toward being top heavy. I had not based any of my 1/300th ships. That wasn't an issue with them. With these, I think I will need to base them to have them stay upright on the table. Once I have some more of Henry Turner's models printed and painted up, I should be in good shape to complete the scenario book. That is something I am looking forward to.

Sailing into Revolution

So currently the working title of my To Covet Glory supplement is Sailing into Revolution. I am not sure I like it yet. There are 10 historical actions detailed. Some have multiple scenarios in each one. There is a generator for creating convoy actions. The scenario portion is standing currently at 45 pages. Then I am detailing the ships of the Royal Navy by providing stats for Royal Navy vessels below the rate. There are hundreds of vessels detailed. Most are complete stats that can be used in your own games.

I have been tinkering with my 3d printer. I have managed to get some better prints by lowering the support density. I was having trouble getting reliable prints on sails. I was breaking the print attempting to remove the supports. I think I have this fixed. I am hoping to get some painting in soon.

January's Almost Over

As January comes to a close, I am happy to report that I have completed 9 scenarios for my AWI book for To Covet Glory. The scenarios are not just single actions in many cases. The one on Convoys gives a template for making convoy attack scenarios for for various theaters giving the player the ability to create random forces to the scenarios with sample merchant vessels. Others include small campaigns following the actions of a particular privateer.

The part still in progress is working through the stats for the vessels of the Royal Navy for the period. Thus far I have seventy-nine ship sloops sorted out based on the books by Winfield on the Royal Navy. I have started work on the Brigs but have much more work to do. There are still Schooners and Cutters to start.

I just started to 3D printing again. I have started on a small Bermuda Sloop and a skiff that I have scaled down from the original 28mm models down to 1/700th scale. I am experimenting with the support density as I previously had too many and the models broke when removing supports from the models. Hopefully this will be successful. In Chitubox, the models looked like they would work.

Happy New Year

2023 has come to a close and 2024 has started. I had a good Christmas that netted me some new books. I picked up British Warships in the Age of Sail 1793-1817 by Rif Winfield. While it is outside of the period that I am working on for the AWI scenarios, it is actually a significant help. It has shed some light on ships from the AWI as there were numbers of veterans of the AWI that continued service into the Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars. I also picked up James Henderson's Frigates - Sloops & Brigs. It is two books published together and was a great read. It gave me some ideas about the use of tenders. The British had armed tenders serving larger vessels to expand their reach. I have previously looked at examples around Charelston in the early stages of the AWI. These two have given me additional information to push forward on the AWI scenarios.

I also picked up Sacrifice on the Steppe: The Italian Alpine Corps in the Stalingrad Campaign, 1942–1943 by Hope Hamilton. This could become a follow up to In the Name of Roma.

Santa left me two new jugs of water washable rein under the tree this year. I have already used it to print out some 1/700th scale ships for a convoy scenario for To Covet Glory. With 1/700th scale, I find that I can get more than one complete ship on the build plate unlike 1/300th scale. I am trying to find out how to print out some smaller vessels than what are currently available. I am having fun with the resin printer. It seems to be much more straight forward than the filament printer I was using earlier.

I have found a figure to convert for my 1982 Israelis for Lebanon. I plan on printing a few and seeing how they look when I match them with my exising Peter Pig miniatures. I printed a Merkava Mk2 that came out rather well. I need to sand the barrel a bit to fit with the turret. Somehow I lost the turret hatch cover and need to print that.

------- 15 days later ---------

Somehow I forgot to hit the publish button here. I found out that even with water washable resin, you MUST wear gloves. The resin gave me a bad rash and swelling around both eyes when printing. It took about a week to heal. I am going to invest in lots of gloves. Will probably wear a mask and goggles as well.

I did purchase a 3d Model for a Bermuda Sloop from Wargaming3d. The model is very nice and the producer was more than willing to talk to me. I am shrinking the hull down to 1/700the scale. I am printing it with and without guns. For a mast and spars set, I had tinkered with some for a cutter a while back and I am going to try to reuse that even though the topsail will be too large for a Bermuda sloop.

I had done some more work on my AWI book for To Covet Glory. I am having great fun going through Winfield's book on the Royal Navy in the Age of Sail. He has a vast amount of information on ships below the rate. Thus far I have been making ship stats for all of the Ship Sloops of the Royal Navy. It has shown me a few mistakes in the original To Covet Glory. I will have to update the book at somepoint.