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[Circlip]

Never be an easy archive while the word copywrong is bandied about. After processing more than 5k toy aero plans to O/Z (another 75 in the last fortnight) I sometimes wonder what's going to happen to the more than 14k that Steve holds for FREE download in the event of something happening to him? On the boat side, probably about 2k some of which thanks to a f*rt in a space suit (Now deceased bless him) known to both Chris and Dodgy, having sent and elicited my services to others to scan, clean and convert purely in the interests of preservation. The Sea Vixen (boat) saga was a lucky shot in the dark, resurrected ONLY due to international co-operation, nobody in the land of its conception came up with the plan but thanks to electronic communication, one appeared from our past penal colony. (JOKE Harry). Another one saved from obscurity but important to a select few. With reference to running an archive for boat plans, I was asked a few years ago if I would administer this for the other free mass archive but due to the number of plans I was 'Tiffling' at the time, (and still do), there are only a number of hours in one day.


 The main reason O/Z started was to collate and save the plans that appeared on one of the threads on an American forum. These were mainly from a defunct magazine of which their plan archive had been 'Acquired' by an individual and despite orders being sent for plan copies, nowt came back. As Dodgy is aware, on another thread for boats, on the same site, the acquisition of the plan archive of a model boat manufacturer again now defunct, by a company who has no plans to resurrect the kits but cling to the perceived 'wealth' they own. Thanks to some rebels    many of the designs are freely available.


 BUT, once they're gone, they're gone.


  Regards  Ian.

 

[Colin Bishop]

And there is the Brunel Institute at Bristol which holds the David MacGregor plans collection but has no apparent plans(!) to make them available although you can go and look at them I believe.

They took the model plans as part of a bequest from MacGregor's representatives but I was told that they 'don't fit in with our acquisition policy'. There may be some sort of condition which precludes them from selling the plans to a third party. I think they find them a bit of an embarrassment.

Colin

[Circlip]

And there is the Bodleian that keeps copies of ALL magazines, BUT will only let you copy one article.


  Regards  Ian. Proud possessor of 20 out of 24 issue copies of 'The Model Mechanic' predecessor to Model Maker (The REAL one)

[Dave_S.]

My wife used to work at the Bodlean, and still knows people there. I can ask her if there's any way around the 'one article' limit.

[ChrisF]

Ian - what's O/Z?

Must admit I'm a bit confused regarding rights. Aerokits for example - JoTika state on their web-site that they took over the manufacturing rights in 1999 and now produce the Sea Queen and Sea Commander under the Caldercraft banner and yet SLEC produce the Sea Hornet which was another Aerokits/Les Rowell design, so who does hold the rights to Aerokits?

Then copyright. Vic Smeeds drawings for the Huntsman 28, MM680, for example, as are available from a number of sources. I can understand Sarik having them as they came the Model Maker/Model Boats route but who holds the copyright for all Vic Smeeds designs?

Chris

[Colin Bishop]

The Aerokits rights are complicated, being split between Jotika, SLEC and Lesro! There is a bit of background to this.

Vic Smeed was associated with the various publishers of Model Maker and sister titles but you can often pick up the plans from other online sources as is the case with many older Model Boats plans. I don't think that MyTimeMedia or its successor are much interested in enforcing copyright over these old designs as there is little commercial value in them these days and it would not be cost effective. I bought a copy of the PS Bilsdale plan online fron a internet advertiser which turned out to be a couple living in Canada. The plans were delivered OK but  the scanning process had introduced distortions. The plan is no longer listed by Sarik and the copy I got was probably enlarged from a copy of the magazinne in which it was published. I have that issue in my own collection.

The reality is that many of these plans were reproduced in the original magazine issues to a high standard and can be easily enlarged if you get hold of a copy of the original magazine.

Colin

[ChrisF]

Thanks Colin, I was just interested out of curiosity. Yes, Aerokits sounds a bit complicated and Veron probably is as well.

Drawings for models from both of those, Swordsman and Huntsman 28 respectively were available, might still be, on an internet auction site, consisting of the original kit drawings and really badly drawn templates, which are pretty much useless.

Chris

[Colin Bishop]

Yes, there was a deliberate policy on the part of kit manufacturers to provide only sufficient documentation to make the model as long as you had the bits as well. So 'plans' were not to scale, and frequently not in proportion either which could cause problems in placing fittings.  The most common omission was of course to omit sections so it was difficult to reverse engineer a model if you only had the plan and elevation views.

