Dream Ship Victory

Dream Ship Victory announced the beginning of the construction of the impressive new 141 m sailing yacht Dream Symphony designed by Ken Freivokh Design and Dykstra and Partners Naval Architects. On the 9th of February, designers and naval architects met in Amsterdam to give one of the largest yacht projects in the world the go-ahead for construction.

Immediately following the decision to go ahead with construction of the 141m Dream Symphony yacht, DSV’s CEO Valeriy Stepanenko set in motion an impressive construction project at their Dream Ship Victory base on the Aegean Sea. Since her inception, Dream Symphony has surpassed expectations in wind tunnel tests and has received approval to integrate the exciting and unique concept features.

A massive and quite beautiful construction in its own right is the purpose built support structure for the 141m Dream Symphony sailing yacht. In parallel, work is also progressing on both the 55m Sailing yacht Princess Maria and the 43m superyacht Imagination, while the 63m luxury yacht Mikhail S. Vorontsov is nearing completion at its fitting out base at Balk Shipyard in the Netherlands.

When delivered sometime in 2016, Dream Symphony will be a clipper ship for the 21st century. Like the 19th century clippers, Dream Symphony will carry an impressive cloud of sail and like the clippers, it will be built of wood. That alone is remarkable as Dream Symphony is 462’7″ft (141m) long. Historically, wooden vessels could not be built longer than around 300′ long.

Conventional carvel planked wooden construction was just too flexible for longer ships. The longest schooner ever built was the Wyoming, which was 350′ on deck. Despite being heavily strapped with iron, the ship flexed and twisted in heavy seas, opening her seams and requiring constant pumping to keep her dry.

To avoid the traditional limitations of wooden vessels, Dream Symphony is built of glued layers of wood laminates. The whole structure is highly engineered and the product of extensive finite element modeling. The wood/epoxy laminates are also protected by fiberglass on the outer hull surfaces.

Unlike the clipper ships of the 19th century, Dream Symphony is a fore and aft rigged four masted staysail schooner. She will set 5,000 square meters of sail, which is impressive when compared to clippers of the 1800s. The clipper Cutty Sark, for example, set 2,976 square meters of canvas.

Dream Symphony was designed and engineered by Dykstra Naval Architects. The interior and exterior design work was done by Ken Freivokh Design. The yacht in nearing completion at the Dream Ship Victory yard, in Turkey.

When completed Dream Symphony will be the second largest sailing yacht in the world, behind the 147 meter long White Pearl, which is also being delivered in 2016. White Pearl will have three masts and will carry a Dyna-rig, similar to the Maltese Falcon.

Modern sailing mega-yachts differ from the clippers of old in that they are all rich mens’ toys. At the very least, however, they continue to develop the technology of sailing, in advance of the day when commercial sailing ships may again return to the world’s oceans.

The Queen Victoria has sailed out of Liverpool – with a final surprise.

The last of the Three Queens left the city to a musical farewell as crowds turned out to wave her off at Liverpool Cruise Terminal.

The ship was given a semaphore send off and then balloons were released before she left the city.

Singer Danielle Thomas sang You’ll Never Walk Alone as the ship sailed away from the dock.

The liner then wowed the crowds by turning 360 degrees in the Mersey while music, including songs from The Beatles, played.

Passengers waved Union flags from the balconies of their cabins as they said goodbye to the city.

Richard and Jean Sutlieff, from Blackburn, were on board the Queen Victoria for its arrival in Liverpool.

Text courtesy of Liverpool Echo

Pictures courtesy of G-Captain

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Man Spends 20 Years Building 3 Model Ships

Model maker spends 20 years building scaled down fleet of radio-controlled warships
Tony Ansell has been making model warships for the last 20 years at home
Mr Ansell uses original Royal Navy blueprints to make scale model ships
On average ships take three years to make but HMS Dreadnought took nine
Each is made from fibreglass and flexible plastic and is radio controlled

When Tony Ansell was given an Airfix kit at was six-years-old, it was something of an inspiration.
Twenty years on the keen model maker has created a fleet of radio controlled warships at his workshop in Ferndown in Dorset.
Each warship is made to scale, using original Royal Navy blueprints and photographs to ensure they capture a snapshot in time when the vessels were in action. Model maker Tony Ansell spent the last 20 years making scale models of radio controlled navy warships. His Dorset workshop features models of HMS Campbeltown.

