Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length.

[barriew]

I know its quite common to enlarge plans, but is it feasible to reduce them? There are some nice plans available for quite large models- the Vivacity for example - but I try to keep my models down to a max of 24 inches for ease of transport and handling.


Barrie

[Neil]

just the same process with me barrie............I take it down to my local print shop and he does it in sections on the printer and then I piece it together.........make sure you leave an overlap on each copy so you have leeway to glue it all together. neil.

[inertia]

Barrie
If your print shop has anything like a decent-sized scanner i.e. big enough to scan the original in one pass, then you'll probably get a single sheet plan. John E Wright in Nottingham scanned a full-size big Huntsman plan for me (drawn 60" x 40"). My advice is to have 2 copies made at the same time. You can work with one and leave the other pristine for any notes you want to make.
If scanning to disk then make sure they use an output format which can be downloaded onto your PC and edited (like JPG). I have a scanned Swordsman plan which purports to be PDF but no way will it open with anything other than Adobe Reader.
Dave M

[grendel]

with pdf there are two types, one is literally a photograph of the plan, the other saves as a vector line format, only the more modern versions of acrobat can see these, not too sure about other pdf reader software.
If you can find a local company that has a drawing office / department, they should have the equipment to scan print and copy nowadays, so sweet talking the guys / gals who work there might be possible.
(unfortunately in my new job we only have a large format printer - not the scanner.
Grendel

[barriew]

Thanks guys - I knew it was technically possible. I wasn't sure if reducing the model would affect its sailability.


Barrie

[grendel]

when you think about it, our models sail, and they are reduced from the originals.
Grendel

[Colin Bishop]

Thanks guys - I knew it was technically possible. I wasn't sure if reducing the model would affect its sailability.

Yes, there will be an effect on sailability if you reduce plans. Whether it matters or not depends on the type of boat and degree of reduction. For example, if you reduce the length by half then the hull volume will only be one third of the original size. This has a major effect on sailing boats as the sail area can rapidly become far too great for the size of hull! It is less of a problem with powered models but you can still run into stability issues if you reduce by too much depending on the nature of the prototype.

Poor stability is a common problem with many types of model boat where the builder hasn't fully understood the issues involved.

These effects can be quite significant but to give an example with full size boats, a 35 foot yacht will, to most intents and purposes, be twice the size of a 25 foot one.

If you can give us some idea of what you are thinking of doing then we can give you some idea as to whether you are likely to run into any problems and, if so, how to deal with them.

Colin

[mrlownotes]

I thought if you reduced the length by a half then the displacement reduces down to 1/8th the original.
The converse being true for upsizing - double the length gives 8 times the displacement.

[barriew]

If you can give us some idea of what you are thinking of doing then we can give you some idea as to whether you are likely to run into any problems and, if so, how to deal with them.

Colin

Colin - I don't have a specific model in mind at the moment. It was just something I was interested in as I am finding it more difficult to find models which I find attractive and which fall within my size parameters. For example, the Vic Smeed Vivacity would be one I might consider if I could reduce it to about 24 inches  max.


Barrie

[Colin Bishop]

I thought if you reduced the length by a half then the displacement reduces down to 1/8th the original.
The converse being true for upsizing - double the length gives 8 times the displacement.

Yes, I should have said that the length and area goes down by the square root and the volume by the cube root.

A 24 inch Vivacity would be OK but you would need to make the construction more lightweight than the original!

Colin

[joppyuk1]

Our local branch of STAPLES, the office stationery group, has a copyshop that can handle sheets up to A0 to any percentage up or down.

[barriew]

Thanks for all the info. I just might try it one day


Barrie

[Plastic - RIP]

One huge problem with enlarging and reducing model plans is that all of the specified material thickness's will be wrong - if you go down by half, your bulkheads are scaled for half-thickness planking - but that may be impractical.

If you use normal thickness, your decks won't fit properly.

Keels may be flimsy or out-sized and you may have too many bulkheads to fit anything in between.

Your superstructure may be really heavily built making the boat unstable.

Things can get complicated so lots of adjustments need to be considered while building.