This may ramble a bit as I am not that straight forward. I have always loved icebreakers and thought that they were a very under represented class of vessels in the modeling world. I remember building a plastic kit when I was around 15. It may have been a "Wind" or the Glacier. Either way, at around 14" it was way too small. Around 5 years ago, I stumbled upon an advertisement for a 1/48th laser cut keel and rib set for a Wind class icebreaker. It was a one off the gent was not going to produce it again. I grabbed it up. The "kit" consisted of the keel and a full set of ribs cut from a decent grade of aircraft plywood around 1/4" thick.
The first thing I did was start my research. Which ship, what configurization, date, paint pattern, weapons, ect.
There were seven ships built for the US Navy and Coast Guard combined, and one built for the Canadian Coast Guard. There were many variations, but two ships stood out. The USS Southwind and her sister the Eastwind. I chose the latter. Furthermore I chose to build her pretty much as built and commissioned. This led to her carrying an impressive weapons suite and an aircraft, which just happened to be available in a 1/48th kit form.
There were many challenges to build this model, not the least of which was to get accurate plans and photographs. The US Coast Guard Museum in Seattle, Washington was an immense help in that regard. Next was that research indicated that all equipment on Polar rated ships had to be of larger, stronger sizes than standard CG or Naval standards called for. Ie, lot's of masters and castings to be made in the future. Lastly was the weapons suite, which calle dfor large and unique fittings. Shapeways came to the rescue there. More of all of this as I go along.
These first pictures are of the kit set up, just to get a feel for it, on a build board. Followed by some planks pictures. The shaft logs are unique. They taper for there entire length and the shaft runs through them, but NOT centered. The shaft centered on the outboard end, but off center on the inboard end. I had a local shop turn these for me. WAY above my pay grade.

Thank you for your kind comments. I need to back up for a moment and modify my scale comment. eastwind is built to 1/48th stand off scale, ie 1/48th scale that look about right standing off about 15 feet.
Nowto my build. Eastwind was planked with 1/8x 3/8" bass wood. Her bow and stern were filled with bass wood blocks for the first and last couple of stations. After rough sanding the hull and shaping the blocks I used wood filler on the hull to fill in where needed.
My plan was to then fiber glass the hull, inside and out.
Once the hull was glassed it was primed and I moved on to installing the bow shaft and stuffing tube. A limited amount of decking was laid down to keep things aligned and give the hull more strength, but I still needed to install the stern shafts and stuffing boxes and they would require a lot of access. Around this time I built the prominent bulkward on the bow, added the towing notch to the stern and the stern fender strips.
While it may look like this all went relatively quickly, it did not. I was about six months of steady work to get to this point. Next: a change of pace. Starting the superstructure.

The stuffing tubes were fitted with copious amounts of a gelled F/G ptty filling the gaps. After again copius amounts of sanding and faring the tubes were in place and the shaft logs were installed. The log are made over here and pretty standard stuff. I added grease tubes to them with hoses to allow remote filling. I use a Mercury Marine Teflon impregnated grease which is quite light, completely waterproof and easily come by. With this step completed I finished planking the deck and covered it with epoxy resin and clothe. Sanded fair the deck was ready for the superstructure.
The superstructure of Eastwind was built of Sintra, a PCV foan product that loves CA, is paint ready and cuts with a hobby knife. It is very machinable as well. With the basic structure built I cut the deck opening. The superstructure lifts off as on unit giving a huge access area to the innards of the hull. At this point I started laying out the platform in the hull on which the batteries and motors would mount. To give and idea of the area I had to work with, the batteries powering Eastwind are two 28 amp/hr gel cell batteries. Each battery weighs 20 lbs and the hull needs extra lead to hit her waterline and there is no issue fitting the batteries into her. I also made up her electronis tray which held her three Electrolize ESC's, receiver, BEC, and various electronic switches for her lights. I added her main battery which consisted of two twin 5"/38 caliber dual purpose gun mounts. I added the small aft superstructure which mount the aft gun mount and enclosed her towing winch. Some bottom paint and grey primer and she was ready for initial trials. I have neglected to mention her props. These were built for me by a gent over here. While they appear to be variable pitch props, they were not so. Instead, these props were designed and built with removable, replaceable blades, with the expectation that the ice would be hard on them. As it turned out, it was, especially for the bow prop which was eventually removed from all members of the class.

I ran out of time during my last to finish posting my pictures, so here are some of the props and the interior arrangements. The motors are mounted on a piece of plexiglass. I am a little out of sequence here, but after the shaft logs were installed and the battery tray was fitted, the deck was finished off and covered in F/G. The access panel was cut and coaming installed. The superstructure fi nicely so I moved on. I satisfied myself with her finish after some coats of primer were laid down and sanded, so sea trials were around the corner. Our former town has a nice kiddy pool that makes for a wonderful test facility so off I went. She floated, a tad bow down as the photos show, but did not leak. She went forward and reverse at the appropriate times and even turned in the appropriate direction when commanded, so it was back home to play with paint.
Because of the patterns I use, they are hand brushed. I figure that the slight variations in tone and color here and there add character. My plan is to lay down the initial paint pattern and then detail and touch up from there. I always liked the Western Approaches patterns of the RN and MS12 is as close as a USN ship came to it. It does work well in hazy foggy light.
She is a heavy model. With the batteries tipping 40 lbs, the hull in her finished state runs about 25-30 lbs. Getting her into the water is not quite as bad as it seems. She floats high and is tippy until a battery is installed then she is fine. I add the other one and the superstructure and she is ready to go.
More to follow.

