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Coastal range ex-Smit-tug

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Hande:
NOTE-Aligning the driving gear


I'm sure Billing Boats have deliberated on the different materials, but this particular choice caused me headache.
The propeller nozzels are glued with Bostik Grab Adhesive. If I had found the Polyurethan glue at that time, I would have used it.
At any rate, Bostik seems to stick very well.


The rudder support is made of 7 parts each. I learned a lot by assembling, attaching them to the prop nozzles and finishing them with putty. A lot of pain, too.


I was really afraid to install the prop shaft tube supports (I wonder what the official term is...). If I would miss the alignment, I would have had to make new holes and all the rest of the repair work. The hole assy would move after the supports were installed and I thought about it for two days, how to foresee that movement and have the whole assy land in the correct position. I found no scientific method so I did it by trusting my eye and hand. - It went well, thank you very much...


Now everything is nicely aligned. THe prop shaft requires tiny adjustment sideways, but I can do it while achoring the shaft tubes on the inside.


Couldn't be happier about this minor success!


Any opinions about the painting of the rudders? Brass color looks really nice, but in every model that I have seen, the rudders are painted the same color as the hull (antifouling red). I know that it's the reality, too. One doesn't want sea creatures attach themselves on the rudders. So am I vain in the wrong way, if I go with brass and neglect the reality of marine equipment maintenance?

Brian60:
How you paint it is entirely up to you. To be a true replica of the ship then it should be antifouling red. But if you want to interpret it as brass then do so. What I would say is that in real life the rudders would be made of steel, only the propellors would be made of bronze not brass, although I'm sure many ships now have even propellors made of steel for cheapness.

I'll just touch back on the acrylic. using superglue what actually happens is the two sides of the rudder stay as two sides with a layer of glue holding them together in the centre - a bit like a sandwich with two slices of bread and a slice of ham in the middle.

Acrylic bonding agent or weld as it is also known actually melts a micro layer of each side of the rudder, as the weld/bond agent evaporates (it only takes a few seconds) the two micro layers fuse together forming just one piece of acrylic not two. I hope this explains the advantage to you.

Hande:
Of course! Steel - not bronze. Even less brass - how stupid of me! I _was_ thinking of bronze (I confused brass for bronze. Sorry about my poor English...).
So painting the rudders in _brass_ makes even less sense. No matter how pretty.

Let's see how they will turn out. I'll sleep on it.

Hande:
NOTE-Twin propeller spin direction


I switched the propellers across (in my picture they are wrong, I figure). I have understood that they should spin inwards (when forward), obviously countering their rotating directions. The kit came with a right spin and a left spin propeller.


What is the contemporary wisdom about this matter - anyone?

Brian60:
On a standard tug hull viewed from the rear, the left would turn clockwise and the right would turn anticlockwise. This tends to suck/make  the aft end squat down in the water and so enhances pulling power.

On an open aft hull, such as an anchor handling tug (my avatar or the link in my signature for posh venture) they turn the opposites, left turns anticlockwise, right turns clockwise. This doesn't make the aft squat so much. If the rear end squats too far on these the workdeck floods with water even more than it does under normal conditions, such that the ship could become un-manouverable.

Of course real life doesn't always equate to models, so unless you are going to enter tug towing contests, then it really doesn't matter as long as they turn opposite to each other, ie not two left props or two right props.

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