Model Boat Mayhem
The Shipyard ( Dry Dock ): Builds & Questions => Navy - Military - Battleships: => Topic started by: Geoff on June 24, 2013, 02:04:18 pm
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I'm looking to build a model of this ship in 1/96 scale and am having trouble in locating the hull lines.
To clarify:
- I recall that a gentleman by the name of "Ron H" had constructed a splendid model and I was able to download from the thread a copy of the bulkheads but clearly there was some distortion in scanning as the weather deck beam of the aft lines was narrower that the weather deck beam of the fore lines (they must be the same amidships). Despite resizing on a copier I still can't get the lines to match as if I have the right beam then the depth is off. Also I don't know the distance between the various bulkheads but my suspicions are that there are a number half bulkhead lines so it's not just a case of a linear division.
- I have plans from "Sambrook" purchased many years ago from Maritime Models but have lost the lines part albeit I recall the lines I had were headed as Benbow (sister ship).
- A friend also has these plans and kindly scanned the Benbow bulkheads, but they are entirely different from the ones used by RH. There are also some clear inacurate lines with bulges/bumps, so I'm not certain of those plans either and there is no tumblehome showed at all. It's posible these are inside frames but there is a distinct bulge in the bow area which is almost absent on the RH ones?
- Does anyone know if the Sambrook plans are still available and/or have copies or any other suggestions where I can obtain the right bulkheads/lines.
It's all very confusing as I was anticipating a good match but the two plans appear to be completley different. I have started to draw my own based on the RH ones but it's a long process and I'd rather build to exact lines than a guestimate.
Thanks in advance for any suggestions that may be forthcoming.
Cheers
Geoff
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Dave Metcalf has bought out the Sambrook plans range and now sells them although they don't seem to be mentioned on his website.; http://business.virgin.net/metcalf.mouldings/catalogue.htm (http://business.virgin.net/metcalf.mouldings/catalogue.htm)
Plans for Iron Duke are listed on the hard copy I got from him at a recent show.
Colin
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To hand I had 3 drawings of hull lines:
A, a 13.5inch battlecruiser (Lion, Princess Royal or Queen Mary)
B, HMS Dreadnought
C, HMS warspite (with hull blisters)
If I was to form a view, I'd say the battlecruisers had more tumbleholme, then it would be Warspite with Dreadnought last.
The 3 hull lines attached in case you don't get any further plan sheets you can have a more informed educated guess.
P.S. There's a book that may be of use to you about the building of a model of the Orion class HMS Thunderer:
http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1848320590/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=historin3d-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1848320590 (http://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/1848320590/ref=as_li_tf_tl?ie=UTF8&tag=historin3d-21&linkCode=as2&camp=1634&creative=6738&creativeASIN=1848320590)
While it's not your ship, the same materials and principles to construction will apply along with all the same fittings such as anchors, funnels, boats, decking, hatches, turrets, etc, will be the same, they are just arranged in a different way. :-)
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Regards the distance apart each frame is: you have the model length then divide by the number of frames. Simples. Where you may have trouble is if you don't have the side view of the 'lines' sheet.
Though you have a good 90% of the information from the hull sections alone, what you need is a good representation of the ram bow and how the area around the props and rudders was shaped. If yu can't get a bonafide plan, the above book may help here.
Good Luck with the model.
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what you need is a good representation of the ram bow and how the area around the props and rudders was shaped.
Some lateral thinking:- You could buy an Aifix model of HMS Iron Duke to directly scale aspects not apparent on the hull sections, and how the sections such as ram bow and around props blend together. A good digital vernier can be very useful, plus the eye can see the blends better on a 3D 'master'.
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I would suggest that you purchase a set of drawings from the NMM.
A building log and the current location of the model can be found here: http://www.shipmodels.info/mws_forum/viewtopic.php?f=75&t=20253 (http://www.shipmodels.info/mws_forum/viewtopic.php?f=75&t=20253)
Please do not try to contact the builder as he is now quite unwell.
LB
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Confusing.......sorry.......Derek
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Thank you for all the suggestions. I was aware of the build blog on Iron Duke and copied the bulkhead plans but on printing they don't match up which is what caused the problem. I also tried dividing the length by an equal amount and they just did not fit. The 6" battery position gives a good location idea but however I played with the plans I could not get a good match.
In the end I bought some plans from the Maritime Museum. Total cost was about £88 including postage and handling. I purchased theree plans being the forecastle deck and main deck and sheer plan (which include all the bulkheads). the only problem is they are huge as they are all to 1/48 scale (the museum can only reproduce to the actual size) and some of the plans (not hull length) are about 18 feet long! The only place I can really view them is in the garden from an upstairs window! ha, ha!
I would like to comment that the advice and help I got from the NMM was excellent, they were responsive and answered by e-mail virtually overnight. I ordered them on 4th July and took delivery today which I think is a really excellent service.
Yes the price is high but there is an enormous amount of detail and given that the model will take a couple of years to build the cost is not prohibitive over that time span and I know the model will be accurate.
Thanks for all the suggestions and comments. I'll probably not have anything to report for a while now whiclst I digest how to re-draw the plans and start the build.
Cheers
Geoff
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Take the drawings to your friendly local copy shop and ask them to do you a set reduced to the size/scale you require. Ask them also to save the copies to DVD/stick this will enable you to just have certain sections reproduced i.e. the frames, stern and bow profile.
LB
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For anyone interested I picked up the plans catalogue from Dave Metcalf at the Coalville show, these are the following plans available:
HMS Hedingham Castle 1/48 £16
HMS Warspite 1/192 £16
HMS Bryony 1/48 £16
HMS Royal Oak. 1/192 £16
HMS Royal Oak. 1/128 £18
HMS Queen Elizabeth. 1/192 £16
HMS Queen Mary 1/192 £8
HMS Monarch 1/192 £8
HMS Iron Duke 1/192 £14
HMS Invincible 1/192 £16
HMS Belfast 1/192 £12
HMS Gambia 1/192 £10
HMS Manchester 1/192 £10
HMS Chester 1/192 £10
HMS Matabele 1/192 £10
HMS Arunta 1/192 £10
HMS Caesar 1/192 £5
HMS Hardy 1/192 £5
HMS Grove. 1/96 £10
HMS Mary Rose. 1/192 £5
HMS Bar. 1/48 £16
HMS Cavalier. 1/96 £16
HMS Onslow. 1/96 £5
HMS Fal. 1/96 £10
HMS Toreoador. 1/96 £8
HMS Bluebell. 1/96 £10
HMS Bryony. 1/96 £8
I'll upload the other 2 pages later
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As promised here is next two pages
HMS Gardenia 1/96. £8
HMS Kilburn 1/32. £10
HMS Hermes. 1/192. £5
HMS General Wolf. 1/192 £8
HMS Marshall Soult 1/48 £ 12
HMS Apollo 1/192. £5
HMS M15 1/72 £10
HMS Speedy 1/48. £14
73ft Vosper MTB. 1/24. £10
HMT St Abbs 1/48 £10
HMT Brigand 1/48. £14
HMT Samsonia. 1/72. £10
HMT Stormking. 1/48. £12
Bismarck. 1/200. £16
SS Marthura. 1/96. £16
SS Hilda. 3/16" to 1ft £12
SS Hilda. 1/48. £14
MV Ilala. 3/16" to 1ft £12
SS Hunan. 1/96. 12
SS Sard. 1/48. £10
SS Thrift. 1/96. £10
MV Europa. 1/50. £14
ST Seaway. 1/32. £14
MT H.Block. 1/32. £8
ST Ocean Unity. 1/32. £8
MT Alexandra Bruce 1/48 £10
Pilot Cutter Chimeara 1901 1/32. £10
PS Red Gauntlet 1892 1/48. £12
BNS Amapa. 1/96 £10
MB Manatee. 3/16" to 1ft. £5
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Small update. The original plans from the Maritime museum also show some small discrepancy between the bow and stern bulkheads which translates into anout 1mm at 1/96 scale so a little fudging needed. So far I have cut all the bulkheads out from 1/8 ply and am just finishing them off, plane and coarse sandpaper to get them to the correct shape, then I'll cut out the middle of each to ensure I have adequate access for all the equipment I want to install.
Next step will be to draw out and cut the main deck so I can ensure all bulkheads fit exactly at that level.
Long way to go but still have until 31/05/2016!
Cheers
Geoff
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Hope you going to post the build up Geoff, I for one would like to see it
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Not too pretty but easier to print.
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I have the Sambrook plans but lost the lines part over the years. A friend has the lines but they do not appear to be accurate as there are definate discrepancies. The set I had (same as my friends) gave me the lines of Benbow and show the side perfectly flat with no tumblehome. Other plans and photographs clearly show a tumblehome which threw me. It's quite possible the Sambrook plans have been updated as mine are literally decades old!
Even copies of the originals from the Maritime museum show some line discrepancies (3mm in beam difference betwen the bow and stern sections) but clearly show the tumblehome which is correct.
I copied the bulkheads down to 1/96 scale and then adjusted the beam by about 1mm and drew the longitudinal lines from those and they all fitted and flowed with no inconsitencies, so I am reasonably happy. I can't do anthing more than use the original plans.
I'll post further and try to get some pictures once something interesting has happened!
Regards
Geoff
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Despite the silence I have made some progress. All the bulkheads and main deck have been cut out of 4mm plywood together with the bow and stern templates and all finished to shape.
I now need to cut all the keel and side stringer slots and dry assemble.
Nothing really to photograph just yet but I'll follow up in due course.
Cheers
Geoff
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When you get the photos up Geoff no doubt you will find a few more replies.
Waiting in anticipation,
Ned
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My wife's Grandfather served on HMS Iron Duke, including at Jutland. I understand he was a cook on board.
She was born in Pompey, with generations of her family serving in the R.N. and Dockyards.
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At long last something to show, some actual progress. All the frames have ben cut out and fixed to the keel on a building board to keep everything straight. The main deck has been fitted which defines the all important deck shape. Imperfections in the hull can be readily corrected (if any) but the deck line is critical to the model. I have also made the forcastle deck but not yet fitted in the pictures.
I have started on the planking and the 6ft 6" first and second planks fought me all the way. I have ordered 24 small G clamps to assist. The problem is the plank is just too long and puts too much strain on the glue joints unless pinned to every frame which means the glue has gone off a little by the time you get to the last frame!
Oh well progress and once I have a couple of key planks in place I expect progress will be quicker with shorter planks, I hope!
Cheers
Geoff
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Geoff....if the glue has "gone off'....before the full length of the plank is correctly placed & pinned sounds like you are using a >>:-( "super glu"..........there are certainly alternatives to this .......
Polyurethane adhesives offer a superior bond strength and is totally water proof when cured %) & you won't experience the quick set issue.....Derek
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Thank you, that's quite a good idea. At the moment I'm using Resin W which is a good glue with reasonable grip but the problem I have with each plank being nearly 7 feet long it just takes time to pin and fix particularly if pin or two does not hold.
I am hoping that once I have a couple of key planks each side I will be able to plank in shorther lengths, overlapping joints like brickwork, and of course can pin to the fixed planks.
The main problem I have is keeping the plank in at the bows so plan on using Resin W for all areas other than just the bow where I'll try some hot glue as that will fix and hold in very quick time.
I'll report back when my G clamps arrive and have another go.
Cheers
Geoff
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Geoff,
I suggest that you invest in some good quality waterproof glue and reasonable quality stapler to affix your planks to the frames; also start gluing from the bow after first establishing their run along the hull, use blocks of the same timber at the extreme ends of the bow and stern, fill the gaps with stealers.
When complete cover the interior with resin and thin matting if you wish also fill any tight compartments at the bow and stern with resin as well as where the planks join the keel. You may then remove the staples and cover the exterior with fine glass fibre matting and resin filler and attend to any remaining holes depressions etc., with bar body filler.
LB
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Once the key planks each side were in place progress was quite rapid. As the pictures will show I started planking at the warterline upwards. Then inserted another key plank following the natural curve at the bilge level and planked in the gaps. A little tricky with some odd shapes needed. The hull was then removed from the building board and turned upside down and the planking finished and sanded smooth. Note the flat ply section amidships - this follows the flat bottom profile of the original ship but did cause some awkward plank shapes to be chamfered in. Next step it to coat the outside with epoxy resin then 25g fibreglass and more epoxy. Just waiting for the epoxy to arrive!
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A few more pictures.
G
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Lovely work - especially nice to see planks laid all the way to the bow and staggered joins.
A lesson to all.
Jerry
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^What he said - it's a lovely job.
Andy
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Great looking project, I'm looking forward to seeing your next pictures.
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Thank you for your kind comments. I'll post some more pictures shortly. Not much progress in evidence but it has now been fibreglassed and followed by lots of sanding. I had some trouble with the epoxy resin cureing due to the low temperatures but that seems to have worked out now after a few weeks!
On a practical basis I epoxyed the bare hull to avoid any dry spots. Then sanded and covered the hull in a single piece of 25gram cloth and rolled the resin in. It all stretched and layed flat other than at the very stern so a few wrinkles there. After sanding smooth a second coat of resin was applied and then the temperature dropped! >:-o
But all seems to be well now :-)
Geoff
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Looking forward to more of this build Geoff :-))
Dave
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Ah, the warm fuzzy feeling when seeing a battleship model being created is wonderful. I wish you well in your project and am interested to see the hull started the right way up rather than upsidedown. Another thing to note.
Keep us a breast of your progress:O)
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I guess is a bit late to say that I have the hull line of Latorre ex HMS Canada, wich is essentially and enlarged Iron Duke...
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So do I. I bought it of the bay a few months back. A superb looking ship.
Ha, If Canada was given 15inch tubes she would have been the most pwerful thing afloat until the Japanese went for 16inch guns in 1916ish.
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Our most powerful naval unit ever. Ah, if only it wouldn't have been sold as scrap... ought have been a museum ship.
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Technically a multinational one given its original owner so this would have added interest for displays etc. But as you say, she went the way of all our other capital ships of the twentieth century:O(
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I make this work in the house ........... {:-{
Above chairs :((
Above the carpe >:-o
I am a dead man! >>:-( <*<
Goodbye the friends <:(
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Suppose this should be another thread - BUT - why was Belfast saved and not some of the other more decorated ships? and on that note what other ships are still around british shores from the WWI/II era (I think there used to be one at Brighton in the 90's at the marina).
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By the time Belfast stopped active service all the battleships had been scrapped. Perhaps she was in very good condition and thus less of a drain on funds to convert?
How is that Iron Duke going?
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HMS Cavalier (1944) was in Brighton.
Now in the Historic Dockyard Chatham.
Ned
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HMS Caroline is in Belfast a cruiser form WW1 and the only ship still in existence form the Battle of Jutland, she is being preserved.
There's a WW1 6" monitor in Portsmouth dockyard.
An A class submarine, HMS Alliance in the submarine museum at Gosport from late WWII
Various harbour defence craft and MTB/MGBs around the country.
We are and have been very poor in preserving our Naval history.
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We only have RM Huáscar, a XIX century monitor captured to Perú, the Simpson which is an Oberon class submarine from the '60 and a concrete replica of Esmeralda, a wooden corvette sunk by Huáscar in 1879. Too many glorious ship, too few museum ships. Coming back to what reunite us, how is Iron Duke doing this days? It'd be nice to see pictures and an update of the construction :)
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Work on Iron Duke has stalled somewhat as I got distracted by some model yachting (please don't shoot me!) but I hope to start work again shortly now the weather has warmed up a little as I can do some more fibreglasing.
Also I am pondering whether to cover the whole hull in car body filler and sand back for an ultra smooth finish or accept the fairly good finish I have and start the hull plating and bilge keels.
I have a deadline to finish her 31 May 2016 so I need to get on with it!
I'll try to get some more pictures up shortly.
Cheers
Geoff
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I have a deadline to finish her 31 May 2016 so I need to get on with it!
Cheers
Geoff
Battle of jutland date by any chance?
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yep, but not by chance :-)
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So do I. I bought it of the bay a few months back. A superb looking ship.
Ha, If Canada was given 15inch tubes she would have been the most pwerful thing afloat until the Japanese went for 16inch guns in 1916ish.
What about HMS Agincourt?
She had the biggest broadside weight for weight of any vessel when she was built.
14 x 12inch guns, I know that are only 12inch guns but what a broadside!
Unfortunately the Iron Duke class were not strong enough to hold 5 x twin 15inch turrets that's why the QE class only had 4 x twin 15inch turrets and used the space left by the Q turret for extra boiler rooms.
I'll be looking forward to seeing your Duke finished for the Jutland anniversary- it'll be a worthy model to commemorate the 100th anniversary.
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...I am pondering whether to cover the whole hull in car body filler and sand back for an ultra smooth finish or accept the fairly good finish I have and start the hull plating and bilge keels.
Geoff, if you went for the ultra-smooth finish (a pile of sanding!) you'd then have a great surface to apply just the "raised" plates.
Here's an aft view of Dreadnought:
(http://www.history.navy.mil/photos/images/h61000/h61015.jpg)
The plate lines are very subtle, but undeniably "there". I think, at 1/96th scale, it would be great to show them: you'd expect to see them.
Andy
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Deadbeat you forgot to mention the WW1 flower class corvette tied up on the Thames embankment H.M.S. Chrysanthemum, as far as I know she is still there.
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That's a great view of Dreadnought. What is the chute thing suspended over the portside of the stern?
Colin
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That's a great view of Dreadnought. What is the chute thing suspended over the portside of the stern?
Colin
Looks like a gash shute. Some of them have it internally, you just see a rectangular hole above the waterline.
p.s. I suspect the other pipes exiting Dreadnoughts hull at the stern are toilet & bathroom wastes.
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Oh the Agincourt was indeed a phenomeonon but the weight of a 15inch shell is about 2.5times heavier than the 12inch so even though a storm of 12inch shells hitting would be severe, a single 5inch will do serious damage structurally. The German Battlecruisers were lucky not to suffer more at the hands of 5th Battle Squadron. But the Agincourt holds her place rightly in the annals of superb battleship design such, that though foreign comissioned, she was meet to serve alongside her cousins at Jutland.
Re Canada and Iron Duke. It goes to show how an extra inch of bore diameter can add so much associated design and equipment weight that a similar design cannot hold five 15inch gun turrets.
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Actually for the QE class the war college wanted a fast battleship wing for tactical reasond to turn the enemy's van so a min 25 knots was required for this. In the US they had just launched US Texas with 10 14" guns firing a 1500 pound projectile (I was fortunate to go aboard her last month) so a broaside weight of 15,000 pounds. Iron Duke fired the 1,400 shell so broadside weight 14,000 pounds. Canada I think also fired 1,500 pounds. Agincourt 12" shell was 850 x 14 = 11,900 pounds so well below Iron Duke. QE shell weight was 1,920 pounds x 8 =15,360 pounds. The 8 gun layout led to a more logical design and as mentioned more boilers and higher speed withou sacricising armour.
They were a special class which is why the subsequent R class were a little smaller but a lot better protected but retained the 8 x 15" guns as broadside weight was deemed sufficient. Also 8 guns made for more logical salvo firing.
Geoff
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And they look damn fine:O) I wonder how much a replica Warspite would cost to build? I'll pass the hat around.....:O)
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The original cost about £2.5 million in 1912.
It's difficult to estimate, but the best guess (using inflation calculators) would put a modern rebuild between 250 million and 2 billion. And possibly a lot more, since much of the engineering infrastructure has "changed". %)
But - not wishing to hijack this thread too much! - which "one" do you go for?
- The gorgeously minimalist "as built" one?
- The added-bulge, trunked funnel, streamlined, and also gorgeous jazz-era one?
- Or that floating block of flats? ;D
(http://www.thefreckledfish.com/dreadnought/warspite.jpg)
Andy
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No brainer really - the one that acrued the most honors :-))
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version one!
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Me personally would go for version 3 O0 - to me it looks more imposing, but from a modellers point of view, version 1 is more of a challenge. but this isn't about QE's but the iron duke.
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A damn fine battleship. I am looking forward to the completed model. There was a model of Benbow on Ebay a while back that caught my eye but the detail and shape of components was irregular.
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AAHH yes - but version 1 and I believe version 2 were battleships, version 3 was then just a battle cruiser, obviously she was demoted in status with her sisters - unfairly I might argue, she looked a lot better than the vessel to her rear.
