Model Boat Mayhem
Technical, Techniques, Hints, and Tips => Tutorials & "How To’s" ... => Topic started by: RODDERS on September 26, 2008, 07:35:45 pm
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Ive tried soldering brass ,and filing the joins.Ive tried using the heads of those pins with a round ,coloured,bobble,then drilling them using a pin vice, then using the ball for the connection of the posts to the rails.Can you buy them in plastic? Nothing seems to look any good ,and /or is very fiddly to do . I hate building superstructure stuff!
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Hi Rodders
You can buy the pre made/drilled brass stantions and use brass wire for the rails.
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Expensive?
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Expensive?
Yep, but easy.
A less elegant approach is to use wire mesh. I have seen this doen effectivly with rabbit hutch wire (long oblong holes not square) then painted gold to look like brass.
But i saw you were drilling so I figured you wanted refined.
You can also get white metal and plastic stantions.
The white metal are not too expensive. A while since I looked but I think £2.50 for a pack of 10.
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Now that price sounds more in my league! Do you know who does them?
Thanx
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Now that price sounds more in my league! Do you know who does them?
Thanx
Be careful with the white metal stanchions, most people change them to brass because the white metal bends very easily then breaks when you straighten it.
Also, it is very easy to melt the white metal if you aren't used to soldering.
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One of the easiest ways is to use very fine brass split pins. When you solder the top rail it looks like a ball and the pins can easily be bent to accommodate a mid rail. Job done O0 O0
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Thats a good idea ,but I bet they aint easy to get hold of!
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rodders why dont you try jim lane stantions they are reasonably priced and the end results are well worth it O0 and easy to fit, its half round brass and he makes them any scale you require ;)
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If you go to Westbourne Models, you should have a choice of brass machined ball stantions, Billings, Graupner and Robbe spring to mind. They vary around 30p each, depending on the height and number of balls required. So a hundred will only cost about £30. Not a lot when you consider the amount of work (and scrap) involved making them yourself. Plus all the hassle of sourcing the materials.
It all depends how much of the boat you really want to make yourself.
John
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only cost about £30
I feel a little faint ???
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You should be able to get split pins from any engineering suppliers. O0
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I feel a little faint
I think that by the time you have driven around, like most of us do to get all our little bits and bobs, £30 for 100 is nothing.
Who hasn't driven miles to get a couple of £1 fittings?, plus the time involved. Twenty or thirty mile round trip will knock the price of those couple of fittings to most probably £3 or £4 each.
If you look at it realistically, most model boats have cost double what you think, when you add up fuel costs and time wasted on those little unsuccessful forays to get the parts we must have now, even when the boat is six months from finishing, when it could have been done a lot more efficiently if you were willing to pick up a phone and wait a couple of days for postage. How many times have you been to a show, most probably driven a few hundred miles, paid for entry, thinking you can pick up just what you want, and find you buy almost naff all, and what you were after wasn't there anyway. Ok if you are really interested in looking at almost the same models and displays year after year, but a very inefficient and expensive way of getting fittings.
By making them yourself, if you aren't very good at it, you tend to get a 'home made look', buy from the professionals, you usually end up with a professional looking finish.
I have seen some fabulous boats ruined, because of the 'well it would have cost me £10 extra , so I made it out of a toothpaste tube and a lollipop stick' attitude, and it looked like it was made out of a lollipop stick and toothpaste tube (just an example by the way).
You might say that this is the wrong attitude, a lot of people can't afford to spend a lot of money on their models. There is nothing anyone can do about that, if you ain't got it, you can't buy it. But if you want a good looking model and can't do a professional job yourself, you gotta pay. I am not getting at the people who can't afford the bits, but this is the real world, good or bad, that is just the way it is.
Myself, having all the machinery, I would make a lot of special fittings myself, but a lot of the time it just isn't worth the time and effort trying to make it yourself, if it was available from retail sources.
John
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Who hasn't driven miles to get a couple of £1 fittings?
Me, mail order only for me, there isn't a model shop that sells fittings within miles :'(
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'tis true of a lot of stuff. I have spent fortunes on shop visits for all sorts of stuff (mainly for vehicles) .I find it easier and far cheaper to get it on line ...BUT there are downsides! ........today Ive been trying to sort out the return of a piece of faulty hi fi equipment . Yes ,it was cheap when I bought it, from Amazon uk,but trying to find the right person to tell me who to return it to for repair/replacement is a nightmare. I spent about 1 1/2 hrs today ,and never got it resolved. After being told that I had to foot the postage bill to Germany (and they ,generously ,would pay to send it back when repaired!!!) Ive more or less decided to write it off ,and buy a new one ,its only 10 months old ,and will cost £100 to replace.Nothing like shopping local sometimes !
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I use ready made ones via mail order ,far better and neater than anything I can make.
chris
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Who hasn't driven miles to get a couple of £1 fittings?
Me, mail order only for me, there isn't a model shop that sells fittings within miles :'(
Yep your right i googled your location and there aint any model shops anywhere :D :D :D .
I have seen some realy detailed models at shows that have used the wire mesh method and they dont look out of place.
daz