Many many years ago ( I think I was about 10 years old), my grandfather gave me a set of true blue prints for an old lifeboat that he, as a master pattern maker, had worked on, as a very young apprentice only for me to store them away for many more years until my skills had been honed to close what they are now.
It was about 25 years ago that I took a look at them and realised what they were.......blue prints of the Duke of Northumberland, the first Hydraulic powered steam lifeboat built in 1886.
this to all intents and purposes was Water Jet Drive, long before the modern jet drive systems of such boats as the Dutch Valentijn and the RNLI Shannon class boats use.
It incorporated a twin cylinder horizontal compound steam engine running a centrifugal pump which sucked in water through a scoop in the keel of the hull, to be blown out of forward and reverse facing outlets on the sides of the hull.
I made a plug and mould of the boat at 1:12 scale including a hull, which ( having been made of steel/iron? was plated, and these plate lines were taken from the original blue prints, and were visible on the mouldings.
Sadly two "happenings" were to occur. The original moulds and mouldings which had been in storage at a "friends" house were thrown away as the friend thought I didn't want it because it had been months if not a year or more since I had touched it because of other commitments ( i.e. the arrival of my first daughter), and whilst n a holiday from the school I taught at, the plans "went missing", never to be seen again.
And that was the end of the story until a fortnight ago, when I saw a plug for sale on ebay of her sister boat, the 56' Hydraulic lifeboat QUEEN.
I notified Baloo on here and told him about it as he has a smaller scale model of the boat.
He told me he was watching it and was going to bid on her.
I told him that I wouldn't interfere, but if he did buy it, and fancied me making moulds and mouldings I would, and so we came to an arrangement........and the boat plug ended up in my back lounge, lol.
Who ever made this plug, and it's not so old being made from bread and butter MDF has made the most beautiful job on it that I have ever seen. There is slight damage to the hull which will be a doddle to repair and she has been marked fastidiously with shell plate and station/support beam lines, making it a real easy process once the lengths of plates has been determined and a little filling and sanding to plate.
And so this will be my next project after the ferry.........complete with hydraulic drive, which I have also been thinking about, and in the next post will be revealing how I wish to go about that......but for now some photos of the hull showing all the markings for plating and a view of her port quarter of those beautiful and exquisite lines of her.
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Topic: A NEW LIFEBOAT MODEL... STEAM LIFEBOAT QUEEN (Read 43242 times)