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Yes, The QEs were the last properly designed battleships. The Royal Sovereigns were the first class to be designed by limitation. IMHO, the Royal Sovereigns should have been ships 6-10 of the QE class if not 6-12 if the last two had not been cancelled due to wartime construction constraints.
Anyhow, whatever, this should be the Iron Duke thread and we ought to start a new thread in the chat section on our love and devotion to the 'eight legger'!!!!
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The "R" class were designed to stand in the line and slug it out hence their lower speed and better protection. As the battlefleet speed was 21 knots they did not need to be significantly faster that the QE's. Their 15" guns were a very powefull addition to the battlefleetr firepower.
Generally British battleships were less well protected than their German counterparts but they carried heavier armament so the heavier protection on the German ships was not the advantage this would seem. However the British ships were let down bu their poor shells and dodgy cordite, particularly the Battlecrusiers who stored cordite in open spaces!
Okay, still little progreess with ID other than fibreglassing the hull outside and lots of sanding. Next step is to fit the bilge keels and correct the bow flare a bit then start on the plating!.
More to follow in due course
Cheers
Geoff
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Typical eh! Our superior guns let down by their shells. I was swayed by the probable biased opinions regarding the fear of an oil shortage when the R's were being drawn up and can see how as demonstrated at Jutland how having Royal Oak and Revenge in the battle line, the speed they had was practical.
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You've got to remember that the QE class were designed completely different to any preceding class like the Dukes and the succeeding R class. They were the prototype vessels to carry the 15in guns, use oil fuel as main fuel supply and were designed to take on any battleship then afloat. They were the original fast battleships. Their action at Jutland proved their superiority over other battleships, they held the entire German high seas fleet at bay whilst the grand Fleet organised itself into battle line, not bad considering that the most damaged (Warspite) was only ordered back to Rosyth after her steering failed spectacularly at the heat of battle. They took the most punishment of all British battleships at Jutland, Warspite receiving 11 heavy shell hits and 18 lighter shell hits.
However in WW2 the shell and cordite problem was reversed, the German shells being inferior to the British ones, the Royal Navy learnt a lot from Jutland.
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I watched a programme on the TV a while back which looked into why the battle cruisers at Jutland went up so spectacularly, turns out the Admirals requested the increase of ammunition be increased by 50%. The shells were no problem to stow but the Cordite bags were a different proposition. They had bags stowed around the turrets inside and the alleyways to the mag and the anti flash doors were locked back and on the Warrior class they believe some stowed on the open deck, all because the Admirals believed in a fast rate of fire over accuracy. As to the QE 15" shells they definitely had a design problem, the armour piercing shells burst without penetrating at Jutland and earlier shelling Turkish positions several 15" shells proved to be duds.
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As an add on, not all British shells were duds there were a good number of German turrets and barbettes penetrated and serious ammunition fires but no flash back to the magazines. It is interesting to note ID scored at least 7 hits on Koenig at Jutland one of which hit the armoured shelf below the waterline (half in the armour) and penetrated into a 6" magazine and started a fire! The fire was only put out by sea water flowing through the hole otherwidse Koeing could very well have been lost.
I think the problem with cordite stowage was more prevalent in the Battlecrusiers than the Battleships as they were chasing higher rates of fire. From my readings there is also a deep suspicion the British cordite was very volatile and it was a problem never really cured - Hood, Vanguard, Bulwark, Natal, Barham for example.
I have been enthused again to start work on Iron Duke as I have been refurbishing my Pre Dreadnougts (Canopus and Lord Nelson) with a view to sailing them at Wicksteed later this month. I was surprised at how long it has taken but I guess refitting a battleship even at 1/96 scale does take time!
Cheers
Geoff
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Detailing seems to take 3/5ths of the time a model takes to complete as there is mch duplication and logisitcal bottlenecks as these parts are obtained in batches or made by hand.
Good luck on your progress.
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Hi Geof, the cordite stowage was a major reason for the Battle Cruiser failures and the Warrior class, because they were made to stow 50% etc ammo above their designed amount which meant finding unsuitable stowage areas, but the 15" gun then where firing Lyddite shells which where observed to disintegrate on hitting. But apart from that the Q E class where superb vessels and ahead of their time in many respects, also I believe the super dreadnoughts mounting the 13.5" guns where beautiful vessels and to a certain extent under rated.
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Found this pic of the old girl in a floating dry dock in a very old book of mine, photo is dated 1933, thought it may be of interest to you.
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There is something about Floating docks that I like. I think it is their sheer utilitarian look. They have not an ounce of frippary about them.
Has anyone built a model of a floating dock?
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quick get away from this before the sternwalk topic raises its head again %) %) , oops too late
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As in wether to add them to one's model or not?
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Okay, progress has been made on ID. The interior has been fibreglassed and the exterior sanded further with the brass bilge keels added and the final resin coat applied to the exterior which has just undergone first sanding.
Pictures to follow soon!
I plan to use plastic card for the armour and plating but am puzzling over the size of the armour plates and have not been able to find any conclusive answers. In terms of depth at 1/96 scale both the 8" and 9" strakes work out at almost exactly 1" deep and the 12" belt about 3/4". Given that the belt was in three distinct tiers I suspect that it was laid brick like fashion but does anybody know the length of each armour plate? My guess would be about 20 feet long each?
I intent only to model the out strakes and punch holes for portholes in the card. I have never been keen on drilling holes through a hull that is meant to be waterproof! I also think some models show portholes which are really too deep as they were really only the thickness of the plating. I believe on the hull the fixings were on the inside. My plan being to utilise smoked plastic shhet for the glazing after painting which has worked well on other models.
On another note I think I will plank the deck. Does anyone know a good source for accurate planks 1/8" x 1/16"? Not looking forwards to that part of the construction but I think it will lok better than any other way to show the deck. I've seen it done so if others can do it so can I!
Cheers
Geoff
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I plan to use plastic card for the armour and plating but am puzzling over the size of the armour plates and have not been able to find any conclusive answers. In terms of depth at 1/96 scale both the 8" and 9" strakes work out at almost exactly 1" deep and the 12" belt about 3/4". Given that the belt was in three distinct tiers I suspect that it was laid brick like fashion but does anybody know the length of each armour plate? My guess would be about 20 feet long each?
Interesting question.
I don't know the answer. But a further question that could help answer it might be "how large could factories make armoured steel plates"?
Now, if you have the shell expansion diagram, it's likely to show the structural plate laps & layout behind the armour plate: not the armour plates themselves.
A quick whizz through Burt's Battleships of WW1 and his Battleships of the Grand Fleet do not, in any of the photos, clearly depict a vertical joint in the ships' armour belts. But then, we'd hope there wouldn't be anything like an obvious joint, else the system becomes fairly worthless.
It's clear that the "obvious" plate edges that show up in photos are the horizontal lines: that ~1" difference between a raised and sunken strake allows for a shadow at some angles. You'll get that for free by doing the plating the way you mention. It's rare to spot a vertical line between non-armoured plates in the same strake, so make that subtle. As for junctions in the armour plates, make it really subtle. As in invisible, would be my best guess.
Andy
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Shapes of the plates would be unique, and opposite hand on the other side, I would assume due to the change in rake and curve as the ship constantly changes profile, some of the changes were at the discretion of the craftsman who rolled the complex curves to have it fit. correct me if I am wrong.
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geoff
the outside of the armour was flat and any different thicknesses of armour would be taken up by the teak backing on the inside face. One photographs of Warspite, the only raised edges on the armour is the strip along the top and bottom of the belt that covers the join between the ships plate and the armour. Any intermediate horizontal joints within are 'keyed' so one holds the other in.
Warspites hull: there's a fair few photographs of Jutland damage about. I found daught marks on one and pasted it horizontally and got a plate of an uncannily accurate 25ft long. The Main belt on Lion was of 16ft long plates.
I don't have photos amidships
And as the below shows, they can be in a 'brick wall' pattern with the vertical joints offset.
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Must agree warspite that the platers were certainly craftsman, however they worked to hull expansion plans that were created full size in the shipyard lofts [huge upstairs plan rooms]
The plates were sheared to the final profile prior to any rolling........an old Loftsman acquaintance [Whyalla Shipyard] suggested a 20 foot x 10 foot plate [for riveted hull construction] would be within +/- 1/8" in length x breadth ......
Post rolling [in two planes] the plates were checked to wooden mockup frames to ensure correct alignment/accuracy prior to punching for riveting :-)) ........
Like many forms of construction .....today we do not have the knowledge or skills to complete this work without the aid of computers >>:-( ........ Derek
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Shapes of the plates would be unique, and opposite hand on the other side, I would assume due to the change in rake and curve as the ship constantly changes profile, some of the changes were at the discretion of the craftsman who rolled the complex curves to have it fit. correct me if I am wrong.
No discretion at all! both sides have to match, remember. :-)
It's even more complicated than I remember. Everything in a shipyard is done with jigs, moulds, forms and patterns. Datums are used and measurments ran from them along with string lines and levels.
Making the moulds for the armour plates starts with a datum line down the centre of the armour joint (this book was written when 2 tiers of armour was the norm) It is marked C in the diagam. The upper plate was measured upwards from the datum and the lower downwards.
Basically, the 'Surface Mould' gives the armour maker the perimiter size and shape of each plate, the 'Plan Mould' shows the curviture of the plate surfaceas looked from above while the 'Section Mould' provides the vertical shape.
Note the Surface Moulds are in a 'brick wall' pattern.
I KNOW that armor-plate making was an art-form and that the red hot plate both shrunk in size with any curves flattening slightly on cooling, thus plates were made slightly over-size and with slightly exagerated curves to allow for it.
HTHs
p.s. I've just read that each complete side of armour was erected in the workshop to test for fit prior to sending the plates to the shipyard. The minds boggles at the energy expended.
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That's great, Pondweed: what's the book?
Andy
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That's great, Pondweed: what's the book?
Andy
Sorry mate, it's "Shipyard practice as applied to warship construction" by N McDermaid. (1911) The author was something at Vickers in Barrow.
Moulds For Side Armour
https://archive.org/stream/shipyardpractice00mcderich#page/240/mode/2up (https://archive.org/stream/shipyardpractice00mcderich#page/240/mode/2up)
I checked the Anatomy book on Warspite for how they dealt with the different thicknesses of armour on her belt. The drawing shows the main 13" belt tapering to 6" where it meets the 6" strip, which is a different method from earlier ships, the latter used different thicknesses of teak backing to take up the difference.
p.s. I see I posted Warspite images up in an Iron Duke thread. Sorry.
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Wow - great resource. I've bookmarked that one. :-))
Thanks,
Andy
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I was under the understanding that the Armour plate was fixed to the vessels normal hull plating by a special set up of bolts, if one see's photos of the old vessels in scrapyards or some stripped of armour to serve other purposes at the end of their lives one can see the normal hull and sometimes where the armour fitted.
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They used bolts with conical ends (that look a bit like a stone masons mallet) but this may have been superceded in later years.
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Hopefully returning the thread to its source!
(http://www.thefreckledfish.com/dreadnought/ironduke.jpg)
HMS Iron Duke shortly after launch, before her armour belt was bolted on.
Andy
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Thank you for the feedback and the picture of ID launching. I have seen this bofre but as pointed out it does not show the armour plate sizes. As a estimate I have used plated 4" long to 32 ft in real life which I think would seem about right. Plates were manufactured as large as possible to avoid weak spots at the joints and because the plates are inherently weaker at the edges. Larger plates = less edges!
As mentioned please find attached some update pictures.
I was surprised at the extent of armour covering the hull and there is more to go on additional lengths of 6" and 4" at the bow and stern.
As a further question I am beginning to think of painting and as I'm building ID as she was in 1916 I think I have to use a darker grey. Anyone know if Humbrol have a good match or will this just be a question of mixing to best guess?
Thanks
Geoff
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Looks superb so for Geoff
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That hull is certainly doing justice to the original.
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Sorry mate, it's "Shipyard practice as applied to warship construction" by N McDermaid. (1911) The author was something at Vickers in Barrow.
Thanks for the recommendation, I managed to find a copy from 1911 for sale on Amazon and what a book!
Considering I'm building a Predreadnought the information is very helpful in construction, layout, and design and it does cover the dreadnought too. Wish id known about the book years ago! :-))
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Thank you for the feedback and the picture of ID launching. I have seen this bofre but as pointed out it does not show the armour plate sizes. As a estimate I have used plated 4" long to 32 ft in real life which I think would seem about right. Plates were manufactured as large as possible to avoid weak spots at the joints and because the plates are inherently weaker at the edges. Larger plates = less edges!
As mentioned please find attached some update pictures.
I was surprised at the extent of armour covering the hull and there is more to go on additional lengths of 6" and 4" at the bow and stern.
As a further question I am beginning to think of painting and as I'm building ID as she was in 1916 I think I have to use a darker grey. Anyone know if Humbrol have a good match or will this just be a question of mixing to best guess?
Thanks
Geoff
Stunning work Geoff, hope to see it complete for the big 100 anniversary! ;)
I think I remember seeing somewhere that Humbrol 27 was the closest colour for RN battleships in home waters in WW1 whilst Humbrol 64 is close for Mediterranean grey.
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Oh I am jealous geoff! That hull is beautiful and so redolent of the shape and feel of an early twentieth century battleship. A reggatta of Jutland era warships together would be a fitting tribute to those who took part and gave their lives in the action. We forget that each capital ship had the equivalent of an infantry battalion aboard, so our battle fleet alone had the equivalent of an army afloat, and this does not include the destroyers and Cruisers!
Keep up the good work Geoff, you will end up with a treasure.
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The best investigation covering WW1 battleship grey I've read is here (http://www.shipmodels.info/mws_forum/viewtopic.php?f=69&t=154630&sid=d89d959a4e137155653e4dd769a3b28d). Read and enjoy! O0
Andy
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By way of an update. The hull plating is now virtually complete other than where there are portholes. In order to get the top strake of plating to fit properly I need to start work on the 6" secondary battery as the cut away in front is plastic card which will affect the plating depth. One thing leads to another!
The secondary battery has proved very challenging to construct as the shape is really quite complex with overlapping plates on places and a cut away on the first 4 guns each side. The geometry is very awkward particularly as I want to have the guns turn. Not under power but my experience suggests its better to have turning gubns as if they catch or hit anything there will be some give as the guns can rotate away from the obstruction.
Despite having the original plans this is a very awkward aspect to model as there is hardly a flat plate in the structure.
In the end I'm building each battery as a separate component off the ship and will add them later but I will need to paint the appetures before I fit the guns so I have to decide on the paint colour for the hull. Lots of dominos with this part!
I'll try tpo post some pictures which may give a better idea of the complexity of the shape shortly.
More to follow
Geoff
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Curves are a bane to model. I know that model engineers will use wooden formers around which, they shape their metal plates but for plastic you are looking at:
-heat forming plastic sheet,
-shaping laminated plastic sheets,
-fabrication from suitable diameters of plastic tube
or
-going down the fibre glass route with its own intricacies of mess and the like.
I did design a railway carriage roof that had multiple curves by shaping an insulation foam former and applying car body filller to it after painting the foam with PVA. I found this to be resilient and after all the sand and fill kerfuffle quite smooth. maybe a similar technique would help you Geoff? I would scribe in plate lines after shaping and finishing as the lines applied while the filler is wet look irregular.
How ever you do it, take it easy and do not loose your patience. You will have a beautiful Battleship to sail soon.
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Thank you for your suggestions which appreciated. I have gone down the Obechi wood approach but am then plating it in plastic card as it gives me the smooth grain free finish I am looking for. I can still sand any irregularities afterwards as well. Looking at it this morning it seems a little big but I think this is perception only as its in white and the adjacent parts of the model are still in wood so it stands out. It still checks in overall measurements with the original plans so I will persevere!
Cheers
Geoff
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No worries, A battleship model of this size and date will be mega complex so you will be using all sorts of materials and practices to get your ship launched. Keep up the good work and lets see some pretty piccies!
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As an update the hull plating and secondary 6" battery are now complete (absent guns) so I will hope to get some pictures up shortly now there is something to show.
Next question is deck planking. I'm looking for a good, and hopefully not too expensive supply of planks, 1/8" x 1/16" for the deck. But bear in mind she's about 11.5" wide and 6' 6" long so I will need a good supply!
Some basic questions:
1) Where is a good source
2) What would be the best wood to use - obechi, basswoord or something else
Does any one have suggestions for both of the above?
Thanks
Geoff
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Cornwall Model Boats have various sizes of stripwood which may be suitable.
Also Deans Marine do sheets of planking for capital ships (I think it is 1/96 scale): http://www.deansmarine.co.uk/shop/product_info.php/cPath/5_19/products_id/2254
Colin
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Hi Geoff,
The Deans marine laser engraved deck panels are excellent, but if you want to go the individual boxwood plank route try here.....
originalmarquetry.co.uk lots of choice and in 1000 mm lengths, they are very good, price wise. I have used them for years.
Regards
Ian
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I have just had a look at their site and it looks like they could do packs of 100 for less than thirty pounds. Obviously a phone call to enquire that this can be done is wise. They do a pack of 100 strips of 1.5x1.5mm bass or sycamore (IIRC) for £22-£23.
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Just an update. I am making good progress but home PC has died so there is no way I can post pictures at the moment!
Propellor shafts and A brackets have been made out of brass and fitted in place and first coat of red ant-fouling has been applied - she's looking good but once completed I hope no one sees the bottom again as if so I'm in big trouble!
Next question for all of you is propellers. I have decided to go for 4 x 35mm which is a tad larger than scale but I would prefer to have a little too much speed than a little too less and if needed I can always trip them as I have a lathe. The question is should I go for 3 blade or 4 blade? Is there really any great difference in performance? The real ship had 3 blades.
Engines will be two car blower motors (Old Talbot Horizon - yes I know its an old car but I picked some up on spec a good few years ago) so revs will be quite low as I'll be running them on 6 volts.
My other model Neptune from 1918 (6 feet) uses exactley the same engines driving twin 3 blade props but they are larger in diameter about 45mm and she goes okay but is not fast. I'm thinking 4 props of smaller diameter should get me slightly higher speed but smaller props are not so efficient as larger props.
Any thoughts?
Thanks
Geoff
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I would go for three blade as, while larger than true scale, they will still look the business at any shows you might display her at. Your extra capacity of speed should help you get the most out of them.
God speed your new or repaired pooter as I need to see your lovely super dreadnought again. I think I have seen an image of your neptune on the web somewhere before and definitly aspire to building a WW1 Battleship.
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Computer still screwed so can't post any pictures at the mpment. I have repainted the red antfouling in Humbol Wine (no 73 I think), which I have used before as the other red was just too bright in my opinion.
Now thinking about painting the hull so may start this weekend after I have fixed rigols and stern door for walkway etc and cleat mouldings at bow and stern as they overlap the side a little.
Pictures of Neptune and my other battleships are on Model Warships Underway (gallery 30 I think) for those who may be interested. Neptune was build in 1974!
I have just ordered some John Haynes photo etched stanchions and 4 x 35mm brass propellors (3 blade Revarbo).
I now have to complete the stand as I need to start working on her upright!
More updaes to follow
Cheers
Geoff
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Hi ,Geoff,
Your hull shape looks remarkably similar to that on my Hms Ramillies model,dimensions also! I am hoping you will manage to get a few photos up soon.Although Ramillies was the first Battleship to be built with interior armour plating,she did have the armour plating belts added later.These did not show on my plans and lines drawings and I have been wondering how to tackle adding them,sizes dimensions etc.I am also looking forward to seeing just how you do the secondary armament also.I shall be following this build with great interest,so keep up the excellent work!
Incidentally, Deans Marine do very good deck planking,it is produced for their superb model of the Warspite, so may I suggest you give Ron Dean a ring,after this weekends Warwick show and have a natter with him?
Aye
Mick F
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Geoff's models are in Gallery 29, and well worth a look! :-))
Tom
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Short update. I still can't get the PC to work or the laptop to send e-mail so still can't get any pictures up. I painted the hull dark grey (Humbrol) but it came out too dark despite it being the colour recomended on the earlier linkre WW 1 colour. I think it was the scale effect where the original colour looks too vivid so I have repainted using a mixture (Humbrol 64 light grey and the dark grey - can't remember the number but will update) and it seems better. Just waiting for it all to dry before I put on the black waterline stripe.
Just awaiting props etc.
On a different note I just took delivery from Amazon of German Battlecrusiers of WW1. A very interesting book with lots of technical detail and action damage pictures I had not seen before.
