2023
A Year in Port Polar Bear
Brouhaha Sat/Sun
March 11, 12 2023
Brouhaha 2023 (15th
annual) was attended by Bob (Stangle’s Scharnhorst), Andy (Nagato), Mike (Seydlitz),
and Tyler (Yamato). Also in attendance were Gerald (Hiei), Dirty Dave (Kongo),
Tom (WW1 Montana), Rick (Jamaica), Ted (VDT and Scheer), a new young battler
from Jacksonville, Sam (Brooklyn) and his dad Andrey. Wade took a ship or two
down to the shore on a few occasions but didn’t battle. The dive down was snowy
through Iowa and rain essentially the entire rest of the way. We stayed north
of Jackson in the usual hotel but right before going to bed Tyler/Andy found a
bed bug and got a different room, found a dead bedbug in that room and bailed
for the hotel across the street which was much nicer and had no bedbugs.
Bob/Mike had no problems and were not itchy the next day.
As compared to years past the
attendance was rather light again. The weather was very warm on Saturday and
humid. Sunday was a little cooler but fairly windy, coming from the pond
towards the house. The battling was otherwise fairly typical and very close
ranged. We balanced teams fairly well and most battles were under 1000 point margins. We did flag/no flag all weekend and for
the most part all got to team up with and against each other. We did get in 6
full two sortie battles.
When we got to town on Friday we went to the pond to work out ship issues for the
three relatively untested new/refit ships: Scharnhorst, Liberte, HMS Shannon.
Liberte (3.5 unit pre-dreadnaught) was upgraded by
removing the single center drive prop and instead driving the outer two of the
three shafts. It turned fairly well but not quite as good. The acceleration and
torque roll with turning as well as the ship control in reverse were much
improved. Andrey, Sam, and Dirty would all use it at some point over the
weekend.
The Shannon was a turning beast
and ultra quick. We got it to 30 seconds in forward but in reverse it was able
to go up on plane and was steerable enough to make the 100
foot course in 16 seconds. The directional propellers were turned around
and it was then 26 seconds forward and 26 in reverse. No one battled it.
Bob/Stangle’s Scharnhorst was
refit from the traditional 3 stern gun setup to have two pumps and 3
sidemounts, he also changed drive setup from the center alone to driving all
three props which improves acceleration and reverse thrust but costs turning to
some degree. The rudder posts were probably a bit close together and would do
better to move them apart a bit. Also both Bob and
Andy had relatively flush/flat forward edges of the rudder which helps in terms
of acceleration as you can increase the thrust but it creates turbulent flow
when trying to turn, with some sanding to round off the front edges of the
rudders both ships turned better. The Scharnhorst battled with 5 of the 10ah
NiMH packs but was a bit stern heavy and sinks uneven. It didn’t really have
room to shift weight forward, perhaps 4 batteries vs reconfiguring radio box to
move forward vs adding stern water channeling would help. Bob ended up sinking
in 5 of the 6 battles generally with 50 below. He was only disappointed when he
sank with shots left in the guns. Another goofy issue was the gear boxes for
the outer two shafts are a different style and when playing with the drive
motors he ended up putting the drive gear on a little further from the motor
and it ended up binding when the motor was fully mounted, it took a while to
discover the issue as it is not a problem with most other gear boxes.
A few other memorable things: On
Friday Tom was at the pond testing and was having some issues with drive ESC
un-binding, as such the joke was that Tyler was going to not shoot any shots on
Saturday morning until Tom lost control so he could go sink him. Tom did go
five out of control a few times that morning having blown a fuse or two
throughout the weekend but we were pretty gentle to him all things considered
when he did go out of control, Tom might contend otherwise. The restaurant by
the hotel was the same Italian place now 3 years in a row, Mariano’s, which
seems to be a new city record for restaurants not burning down or being
annihilated by a hurricane. Mike said that after 6 months of not battling he
initially felt as rusty as the bbs that were left in
Sam’s guns. The Yamato sank with a clogged pump, Tom was shooting it last and
reminded us all of the rules that whenever a ship sinks the guy that was
shooting it last gets to claim the sink. There was a tree that had fallen into
the water with some green leaves on it, we a few times ended up battling in the
forest. Initially Tyler went over there with a plan of shaking off the enemy
when he was on five but it was actually Gerald who they chased into the forest
and he ended up sinking right in it. There were crayfish in the shallows
frequently, Tyler grabbed one with a needle nose pliers but nobody was hungry
enough to eat it. After sinking in his Kongo, Dirty took out the Liberte and
dove right into action and trading sidemounts, it sank quickly. At one point
Bob and Andy chased Ted around for a bit and their wakes nearly sunk the small
ship. Bob’s Scharnhorst’s Atlantic bow jumped up onto the Yamato when he came
diving into the action, the stern of the Scharney
dunked under and it nearly sank before he backed out, the Yamato seemed not to
notice. On Sunday due to fairly windy conditions the extreme top pole of our
press together tent came apart, bob couldn’t reach it standing on a tool box
but Tyler lifted him up and allowed him to fix it. After the 3rd battle
on Sunday Mike’s Seydlitz had 51-11-40 and as a demonstration of deck seal Bob
held the ship underwater for 10-15 seconds and re floated
it. Gerald made lunch again with sausage both days, tasty as usual. On the way
home since we had last filled up gas on the way in, we needed to get gas about
2 hours after leaving town. Right after pulling in to the station Rick/Tom
pulled in right behind us to also get gas.
