Little build for my SMS Mackensen which is a prototype SJS kit. Production hulls have already benefitted a bit from me building this one, even before it's hit the water. Really glad IRCWCC has voted to start allowing some of these "mostly finished" kind of hulls. Should be a fun boat, if not amazingly competitive. She is long. But this does give you a bunch of room for components. This is mainly a picture dump/placeholder for now. I'll come back in a day or two and add context and details. Hull, fresh off the printer This was one of the "post-mine" improvements. I added bosses for small grease fittings. The idea being once the shaft stuffing tubes are in place, you drill down using a bit that is slightly smaller than the hole in the plastic and drill through the stuffing tube. Then tap the plastic + stuffing tube material for your grease fitting. Just something for the people who would be interested in it. About 30% of the way through the build I bought a Bambu P1S on their black friday sale, with AMS. I decided to reprint the SS with the bambu, because I'm lazy and don't do a good job painting. SS Beauty shots to follow showing off the P1S. Note that some of the shots are "transitional" shots with some elements of old printer SS mixed in, and some have these mysterious black decks....more on that next. So one of the biggest issues logistically with SJS and the ship kits is the laser cutting service and their delays getting me my orders. So, when your only tool is a hammer, I decided to try and make the problem a nail. I designed printable decks that would fit on the P1S, with integrated support structure on the under side, that would add stiffness and also aid in deck sealing. My Mack is the first of now many SJS kits with plastic decks: Started to lay out internals and decided to experiment with a designed-to-fit "rose box" for the pump. Since the bambu is so precise, I designed this piece to really put it through its paces. It did a fine job. This magnets down into the water channel. Drive is 1250kv TenShock inrunners through 1.8:1 gearing into the same 5 blade kort props any other SJS mackensen kit would have. Trying for @Kevin P. kongo style rudders since this thing will need all the help it can get to turn. Beautys shot of her right before I started making guns: Gun building: Al the guns feed from their turret, and thanks to the kink-resistant nature of the cupronickel tubing I can put some pretty crazy bends in the magazines with no issues with feeding or rolling. All the cannons are mounted and have passed multiple (10+) full magazine firing trials. She's not done by any means but I got her about 70% of the way and then life got slamming busy with my dog entering heart failure and passing, my wedding, honeymoon, etc. Hoping to get back into the swing of things to make sure Mack is ready for NJ in May.
I think people had this specific fear of Mackensen because "The axis have too many good boats already". Mackensen is like WW1 kongo but significantly worse in most every way. It's longer with minimal additional rudder and you are a full 5 units, preventing a 75rd sidemount. You realistically have two gun layouts: "Fast Iron Duke" with a dual stern, Haymaker, B Sidemount "German Nagato" with B/C/D sidemounts, A 15 deg "funny gun" It's also not quite as "Surfboard" as some of the german BC/DNs, starting with Derflinger I think the germans really started to try and address the blue water seakeeping of their ships. Mackensen basically takes Derf and adds a deck of hull up to Derf's casemate level to improve seakeeping.
Mackensen was successfully sea trialed yesterday in the pool: https://photos.app.goo.gl/gKbSMJFC578auHJUA Had to go back in and swap out a drive ESC, apparently a bad ESC ended up back in circulation and when I saw a pre-soldered waterproof ESC of course my lazy brain was like...SCORE. Didn't ask...hey why didnt you use this already. Some more pics of construction, things have been hectic so I forgot to take a lot of pics but here are a few: Permatex THE RIGHT STUFF deck seal gasket Bow deck setup. Ended up removing the T connector at the top of the pic in favor of a Y connector, helped the outgoing hose to the regulator conform to the shape better. Everything where ever possible is semi-rigid DOT approve air brake tubing. Pump hold down is just this little "sleeve" that I glued onto my magnet-in-place printed pump screen. Does the job OK. Ahh yes, the fun of sheeting...this is the gorilla tape going down on the hull before the wood+silkspan. Helps save the hull when time comes to de-sheet. The neat thing about this boat and it's performance in the video above, is that this is a bog standard SJS kit. I haven't added any kind of special sauce here just for me. Meaning any SJS Mackensen kit, assembled with the included props and rudders, should be able to perform like mine does.
So I've had Mackensen for most of this battle season now and have some ups and downs to share. She's a new boat still, there are always new boat blues and my intention is to stick with Mack for 2026 to really iron some stuff out. I had persistent issues at my first regional with her with the plastic props getting ripped off due to her skinny rear end. In a panic I threw on whatever I could, which ended up being a set of 4 blade propshop kort props. These props "work" but they're a definite downgrade vs my props in terms of turning performance and acceleration/stopping. Right before NATS the "real" solution to the prop problem showed up, but I wasn't sure they'd show in time so I ran the propshops. This "real" solution is my props but manufactured in 316L stainless on a laser sintering metal 3d printer. They are certified finger removers and I am going to get them installed this winter to hopefully restore my acceleration and turning performance. Mack had some weird sinking issues at NATS that I figured out were all related to the pump body being damaged in testing at 6S voltages. The pump functioned correctly at our fall regional here in NJ but I still felt like she was sinking early, going down before she was truly "done". I am going to add some supplemental water channeling to try and keep water from collecting to either side and really force it to collect in the pump sump. I noticed some odd behavior on camera where the pump seems to pulse, in testing it seems like it was creating a vacuum between the bottom of the pump and the hull, so I spaced the pump off the hull a tiny bit more to try and help that. More spacing might be required...I'll keep testing to determine how to resolve this. Overall, Mack is a solid 3.5/5 boat and I look forward to continuing to fine tune her into the german ubership she can be.