Lots of details in the book plus various plans but the plans seem to be originals so relativley cluttered and not really suitable to build a model but overall an excellent book. If this is your thing buy it now whilst you can!
Cheers
Geoff
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On a different note I just took delivery from Amazon of German Battlecrusiers of WW1. A very interesting book with lots of technical detail and action damage pictures I had not seen before.
Lots of details in the book plus various plans but the plans seem to be originals so relativley cluttered and not really suitable to build a model but overall an excellent book. If this is your thing buy it now whilst you can!
I too had this book on pre order from amazon since it was announced last year and I add to Geoff's recommendation- a stunning book of every German WW1 battlecruiser built including the Hindenburg. I just hope that the same author does the same for British WW1 battlecruisers too especially the 3D rendering in the centre pages. What I couldn't believe was the huge amount of damage received from the Battle of Jutland of the surviving German battlecruisers.
Looking forward to seeing your pictures when you've got access to them again Geoff. :-))
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As a matter of interest the British battlecrusiers also took quite a pounding and a good number survived heavy damage. Their reputation has been scared by the three blowing up which was really caused by poor amunition handling and excessivly volatile cordite charges.
What is missing is a balanced perspective as the ships covers which would have showed how well the surviving battlecrusiers withstood comparable damage along with all the photographs were thrown out and destroyed in an act of administrative vandalism decades ago so there are few comparitive pictures.
Damage pictures I have seen on capital ships are:
Lion and Q turret also inside damage to Lion at Dogger bank and external picture of forecastle after DB.
Tiger hole in 6" side armour and Q turret
Collosus damage to superstraucture
Warspite damage to stern
Side view of Lion on way home from Jutland - this is interesting as the draft of the ship appears unchanged
There must have been a pictorial survey of the damaged ships Lion, Princess Royal, Tiger, Warspite, Barham, Valiant, Marlborough (torpedo) but they all seem to have disapeared. Maybe we could arrange for an internet search to see if any pictures can be found out there?
Geoff
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The hull paint colour is a 50/50 mix of Humbrol 27 and 64. It remains to be seen if I can get a perfect match with the suoerstructure as it took two full tins to paint the hull!
G
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As long as the shades are not drastically different I would not worry too much as wear, repainting and age of paint job will differ all over the ship. I appreciate you are not building her as if mothballed in Pompey harbour for a decade.
Perhaps a mist of the mix you have made spryed across the whole superstructure and hull will blend the two together?
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As an update the hull is now fully painted and 10 of the 6" secondary battery guns are installed. I found some plastic pipe fittings which were exactly the correct diameter for the main armamant barbetts and these have been made and painted with an extra layer of plastic card on the side sections as the armour was thicker there. This is evident in some phographs but you have to look for it to see it!
Possibly more importantly is that I now have a working computer which I just need to plug in and hopefully get going so, with luck, I may be able to post some more pictures.
I have been working on the main engines (two Talbot Horizon blower motors) and lining up the various shaft linkages. A problem I have is trying to find toothed belts/wheels of the correct diameter so I may have to use pulleys instead, or maybe gears, but we will see.
I have tried some experiments with decking (single sheets) to simulate planking but so far not sucessfull. You can't see the grain but the colour is all wrong!
Hope to get some pictures up soon.
Geoff
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Hi Geoff,
I don't know what size of drive belts you want but I've used HPC in the past www.hpcgearsinternational.com in the past. They're vary good quality and not overpriced. Might be worth a look?
Great build.
Tony
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I still can't figure out how to get some new pictures up as whilst my PC recognises the camera and I can get thumb size pictures (full size if I click on them) there doesn't appear to be an option to save them anywhere!
However as a verbal update I have mounted the main engines (Two Talbot Horizon interior blower motors) onto a plywood platform and have machined some alloy pulleys (3.5cm diameter) to fit on the motor output shaft and separate lay shaft to drive two propellors each.
I have used large diameter rubber "O" rings as the drive belts. One fitted almost perfectly and the other was way too large so I cut a chunk out and used superglue to join the "O" ring. Super glue just loves rubber and forms an incredibly strong joint albeit time will tell how long it lasts but at the moment I can't pull the "O" ring apart so it should be okay.
I used proper ball bearings in the lay shafts to minuimise friction and the now loaded motor draws 0.2 amps extra when the belts are on which is acceptable.
Still awaiting delivery of the prop shafts and will look to purchase some Huco style double couplings at the ME later this month.
Hope to start on the supertructure bases and conning tower this weekend.
Cheers
Geoff
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I still can't figure out how to get some new pictures up as whilst my PC recognises the camera and I can get thumb size pictures (full size if I click on them) there doesn't appear to be an option to save them anywhere!
If you are using Windows 7, open up 'Libraries' and click on 'main drive c'.
When on C, click on 'New folder' (at top of page)
Rename your folder 'Boat Pictures' or anything you like.
Click on camera pictures and drag a picture over to this new folder on c drive.
When a moved picture is clicked on, it should open up on your computer.
Check their size in Kbytes and if larger than 200k, try reducing them in size.
Seems a lot to take in but after 30 years you get used to manipulating 'things about a bit'
hope this helps
ken
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Thank you but I'm on "Linus" but I'll see if your suggestion works anyway
Thanks
Geoff
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How is the great uploading adventure going Geoff? I hope there isn't a laptop shaped dent in the wall {:-{
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Geoff...without seeming pessimistic, any form of Superglue will remain brittle and ultimately separate from the nitrile/rubber o-ring material without any warning and leave your vessel stranded >>:-(
Take on o-ring off and measure the ID and nominate the cross section of the cord & confirm this...we will nominate a BS standard size in the line of best fit...
O-rings are relatively inexpensive and available from any Bearing or hydraulic shop.......in a one piece format cheap insurance :-)) .... Derek
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Hmmm, my reply seems to have dissapeared. Thank you for the input and I'll do some measurements and report back. On a practical basis only the outer shafts are driven by "O" rings with the inner being direct drive to the main engines so in the event of an "O" ring breakage I'll only loose the outer prop (s) so hopefully won't be disabled.
I have now been constructing the brass tripod mast and superstructure (Obechi and plastic card and plywood) and will try to get some pictures up soon but I'm still having trouble with the computer - grrrrr!
I'm going to start a new topic on searchlights.
Cheers
Geoff
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If I may make a suggestion, with a ship of this size 'O' rings may at best slip, or at worst break. A toothed belt however will provide adequate powered propulsion in a more reliable manner. You will also need toothed 'cogs' with flanges as well.
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I agree and that was my first thought but I could not find a source of toothed wheels and belts of the correct size at a price I thought reasonable! It was working out at around £80-£100 so I figured "O" rings may be a more viable solution.
I have seen people use "O" rings before and not had any adverse reports about early breakage. The pully wheels are about 3 cm in diameter so have a good surface area and centrifugal fource will push the "O" rings out increasing the tension a little and if I jam a prop on something it may be best if it does slip!
Despite the size of the model there is potentially a lot of mechanism to go inside including a smoke generator for both funnels and a multiplue shot gun firing mechanism (Blanks of course) which might take up a lot of internal space depending on how the experiments/development goes!
Its this latter that is causing construction problems as until I have figured out the mechanism I can't work out how much space I have to play with.
Cheers
Geoff
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OK, it was just an idea. Conrad Electronics, Modelcraft. even Amazon. Belts are around a fiver with toothed pulleys around £8. Being toothed you should get away with much smaller diameter, if space becomes an issue.
I used them for driving twin bow rudders in a very restricted corner.
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I have used O rings successfully without problems but they don't like being stretched too much otherwise they bind and cause a lot of resistance. Get the right size and they will be OK but with your setup it sounds as if it would be quite difficult if not impossible to make small adjustments to the tension.
Colin
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Despite the size of the model the "pulley" room is quite small and I have no third pulley wheel to make adjustments at the present time so the "O" rings need to be the exact size needed. Due to the size of the engines and pulleys there isn't room to fit an idler wheel to use as an adjustment between the engine and second pulley albeit I could possibly fit a very small one between the huco couplings facing forwards.
I took the view to make the pulley's as large as possible to give the maximum area for the "O" ring to pull on and keep loadings down. The bigger the diameter the better the mechanical advantage but this is all dictated by the distance between the propellor shafts which in turn are dictated by the original plans!
Only time will tell if it works long term. As above the worst that can happen is I loose two props and I think that unlikley at exactly the same time. If is doesn't work I'll have to work it out again!
Best
Geoff
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Geoff
Meccano (although expensive) is a very good option for the model engineer.
I once fixed up a central shaft running down the centre of my model, 4 pairs of cogs gave the rotation of the main shaft a 90 degree twist 'upwards' meaning that ABQX & the Argo RF hood could all be turned simultaneously. It was trialed sucessfully but the complete assembly never made it through to finish. But it would have worked. The only problem with the method being that once the turrets pass 90 degrees abeam, they start to point acutely or inwardly (if you follow).
But that is an example of the mini-engineering that could turn prop shafts.
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p.s. I've just read that each complete side of armour was erected in the workshop to test for fit prior to sending the plates to the shipyard. The minds boggles at the energy expended.
I've just got a book that appears to show this.
2 photographs of Beardmores 'Armour plate errection shed' show a floor area of 70-80ft? long, the floor is of steel pierced with a several rows of holes to locate a support jig that hold these plates firmly. They can't possibly assemble a complete length of side belt as the length of the pierced steel floor appears to limit this.
The two photos show two sections of armour belt, maybe 35-50ft long, one is of two tiers and the other of three, of assembled armour plates but it is laid horizontally upon it's side.
The ships vertical side armour, at Beardmores at least, is trial fitted in sections horizontally.
The book is Thomas & Pattersons "Dreadnaughts: A Photographic History".
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As a matter of interest the British battlecrusiers also took quite a pounding and a good number survived heavy damage. Their reputation has been scared by the three blowing up which was really caused by poor amunition handling and excessivly volatile cordite charges.
What is missing is a balanced perspective as the ships covers which would have showed how well the surviving battlecrusiers withstood comparable damage along with all the photographs were thrown out and destroyed in an act of administrative vandalism decades ago so there are few comparitive pictures.
Damage pictures I have seen on capital ships are:
Lion and Q turret also inside damage to Lion at Dogger bank and external picture of forecastle after DB.
Tiger hole in 6" side armour and Q turret
Collosus damage to superstraucture
Warspite damage to stern
Side view of Lion on way home from Jutland - this is interesting as the draft of the ship appears unchanged
There must have been a pictorial survey of the damaged ships Lion, Princess Royal, Tiger, Warspite, Barham, Valiant, Marlborough (torpedo) but they all seem to have disapeared. Maybe we could arrange for an internet search to see if any pictures can be found out there?
Geoff
Geoff
where did you hear about this (administrative vandalism)? I know why there's no photographs of some (all?) Devonport built dreadnaughts during their construction: apparently any that were taken were a victim of the blitz! Other than general side-view portraits of Lion that appeared as postcards, I know of no images of her "as completed", pre re-structuring appearence.
There was some sort of record* taken of the battlecruiser damage after Jutland: on Lion it appears to be a photo of each shell hit or area of damage. A couple of them appear in Fawcett and Hoopers book "Fighting at Jutland".
Warspites damage was well recorded and Tiger appears to have had photographers cover the damage. There's a very high-quality photograph of Princess Royals Jutland damage survive so I'd be very surpised if the cameraman arrived onboard and only took that solitary photograph.
So as you mention, it's not a question of what was taken, it's a question of what survives.
p.s. According to Cambell, Lion didn't have any under-water hits at Jutland, it was Dogger bank!
* This was most likely Admiralty inspired to record the damage for authoring reports, further research, etc,. There was a report compiled by Jellicoe on the damage each ship sustained along with a drawing of the ships outline with red & green highlights to illustrate the position of hits to either side, to back that up were a series of sketches of these damaged areas.
Several sketches are very close to surviving photographs which makes me wonder if someone drew or traced photographs? I'm not saying the Tiger photograph below was drawn, I wonder if a photograph taken a few days earlier, when the deck planks where still there, was drawn/traced? It's a thought...
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I seem to remember reading somewhere that the "ships covers" which contain all the details together with pictures and action damage were thrown out in the 50's - 60's which is why you tend to only see the same pictures again and again.
Whilst I don't recall seeing the sketches I recognise the top left as the roof plate from Tiger "Q" I think when taken off and resting on the deck.
I find it inconcievable that hundreds of pictures were not taken of action damage by the navy so where are they? It is possible they were destroyed in the blitz - any evidence of that, but this would suggest copies wern't made and distributed elsewhere.
Anybody got any idea how we can collectivley research this - maybe try to set ap a specific thread/file with Jutland/Dogger bank action shots to colate the available material.
From everything I have read I am convinced there was a serious problem with our cordite which was never fully resolved. I seem to recall a test was done pre ww1 with a pile placed on a field and all the experts said it would just flare up, which is what it should have done. The explosion was significant with a great crater in the ground! The experts were silent but I suspect whilst this was known there was little that could be done to correct the problem and it was hidden away as shells were unlilkly to penetrate a magazine directly. What they couldn't anticipate was the stupid attitude in the battlecrusier fleet of chasing rates of fire and stockpiling cordite and leaving magazine doors open to save a few seconds.
Cordite should flare like a match head and not go off suddenly like black powder. It was a relativly slow explosive crafted to push the shells out of the barrel at an increasing rate hence the long barrells.
Early pictures of the US navy using black powder showed the Dalgren guns (shaped like a fat coke bottle) as massive barrell width was required at the near end to take the sudden shock of black powder exploding.
As Beatty said, "something wrong with our bloody ships today" Not the ships but the actual cordite and the handling of it.
Just my thoughts
Geoff
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I seem to remember reading somewhere that the "ships covers" which contain all the details together with pictures and action damage were thrown out in the 50's - 60's which is why you tend to only see the same pictures again and again.
Whilst I don't recall seeing the sketches I recognise the top left as the roof plate from Tiger "Q" I think when taken off and resting on the deck.
I find it inconcievable that hundreds of pictures were not taken of action damage by the navy so where are they? It is possible they were destroyed in the blitz - any evidence of that, but this would suggest copies wern't made and distributed elsewhere.
Anybody got any idea how we can collectivley research this - maybe try to set ap a specific thread/file with Jutland/Dogger bank action shots to colate the available material.
From everything I have read I am convinced there was a serious problem with our cordite which was never fully resolved. I seem to recall a test was done pre ww1 with a pile placed on a field and all the experts said it would just flare up, which is what it should have done. The explosion was significant with a great crater in the ground! The experts were silent but I suspect whilst this was known there was little that could be done to correct the problem and it was hidden away as shells were unlilkly to penetrate a magazine directly. What they couldn't anticipate was the stupid attitude in the battlecrusier fleet of chasing rates of fire and stockpiling cordite and leaving magazine doors open to save a few seconds.
Cordite should flare like a match head and not go off suddenly like black powder. It was a relativly slow explosive crafted to push the shells out of the barrel at an increasing rate hence the long barrells.
Early pictures of the US navy using black powder showed the Dalgren guns (shaped like a fat coke bottle) as massive barrell width was required at the near end to take the sudden shock of black powder exploding.
As Beatty said, "something wrong with our 'blinking!' ships today" Not the ships but the actual cordite and the handling of it.
Just my thoughts
Geoff
Sorry for not adding more background. The page with the 4 sketches of Tiger is her entry in the forementioned report from Jellicoe to the Admiralty. Each ship damaged in battle had 1, 2 or 3 pages full of sketches of damage. I included one of Tigers pages.
It was the ship construction images for Devonport built ships that were destroyed in the blitz, the story comes from the forementioned book, "Dreadnaughts: A Photographic History".
There are bits & pieces out there of Lion on the stocks but it sounds like any sort of organised chronological photograph taking, similar in scope to what remains of the J Brown built battlecruisers, went up in the flames.
In the book above, the only photographs of the Dreadnaught 'Lion' are a newspaper photograph of the hull going down the slipway and the photographs from the Dock Museum, Barrow-in-furness, showing the boilers & turbine construction.
The Anatomy of the ship book on Warspite, another devonport-built dreadnaught, contains no 'during construction' photographs in the book.
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Should imagine all photographs which you talk off, will now be in either the national maritime museum or the imperial war museum, along with all other info and ship drawings. In recent years the Naval Photographic Unit passes all photographs and negatives etc to the Imperial Museum as a natural course of action after 3 years storage. As to cordite, I was involved with RN Clearance divers searching the wreck of HMS Drake (sunk in WW1 ) for cordite in 1978, as it was known then that the IRA was then retrieving cordite from her time to time to make incendiary bombs. The chief diver in front of me touched the end off a single length of the stuff with a lit cigarette, where upon it began to burn immediately. They emptied a copper container off the stuff onto an island some 100 yds from my vessel then ignited it, sent immediately sent a flame over a hundred foot high and the heat felt on board from it was very intense, considering the day temperature was about 8 degrees.
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Imagine being in Indefatigables cordite store when hers went hot. Frightening image. Was the copper container one of the original charge cases that they fitted magazines out with?
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Should imagine all photographs which you talk off, will now be in either the national maritime museum or the imperial war museum, along with all other info and ship drawings. In recent years the Naval Photographic Unit passes all photographs and negatives etc to the Imperial Museum as a natural course of action after 3 years storage. As to cordite, I was involved with RN Clearance divers searching the wreck of HMS Drake (sunk in WW1 ) for cordite in 1978, as it was known then that the IRA was then retrieving cordite from her time to time to make incendiary bombs. The chief diver in front of me touched the end off a single length of the stuff with a lit cigarette, where upon it began to burn immediately. They emptied a copper container off the stuff onto an island some 100 yds from my vessel then ignited it, sent immediately sent a flame over a hundred foot high and the heat felt on board from it was very intense, considering the day temperature was about 8 degrees.
Well you'd imagine wrongly, they're certainly not there unless some odd snapshots lie in personal RN officers albums un or mis-catalogued or maybe the albums of ancillairy firms that helped equip the ship(s) similarily un/miscatalogued.
The plans are there.
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okay, can now attach but pictures too large. Windows XP any idea how I make them smaller?
Thanks
Geoff
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There are articles about this in the Chit Chat section.
k
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Okay, here we go. More to follow. The pictures are really self explanatory.
Regards
Geoff
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More
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Hmm, they seem to have come in an odd order but never mind. The close up of the superstructure shows the cortecine brass hold down strips together with part of one of the funnels and "B" turret structure.
The turrets have now been completed with alloy roof plates and the sides painted. Just need to manufacture the roof range finders and paint the roofs, a darker grey.
I had a lot of trouble with the roof plates as some pictures show a curved format and others show a more tent like shape. I have found conflicting pictures of each, always assuming the pictures have been captioned correctly. In the end I have gone for the more tent like structure and given it taked me one hour to make one set of plates I'm not doing them all for a third time!
Hope you like the pictures.
Cheers
Geoff
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One more.
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At last - the photo's. Well worth the wait. She is looking really superb.
I look forward to following the rest of this build with great interest. :-))
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I cannot say with certainty, but different builders might have built their turrets slightly different. One of the Battlecruisers had different types of gun houses as some were electric and others were traditional hydralic, so you may find some have round roofs and others had angular ones.
Mind you, did the Navy not have gun house roofs reinforced with extra plates during WW1? If so would this not have covered rounded roofs with flat plate; easier to work and fit??
The images have been worth the wait Geoff! The plating alone is gorgeous, while everything elses oozes the majesty of a Battleship.
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Thank you for your kind comments. I may try a slightly larger file size as some of the detail is a little blurred. HMS Invincible had different turret designs amidships as two of her turrets were built electic powered and two hydraulic and the turrets were quite different in design. The electirc system did not work well and was replaced with a hydraulics just before ww1.
There was additional 1" plating added after Jutland to turret roofs and this was bolted on and the bolts can readily be seen in many pictures but I think it would have followed the shape of the original structure. I'm inclined to agree there were just differences between the classes. I've also looked at the preceeding KGV and Orion classes and they seem to have differences too.
The benefit of building a ship of this vintage is that it highly unlikly I will meet anyone who says "I was there and that's not right!"
Cheers
Geoff
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Not only that but it is your hobby, your enjoyment and your limit of accuracy is balanced between budget, time, end use and tolerance of small detail.
In all hobbies there are a whole range of people from the person who is happy to get it looking like the real thing from forty feet away up to the person who wants to recreate the real thing but in a smaller scale, and loads of people in between.