On top of that, instructions could vary enormously in clarity, some manufacturers were very bad, others better. The instructions for the recent Fairey power boats from SLEC designed by Dave Milbourn were literally models of their kind. A little while back, I made a review model of a traditional fishing boat from a Greek manufacturer. It was a relatively simple static kit and the instructions were pretty clear. The bonus was that it came together with a full sized drawing including all the hull sections which means I could scale it up into a working model if I wish to.

Colin.

[Circlip]

OuterZone Chris and t'other is Aerofred. The copyrite minefield is not helped on many UK generated plans by the successive change of hands, in the main by accountancy firms of the various model mags. A classic example of 'Management stupidity', if you look at Sariks lists, there are a number of plans designated 'X-List' for which not only those but later designs have no picture in the description. I find it unbelievable that no one else has a copy of the 1955 'Aeromodeller Plan Service' handbook where most of the now X series are clearly illustrated and weren''t X at that time. Many designs have been lost due to the deterioration of the plan because not all were drawn on Linen or all rag sheets, ever seen old paper shatter? On one occasion at least one masochist (no, not me) offered to scan the whole of the collection and record electronically for FREE but was turned down by the 'Accountants'. Probably thought HE was going to make millions of pounds selling pirated copies, Doh! wonder how much Sarik makes?
  I think the residue of the AeroKits stock was sold to Jokita which included the stocks of printed plans that were included in the kits originally but think Les Rowell had the masters. Both sold copies of the plans to Joe public.
  Bulk of Vic Smeeds designs were held by APS and later MAP but held his own later ones when he left MAP.


  Dave-S, will send a PM.


  Regards  Ian.


  Forgot to mention Veron. When they closed, Phil Smith retained ALL the master drawings but made available copies which his son now sells.

[ChrisF]

Whilst we have gone off at a tangent, as good discussions always do, it is of course relevant to the topic to ensure that plans are available for future builders, however many there are and as a record.

There are a number of sources of drawings on the internet and as Ian touched on what happens when those that set up the sites and maintain them are no longer capable or around? In some ways, as with photographs, electronic storage is worse than paper copies especially if only held by one person.

Archiving can be a bit mind blowing really. Do you try and archive everything or in our case just concentrate on UK produced drawings and kits? And then just on the better known ones? Even without drawings a list of models and pictures has some merit as at least if someone wanted to build one feelers could be put out for plans. A couple of members are saving as many classic models as they can by collecting/refurbishing/building many of them i.e. Madwelshman and Zooma.

The Aerokits Swordsman and Veron Huntsman 28 drawings with poor templates were Ok for me as the kit drawings were excellent and I used them and original Fairey plans as the basis for my own drawings and having made many alterations to the construction there isn't any problem with copyright. No different to other Fairey models really where some kits were based on existing drawings. For my own part I have pretty much every Fairey drawing available, paper and PDF, except those for the latest SLEC kits.

Chris

Edit: overlapped posts. Thanks Ian, will have a look.

[Colin Bishop]

I was told that the 'X' list consisted of plans that the publishers at the time no longer considered to be worth listing as they were making hardly any sales. The the model boating ones (not sure about the aircraft) were passed over to John Cundell when he retired for him to make available on some sort of franchise basis. When the company later changed hands they were taken back in house much to JC's disappointment and annoyance. The new owners couldn't be bothered to go through the chore of illustrating them online and simply listed them instead. I'm not sure just how accurate this is but it came from a good source.

Colin

[GG]

Well, as my name has been mentioned a few times, perhaps it's worthwhile to add a comment or two and bring it back to the original topic.


Getting youngsters interested via schools, clubs or other societies is not so easy these days.


Schools are often obsessed with students performance and any extra curricular activities which doesn't have an obvious way to boost exam/test scores wouldn't be welcomed. You might disagree with this but before you blame the teachers, they didn't create this measurable performance obsessed culture.


Even if there was some interest in introducing this hobby to youngsters, the people running the show would likely have no experience and have to get someone in.  With the Health & Safety and Child Protection Laws and all the hoops that have to be jumped through and boxes ticked, is there any surprise that they might not feel like doing all this extra work to protect themselves..??


The MPBA has been mentioned and it is hard not to think that they are only currently interested in a limited range of activities in this hobby.  The insurance cover used to be a major reason why club members joined the MPBA but then lots of clubs decided to arrange their own cover presumably at less cost than joining the MPBA.  Having said that, I cannot help but think that the Officers of the MPBA let things slide to what can appear to be a position of total irrelevance to the vast majority of the UK's Model Boaters.