Awards: Best of Class: 6-8 Tyler
(Yamato), 5 Bob (Scharnhorst), 4 Mike (Seydltiz), 1-3
Rick (Jamaica). Most Feared Allied: Tom. Most Feared Axis: Tyler. Best of
Scale: Rick (Jamaica). Winning Admiral: Andy. Losing Admiral: Bob.
Next battle is Memorial Weekend
Saturday and Sunday May 27/28.
Tyler
Port Polar Bear
Memorial Weekend Battle Sat/Sun May 27, 28 2023
We held our typical memorial
weekend battle on May 27/28. We battled
three full battles (6 sorties) on Saturday and 2 battles on Sunday, the second
of which was 3 sorties instead of doing a full cycle of count/patch. In
attendance was: Tyler (Yamato), McCoy (VU), Addie (Tourville), Bob (John's
Scharnhorst), Zach (John's Kongo), Matthew (Nagato), Andy (Nagato), Mike
(Seydlitz), Peter (Erin), KC Tom (WW1 Montana).
Bob, Tom, Andy, Mike, Tyler and
McCoy went to the Twins game on Friday night.
There were as many Blue Jay fans as Twins fans which was a bit surreal,
the Twins lost 3-1 with a ton of stranded base runners.
We were pretty prompt at getting
to the pond on Saturday morning but lots of little delays meant that we were
only able to accomplish 1 battle in the morning. We started out Hellands
and Hoernemanns versus the world. 5 of the 10 ships
sank. At one point when Bob was in the water retrieving a ship another one sank
behind him, and third right sank when he was getting the 2nd one. We laughed
because he couldn't keep up with all the sinking ships.
The 2nd battle Bob and Zach
switched teams with Andy and Mike. There were a ton of little issues that
slowed the start down. Again 5 of the 10 ships sank. There were a lot of pump priming and clogging issues, much more than typical. I
wonder if the sediment from the snow melt was not well settled.
The 3rd battle we kept the teams
the same but Zach took the Liberte and Bob took the Kongo. We got off the water
fairly late and didn't get to Bob's until close to 6pm. We had Domino's Pizza
but Bob had to go to the store to both order and pick it up because they
couldn't understand how to take a phone order, everything is online now and
that wasn't validating gift cards correctly. Cold fermented carbonated
beverages made him feel better.
On Sunday Tom wanted to join the
Helland's so we took him and Mike vs the rest. 5 of 10 ships sank again,
including Tom who lost control and got caught next to shore, he ended up
getting wedged against the shore and sank when the above holes went under. He
states that he has never been sunk in the Montana while he had control. That
being said he had a lot of control issues this weekend and ended up going five
out of control a fair bit without drive but intact pump and gun.
Sunday afternoon the teams
remained the same as the morning. We were feeling too tired to do a full 3rd
battle so instead opted for a 3 sortie battle. This
allowed for 6 of the 10 ships to sink. After that McCoy and I traded ships and
went head-to-head. The shifty little VU stayed away from the duals but when I
finally let him shoot it a panel caved in.
We had hotdogs on the portable
grill for lunch both days. The weather was fantastic. I put Andy's freighter in
the water with duct tape and it drove well but still settles to port when it
sinks, over the winter I added weight and water channeling hoping to solve some
of that. I had Tom H's Scharnhorst with but when I went to get it ready it was
having a load of gun twerking problems and opted to set it back aside for a
different time. McCoy's VU needed new plungers in the stern solenoids but after
that shot well. The battery configuration is fairly well set now so I feel like
I can add permanent water channeling.