The person who walks up to you at a show and says that they were on it, may have been on it in her later days as a training ship, possibly without a whole load of weapons and stuff and covered with sheds etc, so even then it will be loads different from how she looked sailing at Jutland.
Rule no1, have fun:O)
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:-) ....and Geoff says...."the benefit of building a ship of this vintage is that it highly unlikely I will meet anyone who says "I was there and that's not right!"
This is all so true Geoff, however if you base some semi questionable design issue and progress on with the model in the resemblance of an image....just make up a photocopy folder of images and casually have this folder handy when you display the vessel...this can dispel even the most questioning of critic <*<
Extensive research would suggest orders were placed for a number of vessels of a certain Class......plates rolled & punched...& 1/2 way through the build of the 2nd or 3rd in the Class....some Lord of the Admiralty would Order a revision or change ........just as you mention with the additional armour plating over certain turrets roof structures post a conflict
Keep the images coming thru...... :-)) ... Derek
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Okay, should get some more pictures up very shortly now that I have resolved my computer issues. Everything seems to take so long, I spend 6 hours building and can't really see much difference. Engines and props have now been mounted, greased and fitted internally. I still have some work to do getting the belt tensions right and to provide some spares, just in case.
Tomorrow's pictures will show the forward superstructure, funnels and aft superstructure together with the finished turrets, absent guns.
In case I forget to mention it the pictures show a gap under the forward superstructure and a missing deck on the aft superstructure. There will be a wire mesh deck there. The deck and gap is there so I can place the sound speakers for the gunfire effect - the sound has to have some way of getting out!
I may loose some realism but by the same token hope to gain more with the gunfire system. If this works I should get maybe as much as 600 shots (If my maths is right) yes 600 repeatable shots! Smoke, flash and noise with no pyrotechnics! If this all works as planned (big IF!) then I plan to publish full details in due course.
One of the problems is how to turn the turrets and link it all to the gunfire system and still be able to remove the deck to get at the internals. The round objects in front of the hull are the barbette bases, one for each turret. A and Y are the same. Q is slightly higher and B and X are the superimposed turrets. I plan to use my usual system of winching the turrets round using bowden cables attached to modified servos which give 180 degrees rotation and automatic return to center line.
Lots to do to ensure she is finished in time for 31 May, 2016!
Pictures to follow
Cheers
Geoff
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Crikey, I look forward to seeing these images! Lots to absorb especialy that gunfire system.
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Okay, now lets try the pictures!
In terms of the gunfire system the basic principle is to have a large box under A & B, Q and X & Y turrets. Each box contains a smoke generator so three in all.
There will be two valves at the top which connect a 6mm pipe to one gun in A turret and one gun in B turret. There is a separate 1" square valve behind which rests a computer fan motor.
The other guns in A and B will contain a very high intensity LED to give the flash, with the whole lot connected to a sound module for the "bang".
Sequence of operation is as follows:
1) Smoke generator on for 3 seconds to fill the box - all valves shut
2) Open valves for 1.5 Seconds and shut offf the smoke generator, initiate the fan for the same time and initiate the LED flash for half second and the sound module
3) Switch off fan and close the vlaves simutaneously
4) Repeat as required
On a practical basis all turrets will operate at the same time so I get a salvo of 5 shots. The smoke generators typically draw 3 amps at 12 volts so 9 amps in all but lets call it 10 amps for 3 seconds for each salvo of 5 shots.
Lets start with a 10amp hour 12 volt battery which is nominaly 10 amps for one hour or one amp for 10 hours. I know this doesn't work in practice and is an over simplification but let's continue.
There are 60 seconds in a minutes and 60 minutes in an hour so 60 x 60 = 3,600 seconds all in divided by 3 seconds = 1,200 theoretical shots. If we use a factor of 50% we get 600 salvos minimum which x 5 (1 for each turret) = 3,000 shots over all. Now this all seems to be far too high so even if we multiply this by 50% again we get 300 salvos and 1,500 shots. You get the picture. Even if the current consumption is 6 amps this would halve everything again (may need to make the smoke generators work faster) we still get 150 salvos and 750 shots!
I'm fairly sure there is a flaw in my maths but believe the concept to be sound and I can always add another battery, or two, given eht size of Iron Duke to make up for any shortfall.
As always the devil is in the detail, how to construct and operate the valves and sequencing but I believe the theory to be sound.
Do please let me have any thoughts please
Cheers
Geoff
G
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Just as an add on, if you zoom in to the director control unit on the foretop you can see the director sights!
G
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Gorgeous work geoff! Another top build.
How much pressure are you going to create with the generator? I ask because the guns on the super dreadnoughts put out quite a plume of dirty smoke beyond the muzzle, and while the LED will create a good flash increased by the smoke, will enough smoke be created to recreate the cloud?
You should get a better effect with a particulate based cloud of vapourised oil than you would with steam.
I had the idea of using small black powder charges and flour bursters in brass gun tubes suitably detailed like scale gun barrels set off when at a safe distance from my friends and I, and using a simple electrical actuator from the transmitter. It would only give you one discharge.
Naturally, I would get a black powder liscence first :-))
Whatever happens, you are taking us on an adventure and I am interested in your developments.
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Geoff....here is an image of the same 6" secondary MKVI gun mounts however from HM battleship Kent...an earlier Class, however the same [single] mounts were as used on the HM Duke
Interestingly, the image shows doors that could open over the mantlet plate as weather protection......the lower mount also displays the centre cover lowered down
This also asks the begging question...were the barrels withdrawn from the firing position or and maintenance when not in action?
Looking forward to more images & detail of the build...... Derek
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This is pertinent to Colin Bishop's query about ninteenth century armament and how it was stowed.
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Yes Ian...........I have commented on that thread and hence what I was eluding to here......
If we assume the mounts on HM Kent were on the STBD side, it would appear that the AFT mantlet cover could swing out to greater than 90 degrees to STBD [we can see the cover hinges in the vertical plane and the rope]...we also see the centre cover lowered .....again of assumed wire rope].......
What is more confusing here is the centre cover for the lower mount appears to be of one piece construction, whereas the centre cover for the upper mount appears to be in two halves ie., each opening outwards
If the lower centre cover is in fact of this one piece lowerable configuration would suggest that the barrel would need to be fully withdrawn prior to lifting/closing the cover......... Derek
However having seen this I don't know <*< if we will ever find a conclusion......Derek
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Geoff....with respect to the rate of fire for these 13.5" guns......a good reference is ....http://www.navweaps.com/Weapons/WNBR_135-45_mk5.htm
This confirms a ROF of between 1.5 and 2 firings per barrel per minute.....
So even at the best ROF, you should expect 30 salvos per hour.......multiplied by the sq root of scale of the vessel .... Derek
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Sorry .......
you should expect 30 salvos per hour solar powered batteries were flat in the abacus :embarrassed: Derek
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The 6" guns shown are in whats called casemates and they did indeed include lots of little doors to seal them away from the weather and were designed to fit exactly round the gun barrels. They were either lowered or removed before battle. Some hinged up, some hinged down which ever was more practical.
As to whether the 6" guns could be withdrawn depends entirely on the date of the mounting. "Vaseur" mountings were on a slide and dated from the 1890's and I believe these could indeed be slid back inside as the recoil was on the slide. Later mountings which were pedestal mounted and were generally lighter had different recoil systems and I don't believe they could be withdrawn into the ships, hence the complex shutter arrangements.
Iron Duke had pedestal mounted guns with small circular shields and had shutter doors which could be dropped before action but they caught the water. They were removed before commissioning and India Rubber joints were fitted between the gun shield and surrounding structure which eased matters considerably.
This gave rise to the standard 6" secondary battery design/appearance seen in Iron Duke , Tiger, Queen Elizabeth and the Revenge classes that followed.
On a practical basis there was always a problem in keeping the batteries watertight and the tendancy was to have a long line of guns rather like a sailing ship as this gave very effective gunnery control but but this exposed powder and shot to a single hit (Malaya or Barham at Jutland).
In terms of pressure within my proposed gunfire system. I have no way of measuring it but it would be very low. I built a test rig some years ago and whilst it worked there were a number of problems which at the time I couldn't readily resolve albeit the volme of smoke comming out the barrel was quite adequate:
1) It leaked smoke from every orifice!
2) The smoke blew back past the computer fan!
3) the smoke came out in a jet rather like water as opposed to an explosion.
Items 1) and 2) are just engineering/detail solutions which I believe I have now resolved - Where I went wrong was to switch the fan on to pressurise the system and then open the valves. The answer is very simply to open the valves first then there is somewhere for the smoke to go, so a sequencing issue.
Item 3) may be resolved simply by the motion of the model through the water, otherwise a very small deflector cone at the end of the muzzle should gause the smoke to expand in all directions rather than a jet but also a lot would depend on from what side you saw the smoke.
I actually use fog fluid to produce the smoke so little if any residue on the model and any that condenses inside the smoke chamber can just drain back to the smoke generator.
Thats the plan anyway!
I spent 1.5 hours last night doing the first piece of railings round the top of the searchlight platform on the second funnel. Odd shapes are always hard to do so I can't wait to tackle the forwatd superstructure!
Found a source of 1 meter lengths of 0.5mm brass wire from "4D model shop.co.uk" which is in London and walking distance from my office 74 pence a piece. This goes through the John Haynes stanchions easier than the 0.6mm copper wire which I used for the searchlight platform. The copper has the advantage of being more malleable but the brass will be better for the long lengths along the ships side.
I'll try to post some more pictures when there is something to show.
Thanks for the feedback.
Cheers
Geoff
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Railings, railings and more railings with ladders! This was quite challenging due to the complex shapes and the need to have three identical rails with everything. The 0.6mm copper wire was ideal as it was very maleable but this was still very very time consuming!
The canvas dodgers are ordinary masking tape as this has a cloth like outer appearance and is self adhesive. I folder the tape over the top rail for about 3mm so it sticks to itself. This was then painted a mediaum/light gret both inside and outside to waterproof it and to make it stick to the rails more. In practive some bits have come unstuck a little but this should be easily glued down again. I may paint the outside a slightly lighter grey but importantly you can see the rails shape which is what was intended.
Cheers
Geoff
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Your work on the railings is great Geoff. I think they really make the difference espcaially when neatly done. The use of tape for the dodgers initially worried me but then when I thought about it, once the adhesive dries (perishes) it will not be evilly sticky and nasty, so if cafreful, you should be able to re glue them in place and touch up any damage with paint :}
Your idea of using a cone at the muzzle is also interesting as it should recreate the effect a muzzle break has in dispersing fumes. Perhaps a pepper pot muzzle brake might help diffuse your vapour with a cone added to help manoevre the vapour?
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I'm hoping that the paint will also act as a kind of glue and keep all together as its not structual in any way. Nothing further to report at the moment as other stuff intrudes!
I think the next steps will be to start working on the turret turning mechanism whilst I'm sorting out the wood for the deck. I can always build other bits but really want to build in some kind of logical order.
I also have to start on building the gun fire system to validate the whole thing! or not as the case may be!
Cheers
Geoff
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How ever you do it, I am sure it will be an interesting journey Geoff.
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How are things going Geoff? I hope you have had the opportunity to get back to some model making?
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Not really much progress to report. I'm still waiting on the deck planks so have been working on the gunfire system. As referenenced before essentially a plastic box with a smoke generator in it with a valve to let the air in and a valve to let the smoke out.
Its not working too well, I don't seem to have the balance right yet but I still have a way to go because the pressure is so low any tiny leak has a disproprtionate effect.
My idea of using a table tennis ball as a valve works quite well but you do need a powerfull PC fan to make it work. The ball just sits inside a B&Q platic pipe joint as that has an inner lip so the ball just rests on it. I have cut half the circuference of the pipe away and the air flows in and as soon as the fan switches off the ball drops and seals the hole quite nicely.
I have ordered some 12v solenoids from Amazon and intend to use them to operate anexit valve then we shall see.
No more real work on the ship proper as I need to sort out the deck before I can finalise the turret turning mechanism and then the gunfire system.
I'm beginning to wonder where all the batteries will go!
Cheers
Geoff
P.S. I'm off to Wicksteed Park show tomorrow with Canopus (now restored to steam power) and Lord Nelson with a working smoke generator.
Hope it doesn't rain!
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I look forward to seeing images of both from the show Geoff. You cannot beat some pre/semi-dreadnought action:O)
Keep at that smoke system, it sounds remarkable.
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Video? https://youtu.be/IPssjpkj3wM
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That is one pretty ship Geoff. The Lord Nelsons did look more business like than their predecessors. Why we went away from secondary armament in turrets is beyond me.
Thanks for that Martin.
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Actually at the ranges Lord Nelson was designed to fight the 9.2" was part of the main armament and the secondary armament of 12 pounders is all on the flying deck and forward and aft superstructures.
As ranges increased more 12" guns were required and eventually 4" and 6" introduced in a battery to get a sufficient number as whilst turrets would have been better they would have weighed more so less guns could be carried.
At the time of building destroyers were really quite small so a 12pdr could just stop them but as they got bigger it needed a 4" as a minimum and then a 6".
In Dreadnoughts the secondary armamant was designed to destroy the unprotected upper works of ships and hopefully take out some of the enemies secondary armamant.
To prevent this the secondary armamant gained armour but whilst this could readily protect from a 4" or 6" hit it was just the thickness needed to burst an armour piercing shell which would otherwise pass right through without detonating! Damed if you do and damed if you don't!
All battlesghips had strakes of modest armout up to 6" thick to protect agianst the secondary armamanet and to protect against high explosive main armamant shells which could be kept out with relativley thin armour.
The US Nevada class introduced the all or nothing armour concept. Thick to protect the vitals and nothing anywhere else but this did make them vulnerable to main armamant high explosive shells - kind of a soft kill!
Interestingly in WW2 when most battleships were all or nothing none of them ever got really tested in action so we will never really know how it would have worked!
Cheers
Geoff
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I fully appreciate your point about the weight of turretted secondary armament would have meant fewer guns, but I have read that so often, the casemated guns were ineffective in a rough sea, and suggest that turretted guns, though fewer in number, would have been more effective.
Still, we have what we have.
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Okay, some work on ID. I have been constructing two smoke generators for the funnels using the mini-foggers. One came from Maplins but when I went to get another they had all sold out so got one from Amazon, same cost £20. The Amazon one is a bit bigger so doesn't fit in the box I had built, typical!
Side view is "T" shaped with a plastic tube to contain the fogger with the horizontal being a box to contain the water with a very small PC fan to blow it all out. A cone shaped funnel and tube fit on top to take the smoke up through the funnel.
Both work fine and I will try to get some pictures but interestingly the Amazon one produces quite a lot more "smoke" - curious.
Current consumption on 24 DC is about 0.5 to 1.0 amp so is very low.
Okay so far so good but now the technical question?
Where are the real funnel air vents to the boiler rooms? I have found some on the plans each side of the aft funnel but can't find any for the forward funnel - they must exist but I can't see them, any suggestions?
Thanks
Geoff
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Is it worth selling the maplins one on Ebay and getting another unit from Amazon to match? Either that or keep the former one for another model.
As regards air intakes for the forward boilers, I am afraid I cannot help.
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Geoff, here's a late photo of Iron Duke as a gunnery training ship.
That looks like an open vent beside the fore funnel (behind the boats' supports). Are the blocky things between the funnels more vents? Burt's Battleships of World War One gives no clues. But - compared to Dreadnought, which bristles with vents, Iron Duke seems surprisingly lacking.
Andy
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Okay so far so good but now the technical question?
Where are the real funnel air vents to the boiler rooms? I have found some on the plans each side of the aft funnel but can't find any for the forward funnel - they must exist but I can't see them, any suggestions?
They should be around the funnel base. On some ships, the purpose of the lower funnel cap is to keep the weather out of them. On others, there was a plate or cover clipped over them. Roberts drawing in Battlecruisers shows these plates clipped over the vents on Queen Mary in the sketch of the bridge which I believe you have.
The image attached shows Tiger fitting out and shows both the vent openings and the actual cast gratings that went into the square/rectangular openings liad nearby. Instructive image really as you are looking at the air-space that leads down into the boiler rooms in several stages of construction, the gratings are already in the starboard side of the fore funnel.
I have seen hatch openings around the lower cap on Iron Dukes rear funnel ... can only think the rear funnel had different needs than the fore?
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Further to the above, the 3 classes of 13.5" battleship [Orions, KGVs & Iron Dukes] all have a pair of these big vents just aft of Q turret. They are above the engineroom so must be vents for that/those compartments.
The 3 boilerrooms for the ID class are under the 2 funnels thus the vents will be above them somewhere on your plan:
(http://s22.photobucket.com/user/Bager1968/media/Own%20designs/DutchIronDuke02.png.html)
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Guys.....did these Classes of vessels not have pressurised boiler rooms?..........[in inches of water gauge]......Derek
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Derek
What exactly do you mean?
Do you mean that the actual boiler rooms were pressurised, ie like on modern warships?
or
Do you mean that the boilers were pressurised- because I assume that most steam turbines are pressurised?
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Nick....certainly the former.........[pressurised atmosphere in older Victorian coal fired ships boiler rooms]....the value was low as it was a water gauge reading...
Can only assume it was to aid combustion.........here is an extract for the US battleship BB35 Texas
"The boiler system was comprised originally of 4 boiler rooms with 14 boilers, of which 8 were superheated. They were riveted construction and operated at a maximum pressure of 295psi but were tested to 450psi. Though designed as coal burners, each boiler had 6 oil burners which were used when the ship needed to operate at high speed. To communicate with other parts of the ship, the four boiler rooms had 13 different voice tubes. Each boiler room was pressurized by having each boiler matched with a 23,000cfm electric operated blower. For the crew to enter-exit the room, they had to pass through an air lock. Click on the links in the 1913-1925 section for more details."
....... Derek
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Guys.....did these Classes of vessels not have pressurised boiler rooms?..........[in inches of water gauge]......Derek
Yes, there was an 'air-lock' on the boileroom which meant it could be pressurised (sealed).
Attached is a section from the 'Anatomy of' book on HMS Dreadnought that describes the subject you raise. I too had always pondered this as any compartment below decks on a warship needs to be seal-able for damage-control purposes... and I was never able to understand how an opening directly under the lower funnel cap could be.
I did go through this with a 'naval author' and I can now see we were talking at cross-purposes and I'd lumped in the airspace, between the hot funnel and the ships structure, in with the BR vents that surrounded it on the ships we discussed. Mea Culpa.
To get back to the original question: I have a plan from a book that shows 3 or 4 raised rectangular boxes between the funnels.
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Without getting too far off track, & in the absence of documentation for HM Iron Duke, we could assume close boiler design similarities to the US BB35 Texas as Google confirms
HM Iron Duke = Built 1914, 25K tons, 18 coal fired boilers, 29K shaft HP
US Texas BB35 = Built 1914, 27K tons, 14 coal fired boilers, 28K shaft HP
If we were to accept the ~~23K cubic feet of free air/minute for each boiler on BB35, to understand this volume of free air at atmospheric pressure %)....think of a cube of approx. 30 foot...or say 10 meters approximately
In reality, this is not a big number in volume, the limiting factor was the orifice sizing on the exhaust side of the boiler rooms atmospheric vents...so this may explain the lack of visual images here.....mushroom type vents for the discharge would seem logical
However now we see that Pondweed has some documentation from plans O0, would be interesting to see what these look like :-))....
Derek
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Thank you all for your thoughts. I already had the solution as it turns out because I bought copies of the forecastle deck from Greenwich Maritime museum. Whilst I have not seen any boiler room vents on any ID plans that I have seen, the original plans clearly show vents either side of the forefunnel so I have gone with those. The above picture of ID shows these quite nicely but why they don't appear on any of the general ID plans remains a mystery.
progress on the build:
1) I have finally built two smoke generators using 4 "fogger" units (two for each funnel) to run on 24 volts. Despite building various plastic boxes in the end because I used two units for each funnel I used a couple of "washing powder" plastic boxes which were more or less just right and being translucent I can easily check on the water level. The smoke output is quite good but only time on the pond will show if I have enough - you can't get too much smoke from a coal powered ship!
2) Started work on the decks and laid the margin planks yesterday both at the deck edge and round the superstructure. Took ages especially the curved bits. I tried steaming the planks (Walpaper steam stripper feeding into a plastic tube with both ends sealed, one lightly so the steam could escape but after 20 mins steaming the spruce planks still would not really bend). Cut them out of a solid sheet in the end which I was a lot quicker anyway.