As for accessible and suitable waters, I've never suffered from a serious problem here.  True, I have to drive maybe five miles to use a canal turning basin which is usually very quiet.  The local clubs larger sailing water is more than double that distance away from my home but I'm probably luckier than many. But, you don't need a dedicated sailing water to enjoy this hobby.


Back to schools and the lack of knowledge in the teaching staff of our and related hobbies.  I've long thought that the publishers of relevant magazines (scale modelling, planes, boats, cars, etc) could have put together something and sent to schools perhaps once a term.  It could reprint items, perhaps abridged, that have some relevance to the curriculum. There is a lot of project work in school and believe me, ideas for new and interesting projects are not easy to come by especially if it's something that has to work!  Cheap to do as it could be sent out via the internet. There is some sensible scope for advertising things like sources of materials, glues, paints.


Ah, a shade more written than originally intended.
Glynn Guest

[SteamboatPhil]

Young members has been a problem for at least the last 25 years, our club (Blackheath Model Power Boat Club) tried may things, we introduced Radio control (in a straight running club, what could go wrong.......well aerial sword fighting for starters, then we tried mini straight running at one of the model engineer exhibitions, then when my Dad was teaching DT at school, they had a vac form machine, sooooo he made a mould and produced 18 inch hulls (the longest he could get into the machine) took them to shows and gave them away, all you had to do was go to Proops (remember them) buy the running gear and a tube glue and you are away......result nothing


Now as GG has said we in the MPBA are a bit slow, and believe me I have sat on so many meetings over the years where they try and solve the problem of not only new members but the youngsters as well.. now there is another problem which has been mentioned before...child protection act.


When I left the entertainment industry I went into teaching Drama, the school that I was at (independent) have a not bad workshop, so I started an after school model engineering club I had 12 students and the first thing I taught them was building a little oscillating engine, followed by a boiler (over several months obviously) most of them worked and they all got a commendation at the Midlands model engineer exhibition (several years ago) Meanwhile the head of DT at the school had now idea how the lathe or milling worked as ( again as GG has said) that is not their thing, they have a curriculum to fill (stick part A to part B) get a good grade and have now knowledge of models.


I then went on to design a small sailing yacht (sort of based on the we nip) very easy to build (note to self not all students know how to treat super glue with respect) I still had the same 12 students and this was their second year with me. I taught them how to cast the lead keel (they liked that it involved huge flame)
Well they were all finished, 2 channel radio, simple. Took the school mini bus to Bushey park (Surrey) and let them loose.....a lot of crash ban wallop, nothing sank.
As far as I know they are all still going, they all wanted a new project after that and came up with a 5 inch gauge loco......, the school approved, I did a deal with Polly Model Engineering....and then Covid.......
So I retired
Sad, who knows where it would have led


Like GG, gone on a bit


And still no answers

[Colin Bishop]

Well, no one could criticise you for trying Phil. Teaching is a skill, which both you and Glynn share. I'm happy to explain things to people which, is why I concentrate on the writing side these days, but teaching is much more of a two way interaction and requires different skills which I lack.

In the more general situation I do find it encouraging that there is now a more positive attitude to acquiring practical skills with aprenticeships becoming more popular again and recognised as a pathway to a worthwhile career. The idea that almost everyone should go to university and get a degree has always been a disaster in my view and doesn't recognise that people have differing talents. It has resulted in degrees in subjects which are of doubtful practical use in the jobs market, such as media studies, and simply landed students in debt.

Getting qualifications in practical skills is far more worthwhile whether they are in what used to be termed white collar or blue collar jobs. In both cases competence has always been the thing to achieve as that is what will earn you a decent living. I have come across many graduates with excellent paper quailfications who have been pretty useless at the jobs they managed to get. It's the people who understand the 'nuts and bolts' either on Paper/Information Technology or in applying hardware that actually make a difference.

I've also always been in favour of learning on the job but combining study with earning a living which gives you a good practical grounding. In my case it was day release to get an HNC in public administration but applies equally in respect of the City & Guilds vocational qualifications.

Colin

[ChrisF]

At school I did woodwork and metalwork and enjoyed using the the lathes in each department and the forge and other equipment. The school still has lathes and a forge, albeit electric now rather than coke (!) but sadly none of the teachers know how to use them.     So the children who might be inspired and interested to go into engineering etc. don't get the opportunity at an early age before they choose a career.

