Some Peruvian Navy vessels 1890 - 2020.

[reytuerto]

Thanks Andy for your input!!!

In 1874 a pair on gunboats was ordered in Britain, Chanchamayo and Putumayo (after Peruvian rivers of the Amazon basin), but for some strange reason, one of the vessels was named Pilcomayo, which is an Argentinian river. Chanchamayo was wrecked in 1876. During the War of the Pacific, Pilcomayo had mainly escort missions, until being captured by the Chilean ironclad Cochrane in November 1879.

[Hood]

Nice additions, always good to see some sail and early steam.

[reytuerto]

Hi, Hood. Thanks for your input. For me, the period between 1860 to the end of the XIX Century (from Gloire to the pair Nelson/Agamemnon; or from the US Civil War to the Russo-Japanese war), is very interesting (mainly because almost all the technological gadgets are under my capacity of understanding : the world was much less complex! ). The search for pictures of that era is sometimes frustating in the first attempt, because there is any pic available (even in the shipyard records), but trying with the sister vessels, or the previous names, or similar vessels of the same shipyard and the same years, or writen descriptions of the vessels, gave useful guidelines: At the end, it is a funny task ! Cheers.

[reytuerto]

Good morning, guys.

SS Talisman was a little screw steamer (almost a big yatch in size) hired by Peruvian rebels in 1877, packed with Snider rifles and a pair of machine-guns (unfortunatelly, I was unable to find the model of the MGs), the ship made her way to Perú, but was captured during the events that ended with the rebel Huascar against the British squadron lead by Adm. De Horsey at Pacocha. After the trial, Talisman was incorporated to the Fleet with the same name. During the War of the Pacific, Talisman was used as transport, evading the blockede of the Chilean forces en route to the Peruvian southern ports until being scuttled by her own crew in Callao, following the fall of Lima in 1881. Cheers.

[reytuerto]

Good evening, guys.

BAP Stiglich was made in1980 at the Navy yards in Iquitos, over the Amazon river. Using the hull form of the previous hospital ship Morona (qv), Stiglich is an Hydrographic research vessel. In 2011 she was refited, including new diesel engines, better habitability, and new equipment, both for research and for navigation and comunications. Here, Stiglich is depicted as in the year before the Pandemic. Cheers.



NB: I really don´t know if the position of the RIHB at the stern is permanent. Before the 2011 refit, she had a rigid (metal?) boat stowed in the stern but horizontally. Also, I had seen the two water tanks of the upper deck both in blue and in white (at the sides of the parabolic dish aerial); and the canvas roof too, was both in blue and a faded white. In either case, I prefer the blue one only for aesthetic reasons, but sincerelly I don´t know if the blue canvas cover and the blue water tanks "coexisted" in any time.

NB2: I am curious about the navigation radar set used in a riverine vessel. As a river has a fixed course, may I ask which is the task of a radar in this kind of vessels? Thanks and cheers.

[reytuerto]

Good morning, guys:

In the period between the South American-Spanish war (1866) and the War of the Pacific (1879), almost all Peruvian Navy transports were vessels bought to Pacific Steam Navigation Company, of Liverpool. Despite being built between 1863 and 1873, all 3 vessels were very similar ships: Side paddle steamers built by Randolph & Elder at Govan, with a displacement of 1400 to 1600 tons and a lenght of 80 mts, and auxiliary sails in two masts, Chalaco (ex-SS Quito), Limeña and Oroya were rather common ships of the era.

Credits: Several ideas for the wheel paddle were "imported" (plagiarism is a fair form of praise ) from DP´s and Craig´s drawings of similar steamers. Thanks to both of them.



PS: The red color of the side paddle is just an hypothetical guess (in fact, there is no real picture of the vessel at least as Chalaco, I use a lithography of the vessel as Quito). My appologies if there is a mistake.

[Hood]

Nice additions.

[reytuerto]

Thanks for your input, Hood!



This is the drawing of Rímac, a screw steamer built in 1873 for Compañía Sudamericana de Vapores. During the War of the Pacific, she was bought by the Chilean government and used by the Navy as transport. She was captured by the Peruvian corvette Unión. After the fall of Lima, she was scuttled by her crew. Cheers.

NB: I left the funnel with the colors of Compañía Sudamericana. I don´t know if the funnel was painted black in peruvian service, or yellow in chilean service. In Compañía Sudamericana, the standard color of the masts was red, at least in early XX century, but in an oil over canvas paint of a vintage vessel of the WoP era, I noticed that the masts were yellow/buff so I prefer to left this last color (but without being sure if this is actually correct). The boat arrangement was following the only available photograph (of bad quality, very but very far) of Rimac (but I don´t know the date of the picture, if it was under chilean or peruvian flag). I was unable to find a good picture of Rímac, but her sister ship, SS Itata is well depicted by newspapers (unfortunatelly, this was due a tragic fact: she was wrecked with heavy loss of life in the 1920s).

[reytuerto]

Good morning, guys.

This is the drawing of another Rímac (Rímac is the namesake of the river of the Peruvian capital city, Lima), an American made side paddle steamer built in 1848. Armed with 4 x
side firing 24 pounder MLSB guns and 2 x 68 pounder MLSB fore and aft, Rímac was the first steam vessel in Peruvian service, and gave an useful life until wrecked in the next decade. Cheers.

[reytuerto]

Good afternoon, guys:

In South America, Lurssen boats are/were the most prevalent kind of fast torpedo boats, either in the big 45 meter version (Indomita class in Argentina) or the smaller 36 meter boats of Spanish construction in Chilean (Guacolda class) and Ecuatorian (Manta class) service. But in MGP, the torpedo boats were of British construction: the Vosper 110 ft, locally known as the Velarde class. Slightliy longer (110 fl instead 103 ft), with an all steel hull (instead wooden and GRP construction) and with two diesel engines (instead Proteus gas turbines or a combination of gas turbines and diesels) than the previous Vosper models. Velarde class were useful multifunctional vessels, with tha capability of being equiped with 4 torpedo tubes (which were seldom view), 20 mm Oerlikons, and ASW depth bombs (and sonar) and during a decade were the backbone of the Peruvian light attack forces. In the 1980s, with the arrival of French built missile boats, the six vessels were transfered to the Coast Guard, renamed and only were armed with the Oerlikon automatic cannons, until being paid off in the first years of the new century. Cheers.