3) Cut 5 circles for the turret bases but 1/8" wider to show the planking at the base of the barbett and after the glue had dried just cut out the inner circle which was easy. Have also laid the center plank and am now pondering the next stage.
I'll try to get some pictures up.
Cheers
Geoff
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That sounds like a weekend of hard work well rewarded Geoff. Four generators, crikey, it sounds like the real thing as regards multiples of generators and pumps etc:O)
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As an update I have now planked the deck using spruce 1/8" x 1/16" which was obtained through SHG Marine. Given the size of the order it took a while to collect the planks from the same production run to minimise tollerances. The tollerances on all the wood recieved was really very good and well up to spec.
The wood was recieved and work started with the margin planks. I tried to steam the wood for 20 mins plus using a walpaper steamer but with poor results so in the end cut out the "S" shapes from a flat sheet.
Before starting the planks were stained with a light oak wood die (Coldron) as I was concerned that I could leave invisible glue fingerprints which would only show up later.
In terms of planking I started with the king plank on the center line and planked outwards. After much thought I used black electricians tape for the caulking and a graphite pencil for the ends and margin planks. Planking was done in as long a strip as possible to avoid snaking but even so given the layout of ID there was a degree of "fettling" to get it all to fit as even with accuratley cut planks there is always some margin and a very small error shows up over a width of 90 planks!
The whole process was actually quite enjoyable once I got into it if a little tedious at times with the small sections between superstructure and turrets.
Once completed I used a "Stanley kinife" blade as a scraper to level the deck and this is working very well indeed. I still have some work to do with this.
The question now is do I now mark the individual planks into shorter lengths, say 24 ft scale and how. I'm tempted to just use a small sharp pencil or to make a small cut as in practice its only the lenghts that show on a real ship from any distance.
Does anyone have a preference or thoughts to this?
To jog or not to jog that is the question - I didn't as candidly at 1/96 scale I could see myself still planking in 20 years time! Curiously there is a new book out on Japanese battleships - photographic collection and there is a very clear picture of a predreadnought which shows no jogging! Interesting.
I'll try to get some pictures up shortly.
Cheers
Geoff
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The book was "Japanese Battleships 1897 - 1945" by RA Burt
G
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I recognise the author's name. Good news Geoff, I look forward to some photos when the telemetry gods deem it fit to help you to upload photos.
I am sure the Duke looks lovely in spruce.
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Jogging planks is 'character building'. %% But, as you say, it takes an eternity. :((
Andy
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Pictures of the planking underway.
I'll post some more of the finished planking which due to scraping has cut back the planking to a much whiter shade which will need further staining.
Geoff
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Nice planks! :-))
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Gorgeous Geoff, and ever so neatly done:O)
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More pictures showing ID as she is as of yesterday. the deck showing the lighter clour due to scraping.
I stil have a way to go to complete her by 31 May 2016 but I think I am on target!
Enjoy
Geoff
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Looking good! :-))
Andy
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Art with wood Geoff. I think the wor on the decking has probably advanced your progress well and has got a labourious phase out to the way allowing you time to do more interesting bits.
Your work inspires me to pull my finger out and get the destroyer finished for next year. Seeing this beauty and others of a similar era draws me to be at Mayhem next year even if I have to sleep under a pedallo:O)
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Having recently completed the deck planking stage of 1-1/2 meter of deck on my own model, I can appreciate what's involved.
Beautiful work!
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I'll try to get some more pictues up but the silence doesn't mean I haven't been building!
Deck all now stained/varnished, voice pipes on the forward superstructure. A mixture of plastic rod and copper wire (bends easily). Capstan and anchour beds and bollards now in place together with the breakwater. Main boat boom also in place with brass end pieces.
I'm now working on the searchlights which I am making in brass. Conservativley as they are twin I estimate 25/26 pieces for each, it's becoming something of a labour of love but I'm actually enjoying building all 8 of them!
I have done some research on the precise design of these twins, thanks to help on this board, but have not really found any clear pictures or designs which show the detail I'm after so I'm planning on using a little moddling license. There would actually appear to be numerous different versions of the same thing. I figure twins would have been two heavy to move by hand so there was probably a worm/quadrant drive to tilt them and another worm drive to turn them all of which I will try to model.
So far I have made 8 coned stands plus 8 "T" pieces and 16 brass tubes for the actual searchights. I have some very small brass bolts which I'll try to use for the worm drives. Its all a little fiddly as accross the "T" is only 2.1cm.
Whilst the real ones would of course have been painted grey or black I think I'll leave parts in brass to add some "bling" and interest to the model.
I have all the turrets connected up so they will rotate. A drum under each linked with fishing line. A and B together then Q X and Y linked. I have used a servo morph (Action Electonics who gave excellent service) attached to two small sail winches to winch the turrets round. I found the servo morph very sensitive to set up to get 180 degrees rotation with back to the center at 90 degrees but it does work albeit the second set of turrets don't seem to quite follow but this could be an optical illusion absent barrels. If needed I'll just use a second servo morph for the rear turrets.
I still have to have another look at the gun fire mechanism and figure out if I can get the electronic system to function. I'm still optimistic but have put that on the back burner for a while whist I chew over a number of detail problems in my head.
I'm going to have to reconfigure the smoke generators as its too awkward to drop the foreward deck over the inner funnels and make the electrical connections. I plan to use a tube piece of foam under each funnel so it will squash a little to make a seal between the generator and the funnel proper.
Thats about it for now.
Cheers
Geoff
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A friend of mine uses Dolls house electrical copper tape to make his contacts. he wired up a small LCD telly, radar screen and lots of lights etc using it so I presume it can take the wattage without creating inwanted smoke.
It sounds like she is becoming an attractive model Geoff!
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I was reading your early posts of building the hull Geoff and wondered if you could confirm a few details?
1. When manipulating the frame plans to conform to your build style, did you remove the thickness of the deck from the frames or leave them as is so the hull has a bit more depth?
I ask because the main deck piece looks structural and in my mind would need to be factored into the drawings.
2. Did you seal the inside of the planks as you went or after the hull was planked?
I am starting to mull plans over for HMS Achilles while I make more and more progress on HMS Ready.
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The first thing I did was to check the beam on the plans as sometimes hull lines show the inside line on the real ship such that plating and armour add to the width. On ID the plans were exact for the outside beam so I just scalled them down to 1/96 and then a little bit more to remove 1/4" from both the beam and depth.
As the planking was to be 1/8" thick once planked this restored the correct beam. After sanding this narrowed the beam but after plating the hull this then restored the beam to the correct dimensions.
The same with the deck which was 1/8" thick plus the bottom planking. The deck is indeed a structural element as in my experience it is the deck line that is key. If there is any unfairness in the hull lines it can be corrected with sanding and filler as needed but the deck defines the shape and sheer of the ship. I partially cut the deck openings from both sides but left sufficient strength in the deck for it to behave as a solid piece so no twisting or warping.
Building the hull up the right way provides full visual sight of the deck line. Indeed some of the frames were a little high and others a little short by something in the order of 1mm but sufficent to effect the smoothness of the deck run. The differences were packed out with thin card untill all was visually smooth and linear. I kept a carefull eye on this during building and was not able to detect any distortion. Planks were attached to alternate sides to preevent any twisting and all came out well.
I started planking at the waterline to define the hull shape and lock all the frames in place. Then planked up to the deck and down as far as I could go whilst still having access to unscrew the hull from the building board.
I joined two planks together with a scarph joint so I had a continuious run from bow to stern for the first two planks each side to give me the line and run of the hull shape. Subsequent planks were 3 feet long and done like laying brickwork with overlapping joints. There were some strange and very tapered shapes on the lower part of the hull of different widths to get the lines fair but no reall problems as with a 78" hull length most curves are quite gently. Most planks were 1/2" wide, cut from sheet as it doesn't matter if some planks are slightly wider or not as its just covering the hull.
I also added a single long plank each side at the bilge line which gave me both a good run and defined the area I needed to plank above which was a crescent shape. Some issues in getting the last very tapered plank in but nothing really difficult.
I also tapered a number of planks amidships as I went to ensure a smooth plank run but it wasn't critical again because of the size of the hull.
Not shown in the pictures is that I built 1/8" sheer into the build board as in my experience wooden hulls tend to settle a little and "hogg" so this countered this natural tendancy.
With only the area below the bilges to plank the hull was quite ridged and turned upside down to complete. Once sanded and painted in resin and fibreglassed on the outside and sanded smooth etc. The deck openings were then cut out to provide access to the interior. The inside was then resined and fibreglassed to make the structure whole.
Hope this assists
Cheers
Geoff
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Looking delicious Geoff :-))
I particularly like the multiple curves on the deck plank edging, knowing how tricky they can be.
Following with great interest. As I said before my Wife's Grandfather served on Iron Duke and was at Jutland.
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Thankyou Geoff, this did indeed help a lot. I will look at wider planks for the build, though Achilles will not be as wide as ID.
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I had a clear weekend and spent something like 12 hours on ID and still can't see very much for my labours! To be fair some of the work was tricky and slow and inside but to summarise:
- Finished the twin searchlights (8 off)- took 21 pieces each to complete
- Installed another "Servomorph" from Action Electronics and associated wiring. I now have one for A and B turrets with a separate one for Q, X and Y.
- The forecastle deck (goes back to the second funnel) now has legs so I can access the wiring at the pond side to make the connections and stand it upright so I can work on the underside
- Strengthend the engine mounts and adjusted the size of the rubber belt drives ("O" rings) plus two spares
- Constructed smoke proof connectors (At least I hope so) at the base of each funnel. I need to lift the forcastle off and a completley vertical lift proved impractical. This was quite tricky to do and construct.
- Finalised fitting of the smoke generators
- Installed the speed contoller support and speed contoller
- Finished off the twin rudder head and fitted the rudder servo and reciever and connecting rods
- Made 8 bridge instruments in brass (Evershed - for rudder and engine revs and directors)
- Made binnacle in brass together with giro binnacle also uin vbrass plus base stand.
- Made 9 ft rangefinder in brass for upper bridge
- Painted and varnished all the brass fittings
I guess listing it all out it doesn't look to bad but ID just seems to absorbe all I do without showing any great change. I have some pictures of the twin searchlights and front of the bridge which I'll try to post shortly.
I probably need to think about a temporary water tank to test float her for sorting out ballast very shortly but the main item outstanding is the gunfire simulation as until I have resolved that I can't plan the interior spaces too well. I suspect I'll have to put some concrete in the lower hull as ballast as well.
Only 7 months to go before scheduled completion (31/05/16) - I may have to start working time and a half at this rate!
Cheers
Geoff
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For the temporary test tank, could you hire/buy some scaffolding planks to form a box, and buy a tarp that you can then put inside the box and fill with water?
Alternativey suggest that the garden really needs a nice pond and knock something up quick that you can return to later and improve?
I look forward to seeing the photos, especially of your searchlights.
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A labour of love Geoff but will be worth it :-))
Your A & B turrets, as will the X & Y turrets all have as you say have the 180 degrees pointing zone and firing zones, however the Q turret whilst having the same pointing zone would have very limited firing zones...would the latter be say +45 degrees to +180 degrees? to either port or stdb?
I have 3 x ACTion P96 servomorphs..[for different uses] and understand their speed & travel sensitivity.
So if you were training your X & Y turrets at any arc lower that ~~45 degrees the Q turret would be facing at the aft superstructure >>:-(
Or, .....just thinking, Q turret could have train & fire arcs of +45 degrees from athwart ships on both the port& stdb side ....just like the real vessel
Just an observation..... as you say....."but the main item outstanding is the gunfire simulation"
Looking forward to seeing more images as you progress.... Derek
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Okay, here are a couple of pictures of the searchlights and forward superstructure (showing the voice pipes and searchlights. Sorry about the quality!
Some with flash others without.
As regards "Q" turret firing bearings I intend to only fire them at 90 degrees to the centerline so the superstructure position presents no difficulty. On a practical basis you can't see the precise bearing at any distance so if I'm off a few degrees it really doesn't notice.
More work this weekend!
Cheers
Geoff
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They look splendidly Naval with all the brasswork:O) The end of the boom looks exquisite as well Geoff.
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More progress on the gunfire system. Attached is the prototype "fire box". Essentially a smoke generator with a computer fan and gun barrel outlet.
I still have problems with this as the fan is not powerfull enough (currently 7 cfm) to force the smoke through the narrow barrel in the volume required and all the valves leak!
I tried putting a difuser (cone shape) in the end of the barrel to see if it would disperse the smoke but no real difference.
The solenoid on top slides to open a slide valve under the gun and a hatch over the fan. The thought being that when the solenoid is off them the remaining fan suction will slam the hatch closed.
It kind of works so is moving in the right direction.
Question: If I piggy back two fans would I get a meaningfull increase in pressure?
More work to do!
Cheers
Geoff
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I would love to see a video of the above in action. O0
Andy
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I am wondering if you would need a stronger fan unit for each barrel or pair of to get the desired quantity of smoke. Still, this is an interesting subject, what with the amazing build as well.
It always fills me with pleasure when I see this topic in my inbox.
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Thank you for your kind comments. Actually the plan was just to use one barrel on each turret for the smoke and the other to contail a bright LED for the flash, however you have given me an idea. If I can't get enough smoke through one barrel then I could use both barrels and do away with the LED. This would get double the smoke volume - hmm actually on reflection it won't work because I have to pump the smoke up through a 6mm pipe on the turret axis so that may be the limiting factor but given that any gas speeds up when going through a restriction it may still work if I join both barrels together in the turret.
Hmmm, food for thought here.
First plan is to increase the fan pressure and see how that works. The real problem is gas leakage from the valves which is where the fine detail comes in! As always the devil is in the detail.
I'll report back when I have some more progress .
Thanks
Geoff
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Good show Geoff. I am working out my 'Jolly' schedule for next year as I really want to see your ship and sail mine at Mayhem next year.
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Not much to report on the build really. I have been making and installing some of the brass bridge fittings which look kind of nice in pollished brass. Started work on the steam launches. I have used a bread and butter method with obechi and then a thin ply deck wedged up at bow and stern to give the sheer line. The narroe gap being filled with wood filler. All then being sanded to shape and painted mutiple coats of grain filler to provide a smooth finish.
Reserach has shown that if I piggy back two fans of the same power I dont get a significant or meaningfull increase in the volume of the air being pushed through but it does effectivley double the static pressure. I have six PC fans 9.8 CFM on order but the delivery date is the end of November.
I'm having unexpected trouble matching the paintwork. Whilst the colour mix is 50/50 the last batch is drying with more of a satin sheen rather than a matt finish. Anyone got any ideas? If I added some matt varnish would this just dull it down a little?
Oh well, keep on building!
Cheers
Geoff
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Providing the shades do not alter across the model I would paint the whole model and then put a coat of matt varnish over the whole lot.
The Military modelling fraternity put a coat of Johnson's Klear or Future floor polish over a model to seal in the paintwork and any special paint effects such as hairspray chipping before the weathering process begins, but as you want it matt only, I would go for a coat of matt varnish all over (probably missing out the decks etc:O)
I look forward to seeing more photos of this brilliant build Geoff. Your orchestra of fans will impart a sound like turbines running.
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They look splendidly Naval with all the brasswork:O) The end of the boom looks exquisite as well Geoff.
The derrick?
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Excuse my memory for nautical terms! I am Ian by the way not Derrick :-) Sorry, I had to get that one in!!
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Excuse my memory for nautical terms! I am Ian by the way not Derrick :-) Sorry, I had to get that one in!!
Yes, well we all make mistakes.
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Geoff
I hope this post is of help.
The plan view of the rangefinder hood is representative only and not exact, I made mine as a rectangle with rounded corners, it has arms that protrude either end for the RF optics and the port side of the face has a curved bump.
The photos of Queen mary show both sides.
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Thank you for the additional input which as always is appreciated. I have plans of ID conning tower and rangefinder hood from "Warship" - there was an article on fire control which explained how it was developed and how the shape came about. Earlier ships had round conning toweres (KGV class/Orion) but with ID they expanded the sides to include additional positions for the 6" guns which is why you get the "Diamond" type shape. This was sucessfull and was repeated in the QE class. What is not apparent from the plan view is that beneath the rangfinder was a spotting hood, to spot the fall of shot. This was really a duplication of the foretop, the idea was the foretop could not be protected other than a splinter floor as no ship could carry 12" armour at that height so splinter protection was all that could be provided. They would use the foretop director and rangefinder antil they were put out of action. The multiple rangefinders in ID were used to get an average range and then spotting used to correct the fire until a straddle was achieved.
The first picture by the way is of the rear superfiring turret of Neptune - the turrets are of a more angular design and there is a rear tripod. I know this because I have a 6ft model of Neptune as well! Built many years ago back in 1974!
I have been building deck fittings, anchors, deck hatches, ventilators and the like. Pictures to follow if I get a chance this weekend.
I also took delivery of the PC fans for the gunfire system - very dissapointed as they were advertised at 8.9CFM and produce less volume than the one I have at 7.0CFM! Something isn't adding up here! All very frustrating as absent a source of reasonably cheap powerfull 40mm x 40mm PC fans then my gunfire system can't be built!
If anyone knows of a source of proven powefull fans do please let me know. I need three or six if I stack them.
Thanks
Geoff
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Geoff
Could I suggest that the rather miniscule air displacement [~~8 CFM] of the blade fans you mention is also assumed as based upon CFM@FAD [free air delivery] ie., back to atmosphere, therefore the fans are displacement air acceleration elements, not air pressure force elements
So any restriction placed in the discharge plenum of the fan will reduce the FAD by a rather complex >>:-( calculation amount ...however simply put, the easiest way to understand the reduction in FAD [by restriction] in such basic elements is by an inverse increase in current consumption of the electric motor
Direct piggybacking two fans of 7 CFMFAD [on one common suction] would possibly provide ~~8 or 9 CFMFAD total prior to the restriction
The same two 7 CFMFAD fans with independent suctions will provide ~~ 14 CFMFAD prior to that same total restriction........ O0
I hope this makes some sense........Derek
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It does, thank you. Its kind of what I figured when considering piggybacking two fans. However the 7CF fan in laymans terms, when measured by the good old fashioned hand, delivers significantly more air flow than the 8.9CFM which is what is puzzling me. The unscientific measurement suggests something in the region of 4 times!
How do I know the 7CF is indeed a 7CF? Basically I Googled the make/model number and it gave me the specifications but they are old and no longer available.
You can get 4cm x 4cm fans up to 17CFM and more but they tend to be server fans rather than PC fans and I can't find a reasonable cost option. In the US about $5-$7 each v £15 each in the UK.
The obvious thing is that maybe the 7CF fan isn't what it appears to be. I'll do some more checking and will report back. This would explain why the 8.9CF fans are comming out weak - maybe they do indeed give 8.9CF but I'm comparing them to something rather special which I didn't realise was something special - murphy's law is alive and well!
Thanks
Geoff
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Looking at the images that Pondweed put up, I noticed the clear image of the twin searchlights and their mounts. If only this had trned up a year ago when you were scrabbling around for references. That image alone has enough detail to build from. Brilliant find Pondweed.
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If your fans are a bit lacking, here's an idea from the left-field but why don't you inflate a party balloon with your smoke? Then once your valve is let go, the balloon will doing the blowing .. or pushing!
Though if I remember my physics right, you only recieve the same energy output as you impart (input). So as an experiemnt, try blowing down a drinking straw to understand what you're asking a PC fan to do. [edit: you're focussing on CFM which is volume, volume is not the same as force or pressure or PSI.]
So you may need a compressor ... but can you compress atomised or particle-ised air? I don't know I've never tried. I have lit one of those plumbers tablets they use to test chimneys, to use the Spinal Tap line, they DO go to number 11 and I once gave thought to having a RC boat that would lay 'smoke screens'.
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Oddley enough I had thought of that but the problem is where do I fit the balloon!
Good idea though!
keep em comming!
Cheers
Geoff
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fans stacked need different blade profiles so there acumulative effect is negligible
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In terms of increased CFM I concur but my research shows that the static pressure nearly doubles. At least that's what the boffins say on various IT sights
G
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Hi Geoff,
Just a thought on your air flow issue... why not use a small 12v dc Tyre inflation compressor, pumping air into a small expanding bag or a pressure vessel. Then you could release the air through an electronically controlled solenoid valve? to each individual barrel or turret group. With fairly low pressures, you could get away with using silicon tube and tie wraps to secure them to the breach end of the barrels.....just a thought.