On the subject of plans again, I was reading the digital version of MB earlier and there is an article on Model Maker plans etc., very timely.

I agree with you Colin about studying and working and like you followed that route. My two sons went to university though, but that was the right route for them.

Chris

[JimG]

I'm an ex teacher (Chemistry) and even when training there were comments being made that Techical teachers were not coming in from industry with wood and metal working experience. I finished up as a school technician (much less stress) and the school I ended up at was new built and had plenty of new machine tools including three lathes. A lot of the work using these relied on the technician who was an ex toolmaker. (He retired a year after me and don't know the qualifications of the new technician.) Even though I have a small lathe at home plus a bandsaw I couldn't use the ones at work as to do so you had to have attended a training course for them. No such courses were available as the local authority wouldn't spend the money on training.At least there was simple wood and metalwork classes for the first 2 years with the option of continuing on to do Craft and Design quailification.
Jim

[Subculture]

When I was at school in eighties, access to equipment was exceedingly restricted. In metalwork they had a nice pair of Colchester Bantams, but I never saw them turn a revolution.  This was during the time woodwork and metalwork became “design technology” and you ended up spending more time in the classroom than the workshop, trying to teach you to run before you could crawl IMO.

My Dad had a small Zyto lathe, but that and the bandsaw were off limits, I think he was concerned I’d use them unsupervised and risk losing digits. When I started an engineering apprenticeship and the first year was full time at a technical college where I spent three days in the workshop, where I got a thorough basic grounding in milling, turning and bench fitting.

After that I was allowed to use the bandsaw and lathe in the home workshop.

[Geoff]

When I was at school they had a well equipped workshop but I left before I got the chance to really use it. The workshop was great but the rest of the school was awful which is why my parents moved me. Smaller school but no equipment at all.


Now one of the first lessons the teacher told us was to hold our hands up and count the number of fingers. He then said at the end of the year there would be a few missing if we didn't do as he told us! It clearly sank in because at the end of the year we all still had all of our fingers!


It was also some of the little things - we were taught at 13 how to wire a plug because in those days most electrical devices did not come with a plug, you had to buy it separately. Some other practical skills were also taught and some good experiments with a Van-der Graff generator - lots of sparks!! which I still remember.


Fundamentally the world has moved on and children are not introduced to the concept of making or repairing things but just to buy something new so many do not discover the sense of achievement in making things, and there is little perceived social benefit to be seen from making model boats.


On public lakes many people look at you in disbelief when you say you made it! Some still cannot understand that a yacht uses wind to move. To be fair if people have never been introduced to the concept there is no reason why they would even have thought about it. As kids we made small yachts and motor boats to sail in the local pond (now long gone) we made our own kites and other stuff so we naturally learned a lot of practicable skills.


I don't think any of us have a real answer other than to be friendly and keep trying and let youngsters have a try where practicable. Lockdown didn't help as it killed lots of shows so no where for potential new members to go and see.


I think one item is that most model boaters have been doing the hobby for years so what they build and sail are very good and a youngster may look at that and think, no way can I do that, which is a circular argument and they are put off. We all agree without youngsters joining in then the hobby will go the way of the dinosaurs!


Sorry, no answer here!


Cheers


Geoff

[roycv]

Hi all we had our Christmas evening yesterday and I ended up in conversation with our very own teenager who came on his own via another club.  He was saying that the 15 - 17 year olds are on their phones.  I understood him to mean that they could partake anonimously or withdraw, he said he had a few 'friends' he had never met, they could be anyone maybe even living next door! 
I asked about the lack of interpersonal skills that this would lead to.  He responded that on occasion he met some and they behaved like 10 year olds.
I asked how he had moved on as he was a quietly confident young man nicely spoken that anyone would be proud to have in the family.  He said he got used to it and commented you will never get them here as you are all soooooo old! 

He did say that he had just done his mock GCSE's and this was clearly important to him. 
I think we must all accept that there is so much pressure on performance and having a qualification as the main method of employing young people.  You have to accept that we have to work with the system as it is now.  It is all done on-line   it is just the way things are now.  We as I am sure other clubs have, a presence on facebook and we are watching to see how that pans out.