I am backing up for a second here to give do where it belongs. My proops were made, as I had said, by a gent over here, Keith Bender. he is an incredible modeler and specializing in making props. Here are his. Each consisted of a hub, blades and individually soldered nuts. I am also including a PDF of the Eastwind's first cruise. It is enlightening and terrifying. I will continue with my build in my next post.

When I left off, I had sea trialed Eastwind, successfully. Now I am going to back a fill a bit. The shaft logs have grease tubes soldered into them with aircraft fuel hose fill lines extending to an accessible area. The rudder was built up from aircraft ply. Nothing sissy about this beast. It hangs on three pintals and a foot and is 5/16 inches thick. The rudder shaft is 3/16 brass, cross drilled and tapped for brass machine screws, which lock the shaft into the rudder, but allow the shaft to be removed and hence the rudder as well. I have been using extending double jointed u-joints made of Delrin nylon. I get them from Stock Drive Products, but they are available quite readily. The rudder servo is mounted under the aft superstructure, and if the servo tray is removed, access is gained to the shaft lock set collars and the u-joints set screws on the shafts.
Back when I sealing my deck, I planned my rudder access. I wanted the deck to be watertight, but I also wanted to show the wood decking that covered the steel deck on the full size ship. I F/g'd the deck and added matt. I also cut an access panel for the rudder shaft. The hack ended up being wood decked with a "steel" flange of styrene. From here I moved on the fitting the wood deck, using 1/32 sawed Basswood decking that I got from BlueJacket Shipfitters, just down the road from me. The wood decking extends to the sides of the ship leaving a waterway. The rudder access hatch received it's section of wood decking.
Til next time.

Well at this point it was time to start building, now that the tedious job of creating the hull was done. I added the lower bulkward on the bow and the breakwater aft of it. Both were worked out of styrene sheet. Oval eyelet were used for the hawser ports and the tow cable hole was bored. The bridge top carried a MK 51 director, a pair of sky lookouts and a pair of 24" search lights. The enclosure for the MK 51 was,agin, styrene and the fittings themselves were from diStefan's shop at Shapeways. I applied the first of several coats of paint to the deck to layout the camouflage pattern and began locating deck fittings. While I was at it I made the aft pair of 20mm Oerlikon shields and applied them. The Winds had a unoque winch cable roller bitt mount that was mounted aft of the aft house which contained the towing winch. I made this of styrene, turned bits of PVC and anything else handy. A pair of vents made of turned PVC rod and brass tubing, mounted outboard of the bitt assembly finished the install. AND NOW...... I confronted the error of my building choice. There is a wonderful gentleman over here by the name of Robert Thomas who sells beautiful, flawlessly cast resin 1/48 fittings, look up QuarterMaster, mostly for USN destroyers. But, many are applicable to other USN ships...except, icebreakers. It was at this point that I realized how many masters, molds, and castings of deck fittings I would need to make. Pause... Let's think about this... OK, how about a beer? Good Idea. I always think better when my eyes are closed.

Well Fall is here and I had to take some time to start getting "stuff" done, ie, mowing the field, cutting and dragging trees, ect. Now that I have made an apparent attempt to start that, I can continue on the Eastwind Blog.
For some reason, I am losing my narration after posting photos. So I'll be brief. Making masters for deck fittings, molds and casting of fitting was a piecemeal process. I do not have the discipline to do it straight thru. There were many directions of this build and I took whichever one suited my fancy on a given day. I ordered 5'/38 twin mounts, quadruple 40mm Bofors mounts, Hedgehog and Mk51 gun directors from Shapeways. I'd still be struggling without them.
My funnel, which I chose not to make functional, was of sytrene with a detailed exhausts(9) inside. I also planned my lighting about this time, which included 4 24" search lites(Shapeways) butchered to accept LEDs with reflectors. To mount forward and two aft. I painted the deck with her camouflage pattern and later, after all fittings were mounted, spliced in the required colors where needed. There were so many minor major projects within this build,that I get lost sometimes. Eastwind carried a Grumman J2F amphibian which was lower into and out of the water by crane. The aircraft was fairly easy as it was available as a 1/48scale plastic kit, but the cranes were another matter. They were similar to cranes mounted on other USN ships, but I had no plans. They were scratch built of styrene and various castings, again home done. The booms were styrene angle stock and while not perfect are OK at stand off scale.
At this point I want to say why this ship intrigued me. She was about the size of a destroyer, maybe a little short. Quite a bit slower, 16.5 knots with a tail wind and down swell, and she rolled a bit. I believe she once recorded a 70 degree roll. My stomach just did. BUT!! she was loaded to the gills. Her aramentwas, 4x 5"/38 dual pupose guns in twin mounts, 3 x 40mm quadruple Bofors canon mounts, 6 x 20mm Oerlikon machine canon mounts, two depth charge racks, 6 x K guns ( depth charge projectors, 1 x Hedgehog, and 1x J2F float plane. Quite the package. Until next time....

I think I left off working on the cranes and the aircraft. After that, well it sort of continued for a while, Just adding details took quite a bit. Again, every thing was custom sized for an icebreaker. I did make up my own 40mm quad mounts using twin 40's as a basis. These came from Robert Thomas, a master at resin casting. I made the shields from styrene. Alas, as I have already noted, mine were replaced by even better units from Shapeways. I don't need to add too many more comments tonite, rather I will just post a number of photos that are pretty self explanatory.

Just to let you all know that I have not abandoned my blog, fall lean up and storage followed by a new knee have interrupted my schedule. As soon as I can get back to my desk long enough to sit for a while I will continue the saga.