by John Leyland
1/700 1898 Royal Jubilee Review- HMS Royal Sovereign and SS Turbinia (Combrig/Scratchbuilt)
When Combrig released the HMS Royal Sovereign, the subject called for a diorama which would showcase the beautiful color scheme of the victorian era Royal Navy. I recalled the story of the "crashing of the party" at Queen Victoria,s 1889 Royal Jubilee Fleet Review by Charles Parsons and his revolutionary yacht SS Turbinia. The publicity generated by this rude intrusion into the pomp and circumstance of a royal event was successful in advancing the adoption of steam turbine propulsion by the naval community.
The Combrig model was basically built 'out of box" with the exception of replacing the boat support structure on the boat deck, adding stowed antitorpedo netting, replacing masts and spars with brass, and detailing with photoetch (none included in the kit) including WEM Askold, GMM merchant, and Tom's/GMM crewmen. The flags are Midship Models and GMM hung on guitar string. The rest of the rigging is sprue. The Combrig kit is recommended to anyone who has built a few resin ships ans is comfortable with photoetch. Turbinia was scratchbuilt using plans found on the internet. The "water" is acrylic gel painted with Testor's enamel and coated with Future. No weathering was done as the ship would have been in immaculate condition for the review.