It looks like the main source of young people to any of our disciplines is via Parents who bring them.  We had an interest about 6 months ago from a mother with a 14 year old lad who liked to build and mend things and he was interested.  He was working with his dad renovating a sports car.  Then he got an invitation to join in a small team in motor sport and he went to them.  I do not this think of this as a loss but rather a lad who was going to get his hands dirty doing someting he enjoyed.
Maybe it is us oldies that need to adjust?  The times are so different from our now distant youth experiences. 

Having read previous threads it is all there, but needs bringing together in a new way.
At our recent Model Show (2000 visitors) I was fortunate to find the Headmaster at last, they have good reason to walk quickly!  We shared a mutual friend, I had just found out, which helped a lot.  I was able to say how we had failed over the last few years to contact any of the teaching staff and they do have a craft and technology section.  He identified himself with an email address for future contact next year.  Fingers crossed!
regards
Roy

[phil_parker]

If we want to get people involved in our hobby, WE need to get out there and sell it.

That means taking stands of model boats to local events. Maybe even hiring the local village hall and putting on a show ourselves. The general public are NOT going to seek out a pond hidden away unless they are interested already. Those sailing on public pools have the chance to engage people, some of whom may not know yachts are powered by wind, and chat. The success rate will be tiny, but it's going to be higher than sitting on forums moaning no-one wants to join the hobby (this isn't an exclusive model boat thing...).

People are interested, but at the moment, unless they pick up the only magazine on WH Smith's shelves, or randomly search online, they aren't going to be exposed to this hobby.

Even if Warwick show returns, that doesn't help, you only go there if you are interested. We need to be where people are, and there will be lots of general events where a free display stand will be possible. It doesn't matter how small. Your village fete (and before someone leaps up and says they don't have one as though that means the whole idea is doomed, ANY village fete) will do.

People need people to engage them. It's up to us.

[Colin Bishop]

Phil is quite right but I rather suspect that for most older model boaters the energy is no longer there. I still enjoy building models, not so much running them, but but advancing years tend to focus your interests and, to be honest, at the age of 74, I have other priorities to enjoy in my declining years than in actively promoting the hobby, but I salute the efforts of those that do. I rather suspect I am not alone in this respect.  (how the hell did I get to 74 anyway? I was just 60 only yesterday!  )

Colin

[Subculture]

What it requires is many to offer small amounts of their time, rather than a few having to contribute a large effort.

I think it's rather too late to stop the ship from sinking, but may be able to slow its descent.

[ChrisF]

I'm guessing that many of the membership who contribute to this forum have been modellers from when they were young? Unlike me for whom it's only been 5 years. We had a spike in interest and builds during lockdown but haven't heard anymore from most of them since.

I think that even if you could get youngsters interested in the majority of cases it would only be a passing interest as it was for one of my brothers and myself. I don't remember my other brother being interested. We moved on to messing with motorcycles and scooters and then cars followed by work and family and little time for hobbies and other interests. I only became interested in model boats as I was looking for a winter hobby as I approached retirement and came from a conversation with a neighbour who is interested in various RC and my lifelong involvement with full-size family boats. So there was an element of luck with me getting interested. What drew others into the hobby and when?

Chris

[tonyH]

I get the horrible feeling that we're a generation too late. I'm 74 and learnt the art of " doing stuff" from my dad. I've tried to give some of the skills to my kids but it was an uphill battle where many of the things we learnt on, cars, washing machines, radios etc. started to call for specialist/modular replacement bits rather than a soldering iron/spanner. Now, a generation later, what use generally is the ability to wield a Stanley knife apart from, of course, doing the decorating? I had a retirement job in a proper hardware shop and it was pretty obvious that there was generally a real skill difference between the age groups.
All is not lost though. A lot of the skills that tended to be the domain of the ladies, knitting, sewing, gardening etc. still ring true so, perhaps, we need to learn from them......again! There are plenty of videos on-line about the finer points of all forms of modelling but I don't know of any that do the "how to draw a straight line" or "how to use a Stanley knife without slicing your finger off" variety but I reckon that's where we need to start.
 

[roycv]

How true TonyH  and I am 10 years older than you.  Best to ignore age I do.
Over the years when I wanted to learn something from scratch I would visit the childrens section in the library.
Some things are difficult to work out I remember in Spanish wondering what is the equivalent of some.....  It was ages before I found out it was the plural of 'one'  Uno and Unos.  Some things are assumed.
I reckon during covid lock-down there were a lot of model boat kits bought to pass the time.  Were they built?  have we seen any new boaters?
regards
Roy