Model Boats April 2010

From the Editor…..

Model Boats April 2010

This issue is crammed with articles of diverse subjects to interest all model boat builders. The main feature is Part One of Shamrock, a scratch built project from a MyHobbyStore plan. John Elsy has gone to some lengths to explain how scratch building need not be intimidating. We also have Flying Dolphin, a diesel tug, as a Free Plan designed by James Pottinger. Colin Bishop, who looks after our website, has an excellent photo feature on the recent Navy Days at Plymouth, with a particular look at submarines and amphibious warfare vessels.

Readers’ Models is devoted largely to Tony Martin’s Alert, built from a Krick kit and Around the Clubs has a useful piece by Anthony Addams on the planning and thought that went into the Daventry MBC stand at the International Model Boat Show last November.

The Gallery by Jon Godsell is for Empire State (VI), a ship that is part of the US Ready Reserve Fleet. In addition we have the usual regulars including Range Finder, Focus on Scale, Collectors’ Corner Minis, Period Pieces and your other favourites.

Model Boats Website

Colin Bishop has been our Web Editor for over a year now and as a result there has been a marked upswing in postings and viewings on the forum which is very pleasing as it means that model boat builders feel that it is of real value to them. Subjects discussed are 99% model boating related rather than general chit chat and perhaps because of that, membership has risen by a third in the last year.

With Colin, we have a webmaster who knows the hobby inside out and who is universally respected for his opinions and model making skills. The forum is provided FREE by this magazine so that readers, many of whom are ‘lone’ model makers, are able to quickly resolve problems they may be having with something they are building or painting. In addition, the forum enables the latest information about model boating events to be rapidly broadcast.

There are regular competitions running on the website, one of which is usually exclusively for magazine subscribers, so those lucky people have two chances of winning something!

Easter competition on the website

Visitors to our Model Boats website and forum in the week before Easter will have the opportunity to win spot prizes hidden behind Easter eggs! Prizes include books, tools, subscriptions and plans. So please come along and visit: www.modelboats.co.uk at that time.

Subscriptions

These are considerably less costly than buying the magazine via newstrade and of course it is delivered free to your door and before it is on general sale. Subscribers are also able to view back issues, from the beginning of 2007, online for free, a feature that is unique to us in the UK model boating press and is another added value benefit of being a Model Boats subscriber. So, please visit our website: www.modelboats.co.uk for current news, an active forum and to enter the free competitions.

North America subscriptions

We value our worldwide subscription business, but there have been problems with erratic deliveries to our subscribers in the USA and Canada for which MyHobbyStore apologises. I understand these have now been resolved, but all complaints are taken seriously and remedial action is taken where necessary. If North American readers do still have the misfortune to be the recipients of irregular magazine deliveries, then please contact: [email protected], including your full name, address and if possible your subscription number, for a rapid resolution of the problem.

Future magazine news

The May issue is on sale on the 9th April 2010 and UK subscribers should receive their copy approximately a week before that date. In that issue, the main feature articles will be for Shamrock (Part Two), a review of the Robbe yacht Comtesse and a Plan Feature for Maid of the Loch. I am including a piece about James Pottinger as it always nice to know of the individuals who contribute so regularly to this magazine.

Further ahead and just to wet your appetite, there will a scratch build article for Edmund Gardner (Liverpool Pilot Boat) already placed in the June issue of MB and Whitby Abbey will be a Feature Plan in the not too distant future. In house now, is a full two issue review of the Model Slipway Assurance tug, an article on landing craft and a steam engine for paddlers. The airboat development series is continuing and will be published very soon. Future COMPLIMENTARY FREE PLANS include: USS Ripley, HMS Mandate, Trygve Braarud, Chunky Boy and a Shrimp trawler. On the horizon, but also coming over the horizon fast, is a Vosper MTB. So there should be something for everyone in the months to come!

Paul Freshney – Editor