Right after our just released Ship of The Line, our Age of Sail next model is going to be a Xebec - a swift, agressive looking lateen sailed ship widely used not only by pirates and corsairs, but also by all Mediterranean naval nations from 17th to 19th centuries. Here above you can watch a preview of its hull at its current designing stage. Hope you like it!

I'm happy to show our upcoming 1:600 scale Ship of the Line, work on whose ultimate desig is over now.

Loosely based on the plans of an early 18th century Russian real ship, this new model can stand on tabletop as a 3rd or even a 2nd rate man-of-war --so being ideal for War of Spanish Succession, GNW, Turco-Venetian Wars or even golden age of piracy settings!

In the next weeks we'll 3d-print the design and start prototyping a master model --a job to include levelling it down to waterline, of course.

Work on what is going to be our third 1:600 scale Age of Sail range model has already started. Now we're planning to do a man-of-war, loosely based on the plans of an early 1700s Russian warship.

At so an early design stage, many features are quite provisional, some of which are to be refined step by step, or even modified. What I can say right now is that further detailing is to include open artillery ports, mizzen mast re-design, as well as fore and main masts re-sizing. Hull is going to be around 8 or 9 cm long. So there's still a lot of work ahead!

Unless something starts going seriously wrong, I expect this will be my last update on our Spanish galleon designing project, before we plunge into the process of tooling it for production.

After all, as you can see by the image above, we have designed the model with two alternative bows and sterns, to reflect the design changes suffered by the ship over the centuries. Thanks to this artifice, we shall be able to launch not just one but two different galleons (sharing a central hull, but with interchangeable bow and stern pieces, in order to facilitate the construction of hybrid models).

In the end, this is the shape our upcoming 03NAV001 Early Galleon is going to take:

And this is what the 03NAV006 Late Galleon following afterward is going to look like:

That's not all though, because we have also designed each mast in two different configurations: with either fully unfolded and partially furled sails. As both kits' masts will be interchangeable too, this will allow for even more customization and variations.

Worth to confirm that ultimate model kits will be waterline (despite drawings above are showing hulls complete to keel).

POLL REMINDER

As already announced, we shall start releasing soon a collection of naval flags suitable for this upcoming ships range. Our first releases are to comprise ensigns, jacks and pennants for Spanish, Portuguese, Catalan, French and Ottoman ships (either men-of-war and merchants/privateers); but we've also set recently a poll to help determine real priorities in this matter among users. Please help us decide by answering it!

Apologies to all those interested on our announced range of 1/600 scale sailing ships for the silence we've kept on the matter lately. We've had to re-design thoroughly some features of model --nearly from the start. However, we can now consider its hull as completed --except for one side feature I'm going to explain below. But let's take a glance on the galleon's hull before.

As you can see, ship model shows two apparently odd features. First of all, we have decided to design two alternative bows under form of separate parts, so as to help give to the ultimate ship an earlier or later appearance. Following that same 'customizing friendly' core idea, we have also deviced two alternative sterns --a more archaic one with long open balconies, and another one more baroque-styled, with windowed galleries.

Now we are about to start masts design; most probably, we're going to draw two versions of each mast --the one with fully unfolded sails, the other one with partially folded rigging. So many variants and alternative parts are not intended for one single kit, naturally (it would be a real waste to produce a model with only one hull and a pair of every other part there!). Otherwise, the idea behind is being able to make two different model kits (let's say, an "Early Galleon" and a "Late Galleon"), with interchangeable parts so as to allow the building of 'hybrid' models, or allowing to customize an entire fleet of all slightly different ships, just from two different kits.

I am aware that so many comes and goes are slowing down the project, and I apologize to those among you with less patience. However, I honestly believe all these turns around are to be for good. Thanks for your support!

Just a few words about our 1:600 scale Spanish Galleon, the first one of an announced range of Baroque Era ships: We have kept silent for a long time since our first piece of news at regard --and such persistent silence had a reason why.

Rather unused to ship designing, our 3D designer experienced at first some troubles with the rather organic volumes of a galleon's hull, thus slowing down the project quite dramatically. But now those problems have been sorted out --one learns with practice!!--, so that the basic forms of hull itself are finally close to an end.

In advance to your possible objections after watching the picture: yes model will be waterline! It only happens that designer found it easier to draw hull entirely (a matter of polygons netting, don't ask me why) and, after 3D-printing the ship, to conveniently cut its hull to waterline. It also has the advantage of having the hull ready designed, to be used as a standard for future projects.

I believe this will be exciting news for all 20mm SCW wargamers: we at Minairons are about to start a new 1:72 scale scenery range, specifically intended for re-creating the common (and not-so-common) Spanish landscapes of those years.

