„Titanic“ or „Olimpic“ – the British passenger liners

At the beginning of the XXth century, passenger ships were mainly classified under two lines: “Cunard” and “White Star”. It built luxury class and innovative ships for those times. The engineers of the “Cunard” line built ships, that could carry passengers at high speed, and the Ismay family, who owned the “White Star Company”, sought to attract passengers with the size and elegance of transatlantic ships, reserved for wealthy passengers. With such a goal in mind, in 1908, the construction of the “Olympic” began at the “Harland and Wolf” shipyard, and on March 31, 1909, the construction of the “Titanic”. Three years later, the ships were ready for their first voyages. The designers wanted “Titanic” to be the largest and safest ocean liner, and the press called it unsinkable thanks to 16 watertight compartments, that could be sealed automatically or manually. The first voyage of the “Titanic” began on April 10, 1912 - the ship, under the command of the experienced captain Edward J. Smith, sailed from Southampton to New York. There were 1,308 passengers and 898 crew members on board. No one could even suspect, that after 4 days the ship, having collided with an iceberg, would sink and take 1503 lives with it. "Olimpic" made its maiden voyage on June 14, 1911 from the same Southampton and reached New York 6 days later. This ship has been in dangerous situations several times. One of them occurred on September 20, 1911, when the liner collided with the cruiser HMS “Hawke” shortly after leaving Southampton. As a result, two huge holes opened in the “Olympic's” hull and the ship was diverted to Belfast for repairs, while the passengers continued their journey on another ship. Casualties were avoided, but HMS ‘Hawke's” forward section was completely destroyed. In 1915, the "Olimpic" was converted into a military transport and transported soldiers between Canada, United States and Great Britain. In May 1918, the ship was sailing with several thousand American soldiers and sighted a German submarine U-103. Captain Hayes ordered an increase in speed and steered the liner directly into the submarine, which he managed to ram and sink. On September 4, 1918 a torpedo, launched from the submarine U53, hit the left side of the Olympic, but did not explode - it got stuck in the side plating. This violation was noticed only in 1919, when the ship was docked. After the war, the liner returned to carrying passengers, but dangerous situations continued to haunt it. On May 15, 1934 near Cape Cod, Massachusetts, he collided with the “Nantucket” ship - lighthouse, Who is sinking with 7 of his 11 crew members. In 1935, after serving 25 years, the ship was sold for scrapping.

A complex, large for its scale, well designed model for intermediate to advanced modelers. However, a simplified version can also be made by a modeler with little experience, working under the supervision of a more experienced colleague. You can make a model of one of the two ships.