Calypso 1:45

Product detailed description

Description: When the BYMS Mark 1 class minesweeper for the British Royal Navy was launched at the Ballard Shipyard in Seattle, USA, on March 21, 1942, they certainly had no idea what legend had just been born. The ship has served in the Mediterranean since 1943 under the designation HMS J-826 (later BYMS-2026), after the war it fell into disrepair for some time in Malta, in 1949 it was converted into a ferry for sailing between Malta and the neighboring island of Gozo. In this form, already under the name Calypso, the former officer of the French navy, co-author of aqualung - an open-circuit breathing apparatus that enabled the mass development of scuba diving, oceanologist Jacques-Yves Cousteau, caught the eye of the former officer. Thanks to sponsors such as the British industrial magnate T. L. Guinness (who financed the purchase and reconstruction of the ship) or the Prince of Monaco, Calypso was specially adapted as a floating base for underwater research. An underwater observatory was added to the bow, a transition and decompression chamber for divers was added, a crane with the legendary plate minisubmarine, and cranes for inflatable motor boats.

Zodiac, a helicopter platform and a number of research facilities and equipment. From the early 1950s until 1996, when it sank in a port barge in Singapore, Calypso roamed the seas and oceans, rivers and lakes and faithfully served Jacques-Yves Cousteau, his son Philippe, a team of French divers and scientists and filmmakers from Worldwide. Probably few people have seen any of the documentaries or read any of the books in which Calypso plays a major role. The shipwreck was eventually picked up, triggering a series of long struggles and lawsuits about its future - but now it seems that after the overhaul, Calypso may return to the waves of the seas.

The real ship has a wooden hull made of Oregon pine (so as not to attract magnetic mines) with a length of 42 m, a displacement of 360 tons and powered by two 580 HP engines, which gave it a speed of up to 10 knots (the original minesweeper was 41 m long, displacement 270 tons , with two 800 HP engines speed up to 15 knots; carried one 76 mm and two 20 mm cannons and two depth charge launchers). The 1:45 scale kit is designed for experienced shipbuilders.

The Calypso model has a hull consisting of a plastic molding with internal plywood reinforcements, a deck and a superstructure made of plywood and plastic parts. The kit contains a plastic hull molding and other plastic and wooden parts needed to complete the model, mock-up accessories (eg position lights, anchors, mini-submarine, helicopter, etc.), ship shafts with bushes and three-bladed propellers.

For the drive of the model, two 400-480 series DC motors with at least 15 A bidirectional regulators (depending on the motors) and 6-7 cell NiMH or 2-3S LiPo batteries with a capacity of 3-5000 mAh are planned.

In principle, even the most ordinary two-channel RC set is enough to control the basic functions; common standard servo is suitable for rudder control. But for the right modeler, of course, it is an "obligation" to add as many model functions as possible (lights, sound module, independent motor control, etc.), which will require the use of a multi-channel RC kit - and there are never enough channels.