Ian
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Ha! You beat me to it Ian. That is a fab idea especially as it removes the need for lots of fans and attendant wiring. You might also be able to introduce particulate release to give you the clouds of cordite smoke.
Sadly Potassium chlorate is illegal to purchase, so that is not an available source of smoke.
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Those little compressors can be very noisy though...
Colin
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That's the problem I figured as well, also lots of vibration. They also work at quite high pressure and can get up to 50/60 PSI if not more which is probably excessive for what I need.
I had thought about using a small air (piston/peristaltic type pump) to charge up an air reservoir which I could then discharge with a solenoid valve, but this means pressure tanks etc which introduce further complications.
Or use a rechargeable air horn canister but they work out at about £15/£20 each and take up quite a lot of volume. If I have any kind of pressure vessel then volume begins to be a problem as not only does the vessel have to be sufficiently large to give say 100/200 strong puffs of air but I still need a volume container for each of the smoke generators to hold the smoke. This is why I had though about using PC fans as they can suck/blow as much air as they like and take little space. A number of the main ventilators on the deck will be working to provide an air flow to the guns and the funnel smoke.
I have also though about using one central fan unit ducted with 1/2" diameter piping. This may be viable as some of the fan pumps can be used in model aeroplanes for electric flightand give a good pressure surge very quickly.
At the moment I'm still building various deck hatches and fittings, bollards, fairleads, boats, cranes etc so I still have time to work on the gun system. However I just want to see her with some guns in place!
I'll have to have another concerted try at the fan system to see if it really is viable and prioduces enough smoke using any kind of fan I can get then it "just" becomes a question of finding the right fan!! Yeah, right!
All ideas most welcome because if I can crack it then we all have a model gunfire system with multiple shots and 110% safe and reliable - that's the real goal.
Cheers
Geoff
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Little bit of history - we supply fans to companies around the globe mainly centrifugal for the plastics industry, several years ago we supplied axials for a Russian contract, they were run and standby and one attached to the front of the other, so not so dissimilar to what you first mentioned (though a lot smaller, ours were 16-19 inch in diameter), they required different impellers as the first impeller compressed the are such that the second had to have a different profile to account for this compression factor.
I am not saying that this is noticible in the size of fans you are using but it is a scaleable effect and actually may be negligible in the grand scheme of things.
On another thought a sales rep was doing a little R&D of his own in which he changed the inlet of one of these fans with some other alterations and created a small centrifugal that was quite powerful, unsure as what the final voltage he used was, as he had connected it to a transformer, will see if I can find any details he may have left.
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Hi Geoff, are you aware of something called an Air Bazooka (which is actually a toy) but more commonly known as a vortex cannon. They are to big for your application, but the principal may be of use. certainly worth Google.
Glenn
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Never heard of a vortex cannon - Googled it and oh wow!
A whole new line of development to consider! Thank you!
My brother in law had suggested a diaphram but we were focussing on the volume of air that would be displaced by its movement not on the shock wave/pulse effect. Found a video clip with smoke in side a large vortex cannon and it blew smoke rings 20 feet and knocked paper cups of the audience heads.
Interestingly the actual volume of air displacement seemed to be quite small as once filled with smoke they did this at least a dozen times without refilling with smoke.
Also the inherent design has a relativly large diaphram and a small exit hole so its certainly worth experimenting as this is fundamentally the set up I need. Question is will the shockwave/pulse pass down a thin tube?
In general I probably have room for about a 6" cube which is why I figgured to use a PC fan as when you add air to smoke it significantly increases the effective volume of the smoke, hence my focus on PC fan CFM. A shot should last about 1-2 seconds maximum so I need to displace a 6" cube of smoke/air in that time frame through a small hole. Reverse engineering suggestes I need quite powerfull PC fans to achieve the volume displacement but a vortex cannon appears to rely on the shock wave/pulse affect rather than pure volume.
Might have a busy weekend comming up!
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hi
Have you ever considered using the internals of the cheap airsoft gun? My son does airsoft and on one or 2 occasions he has given me one of his broke hand airsoft guns to repair - electronic failure in the switches etc and I have often thought about using the internals to fire pellets from barrels of guns and warships. In your case you could us it to propel the air from the barrels with a mixture of smoke.
Just a thought, you may have already thought of it.
Aye
John
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Still progressing with the model and have been building steam launches (3 of) and ships boats (one actually!). Only another 10 of different sizes to go!
I'm making the boats in plastic card using a male mold/female mold in plaster then heating the plastic card and pressing out a hull shell. then all the interior detail to be done which is really what takes all the time.
I'll try to get some pictures up shortly but she is looking good!
G
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There is doubting that Geoff. The boats do seem to be a major part of a capital ship project. Even my little destroyer can have two boats and two/three dinghies!
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Geoff,
I'm planning on using a mini Co2 canister, the sort that fits in an old fashioned soda making machine.
The idea will be to replace the trigger with a solinoid that's fired by an RC switch.
I'm going to build/use a water atomiser wich will fill a reservoir of atomised water vapor which then gets blasted via silicone tubes and manifolds to all 8 main guns on my 1/144 H39 "William der Grosse" (un-built bigger than the Bismarck H series super battleship)
Don't hold your breath to see it working as it's right at the back of the project list! :embarrassed:
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That would remove the space hungry fans and the like, just leaving the solenoid valves and a holder for the canister.
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Okay, finally some updated pictures. Hope these may be of interest
Cheers
Geoff
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You are a tonic for a late autumns evening Geoff. I cannot wait to see your wonderful build next year, she looks amazing.
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I'm still working on this but not a lot to show for it as she just swallows anything I do. I started making the ships davits which I thought was going to be quite time consuming and awkward but in the event it really was very quick. I used a 6” piece of ½” square timber with a small plank superglued to one side. I held this in the milling attachment on the lathe and put the brass rod in the lathe with the wood supporting the rod to keep it all stable. Then just filed it into a taper but I left 3-4mm untouched at the top end. I then annealed the brass and flattened the end bit and drilled a hole through and filed it into a circular shape. This obviated the need to solder a very small circular disc at the end. So far so good!
The problem I have is that the two sea boats either side of the forward superstructure would stick out just too far on a working model so I want to turn them inboard. I have seen pictures of battleships like this when in harbour so they obviously had the same concerns. However on ID these davits are very long at the top to clear the ships side and if I turn them inboard there is nowhere for the boats to go unless I have them sit close to the davits which pputs the rigging at the wrong angle. I may just have to do this for practical reasons.
I have finally completed the ships boats with all the internals, seats etc:
2 x 50ft steam launches
1 x 45ft admiral’s barge
1 x 42ft launch
3 sea boats
2 cutters
4 whalers
1 rowing boat
14 in all but I now have to make 50 pulleys of 1/8" in diameter for all the boats to rig them.
I'll post some more pictures when there is something tangible to show.
I'm still pondering the gunfire system and must do some more experiments to prove the theory.
Cheers
Geoff
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Hi Geoff, if fourteen boats, davits and some nifty brass forging is not tangible then I am not sure the term has a use these days! That sounds like a lot of work and worth looking at.
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One of the problems I had was in making pulley wheels of the right size. With each of the boats I need 6 pulleys and I have 7 boats that are slung from davits so need 42 pulleys.
I have given this a lot of thought and believe I have found the solution to making pulley blocks. I made 46 of them over the weekend without too much effort. I figured the hard part is really to make loads of small wheels with a grove that were all identical, or nearly so.
So how did I do it? Well I thought it all through and decided mass production was the only way and what I wanted was a long rod already grooved at short intervals so I can just cut off the wheels. I put a piece of 3.2mm (1/8") plastic rod in the lathe and ran the far end through a close fitting piece of brass tube supported in the milling attachment on the cross slide half way down the bed. By moving the cross slide towards the chuck it exposes a small piece of plastic rod sticking out the end of the tube. I used a junior hacksaw to cut a groove (takes about 3-4 seconds with a very light cut) then moved the cross slide a little towards the chuck so I could cut it off with a Stanley knife and so on and so forth.
The brass tube supports the rod and ensured I can rest the cutting knife against the end to get a smooth and parallel cut every time and it’s entirely repeatable. It took me about half hour to produce 50 plus tiny little wheels with a grove in each, no finishing required, each one was perfect as the knife cut requires no finishing.
For the strapping I used 0.6mm copper wire. I bent the wire round a very small drill to put a loop in the wire, tapped it with a hammer to merge the loop together then heated each arm to red hot to anneal it. Hammered each arm flat (used a ½” square section of mild steel) hit with a hammer then bent the arms to become legs. Superglue the wheel in between and left to dry. In practice I found the superglue worked just as well if I dabbed it on the outside as it sucked itself under the strap. Once dried I cut the legs off with wire cutters and we have a perfect looking pulley wheel with a loop at the top for fixing and a grooved wheel. The flat strapping on the outside looks pretty nearly perfect and very realistic.
I modified the process a little to produce some with a loop at the top and a hook at the bottom by doing the same thing but with 0.3mm copper wire, missing out the annealing process and just twisting the bottom of the legs together to provide a hook – simples as they say!
They only needed to be painted to finish off. I see no reason why this process could not be used on any size of plastic pulley needed. You could also make them in brass using the same process but may need to file the end saw cuts smooth afterwards (you can do one end in the lath before cutting off).
I have been making lots of davits and fitting then with all the pulley wheels over the weekend. Slow but certain progress as davits are fiddly little things!
Hope this may help others in looking at how to make little pulleys.
Cheers
Geoff
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Extremely interesting technique Geoff. Thank you for sharing. I look forward to a photo in due course to help illustrate how the finished pulleys look. :-))
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I look forward with great enthusiasm to see the progress and boats etc fitted to the great ship! It is going to look so god.
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Wow, that is a nice peice of work, very sharp and clean
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Wow that looks really great! :-)
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All ships boats are now fixed in position and slung from the davits where appropriate. I have completed and rigged the two cranes on the aft superstructure and have a flag fixed to the staff just aft of the rear conning tower, looks quite nice!
I have been doing the rigging for the ships boats which takes ages. I use very small 1mm diameter beads to join the rigging as you can pass it through the bead, round the connector, and back through the bead to adjust and fix with super-glue.
The small pulleys worked out fine and look good, just the rigging for the two forward boats to do and then they are done!
I have been building the stern walk and found a source of copped diamond shaped mesh which is just about ideal for the railings. I tend to build this on the ship using brass rod for the base outline then solder all the supports in place then a thinner section for the top rail and the roof rail all soldered together. Once done it looks a bit like a bird cage but is surprisingly strong. I then tack soldered the copper mesh to the bottom and mid rail and paint. Just the roof to do.
I'll try to post some new pictures shortly.
Progress is generally on target but slow as I anticipated the ships boats would be a "log jam" as they are so awkward and time consuming to make.
Now to make some 60 oars! First attempt is quite promising using 1mm plastic rod and just crushing about 1/2" flat in a metal vice. It flattens out to just over 2mm and looks about right.
I have started making the various yards for the foremast but have yet to rig them. A complication here may be that the fore topmast has to be removable to get it into the car.
I still have to devote some urgent time to the gunfire system.
Thinking about the ships rails now as I'm getting to that stage which is always nice as the rails tend to add the finishing touches.
I'm going to have to start selecting batteries and building a test tank soon.
At least some progress
Cheers
Geoff
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Rubbing hands together with glee at the thought of seeing your boats and rigging Geoff. Bob K is looking at fitting a gunfire system into his Abercrombie and suggested he read this topic to see how you were going about things. Two eads are better than one etc.
Keep up the good work Geoff :-))
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Okay,
Some updated pictures as of yesterday. Also a couple of pictures on "gunfire" please see the related topic but I seem to be on the right track!
Cheers
Geoff
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The barrels are 10mm plastic tube purchased from 4D model supplies - Leeman St in London (Near Fenchurch Street Station). These tubes are thick walled in the order of 2mm so can be tapered in the lathe. The one on ID has been tapered but the muzzle end still needs tapering in a very slightly outwards direction.
Brass tube will be used to show the larger diameter as we get nearer the turret and this also needs to be subject to a little tapering if possible.
How the guns will be fixed inside the turret is still to be determined but I favour an "L" shaped piece with the brass outer tube soldered to it such the L angle can be bent to produce a little elevation. The inner plastic tube can then project about 4mm for fixing to the smoke tube.
The plan is to use 10mm copper elbow joints but maybe silicon tubing would work better - does anyone know what temperature silicon tubing will handle?
More details to follow in due course as ID develops further.
Cheers
Geoff
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That is a lovely burst of smoke Geoff :-))
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That is a lovely burst of smoke Geoff :-))
The model is alright as well!!!!
Only kidding Geoff, she is amazing.
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Not a lot of progress to report but have made and painted ten 13.5" gun barrels and ordered some 10mm copper elbows which I hope to use between the centerline of the turret tube to the rear of the gun barrel. I anticipate a lot of "fettling"
At least with the barrels fitted she will now really look like a battleship
Geoff
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One step forwards and two steps backwards. Now that I have the guns installed the distance between the end of the barrel and the centreline "smoke trunk" is very small and the best angle I can get is about 45 degrees. Alternatively I could route the smoke trunk/pipe rearwards into a semi circle and then join the gun barrel. Either way I can't do much until the 8mm ID silicon tubing arrives then I'll have a better idea which way will work best.
The servo morphs despite being connected to small sail winches don't quite give me 180 degree movement which is very disappointing. I have solved this by wrapping a couple of layers of plastic card round each grove in the winch drum thus increasing the circumference and the length of pull to the turrets. All very fiddly and time consuming but it does appear to have worked. Now only Q, X and Y to alter!
I've also rethought the gun valve design and may now go for a cone on a see-saw type arrangement inside the smoke chamber. The valve being held closed by a counterbalance weight (or a very light spring) and opened by using a solenoid to pull down the cone. The Piston valve will be better suited to the actual air pump.
The benefit of the "cone valve" is that it is contained within the smoke box and not on top and thus reduces the overall height of the system.
More details and pictures to follow in due course.
Cheers
Geoff
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Geoff........if you have varying levels of disappointment with the final [train] rotation for the gun mount, could I suggest it is not the ACTion P96 servomorph, but the choice of the sail winch servo you have purchased
The manufacturers documentation clearly states to up to around 180 degrees. I needed a full guaranteed 180 degree rotation for a chosen function and compensated for any shortfall in rotation by other means
I suggest the real beauty of these P96 units is not only the variable adjustment of each end point, but the smooth slow rotation that can be achieved...so pleased with them I have three for my current build......... Derek
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I agree to a degree but a servo only has a natural movement of about 45 degrees. With the servo morph this extends this to about 160 degrees. With a sail winch having a much greater natural rotation (end to end) I anticipated there would be no issues in getting at least 180 degrees movement on the turrets.
I winch the turrets round with fishing line attached to the circumference round a drain pipe connector which is about 3" in diameter. The loop attaching to the winch drum. "A" turret is then linked by fishing line to "B" turret so they both move together.
I have solved this problem by simply increasing the diameter of the winch drum so the same degree of rotations of the winch pulls in a longer length of line which in turn rotates the turrets a few degrees further so it now works. However I'm a little disappointed that a very very minor adjustment on the servo morph creates quite a significant degree of movement on the turret and the self centring point seems a little variable as well. When using the throw adjustment there seems to be no reaction then a sudden movement.
I suspect the issue is using it on a sail winch rather than a servo . I got the sail winches from the same source.
It works but candidly I see no real advantage to my older system in modifying a standard servo to give a greater degree of rotation (Cut out the potentiometer and remotely wire it in. Remove any gear train limiting lugs then extend the gear train of the servo and position the potentiometer further down the gear chain and you end up with at least 180 degrees of rotation and self centring).
I do however agree the servo morph does give smooth operation and of course speed control which makes it ideal for fine tuning. I just find the adjusters a little "coarse" in action. A good product though and not excessively expensive. Perhaps more familiarity will improve things.
Cheers
Geoff
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As an update I'm still developing the gunfire system and despite my earlier post have gone back to a sliding valve design. Basically a miniature ruler with two holes inside a sleeve. When pulled the two holes match with and entry and exit holes in the sleeve thus letting the smoke pass through. These were quite easy to build in plastic card and require very little effort to operate and have the benefit of being very flat so do not occupy much space.
One end is then connected to a miniature solenoid such that when power is supplied it moves the "ruler" to align with the pass through holes. With power off the spring on the solenoid pushes back and closes the valve.
This all works fine but:
1) The solenoids I have only give 10mm of movement but I was able to extend this to about 15mm simply by removing the retaining nut and stretching the spring a little.
2) This worked fine but the other two identical solenoids just wont work the same way! No real idea why but have accepted a lesser movement which nearly opens the slide valve which should be sufficient to let the smoke pass through.
I have made three box like structures to act as smoke boxes and to hold the smoke unit and am trying to fix them into the model - actually they will fix underneath the deck and curiously this is proving to be quite difficult to get a gas tight seal. I intend to use Vaseline as the seal so this will work but in hindsight maybe it would have been better to have the boxes as a sliding fit rather than just held on by screws.
The problem area is how to link the valve to the solenoid via a gas tight seal as the solenoid is outside the smoke box. At the moment the pull rod just passes through a brass tube which whilst not 100% gas tight with a little bit of condensation should be close enough! This seems to work but increases the length of the system by about 2.5" which has caused some fitting problems.
Random thoughts here:
1) Would the solenoid continue to work if it was inside the smoke box in a fog atmosphere?
2) What about using an electromagnet outside the box to attract a metal plate on the slide valve and move the valve that way - how strong would the electromagnet need to be?
3) Possible interference with the radio control?
This is the problem with development as there are multiple theoretical solutions to solve any particular problem but no factual data as to which will be the best solution - just have to suck it and see.
More pictures to follow shortly.
Cheers
Geoff
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You are into truly pioneering territory here Geoff. I suggest that when you get it working you might think of Patenting it, maybe even getting someone to build it under licence. That way we can all have one, plus you get some return for all your development work.
Sounds exciting. Well done !
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A nice idea, but if I can get this to work it will be a "freebee" for anyone who wants it. Again if I can get it to work I intend to draw up some plans and some narrative to match.
Lets get lots of models doing it and them we can fight a mock battle all day!
Cheers
Geoff
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I've just bought some 180 degree servos from ebay, same size as a standard servo and not a lot more expensive. The arm will move further than 180 degrees, so meybe with the servo morph you could get 220 plus ?
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I have spent absolutely hours making and remaking components for the gunfire system. i have used an old hairdryer motor fan unit for the main blower which I originally installed amidships until ai remembered that was where one of the batteries was going to go!
I then found a bigger fan/motor combination which gave much more air and have installed this in the bow section - not ideal for air flow but I hope there will be sufficient I used B&Q 1" plastic pipe and the various connectors. L and T shaped connectors.
One thing I find hard to make are plastic cones so I found some cheap plastic wine glassed at Tesco £2 for eight which has detachable stems which gave me a very nice cone to jet the air into the smoke box. I used the main part of the wine glass to cone the air into a 1" diameter pipe but found it was 1/4" too big to fit so then used a PVA glue container which was nicely coned, then as above I found a larger fan unit so used a plastic bottle which gives a very nice run in and as a bonus the 1" pipe is a perfect fit.
I'll post some pictures which makes this all clear early next week but in conclusion I get a very strong blast of air out of each nozzle into each smoke box which I think will be strong enough!
Progress but its very slow particularly as I have had to alter the smoke boxes for Q and X & Y to fit the pipework - running out of room and getting a little fed up in taking everything apart a dozen times to do anything!
Cheers
Geoff
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At least you will be familiar with the internals of the model Geoff. I look forward to see the pictures as you have spent lots of time perfecting the system.
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I'm certainly looking forward to seeing her for real at Mayhem. :-))
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Attached are some updated pictures of progress with the gunnery system. A number of comments and observations:
1) I'm still fed up with taking every component apart a dozen times but to be fair as this is in the R&D phase once I have worked out how to do things it will be much easier.
2) The larger fan has made a significant difference and once the "cones" at the end of the piping were fitted I was surprised at the significant increase in pressure/blast they made. I know that as you reduce a gas flow the pressure has to increase but it was more than I anticipated.
3) Clearly one larger fan is the way to go.
