Print

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

[Unsinkable 2]

When is Wicksteed this year? If it falls within my holidays I might try and get there!

[ballastanksian]

Hi U2, it is on the weekend of 28th and 29th of May.

[Unsinkable 2]

Ah well looks like I'll have to have a 'la Wicksteed' with my 2 boats and maybe Andrew44 because my holidays are not until the end of July  , your boats coming on well by the way.  U2

[ballastanksian]

Ta mate. You could come over next year maybe?

[Starspider]

I'll have a word with swmbo in the morning and see if we can drag the caravan up or I'll shoot up for the day Ian.

[ballastanksian]

Just a quick boat building update.

This the third boat being carved. It is a 20-22 foot motor boat with vertical stem and quite stout looking. The first image is of the main hull block and the upper strip that will give the wales and bow section.


This is of the hull block from the top showing the section that needs to be removed.


And finally the section surgically removed with only a scalpel. No carving was required to remove the piece of scrap balsa


Its a technique I remembered from when I was building my Tudor warships and needed to remove the waist without lots of carving.

More soon.

[radiojoe]

I think it's very satisfying to make something rather than buying it, very neatly done Ian. 

[petesubman]

Hi Ian , good idea modifying  the fletcher hull i have one i thought using for a vw but thought bit was as far as i got regards pete

[ballastanksian]

It is a reasonable base for conversion bearing in mind that it is not symetrical vertically with one side of the bow area being a bit more oblique than the other. This may be the internal shape of the plastic hull being different each side. The hull is a one piece casting, so for the time quite a large piece to make an accurate mould for before plastic car bumpers became common place. 

The plastic readily glues with Plastic weld but the stem and stern need modifying to make an accurate model. Mine has ben through the ringer a few times as I had no concrete references until Dennis kindly sent me some plans but it seems to have survived them!

[ballastanksian]

A little deviation into the world of superstructure.

Like many destroyers of this era, the superstructure is largely confined to the bit that the head of the uptakes live in and the Bridge.

The front two funnels are mounted in a little island with pinted ends also holding the fore boiler room vents , while the aft funnel has a little isle backing onto the aft vent. I nbetween the middle and aft funnels is the bandstand for the midships 4inch gun. I am going for a middle height position for this,


The funnels all now have their eyelets for the stays. These are made from bended wire and glued into the funnel bodies. I could have brought them home for the insides to be painted black but I forgotted


More very soon.

[ballastanksian]

  So you know your day has just been holed by a torpedo and you are sinking when you are now pretty certain that your scratch built superstructure bits are not the same scale as the hull, but indeed larger.

I made the shallow ridge of superstructure and started measuring where the funnel plinths, bandstand and ventilator boxes go and then ran out of space before I could fit the first torpedo launcher and search light position on.

Grrh. I will pop up to Wickie with my Biccu tug instead.

[ballastanksian]

Major change of plan. I am going to build a new hull in 1:72nd to accomodate the larger tophamper. I thought it the lesser of two blooming annoying evils 

Tony Green's Steam Models has a set of plans for about £9.00 and I will enlarge these. A ply and plank hull should not be hard to make having read fellow modellers logs and tutorials and it will be a good test of skills for when I build the Achilles sometime in the next century (at this rate).

[petesubman]

Hi Ian  love what  you have done with lindberg hull ,  i was mulling over a v and w or a hunt class with my  llindberg hull , regards Pete

[ballastanksian]

Do make sure the hull is the right length for the model you want to build. There were numerous slight dimentional differences between the ships depending on who built them. The Lindburgh hull is a good start and as yours is not damaged you can do one of the slightly longer ones!

[petesubman]

How did you make the main armament , lovely detail, i struggle with this stuff, i blame my eyesight, regards Pete

[ballastanksian]

I scratchbuilt a master in styrene using rods and sheet plastic and then moulded and cast the three required in white metal.

The 'kits' have around ten parts. I would remake parts to include the canvass cover that goes behind the shield and the operating lamp that sits on top of the shield.
Of all the 4inch guns used by the RN, there is a plan of this weapon from a series published years back (I cannot remember their name at present) but I used photos and some written info to build them.

[petesubman]

Thanks for the info, regards Pete

[ballastanksian]

I think I have solved the problem of too much deck fittings and not enough hull length 

I measured the torpedo tubes and shortened these by 5mm giving me 10mm spare for the two sets, and reduced the bandstand by 9mm in width.

This gives me a total of 19mm to play with. If I re position the aft gun further back and the funnel group further forward, I get more space allowing for all the main fittings.

Once I have some funds I will re order my deck fittings list from J.R. Haynes that I submitted last year. It would be lovely to get M19 and HMS Ready ready for Wicksteed this year.

Pictures soon.

[warspite]

Thought better of building a fresh hull eh  , don't blame you, other wise you may of considered having two ships with different scales etc. this modelling lark is so much fun 

[raflaunches]

Glad you've worked out a compromise as you've done some fantastic work with both the hull and superstructure- love to see her at Wicksteed this year

[ballastanksian]

I fried my (Rude word) mixer this morning whie trying to get it ready for a lake test before commiting to work on the deck 

I think I wired it into separate power sources on the same distribution board and I don't think mixers like that 


 

[ballastanksian]

Oh well, I Y joined all the motors together and I will give her a pond test soon.

I worked on the torpedo launchers. The cupolas are turned from Modlab with the gear train made from a strip of plank effect styrene card.

The tubes were detailed and fitted to the cupolas before the training mechanisms were added using styrene rod, strip and some wire for the handles.

I have the Launch bottles and breech detail to add before I can claim these done.



The launcher with the shallow cupola sits on the mini superstructure (possibly called the Fidley, though wether this means for the whole length I do not know) forward of the searchlight bandstand.

The bridge received more attention with storage (?) boxes being added to the sides and rear. These were made from Modlab and detailed with styrene strip.


The bridge searchlight was also fitted to its pintle. Has anyone gta an idea of what the mechanism looked like the controlled the light? It had a system of rods and linkages leading from the light down to the bridge deck where it was controlled. I have plans etc but they are way too small for more than just hints.


The searchlight is from J.R. haynes.

[Bob K]

Very nice detailing work there   

[ballastanksian]

Lateral research took me to this vessel showing the mechanism on the searchlight for remote control. I assume the model is simplified and so there would be a switch for the lamp at the bottom as well as a retainer for the control lever.

It is on a P class sloop (Nice looking vessel  ) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P-class_sloop

And:  http://blog.twmuseums.org.uk/page/56/

[raflaunches]

Nice work Ian
I've copied your method of splinter matting for my finishing touches on my Dreadnought