Paddle steamer SS Menna

[wsnowdon]

Help! I have just been searching for paddlers and found an
intrigueing plan for a Welsh paddler on Google. The web address is
pages long and indecipherable, but try" Paddle steamer ss menna "as a
search and you may find this little gem. ANYONE got any details of
her history ? she is a new one on me. Site has 1/48th scale plan and
states three sheets in various scales are downloadable but my
ignorance of computers has stopped me doing it! SO, my plea for help-
anyone heard of her?. Thanks in advance, Walter.

[Paulrjordan]

Man! now there's a cute little paddler..and what a fine subject for a
model...but actually Walter she's very well known..but under another
name!

She was built in 1923 by Abdela & Mitchell with a LOA of 80' and beam
of 17.5 ft (obviously not over the boxes). She was
renamed "Alumchine", in fact if you really look closely at the plan,
you can just see a faint reference to that in pencil.

She was very nearly the first paddler to be purchased by the PSPS for
preservation but they couldnt raise the 500 pounds to buy her from
the Pembroke County council where she had been a car ferry between
Hobbs' Point and Neyland. (Boy how things have changed!) In the mid
60's the poor little paddler was therefore scrapped and the PSPS
first purchase became instead "Kingswear Castle" some time later.

You can see pictures of the gutsy little "Menna/Alumchine" and read
all about her at the Kingswear Castle web site where she was featured
as PICTURE OF THE MONTH - January 2001. Here's the URL:

http://www.pskc.freeserve.co.uk/alumchin.htm

By the way, the drawings are quite easily copied from the image on
the website although they make no mention (as far as I can see) of
them being downloadable as a separate file.

The url for the blown up plans is:
http://www.gtj.org.uk/blowup.php?lang=en&id=18019&t=1

So get the blue foam out, Walter...and start carving!!!

Best regards

PJ
Victoria, BC Canada

[wsnowdon]

Thanks Paul, I was so pleased to find the plan that I didnt do my
usual "sideways" search !! If you look at 3rd paragraph below the
plan it clearly states 3 sheets in different scales are downloadable.
Whether that means the same sheet three times over or three DIFFERENT
sheets, I still havnt fathomed how to find out! Bring back steam
radio and the trusty quill pen!. I am away for the next two weeks
(mediteranean) and five days after my return I am working as a
volunteer on WAVERLEY for 2 weeks in the Bristol Channel and Welsh
coast cruises. Its a hard life when you are retired!. This means I
will be absent from the site for about five weeks. (Hurray they all
say, the auld anorack is gone !!!) All the best, Walter.