4) Given the layout of the piping which is like a letter F but with an extra prong somewhat as anticipated the further from the fan the higher the pressure as the air flow is easier. There is a noticeable difference from A&B and X&Y but I'm hopeful that once enclosed the pressure will equalise between all smoke boxes. Engineers tackle this in practice by using reduced diameter piping to increase back-flow so all sections are the same but I don't think I'll need to do this in a model.
5) The alloy plates are heat protectors under the valves - the operating solenoid can be clearly seen
6) It was very time consuming to align the smoke box inlet with the outlet nozzles. The connection at that point is a small sheet of rubber with a hole in it such the nozzle forces its way through creating both a seal and allowing for limited misalignment. It seems to work.
7) Not visible in the pictures are some 3D cut outs in Q and X&Y smoke boxes due to space requirements for the air piping.
8) Because the smoke containers did not need to be as large as expected (following test experiments) there is room beneath A&B to fit two large gel batteries on their side which helps both battery capacity and ballast.
More to follow
Cheers
Geoff
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To caption some of the pictures:
The second picture shows the original "T" connections for the fan and Q turret. The fan was later moved to the bow compartment as this the space next to Q was designed to take a large 12 Gel battery
The third picture shows the fan in the bow compartment. I hope the restricted air flow won't be a problem once the deck is on. There are lots of open features in the deck to permit air flow.
The fourth picture shows the method I use to operate the turrets. there is a small sail winch on the right which is operated by a servo-morph. The spare threads/lines take the drive to "Q" turret
The fifth picture shows the ex hair-dryer fan unit using a plastic bottle for the cone
Cheers
Geoff
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Sorry, to clarify a little with the turret turning mechanism - with "X&Y" the direction of rotation has to be reversed hence the two idler wheels which also take the drive to "X" Barbette which in turn drives "Q" and "Y" thus equalising the pull in both directions.
The white bottle with the other fan unit was a B&Q a PVA glue bottle - the shape appears good but in practice was not as good as using a plastic wine glass which has a more gentle curvature. The plastic cones at the ends of the white piping also came from the plastic wane glass stem - this worked well.
Sorry for the repeated amendments but its hard to recall everything at once!
Cheers
G
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...and in image #2 the coal scuttles have turned up. I've been waiting quietly for them! :-))
Andy
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Well spotted! I haven't fitted them yet as they should really be flush with the deck rather than proud. I'm tempted to try to counter-sink them but may mess up the planking if it goes wrong. I'll probably just stick them on for expediency and safety!
Cheers eagle eyes! :-)
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A very sharp scalpel and a small (hand carving) chisel should do the trick. Mind you, there's a lot to countersink.
(I'll keep schtum if they should appear stuck on, later. %) Everyone will be gasping as the smoke-breathing monster, anyway!)
My acres of Dreadnought deck planking almost cry out for little features like this to break up the monotony of endless planks.
Andy
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Wow! Considering the eclectic variety of materiels used in its construction, the system looks very very tidy. I imagine you will be lifting the superstructure off many times to show us how the system looks and works in situ.
I am glad you found a good powerful fan as I know the worry about a forest of small fans was putting a dampner on the project for you.
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Thank you. its a bit like the "X" files, the answer is out there, somewhere!
G
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It's in your battleship! I know what you mean though Geoff, somethings take a little fiddling about with before the answer comes to you.
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A further update. Its always the little things that cause problems. The silicon tube I ordered to join the barrel to the center of the Barbette for smoke transference turned up, exactly as ordered, but I still can't make the connection as it kinks and there is actually so little room between the two points.
I was using 10mm copper elbows modified to guide the smoke out of the barbette to the rear of the gun as this gives a nice curve but left very little room to make the connection. Plan "B" was to point the elbow to the rear and run a loop round to the back to the front to join the barrel. This has the advantage of a gentler curve but would increase the distance the smoke has to go with attendant condensation and drag.
A new plan "C" is to construct a square pipe from the rear of the barrel to go over the hole in the barbette. Yes its square so it won't be quite so efficient but because I can use the whole distance between the end of the barrel and the center of rotation the join angle will be easier and it will be easier to construct. To put this onto perspective its only going to be about 1 inch long!
I can also construct it on a base plate inside the turret such the barrels can be pulled out and the whole assembly removed. Based on past experience I think I'll need to remove it dozens of times!
As mentioned before because this is R&D the knowledge gained would lead me to design a different style of barbette so the smoke hole is on the edge and in a straight line to the barrel - one lives and learns! :-) .
More pictures to follow once there is something to show.
Cheers
Geoff
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One does indeed. Would winding wire around the tube help keep its shape? You would be making hose of the type seen for fuelling ships and the like.
If you already have the solution in effect then ignore me!
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Is it not possible to take some evergreen type abs, just cut the abs tube into segments and glue them on to the outside of the clear flexible tube, it would make the tube resist the urge to kink. like making a segmented bend with every other segment missing (web search - segmented bends).
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By way of an update, I decided to construct the awkward shape as a square section in plastic card leading from the center of rotation (the smoke tube) to the rear of the gun. It was still an awkward shape and each one was custom built but it does appear to work. I hope the change in shape of the ductwork won't have any adverse effect on the smoke discharge but only time will tell.
I then spent something in the region of over 5/6 hours over two days trying to get the servo morphs to work properly with the turret winches. Much fine tuning and fiddling about but I was unable to get the desired result. The slow characteristic was perfect but I found it impossible to get 180 degrees of movement with any repeatability. It is possible its characteristics of my system in some way but the net result is that neither of the two servo morphs now work at all and they are in the junk box.
I'll need to go back to plan B and put physical stops on the transmitter to limit the throw of the joystick and thus the movement of the turrets. With the sail winches this does of course give me self centering when the joystick is in the middle. This works fine but there is some slack in the system so I have to fiddle to get the exact center point but I can live with that. If I move the joystick slowly then the turrets turn slowly , not ideal but it does work.
I have been struggling to get all the batteries in and have had to re-build the funnel smoke units but at least I have three 12 volt/7.2ah batteries in place and I have found room for three 6 v batteries for the main propulsion.
I hope to do some floatation tests over the weekend to sort out the final ballast and may get some pictures - first build the test tank!
Cheers
Geoff
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I am excited about seeing the floatation tests.
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Okay, some more pictures.
I'll do the narrative in the next post
Cheers
Geoff
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Okay, now for some narrative in sequence:
1) Midships section showing two funnel smoke units offset to port and starboard plus 3 12 volt 7.2 amp hour batteries.
2) X&Y Smoke box showing internal construction - note plastic funnel and rubber seal - the smoke unit is the fireproof rope with a wrapping of nichrome wire. It sits in a bath of fog fluid. All of this box will be fixed to the deck. There is no reason for the red paint - I just had a can handy!
3) One 6v 7.2 amp hour battery under the gunnery control unit. Far left is the air inlet pipe to A&B smoke box (not shown)
4) Gunnery control unit - not a good picture but it gives the idea - a small engine and gearbox turning a plastic cylinder with cams which in turn operate the bank of micro-switches - 8 seconds for smoke generation- one second overlap then two more seconds for fan unit - overlapped with two seconds for valve opening - overlapped with signal for 2 second sound unit - overlapped with one second for light flash - followed by an off switch.
5) Main engines (Two blower units from very old Talbot Horizons 12 volt 12 pole motors running on 6 volts. If you look closely you can see the rubber belt drive to the outboard props. Wooden platform over universal joints showing edge of two 6 volt 3.1 amp hour batteries for main engines. Gap in the middle is intended for the sound unit with the sound exiting a wire mesh floor in the aft superstructure between Q and X/Y turrets.
6) Rudder linkage and receiver and servos - bottom right shows the cam on one servo which operates a push on, push off switch to operate the funnel smoke. Micro switch operates the gunnery control unit.
I didn't get around to the floatation test over the weekend - maybe next weekend.
Enjoy
Cheers
Geoff
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Crikey, it looks very sophisticated. I wondered if the micro switches might trigger individual turret detonations. I look forward to see this in action in a few weeks.
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I'll actually be triggering all three gun smoke generators at the same time. A&B and X&Y are double size so will feed both forward and aft turrets simultaneously so I will fire one shot from each turret at the same time. I'm hoping this will collectively give me the smoke volume to simulate a broadside from all five turrets.
G
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Ok, some progress. ID has now been ballasted. I used lead flashing and put in about 6 pounds to get her to the waterline in the homemade test tank.
Sunday at Southchurch Park in Southend - first sailing which revealed a few issues:
1) She is only just fast enough which was a puzzle but just about okay.
2) terrible radio interference and complete loss of control. I'm on 27 and have never experienced a similar problem. Even a change of crystals made no difference. Traced it down to interference caused by the funnel smoke generator. I'm using step up voltage regulator for 12v to 24v. It has a completely separate power supply. Does anybody have any ideas?
3) Main engine batteries last 90 mins which is not as long as I wanted but within the capacity range of the batteries. I'm not sure what I can do about that other than to carry some spare batteries
4) Otherwise she sailed quite well albeit in an unfinished condition.
I'll post some pictures shortly but the main query is the interference
Cheers
Geoff
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A silly question from a noob in the RC world, but is the aerial exposed enough to catch the radio transmissions? I think this is more an issue for 2.4 but worth a look.
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Traced it down to interference caused by the funnel smoke generator. I'm using step up voltage regulator for 12v to 24v. It has a completely separate power supply. Does anybody have any ideas?
Could depend on which type of step up regulator you are using. Most 'traditional' ones involve converting to AC (inductor / transformer) increasing the voltage then converting back to DC. A 2A "inductor" can generate of lot of RF locally.
When needing 24V I try to use additional batteries to avoid this, although Component Shop now do a nice compact step up unit without large coils. I have recently bought one for my 24V mister but not had a chance to trial it yet.
http://www.componentshop.co.uk/voltage-booster-with-green-led-display.html (http://www.componentshop.co.uk/voltage-booster-with-green-led-display.html)
Not bad for just under a Tenner
Bob K
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I think most of the 12/24 units will have inherent RFI.
2G4 will probably be immune.
Worth borrowing a set up to test before parting with cash.
Ned
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just read the bit about the pipes and their diameters, in an air conveying system (although this is smoke it's still air being used to convey it), the action of reducing the diameters is to increase the pressure as it moves from the nearest offshoot to the furthest, all the outlet diameters and the pipes for each run should be the same, i.e. each branch should be the same, that means for 3 connections they should all be the same irrespective of their lengths, so the furthest is, say, 100mm dia then the second furthest should be 100mm as should be the third, the diameter change from the furthest to the second furthest should be as close to the branch where they meet, doing a trouser branch (60° equally branch) is ideal, the diameter back should be equal to the same cross sectional area of the two connections, the same applies for the connection to the closest connection though here the problem is that the small diameter and the furthest branches run of pipe diameter is different so a 30° branch is used with a cone down to the larger diameter from the feed duct, again is now sized at the same cross sectional area of all three connections (4 connections at 100mm would equate to a doubling in the diameter of a duct to 200mm).
this ensures that the pressure is the same across all 3 ducts, as air will like water take the least line of resistance, in practice calculations are taken based upon the furthest duct when sizing a fan for the pressure and duty, at this scale however, all the above is throw out of the window as the differing diameters, lengths and fan pressure will be to small to make a noticeable difference :D, also in practice, dampers are used to throttle the air pressures, where a damper could be almost 2/3's closed before it had any effect and then the effect would be quite big or little depending upon how the system wanted to behave.
You could also have 3 lines of piping all identical in length and that would create the ideal equal pressure system.
As you discovered, small cones are not as efficient in airflow as longer cones, the back pressure is more prenounced so the speed reduces.
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It was the component shop step up voltage unit that I used. It works fine but as above mine gives terrible interference. I had the ariel both inside and outside the hull but it made no difference. All very strange!
Cheers
Geoff
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) terrible radio interference and complete loss of control. I'm on 27 and have never experienced a similar problem. Even a change of crystals made no difference. Traced it down to interference caused by the funnel smoke generator. I'm using step up voltage regulator for 12v to 24v. It has a completely separate power supply. Does anybody have any ideas?
Geoff - could be a combination of many things: (I imagine most of these you have already considered)
Check out- Proximity of voltage step-up device to receiver/aerial - try to get them as far apart as possible
- Lead lengths - shortest possible cable lengths - both dc power and servo - routed as far away from each other as possible - shortest length probably difficult to achieve in a large model
- Ferrite ring - worth trying a ferrite ring on the 24v cable - maybe others as well - even servo leads
- Common ground - worth trying connecting a common ground(-) connection between all electrical kit in the boat
- Re-evaluate need for 24v - e-cig coils can work @ <12v
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Okay, now for some pictures. The first two show ID in the home made test tank and yes that is a bottle of vinegar used as extra ballast! The other pictures are self explanatory.
She is not yet finished with the most obvious omission being the ships railings.
Cheers
Geoff
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:-)) (Huge round of applause from me)
She looks the business, Geoff.
Andy
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Love the dry dock supports on the stand, certainly gives her the look of being real, absolute astounding on the water.
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She looks positivly majestic in the water Geoff. You must be chuffed to see her sailing at last and so near to completion?
So why did you choose the vinear bottle Geoff> I cannot imagine you were running around like a mad man screaming for something to stop ID from capsizing. I bet you and your significant other had been eating fish and chips just before and the bottle was still near by!
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Okay, another sailing session on Sunday at Southchurch Park in Southend and she sailed quite well indeed. Better speed and longer duration and am now getting about 2 hours before I need to change batteries. One of the previous batteries was not holding the charge too well and ai have removed some of the grease from the prop shafts so overall better.
Where there was a failure again was with the funnel smoke generators as I removed the 12/24 volt regulator and linked two 12v batteries in series and the result was exactly the same, massive interference. I can only conclude that the nebulisers and 27m do not mix so I'll have to revert to the original idea of nichrome wire and fog fluid. Anybody got any thoughts on this? In fact with four nebulisers on 24 volts they were drawing 2 amps so 2 x 24 = 48 watts which is equivalent to 4 amps at 12 volts = 48 watts. winds were light today and the nebuliser smoke was easily dissipated so maybe the fog fluid will be better but certainly lighter so I can get another 6v 7.2amp hour main propulsion battery aboard.
railings now all complete and just have a few bits and pieces to go but either way she is definatley ready for Wicksteed Park on the Saturday. I may even have some of the gund working!
Cheers
Geoff
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... I removed the 12/24 volt regulator and linked two 12v batteries in series and the result was exactly the same, massive interference. I can only conclude that the nebulisers and 27m do not mix so I'll have to revert to the original idea of nichrome wire and fog fluid. Anybody got any thoughts on this?
"2.4GHz" would be my first thought. 27MHz is so twenty years ago. %)
Andy
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My thoughts entirely, that magnificent ship surely deserves a decent 2.4g set, I've ditched all my old Mhz sets now.
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Geoff
The nebulisers are basically a ultrasound loudspeaker and the diaphragm shakes the water into droplets small enough to not-quite fall out of the air
So the 24VDC is running some sort of tone generator and driving a minispeaker at very high frequency
I started out with a brilliant idea (Faraday cage) and as I was writing I can see that it would only work with RF interference
I was about to suggest that you surround the misters with a lot of turkey foil and see if that helps
(I fear it may not do so since I suspect the real culprit is electromagnetic)
Its probably worth a try :-)
More likely to work would be be an enclosure which would kill magnetic interference - and something in tin would seem to be worth a try
Not sure how big the misters are (I have one which is about 60mm dia and 30mm thick - with pretty leds, already!) but putting them in an old tin can would check if the interference was absorbed.
As the wise men say - 2.4 giggles may completely remove the issue - it certainly does for gross mabuchi-sparking, so its worth a try. (the last 4-ch 2.4 GHz set I got was GBP25 with a spare Rx as well)
hope you triumph with this great model
andrew
[/size][size=78%] [/size]
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Thank you all for your suggestions which appreciated. I'll give this some thought. In the meantime if you go to Youtube and type in Iron Duke Southchurch Park there is a short video of her sailing - thank you Angela!
Cheers
Geoff
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Lovely (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sAsfRD3ZoIo)!
Speed seems fine, Geoff.
Andy
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Gorgeous!
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Yes, in the video the speed does seem fine but when actually there it seems a little slow particularly when in rougher (wind swept water). In the video she is at maximum speed.
Slightly curious wake formation at the stern which is quite realistic but may be a function of slightly larger props than scale.
For Wicksteed I have built a hot wire/glycol smoke generator running on 12 volts which draws 3.5 amps. Lets see how that performs. I hope to try to get the gunfire system for the forward two turrets functioning as well. Without sound but perhaps it will prove the process!
A hidden benefit of this is that it removes the weight of a pint and a half of water which I can then use to increase the battery capacity. The glycol unit is also much smaller.
I now have crew aboard together with some more booms along the upper deck edge, flagstaff at bow and stern.
Making progress and lets hope there are a number of Battleships at Wicksteed for some manoeuvres!
Cheers
Geoff
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Further update - by replacing the smoke generator with a glycol based unit this has freed up considerable internal space to the extent I can now get the two 12v 7.2 amp hr batteries parallel with the smoke unit in the middle and move them stern-wards by about 1". This also means I can now fir two 6v 7.2 amp hr batteries between the aft funnel and Q turret which now increases the 6v main engine capacity to 3 x 7.2 ahr + 2 3.2 ahr for a total of 28 ahr which is much better and should give me extended running times of about 3-4 hours. I have also removed about 1/2 pound of led from the bows as well as I think otherwise there would be a bow down trim but this will show up in the next floatation test.
It actually simplifies the internal arrangement which now looks much more logical.
I have fitted the gunfire control mechanism such that if I depress the joystick for two seconds and let go it will perform one complete cycle. If I hold the joystick down it will be continuous.
Name plates have been fitted to the aft superstructure and stern walk and I'll tackle the 60 oars soon!
Cheers
Geoff
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Crikey, That's a lot of battleship to row about :}
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Okay, it was a fairly good sail last Sunday and certainly the new motive batteries have significantly increased the duration to well over three hours with no loss of speed so that problem has been solved. Other than weed and catching a plastic bag which typically wrapped itself round both inboard props disabling the hip, and blew both motor 5 amp fuses it was a very good sail indeed. The engines are virtually silent and all appears to be well.
The new smoke generator worked well for 2.5 hours pretty nearly continuous smoking then the inevitable happened and the smoke turned blacker and smelt of burning plastic. I had a small fire on board which burned out a hole a good 1" in diameter on the smoke generator and damaged the smoke trunking. No actual damage to the model itself. I just switched off the smoke generator and blew down the funnel which put the fire out.
So why did it catch fire? I figure that after 20 mins it was all at ambient temperature but after 2.5 hours the fog fluid level had dropped quite a bit (it was not empty) but sufficient for the wick absorption rate to decrease to the extent the unused heat caused the element to glow red which in turn melted the top and dropped a small piece of plastic onto the hot element starting the fire. Even a very small flame produces a lot of heat. It would appear that the alloy heat shield I used was just a little short. Repairs consisted of lining the plastic box with thin alloy and extending the heat shield all the way at the top and end with just a hole to exit the smoke into the funnel trunking.
What was pleasing was the smoke was pretty even from both funnels. As a further modification I have stacked two PC fans rather than one. This will not increase the air volume but should increase the ambient pressure a little and it costs nothing to do so lets see what happens next time. Memo to self, refill the smoke generator after 90 mins maximum use. This has not happened before because in my other units the fog fluid capacity exceeds the amp hour capacity of the battery so I would only get about 45 mins. despite the small fire I'm fairly relaxed about this as I believe I know both the problem and the solution.
I have been making oars and small bits for the anchor chain apparatus so just need to get these fitted.
Iron Duke fits readily in my Vectra but the top mast has about 2mm clearance! I'll shorten the top mast just a little for safety - I hope scale purists will forgive me but it also means I can now fix permanent signal halyards from the spars.
Attached are a few pictures.
Next steps is to focus on the turret turning and gunfire system now that I have the key motive elements of the design worked out.
Cheers
Geoff
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Geoff,
Great pictures - very impressive.
Maybe worth putting a small digital kitchen timer on-board as a "top up fluid" reminder - can be purchased from Amazon for £1.29 post free
Regards Jonathan
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Despite all the risk of fire and destruction, did she look good with a bit of black smoke? She looks absolutely amazing and I look forward to seeing her in a few days.