Model maker Tony Ansell spent the last 20 years making scale models of radio controlled navy warships. His Dorset workshop features models of HMS Campbeltown, HMS Hood  and HMS Fencer
Mr Ansell, a former plumber, uses original Royal Navy blueprints to make the scale models of the warships and so dedicated is the former plumber to his craft that he is in the process of writing to the Queen to ask for permission to name one of his ships – a G3 battlecruiser – Beatty because the original was cancelled and therefore never named.
‘You need to put in the research and I tend to pick a particular time in the ship’s life to make it at because warships went in for refits lots and could be different from year to year,’ said Mr Ansell, 63.
‘I like to make ships you don’t see at model shows very often and bigger ones are more of a challenge because you have to be more detailed.’

Mr Ansell uses fibreglass to make the hull of the ships and flexible sheets of 1mm thick plastic for the rest of the structure. He researches each of the vessels before he makes them, using photographs to ensure accuracy.
Most of the other items such as guns and aircraft are made from resin and mini Airfix kits.
Constructing the models is a painstaking process, sometimes taking longer than it took to make the actual warships themselves.

HMS Campbeltown was an American ship that was eventually transferred to the Royal Navy in 1940
Mr Ansell’s most recent build, the battleship HMS Dreadnought, is a 6ft long, 1:196 scale model and has as taken him nine years to finish – nine times longer than it took to build the actual warship in 1906.
But the project was delayed by a lack of photographs of the vessel and he built two other models during that time.
He has also made models of aircraft carrier HMS Fencer, HMS Campbeltown and HMS Hood, the ship sunk by the Germans in World War Two.

The HMS Dreadnought replica was the most time consuming of all Mr Ansell’s models and each additional part, from aircraft to weapons and fighters is made with similar attention to detail from resin or airfix kits
He is making a G3 battlecruiser – a ship that was planned but not built because a naval treaty came into place that limited the weight of warships.
Because the G3 was cancelled, it was never given a name, so Tony plans to write to the Queen to ask her permission to name his HMS Beatty, after the British admiral at the Battle of Jutland.
FROM 860FT TO 7FT: THE WARSHIPS THAT INSPIRED THE MODELS
HMS Fencer – 1:196 scale model
The original HMS Fencer was an aircraft carrier, commissioned in February 1943
Escorted Atlantic, African and Russian convoys
Also took part in a strike on a German battleship
HMS Hood – 7ft long, 1:1,128 scale model
Original was an Admiral Class battlecruiser
Warship sunk by the Germans during World War Two
Had an overall length of 860ft
HMS Dreadnought – 6ft long, 1:196 scale model
Took Mr Ansell nine years to finish
The Dreadnought was introduced in 1906 and became an important development in naval technology
It was the first naval warship to have a uniform battery, rather than just a few guns
He added: ‘With the Dreadnought I even laid the planks on the deck one by one. It took six months just to do the deck but it looks like the real McCoy.
‘The G3 was never named because it wasn’t built. Some names were banded about but they were then put to other ships.
‘So I want to keep with naval tradition and write to the Queen to ask for permission to name it after Admiral Beatty.
‘The Navy do it when they name ships and I want to make things official. I’ll ask her if there’s something else she’d rather I called it.’
On average, a ship takes about three years to build and his hobby has cost Mr Ansell several thousands over the years.
He said: ‘Back in the 90s, my ambition was to make a 10-foot model and I got laughed at, but I kept making models bigger and bigger.
‘The next one I’m going to do is nine-foot so I think I’ve proved the doubters wrong.’
Mr Ansell belongs to a model boat display team in Portsmouth who stage battles with their ships and even use pyrotechnics, which means they have to have a health and safety team at the ready.

By CLAIRE CARTER FOR MAILONLINE