Boats

All post-war (obviously!), but potentially very useful for post-war modelling. A //lot// of WW2 coastal craft (MTBs, MGBs, motor launches, fast rescue launches, flying fleas, motor minesweepers - of both the Mickey Mouse - MMS - and BYMS persuasion - and gawd wot else) ended up in creeks around the UK, especially in the south as houseboats and much else (MTBs and MBGs made good houseboats - big hulls and plenty of space once the monster petrol engines had been whipped out for scrap) - and they lasted years as such. I nearly rented a 70' Scott-Paine Motor Gunboat as a flat when I was a post-doc researcher in Southampton in the early 1990s. Things like Motor Launches (112') and Harbour Defence Motor Launches became things like cruiser boats and Customs cutters. In fact, if you have £45K to spare you could buy either of the last original MLs in 12":1' scale:

?boat=21007 Flower-class Corvettes - as befitted their ancestry, being based on Smith's Dock's southern ocean whale-catcher _Southern Pride_ - mostly became whaling ships post-war, those which didn't go to scrap. I can't recall seeing a whaler featuring in a model display, important though they were in the post-war economy. John Harland's "Catchers and Corvettes" is the key text for the relationships between the corvettes and whalers, and invaluable for anyone who decides to model one...