What I have to say about the Heller 1/100 Victory would bore everybody in this Forum to death. We’ve discussed it in depth quite a few times; a Forum Search on “Heller Victory” will bring up quite a bit of interesting material. But since the subject has come up, I’ll offer the following as points to think about.
In my personal opinion it’s one of the half-dozen best plastic sailing ship kits ever. That fact does not, however, make it immune from some fairly significant mistakes and weaknesses. The biggest problem with it is so obvious that lots of modelers probably don’t notice it until they’re well along in the task of building it: the kit provides no means of attaching the yards to the masts! It’s certainly possible - and not especially difficult - to make a set of parrals from scratch, but it seems like a kit in that price range ought to provide something to hold its major components together.
The kit is, in many ways, a showpiece for the capabilities of styrene. But styrene is not the best material for all parts of a sailing ship model. Unless the modeler enjoys the sound of breaking plastic he will throw out the hammock netting stanchions, eyebolts, and belaying pins. I agree with Crackers about the blocks and deadeyes; it just isn’t possible for a two-piece rigid mold to produce a part with a hole through it and a groove around its circumference. (Exception: the geniuses at the late, lamented Japanese company Imai managed to pull it off through the use of slide molding.) Unfortunately the cost of aftermarket blocks and deadeyes (my personal favorites are the cast Britannia metal ones from Bluejacket) in the necessary numbers will exceed the cost of the kit. (But there’s no reason to buy all of them at once.)
While you’re in the process of junking the kit’s blocks, deadeyes, etc., also trash the ridiculous jigs and other gadgets that were designed to “fake” the rigging of the shrouds and ratlines. (I won’t go into that subject again here; we’ve wrestled it out in several other Forum threads.)
There are some strange lapses in detail on that kit - almost as though the responsible people just forgot things, or several people, with widely varying standards of quality, worked on the design of it. The ship’s boats are awful; simple, hollow shells. The steering wheel looks downright crude compared to the rest of the kit.
Critics have had mixed reactions to the McKay “Anatomy of the Ship” book. Mr. McKay’s draftsmanship is some of the best I’ve ever seen (I don’t consider myself worthy to sharpen his pencils), and the sheer volume of information in the book is almost unbelievable. Unfortunately, though, it contains some pretty significant errors. Most of those won’t be terribly relevant to the modeler working from the Heller kit, but they do detract from the value of the book. (The most egregious example: the wales are shown as thin strips of wood spiked to the outside of the hull planking - as they are on the restored ship today. Originally the wales were enormous pieces of timber fastened directly to the ship’s frames. And the bilge pumps are shown penetrating the bottom of the hull - which, in reality, they don’t. Etc.)
Quite a few years after writing and illustrating that book, Mr. McKay collaborated with Dr. Allan McGowan on another (unfortunately more expensive) one: H.M.S. Victory: Construction, Career and Restoration. For that project Mr. McKay prepared a heavily revised set of drawings. The ship’s rigging is actually shown in more detail, and more clearly, in that later work. I recommend both.
In terms of rigging, though, the book I always recommend first to Victory modelers is an old standby: C. Nepean Longridge’s The Anatomy of Nelson’s Ships. Contrary to what the title implies, it’s a detailed account of how Dr. Longridge built his famous, 1/48-scale model of the Victory (now in the Science Museum in London). It includes a set of fine drawings by George Campbell (which probably would be regarded as definitive masterpieces if Mr. McKay hadn’t come along), and (a real blessing for the modeler) detailed verbal descriptions of how all the lines of the standing and running rigging lead. I’m not sure whether it’s in print now or not, but used copies should be fairly easy to find at reasonable prices.
We’ve also had lots of discussions on the subject of sails here in the forum. This one might be a good start: /forums/t/33775.aspx?PageIndex=1 . The Model Ship World web forum also has a revised and expanded section on the subject: http://www.modelshipwrightsdatabase.com/Articles/10ScaleSails.htm .
I’d better stop here, lest I inadvertently hijack the thread. The Heller Victory is a basically sound kit, and certainly has the potential to produce a fine model. But be aware that a lot of the pieces in the box (several hundred of them) need to be replaced by either scratchbuilding or spending a considerable amount of money on the aftermarket. And for the average, part-time hobbyist, to do that kit justice will take several years of work. I agree with Crackers: Grem56 is perfectly capable of doing it. But I also understand perfectly if Grem56 doesn’t feel like making that kind of time commitment. Frankly I feel that way myself.