Nats is
in July. We will battle again in Chanhassen Sept 9/10.
Tyler
NATS 2023,
Ionia, MI. July 10-14, 2023
Port Polar Bear members who went
to Nats included: Tyler (Yamato, Duca d’Aosta, Hikawa
Maru, Hikawa Maru2, Hie Maru, Heian Maru), McCoy (VU, Zara), Zach (Nagato, Zyrini, LST), Matthew (Nagato, Glorie), Andy (Nagato,
Glorie), Mike (Seydlitz, Glorie), John from Ireland (Kongo, Shannon, Liberty
Ship). We took Tyler’s Truck and Andy’s car, Matthew flew. The Midway Motel was
about as shady as we all remembered, Tyler and McCoy’s shower had pretty
intense rust stains and dripped the entire time. The teams were divided into Orange and Green fleets. Matthew, Andy, Mike were Orange
while Tyler, McCoy, Zach were Green. Orange Fleet carried the week but it was
close. Zach won Allied High Spirit Award. Andy (tied with Will) won best of
class 6. Tyler won the Von Fluegel.
Next battle is September 9/10 in
Chanhassen.
Tyler
Port Polar Bear Fall
Battle Sat/Sun September 9,10 2023
We battled three full battles (6
sorties) on Saturday and 2 battles on Sunday the second of which was a 3 sortie battle. We had: Tyler (Yamato), McCoy (VU), Addie
(Tourville), Bob (Zach’s Nagato), Andy (Nagato), Mike (Seydlitz), KC Tom (Alaska),
Rick (Jamaica). Brandon flew in from Reno and battled his Caio Duilio which
lives at Bob’s house otherwise. Kevin Plumber was in town for work and came out
to battle Tyler’s Derffligner 2. Owen showed up and battle
the Zrinyi. Matthew came Sunday with his new Seydltiz
but fried something and ended up taking Bob’s Nagato out while Bob took John’s
Shannon for the final battle of the weekend. Etta, Tyler’s youngest also made a
brief appearance at her first ever battle, she drove around the Tourville.
We battle the first two Saturday
battles with Tyler, Tom, Kevin, McCoy, Rick vs Bob, Andy, Mike, Brandon, Owen. Addie
showed up late due to volleyball and joined her dad’s fleet half way through
the day. Tyler’s wife Terri dropped her off and witnessed her first battle since
Tyler started 16 years prior in 2007. Team Bob/Andy won both the first two
battles in this configuration. Tom was out of control a lot over the weekend,
he tried a few different batteries and this seemed to help but didn’t
completely solve the problem. Kevin was not shy and wasn’t sure how aggressive to
battle the Derfflinger which resulted in him getting
in the mix a ton, to be fair he has battled it now significantly more than Tyler
has. That ship seems to be good for around 40 below but not consistently more
than that, it does ride a bit low in the stern, perhaps water channeling or shifting
weight forward would help. For the 3rd sortie Bob and Kevin flipped sides.
That time Bob/Tyler won the battle. We went to Bob’s afterwards for boat work
and pizza.
Sunday we
kept the teams the same as Sunday afternoon. Andy’s team won every battle that
day. We listened to the Vikings lose the season opener at home to Tampa on the
radio. We had hotdogs for lunch along with deserts by Owen’s mom. Mike brought
a huge bag of licorice as well. Weather was fairly cool but not consistently
needing sleeves cold, it rained briefly on Saturday. Tyler brought some field
rock to try to reinforce the eroding shoreline, it will take several more loads
to make a difference. We allowed first sortie sinks to come back into the battle
after patching. We had some impressive scores with Kevin in the Derfflinger 2 taking 70 total below in the first battle causing
him to sink in both sorties. Tom took 77 below in the Alaska Saturday battle 3
and 73 below in Sunday battle 1 and didn’t sink. Andy’s Nagato sunk with 74
below. Tyler took 87 below in the Yamato with terrible hull skin and stayed
afloat Sunday battle 2. Tom had the most damage all weekend due to being out of
control a fair bit (one time Andy was sort of being a nice guy by pushing him
back into shore when he couldn’t move, but shot his funny gun empty on the
drive in) but Tyler was close behind. The Yamato somehow took only 26-4-16 on
Saturday battle 3. Aggregate weekend shooting percentage was an impressive 37.9%
though the formula gets a little goofy when we do 3 sortie battles.
We will likely battle at Wades
in New Orleans in the Spring of 2024 and host a local battle Memorial Weekend 2024
as well.
Tyler