Reviewed by Timothy Dike
| The CSS Palmetto State was a Richmond
class ironclad ram built at Charleston, South Carolina. She was commissioned
in September 1862. Not long after on January 31, 1863, she and a sistership
disabled the USS Keystone State and USS Mercedita that were blockading
the harbor. The ships suffered very little damage and almost succeeded
in breaking the blockade.
Palmetto State defended Fort Sumter in April 1863 from US Navy ironclads. She also covered the evacuation of some of Charleston's defending batteries in September of that year. She operated in the Charleston area until the city was evacuated when she was destroyed. Master Modeler Rusty White, well known for his Photo Etch line of ship accessories has ventured into Resin Ships in a big way. This Confederate Ironclad is just one of many large 1/192 scale ships from Civil War period that will be appearing soon. |
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| HULL | |||||||||||||
| The Hull is cast as a waterline version with a separate lower hull. The surface is nicely detailed with a corrugated panel effect. Don't be concerned that the metal panels don't look perfectly aligned. Metal ship building technology was in it's infancy and fabrication techniques were not as advanced as today. The panels are actually railroad iron laid side to side to provide the armor. Overall the casting on the surface looks good and very little cleanup will be needed on the top side. The molded on chocks look pretty good and only need a light touch with a file to finish. The lower hull is nicely cast with both the corrugated metal and the wood hull the ship rides on. The wooden portion has some nice wood grain cast on. The only thing that will be a challenge is the resin overpour on both hull halves. If you are building a full hull model then you have quite a bit of resin to remove. If you are building waterline, then you are on easy street. |
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| RESIN DETAILS | |||||||||||||
The only external resin structural parts on this kit is
the funnel, rudder, and ships boats. The funnel is rather basic, but so
was the real one. Other than drilling out the center there is not much
detailing to do. The ships boats have nice wood planking detail on the
exterior and a mesh pattern in the stern. I would have liked to see the
seat boards replaced by strips of plastic or photo etch, but that is something
that you can do yourself if you desire.
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| WEAPONS AND FITTINGS | |||||||||||||
| Anchors, vents, and gun barrels are cast in white metal with just a light amount of flash on some parts. The anchors are well formed and will look realistic with the real metal chain provided. The vents are well formed and are somewhat hollowed out. The metal gun barrels are pretty good. I would resist the urge to turn these as I believe these canons were cast and would have had a somewhat rough surface. |  |
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| PHOTO ETCH | |||||||||||||
| What would a Flagship kit be without Flagship Photo Etch. The large relief brass fret includes all the parts needed for build this ships and then some. There are anchor and boat davits, stairs, oars for the boats, and stantions for the railings. The stantions are a nice touch as you can thread them with your own line for a realistic effect. There is also plenty of mesh to fabricate the grates. Three types of gun hatches are provided. You will have plenty of extra parts for other projects as this one fret provides parts for many of the ironclad kits. The one thing that would really improve this set, is to etch the rigging on the davits and pulley detail at half thickness so the pulley details would stand out better. |  |
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| DECALS | |||||||||||||
| A decal sheet with flags and pennants from both sides is included. Several styles of Confederate flags are provided so chose the one that best fits the era you are modeling. |  |
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| INSTRUCTIONS | |||||||||||||
The Instructions two pages with assembly notes. They are
well drawn and appear to show all the assembly steps. Also included are
instructions for adding items such as awnings for when your ironclad is
not in battle. I've included a scan of the box art as the three view drawing
is nicely colored.
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| CONCLUSIONS | |||||||||||||
If you like building large models, this is a good kit for you. Especially if you would like to model the ships of the Blue and Gray. The large size of these kits, lends them to many superdetailing possibilities. With so few parts the painting and weathering be what makes this kit
standout. Not to worry, as Flagship has a line of How to CD's that will
help you out in many topics from Building
Resin Ships and Working with Photo
Etch Parts to Making Realistic Water.
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