by Duane King

The Deep Space Freighter WINNIPESAUKEE (or known as the Winnie P to her crew) is owned and operated by McCormack and Sons Freight Haulers. The Winnie P transfers freight of all kinds to the various colonies from the Earth’s moon to the moons of Jupiter and all colonies in between. She is 100 feet wide, 540 feet long and the height is over 240 ft. There are 14 booms (with four stations on each) for cargo containers along the spine, and there are provisions for 10 habitat domes, not including the one immediately on top of the propulsion/habitation (p/h) section. There are two docking ports on the bottom of the p/h which allow shuttles and crew vehicles to deliver personnel and supplies as needed.

The ship is outfitted with it’s own cargo handling pod, and the clan operates its own cargo delivery ship. The Winnie P has some armament to fend of space pirates.

The Model

The idea for the Winnie P came from thinking about the craft in Silent Running, and container ships that sail the oceans, with the containers being slung outside for ease of handling and transport. I have modeled it in 1/144 scale; the model is roughly 45 inches long, 20 inches tall, and 9 inches wide.

The p/h section came from a SW:ESB Star Destroyer, the space station Mir kit was the donor for the modules attached to the p/h section. The habitat domes are scratch built, as is the Alice (not shown) docking port. The freighter spine is entirely scratch built using I beam, H beam, Al rod, and various plastic shapes from Evergreen and Plastruct. The spine is roughly 30 inches long and 8 inches wide. There is a sliding arm on the bottom incorporating the cargo arm from the space shuttle. The front mounted sensor/deflector dish is a small plastic wedding champagne glass.

The logo is my own creation.

Winnipesaukee is a lake in New Hampshire. Alice is the matriarch of the McCormack Clan

Addendum

I have spent over 200 hours in design, build, making the model—I decided to try to keep track of time and costs this time (still have not added cost yet).

The model was designed and built as modules, in an attempt to minimize breakage when transporting the model to local ***Con contests or moving…..if you have ever moved models you understand the ‘tears’ when you open a box to find broken parts that are hard to re-attach. The Habitat Domes are removable, and come apart. I plan to make each a distinct diorama depicting some wildlife habitat on earth. They come apart so I can change/fix interior details as needed. The sensor dish and bow dome support boom come off as well. I plan to put a blinking light onto the boom and run the wiring through the square open section of the spine, to the propulsion/habitation (p/h) section. I got the light, ran out of time for the electronics. The Spine, through a series of interlocking concentric tubes, is removable from the p/h bottom, and the square part on top of the spine is open front to back, a wire chase way. As are the Al tubes that make up the side supports of the Spine.

The top of the p/h is designed to be placed onto the bottom of the p/h (it might be glued in the future), to allow access to the cavity so I can install batteries & lights for electronics (blinking navigation, cargo pad, docking ports). The p/h top has a removable part, just below the part of the super structure that I painted green. I have started a removable command and control (C & C) area, to be complete with tables and chairs in a conference/lunch room area. I have to look into the arrangements found in aircraft carriers/submarines for layouts. This area when removed would be the access to the cavity in the p/h. I had first hoped to keep the Mir modules removable, but other things prevailed.

My long term goal for the Winnie P is to finish off the support vehicles, make acrylic display stands, and to invade the local contests to show the “serious modelers the military/car accuracy rivet counters” what a real model is all about.

Image: Underneath

Image: Bow

Image: P/H section

Image: Spine

Image: Closer look