True that some first timid attempts were performed not long ago, by creating a couple of battlefield scenery pieces (a bailed out command Panzer and a downed I-15 fighter), that have proven to be successful enough to encourage us to try and expand the range with a new series of elements --either large buildings or simple widgets.

So that, taking advantage of the mutual trust arisen after our retailing partnership with Surus Creations (by which we became a vendor of their Belchite 1:100 scale SCW scenery), we alongside met a further agreement with them for a similar 1:72 scale range to be made in exclusive for Minairons, under our own make.

Little afterwards, work started on a first project --under some kind of deliberate news blackout, admittedly: a modernist style Wine Cellar, inspired on the numerous cooperative farming facilities built between 1914 and 1925 by the Commonwealth of Catalonia, a semi-autonomous government institution of these years.

Despite work on masters is well advanced now, so that some preliminary pictures might be already shown, we've preferred to let the whole prototype be finished before sharing with you. Pictures will follow in few days, I promise. meanwhile, I've thought you would like to take a glance on the thing plans, so as to get a first taste on the thing:

Front view

Side view

Architectural detail

Some kit elements (such as chimney, for instance) have been devised as optional, depending on whether the user plans to build an industrial factory in an urban background, or as an oil or wine cellar for his countryside settings instead.

As said above, work on this superb building masters is well advanced now, so that we'll be able to show you pictures of it in not too many days' time.

After a somewhat longer than wished lapse, we've retaken the range of Spanish Civil War aircraft; this time, we wished to place on workbench the Breguet XIX. This two-seat biplane was the Spanish Republic Air Forces standard bomber before the burst of civil war.

We are planning to supply the model kit with a decals sheet including markings for both SCW sides, but had also in mind to supplement it with some early WWII markings. We're thinking of Greek and Polish markings --would you support this choice?

As for model itself, it will be quite easy to build --with no more than 8 parts besides of pilot and gunner.

After a lapse of frantic activity time either re-vamping the miniature ranges of his own, or launching a new WWII 1:72 models and accessories company christened as Steel 72, our sculptor Xan has finally met the time for sculpting a new set of Spanish Civil War figures for Minairons. Such new set is devoted to Requete militias and will consist of 18 figures, comprehensive of NCOs and officers, an LMG team, flag bearer and christophore. Here below you have his preliminary sketches on it:

It's soon still to give an ultimate deadline for them. It depends not just on sculptor's own speed at making the greens, but also on other factors to be kept in mind: boxart progression, packaging design and printing... However, my overall feeling is that we'll be able to release them reasonably soon.

Well, I admit there isn't much to show yet, because 3D designing of our announced 1:600 Galleon has revealed to be a little harder than expected at start. However, when designer showed me a few captions on his work progress, a few days ago, I couldn't resist the temptation to post them on blog. Ship's hull, a part of which you can see above, will measure around 70 mm long --Manila galleons were really big!-- and perhaps around 17 mm wide.

As you can see by the picture above, we're taking a lot of care about detail --even at the risk of having to reduce it later!--. Only after having 3D-printed a first prototype, we'll be able to determine parts and materials, although I'm currently considering as most likely to finally make hull in resin, with masts and rigging in white metal.

Unless something gets really wrong, ship will be released as a boxed set including a DIN A7 format paper sheet comprising not only its main ensign, but minor flags and jack as well. Here below you have a draft of such flags sheet:

Minairons Miniatures was brought to life by manufacturing figures, vehicles and accessories related to the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939), and this is the period and range we have been devoting our hardest efforts so far --at such at an extent that "Minairons" has likely become a synonym of "SCW stuff" to many hobbyists.

However, our brand wasn't born to confine itself to one single range of miniatures only, but with the explicit aim to cover as much as possible all periods of Spanish Peninsula nations military history instead; so that we've decided to start a radically new range.

Every shot aimed to new targets always implies some risk of missing the shot, and such could be the case now. As sayings in most languages use to say though, for winning you must dare first, so here it goes our bid: we're going to start a range of 1/600 scale waterline ships of the Age of Sail, normally belonging to late 17^th or early 18^th centuries. Models will follow our usual trend of being CAD-designed for best detailing, accurately produced with quality materials and insultingly easy to build.

Following another of our dominant trends too, our upcoming models pretend to be compatible and complementary to those of other brands already producing age of sail ships, such as Peter Pig or Skytrex for instance.

We have already started design of a first model, the Manila Galleon --the huge 4-masted pride of the Spanish Pacific fleet. Other models in the pipeline are lateen-sailed xebecs, hybrid xebecs, WSS warships and galleys. We intensely hope this new range comes to please you!