| Mast Brackets Naturally, the masts on Pommern were not simple; each mast consisted of four sections: the large tower with internal stairs that was secured to the upper deck with a the 'crows nest' on top, a main mast from the 'crows nest' to the upper searchlight platform, a centre mast from the upper searchlight platform to the gun spotters shelter, and the final top tapered mast. To make the large brackets that hold the masts sections together, I cut brass tube larger than the two sections, and soldered them together in a jig. Without a jig, I never would have been able to solder these all identically; and they had to be identical, as even the slightest variation and the mast would not be perfectly vertical and true. |
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| Main Masts The Deutschland drawings seem to be representative of all five ships in regards to height and basic structures and period photographs seemed to support this, so the masts were built to these drawings. The bottom towers were already in place from Part IV: The Aufbau (Superstructure) basic construction, so my effort started from the towers up. Fortunately, the main and centre mast sections consisted of straight tube with a consistent diameter so I was able to use brass tubing. For the main mast I used 7mm brass tube from top to bottom, and for the centre section, I used 3.5mm. |
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| Mast Allignment To ensure that the masts would always go into the same spot and sit straight in the towers, I glued a wooden plug into the bottom of each tower which would line up with a small tube soldered to the base of the main mast. Now whenever the mast was inserted into the tower, it would always been in exactly the same alignment. |
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