Very Old 1/74 Glenco WW1 Sub Chaser

This kit really surprised me as it was very free of flash & everything fit nice. It lends iself to a lot of detail & I did at least 18 things to dress it up. The first thing was a Scaledeck wood deck & it was nice. A real well done wood deck.

I took a few pictures of my start with a 1" piece of wood dowell about 9" long in the hull bottom, but I haven’t found them yet . They held the model base fine as always on my ship models. I use a #6 or #8 screw thru a piece of brass tube & a decorative pedastal to finish.

Iwill go over a lot of detail that I added in case anyone wants to build it & is lucky enough to have one. This likt I believe was a late one as it was a very nice casting. I bought it from a great guy on ebay. Nino told me about it.

Her are a few first pictures & I will put more in as I detail it.

Some of the things I did were The 1’ dowell in the hull, the Scaledeck wood deck , the railing done with .032 brass rail posts & .020 pvc top rail & .o15 lower rails. I wasn’t happy with the plastic rails this time. Pilot house rail. Lifeboat extra detail, I ground the kit boat sides out to thin them & sande the seats down to fit lower & added oars & rope rings. The masts & flag poles ,I made from 3/32 & 1/16 aluminum tubes. That is all I want to use for this size masts. I added the lit mast tops . I ground the searchlite out & used my Chrome paint pen in it. I cut the plastic prop shafts off & used 1/16" alum tube for shafts. I reworked the gun & added some brass wire & extended the gun barrel with some fine plastic tube & a brass whell from a 1/32 Spitfire PE kit. I added an extra depth charge rack at the rear. It is not on the model yet, but it’s done. I made life rings from WW1 plastic kit fighter tires.

Time for a paragraph, I added fine anchor chain & a small chain channel & raised the capstan .025 to fit the chain under as it was & into the hawse hole, tiny funnel like thing by the capstan. I had no idea wher it was until nino, Jim , sent me pictures. He is like a mother hen to me, but I will be 90 in December, so you all have hope to model late in life. The model drive never leaves you.

More pictures.

I will be back with more pictures & more details if you can follow my Chinese writing… Computers & I are not from the same century.

Gene, I have anothe build after this on the Lindberg 1/245 Ironclads & Pyro 1/210 ??? Monitor. They are interesting.

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I had a few other things I did on this kit, I driiled all the portholes out , then painted everything before i put in the clear plastic sheet inside the portholes so I didn’t paint the clear portholesThen I glued the kit plastic deck on Then I used white 560 to .glue the wood deck on. I added a bunch of eyebolts where needed & put a ladder up to the pilot house. I added 2 1/72 WW1 macine guns beside the pilot house.

It was areal fun build & is a pretty little model. Now I want to see if I can build models until I am 100, only 10 years to go. Maybe I will be the first one to do it, maybe???

beautiful work as always gene , look’s a really fun build too .

Steve, it’s always a pleasure to hear from you, thanks. It was a real fun build.

Gene

Very nice! Great work.

Don, if you don’t have this kit, it is worth getting. You would do a beautiful job on it.The Scaledeck is a must have for it.

Gene

Very high quality work Gene. The wood deck is a really nice addtion.

Scott

Ah Well;

What can I say. You did an awesome job on one of my all time favorites. I have eight in the stash. For conversions to Yachts of the Thirties . You outdid yourself my friend.

Doc & Scott, Thanks that is nice to hear. Doc, I was hoping you saw this build, it was a really fun & nice kit to work on. My kit had very little flash & the casting for an old,old kit were great. I would like to see you add some of yours here.

Gene

Here are some detail pics of the props &the wood dowell in the hull. That has worked fine for me for ages & it is simple, & strengthens the hull.

Super job. She looks great.

Beautiful job on what really is a fine old kit…and the sort of subject modern companies would likely never touch in a relatively large scale like this.

The wood deck in particular really makes it ‘pop.’

BTW, for those contemplating building this kit, there’s an excellent site devoted to the type, chock-full of original photos and an absurd amount of detail on the '110’s in general. Well worth deep-diving into:

https://www.subchaser.org/

Greg & Duster, thanks a lot & it is a super fun kit to build & that Scaledeck Deck really made it. I will be 90 in 2 months & still love to build. I will try for a 100. I checked your site Greg & I had been there & it is great.

Thanks, Gene

I remember as a very young kid, at the Elk’s club in Galveston, staring endlessly at the ship modles on display there. One was a WW1 sub chaser. Not sure if it was this one, but a very fond memory looking at yours. Thanks for the post.

Hi Gene!

And everyone else!

I found the Wheelhouse and Main Cabin. Now I have to figure out where the Hell the Hull wandered off to. That IS one of the old kits I found an extreme pleasure to build. Over and over. I don’t remember how many I have built.

You took it to the next Level, Awesome!

Such great work Gene. Your builds are always so inspiring! And always full of tips and tricks that you always share.

Thank you for sharing!

That turned out great, especially when you consider the “vintage”kit that you started with. Man, I can remember when these Glencoe & Pyro kits sat on the shelves and no one gave them a second thought. Now, if you can find one, they’re fetching huge prices on EBay. Great job!
Tom S.

I had that model once, was going to build it for display in Bayonne, NJ, where many of them were built. Not certain where it went.

On the same subject I built a set of 1/600 subchasers showing how they would operate in groups of three.