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She looks superbly menacing on the water...congratulations Geoff :-)).......small fire on board when at sea?....all in a days steaming
Derek
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A very nice model Geoff, she looks superb! :-))
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Whilst a little bit of duplication its hard to believe its gone from this to this in 32 months. The keel was laid on 7th October, 2013 and I think I can call her finished! (well nearly so).
Hope to see lots of other Jutland Battleships on Saturday at Wicksteed.
Cheers
Geoff
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And now the attachments!
Doh!
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Fingers crossed I will see this beauty in a day or so's time.
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Nothing significant to report on the build which is really finished albeit there is always something to add on a model this size. Having said that I made some changes to the simulated gunfire mechanism and focused on "A and B" turrets only. On Sunday the conditions were ideal and I was able to get sufficient smoke out of two barrels such that members of the public kept asking where was the bang!
To summarise:
1) I reduced the volume of the smoke box by about 20/25%. The rational behind this was I was probably diluting the smoke too much when the fan kicked in. Either way it seemed to work with a much better density of smoke (in ideal conditions and light). This also increases available hull volume which is a bonus.
2) I removed the troublesome smoke box slide valves and accepted an element of smoke drift from the barrels when the system is charging. In practice its hardly noticeable and simplifies the system significantly.
3) I put a curved alloy plate over the air inlet in the smoke boxes to direct the air onto the element for better mixing.
4) I amended the control cam drum such the heating/smoke element was on for longer for about 10 seconds and reduced the fan duration to about 2.5 seconds - the results seem a lot better.
There were a number of pictures taken and in due course I hope to get some copies and post some here. I fired about about 20 salvos in all so some 40 shots overall. If I can do 20 salvos with all the guns this would give me 100 shots!
Next steps are to modify the smoke boxes under "Q" and "X and Y" and see if I have the battery capacity to run all three units simultaneously. Whilst the smoke volume is still a little less than I would like if I can increase it from 2 guns to 5 then I should have 2.5 times more smoke which may well be sufficient to simulate a proper broadside particularly if linked to a sound generator.
I don't think its ever going to be an absolutely perfect system because I'm ejecting fog rather than smoke so the direction of the light has a significant effect on the visibility of the "smoke" but I'm quite optimistic it may well prove to be enough to achieve the overall effect.
More to follow in due course.
Cheers
Geoff
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I await your images with excitement Geoff. The model is astounding and any effect that enhances that will be worth seeing.
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I too await with bated breath for the pictures. :-))
Jus two weeks left and I can get back on to the Dreadnought :-)
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I've now upgraded both the funnel smoke generator (by having a "n" shape with the wire in the middle and therefore two long tails in the smoke fluid to increase the flow and
"Q, X and Y" smoke generators have been replaced. Using nichrome ribbon wire from an old toaster so should be stronger.
I hope to be able to try all the guns this weekend.
I have purchased a servo slow from a different source and this only controls the speed and not the throw. The throw being controlled by a plastic gate on the transmitter to limit the joystick throw. The new servo slow (will post details once I can find the site)works perfectly - asked for a modification 20 - 30 seconds and with this one you just press the button and count the flashes and stop where you want - more flashes = slower rotation. A simpler lower tech solution but works fine.
The big question is will the 12 volt batteries provide 16 amps to work all three smoke generators - we shall see. Worst case is to use one battery per smoke generator which means more re-wiring, again!
I'll report back in due course and hope someone got a picture or two!
Cheers
Geoff
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Okay, now for some pictures. It works! To be fair the pictures were taken on an ideal day and in ideal light but they do show the effect quote well. At the time of the pictures only A&B turrets were working.
I have subsequently got "Q" and X and Y" all working and the batteries do provide sufficient capacity to work all three smoke generators. No pictures of that as Saturday was like a gale locally and the smoke was instantly blown away but it was still visible so I'm certainly on the right track. However I was able to fire 30 salvo's at five shots a time so 150 shots in all!
Candidly for the first couple of salvo's the smoke is diminished until the system warms up then its much better. It fires every 12 seconds or so which seems about right for scale effect.
Curiously A&B seem to make more smoke than the aft turrets so I'll need to investigate. It could be that the fan is in the bows and therefore there is a higher pressure surge to start with so again some further experimentation required.
Overall I was very pleased.
Enjoy
Geoff
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I meant to add that the servo slow comes from "modelradioworkshop.co.uk" and works perfectly - Thanks Mike!
Very pleased with this product.
Cheers
Geoff
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Given the lack of particulates, that is a pretty good effect you have strived for Geoff. I would be pleased with that result, and I have been sceptical due to the lack of said particulates to create density.
I expect in real life the gunsmoke would dissisipate quicker in strong winds so everything you are doing is sound.
Hats off to you Geoff, it has been a journey and you are nearly there with the tweaks.
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Astounding work Geoff! :-))
Considering the effort and the hours you've put into her you deserve a special well done. All you need to do is take a black and white photo of Iron Duke firing her guns which would certainly create a new old picture from WW1.
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I'm pleased to report that Geoff was awarded a well deserved Gold Medal at the Model Engineer Exhibition currently being held at Brooklands Museum near Weybridge, Surrey.
The model was not displayed to best advantage, I think it came in late yesterday and space was tight but it did not escape the eye of the judges.
Well done Geoff.
Colin
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Wow, thank you, I didn't know! Quite made my day. yes the display area was a little cramped!
Thanks for letting me know!
Cheers
Geoff
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Well deserved Geoff. I saw it at Wicksteed and could not keep my eyes off it in and out of the water. The Dukes and KGVs (Super Dreadnoughts) were very attractive ships.
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Hi Geoff great to see you at Brooklands even though it was towards the close of the event and a very well deserved Gold ,a truly outstanding model . :-)) :-)) :-)) :-)) :-))
Bowwave
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By way of a further update with ID I had used a new servo slow from "Model Radio Workshop" which was excellent and very easy to use. I believe they can also provide extended "slow" devices upon request.
I was viewing their website and the "twin servo slow" product caught my eye as with ID's turrets linked to a "Y" lead I was getting some disproportionate turning with the turrets not quite lining up to the level I wanted. This product allows you to set the center point and the end points individually so you can tune two separate units (servo's or small sail winches) to match. It also adjusts the speed of the units as well.
Duly purchased and it arrived in very quick time and it works. I found it a little fiddly to get it absolutely right but as I became familiar how the product worked this was soon sorted and its perfect. The return to factory setting proved very useful! The turrets now all turn to virtually 90 degrees each side and return to the center automatically. With ID the small sail winches I used to rotate the turrets have a sizeable "dead band" so there is a little fiddling to get them exactly fore and aft after training but that's down to the winches.
Very happy with this product and the level of service. There are lots of very interesting products on his website. This is miniature electronics at its best - the devices are tiny!
I have also re-vamped the stern smoke generators in "X and Y" turrets as they were not producing enough smoke. Final trials will prove but it looks a lot better in tests. Just got to get it all back together again!
Cheers
Geoff
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Your resolve never fails to impress me Geoff! I do hope we can reconvene at Wicksteed next year where all your hard work on the inside will be as visible from the outside.
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By way of an update with ID. All turrets now work and on a calm day discharge a good volume of “smoke” which is certainly visible from a distance. The feedback received has all been the same, nice but where’s the bang! Something I am still working on
I have now fired something like 150 shots in sessions (30 salvos) without issue so the system/process definitely works but like most systems the devil is in the detail.[/size][size=0pt]However curiously I set fire to my fourth funnel smoke generator which is built along the same lines as the gunfire system (basically a wick in a bath of fog fluid which is vaporised by nichrome wire). The first two caught fire because the plastic top melted and dropped onto the element. The third was less certain and the fourth was a complete surprise because the top and piping was brass and copper so can’t catch fire.[/size][size=0pt]I tried some tests:[/size][size=0pt]1)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]Is the fire rope I’m using for the wick actually fire proof or just fire resistant? I put a piece in a gas flame and it wouldn’t burn so obviously fire proof.[/size][size=0pt]2)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]Is the non-flammable fog fluid flammable – much to my surprise yes! The same test set fire to the fog fluid despite what the fact sheet says (flash point Not Applicable). The flame was smaller than a candle but even a small flame produces a lot of heat.[/size][size=0pt]3)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]Further checking on line revealed that if the fluid is not completely vaporised it can undergo a chemical change and leave a residue. Once the residue reaches a certain concentration it can catch fire if conditions are right (wrong). A guy just put some in a pan on a gas flame and whilst it produced copious amounts of smoke it suddenly caught fire.[/size][size=0pt]4)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]My fog fluid was 10 years old so it may have deteriorated anyway and could be a contributory factor.[/size][size=0pt]This has the potential to be a serious problem for obvious reasons however I believe I may have the solution:[/size][size=0pt]1)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]The funnels were being used for an hour at a time which creates a very different set of dynamics to the guns which are on for 12 seconds at a time.[/size][size=0pt]2)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]I was extracting the unused fog fluid and putting it back in the bottle which is why the liquid took on a yellowish tinge which I then re-used. Inadvertently I was systematically increasing the concentration of residue.[/size][size=0pt]3)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]I now only use fresh fog fluid.[/size][size=0pt]4)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]A small funnel fire isn’t too serious as it can be put out from above but a fire in a “magazine” is rather harder to control and manage in terms of access.[/size][size=0pt]5)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]Redesign of the guns magazine (smoke box) such that the actual smoke generator sits in a draw and can be easily be slid out for inspection and replacement without a major dismantling exercise. This also lets me experiment with alternative heat sources (PTC Heating elements).[/size][size=0pt]6)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]Remove the remains of the plastic slide valves as a potential source of burning[/size][size=0pt]7)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]Additional alloy heat shields[/size][size=0pt]8)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]I purchased some Kapton self-adhesive tape. This is temperature resistant to 350 degrees centigrade – it’s used in 3D printers. I intend to line the roof of the magazines to provide additional protection.[/size][size=0pt]9)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]Most importantly a filler tube will now exit above decks disguised as a ventilator. It points directly onto the wick so the fluid absolutely soaks the wick when charged and in the event of any small fire I can pump water down directly onto the source. I could readily set this up for radio control as well.[/size][size=0pt]10)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]I’m hoping that only using new fog fluid will cure the problems for the guns but best to be sure I can manage any issues.[/size][size=0pt]11)[/size][size=0pt][/size][size=0pt]More experiments with new fog fluid for the funnel generators.[/size][size=0pt]The biggest puzzle is that the fog fluid is flammable when all the fact sheets say otherwise.[/size][size=0pt]Either way I have decided to pursue the experiments and will report back in due course. The lure of 450/900 shots is too great to ignore![/size][size=0pt]Cheers[/size][size=0pt]Geoff[/size]
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Reading your report on progress leads me to think that how ever old the fluid is, it has a potential to catch. Therefore your preventative actions are wise especially given the amount of time you have spent building ID.
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Just found this build and messaged you Geoff!
It would be wonderful to have an easier version of your smokers for the firing of my gun barrels in Ramillies,but certainly could not do what you are doing,brilliant as it is!
I was just wondering if a water vapour smoke producer could do the job without the heat of oil? My barrels are made of plastic tube,and the turrets of fibreglass.I would only want two turrets,4 barrels working,and will use ultra bright orange and white leds to simulate the flash.......... or maybe not!
Mick F
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Wow, I don't quite know what went wrong with my update - okay I'll try this again to delete the gibberish!
All turrets now work and on a calm day there is a good discharge of "smoke" which is certainly visible from a distance and leads to the same question, where's the bang? I'm working on it!
I have now fires something like 150 shots in a session (30 salvos) without issues so the system/process definatley works but like most systems the devil is in the detail.
However curiously I set fire to my fourth funnel smoke generator which is built along the same lines - a wick in a bath of fog fluid wrapped with nichrome wire. The first two caught fire because the top cover was plastic and a small piece fell onto the wire. The third was less certain and the fourth a real puzzle as the roof is brass with copper piping to the funnels, so whats to burn?
I tried some tests:
1) Is the fire rope I use for the wick really fire proof or just fire resistant? I put a piece in a gas flame and it wouldn't burn so is fire proof.
2) Is the non flammable fog fluid flammable? - much to my surprise the answer is yes! The same test set fire to the wick with a small flame despite what the data sheet says flash point Not Applicable. It was a small flame but even so a lot of heat is produced.
3) Further checking on line revealed that if the fluid is not completley vapourised it can undergo a chemical change (don't know why) and leaves a residue. Once the residue reaches a certain concentration it can catch fire if conditions are right (wrong). A guy on line put some fog fluid in a pan over the gass and it produced copious amounts of smoke but then caught fire!
4) My fog fluid was 10 years old so may have gone off a bit
This has the potential to be quite serious for obvious reasons however I believe I may have the solution:
1) The funnels were being used for an hour at a time which creates a very different set of dynamics to the guns which are used for 12 seconds at a time.
2) I was extracting unused fog fluid and putting it back in the bottle which is why the liquid took on a yellowish hue which I then re-used. Inadvertently I was systematically increasing the concentration of residue
3) I now only use fresh fog fluid
4) A small funnel fire isn't too serious as water can be dropped down the funnel putting it out but a fire in the "magazine" is rather more serious and awkward to get to.
5) Redesign of the smoke box (magazine) mans the actual unit is now on a tray and can be slid out for inspection and replacement without a major dismantling exercise. This also lets me experiment with alternative heat sources (PTC Heating elements).
6) Remove the remains of the plastic slide valves to minimise combustible material
7) Additional alloy heat shields in the magazine
8) I purchased some Kapton self adhesive tape - this is used in 3D printers and can withstand 350 degrees centigrade to line the roof of the magazine. To be fair I've never seen any signs of burning but better to build in more protection.
9) Most importantly I now have a filler tube which can exit above decks. This places fog fluid directly on top of the wick. I can also pump water down the tube to extinguish any fire. This will be disguised as a ventilator. I also have a drain tube which is accessible when the deck is off.
10) I'm hoping that by using fresh fog fluid the problem will be solved for the guns but with the additional precautions I'm now more comfortable in managing any issues.
11) More experiments with the new fog fluid for the funnel smoke generators.
The biggest puzzle is that the fog fluid caught fire at all when all the fact sheets say otherwise!
Either way I have decided to pursue the experiments as the potential for 450/900 shots is too great to ignore
Cheers
Geoff
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I tried to respond to a PM but got a bounce back so to answer a few questions.
I'm more than delighted if anybody wants to copy my system and if they can come up with some improvements so much the better. For a detailed description of the funnel smoke generators I wrote an article a few years ago on another web site - http://wmunderway.8m.com/cont/smoke/smoke.htm which give full details. (Model Warships Underway - How to's if the link doesn't work)
The barrels on Iron Duke are plastic and they remain cool to the touch so the actual heat passed through any piping is quite low. The central pipes within the barbettes are brass for rotational and bearing purposes. The only issue would be if something catches fire.
I tried using the ultrasound smoke generators on ID and has four of them but they interfered with my radio (old 27 set) no matter what I did. Its probably worth experimenting but my thoughts are that its too water based and would cause too much condensation in the guns to be of practical use - insufficient smoke volume but please go prove me wrong!
Cheers
Geoff
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By way of an update, in view of the possible flammable nature of the fog fluid, whilst I have been working to improve the current system with some success I have also been working on a completely new gunnery system for Iron Duke which has proved to be very successful and is completely different from my previous method.
Candidly the possibilities are so broad that it would be possible to "fire" a gun with an external barrel diameter of no more than 3mm which means secondary armament can be "fired" or indeed anti-aircraft guns.
I'm still working out the details and will publish in due course but to date I have built a replica ID turret and barbette and everything fits quite comfortably within.
So far I have had about 20 shots out of the new system and it seems to be very repeatable with good effect with much more of a "blast" effect when firing.
A friend took some camera footage and I hope he will be able to post it on you-tube so I can link it in. As always the devil may be in the detail and at the risk of a boast it is so far advanced over the previous system there really is no comparison. The downside is that I'm unlikely to get anywhere near 450 shots but I anticipate something in the region of 200 so 40 or so full broadsides, which is probably adequate.
Full details to follow shortly
Cheers
Geoff
.[size=78%] [/size]
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Please see the you-tube link below - hope this works!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qS84P5wSX9U
Cheers
Geoff
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That is pretty impressive. You are dealing with a different scale and material than heavy particulate-cordite gasses, but still get a pleasing burst of smoke.
My only concern is the water condensate landing on deck, but if you mainy fire broadsides, this will be less of an issue.
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I think the waste water was partly a function of how cold and damp it was on Sunday, with light rain, but also because of the low temperature the barrel hadn't yet warmed up properly. I get this with the other system as well, I think its just a function of using fog fluid.
There are a number of experiments to continue to work out the best results and it maybe an increase in elevation of the barrel may assist (I doubt it because of the blast pressure) and/or the volume of fog fluid being used for each shot.
The volume can be adjusted but in the test model the stick operated the mechanism inside where in the production model this will be done with a servo which can be adjusted to the optimum fluid volume.
Its more a question or repeatability at the moment and to determine how many shots I can get.
In the video the gun was pointing into the wind. When pointing downwind the smoke effect was greater.
As per my earlier message the great advantage is that everything is contained within the turret and barbette so no large fan powered air supply and no fire risk at all.
I'll report back with developments as I'm in the process of mass producing five guns and equipment to finalise plans to fit into Iron Duke.
Looks like a fairly extensive re-fit coming up!
Cheers
Geoff
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As an update I have now radio controlled the process in the test turret and other than a couple of bits of equipment failure (not unexpected) I successfully fired 90 shots with a 15 second gap between shots. Still some improvements needed but I have definite plans for that.
The battery was a 12 volt 7amp hour lead acid so nothing special. If I can get 90 shots per turret x 5 = 450 shots I'll be well pleased.
More updates to follow in due course.
Cheers
Geoff
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I'm now building the new system into Iron Duke and will take some pictures of the various components shortly. I have drawn up some schematics of how the process works and how to build it together with a long narrative. I have built all the new guns and controls and am now working on the new inner barbette to contain all the equipment and progress is reasonably good.
As soon as I have the ID system working I'll publish full details so anyone can build and/or modify as they see fit - won't be too long now!
Cheers
Geoff
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Okay, its finished, the new gunnery system. First the narrative - sorry but its quite long, then the pictures and plans, but it all works!
The original gunfire system works reasonably well but still needs some fine tuning and is quite voluminous to install. The blast effect is also limited so it’s really only suitable for calm days. The funnel smoke generators work on the same basis and during these experiments I had several small fires. Investigation showed that under certain circumstances the non-flammable fog fluid can catch fire if it’s not vaporised properly as a residue can form which can catch fire once the concentration reaches a certain level.
[/size]Gun smoke output can also be a little variable dependent on the nichrome wire crimped connections and the imbalance between units but it was the fire issue that led me to research alternative forms of heating elements and I stumbled on PTC Thermistors. These are used in the chemical and food industries and many of us have them at home keeping coffee warm.
[/size]They are constructed to different voltage and temperature requirements but the fundamental feature is they are self-stabilising so once they reach the designed temperature they will not get any hotter so no feedback circuits are required and no exposed elements to cause a fire.
[/size]These are available on E-bay or Amazon and cost about £4 each so are not expensive. The ones I have are 5cm x 2cm x 0.5cm alloy with two wires supplying the current. On 12 volts they reach 230 centigrade in about 20/25 seconds. Current consumption is about 10 amps but once up to temperature this drops to 3-4 amps dependent on heat loss.
[/size]I researched how real fog generators work and they are based round a block of alloy which acts as a heat capacitor. Once up to temperature fog fluid is pumped into a small cavity inside the alloy and immediately flash vaporises/pressurises and exits via a small hole (2mm I think) under pressure. On contact with cool air it immediately condenses into fog and produces the well-known “blast” seen on stage shows and special effects.
[/size]Experimentation showed this process will work in miniature as you may have seen from the u-tube clip. [size=78%][/size][size=0pt]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qS84P5wSX9U[/size][size=78%] (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qS84P5wSX9U)[/size][/font][/size] The heat exchanger/thermal reservoir block is a matching sized alloy block 1cm x 2cm x 5cm. This has a 6mm hole drilled lengthwise but not penetrating all the way through. A smaller 4mm exit hole is then drilled all the way through and a 13-15cm copper tube is a push fit and is used as the inner barrel. A small plug with a 1.5mm exit hole is soft soldered at the very end. The entrance hole has a brass insert pushed in with a 2mm pipe connector. This is then strapped to the PTC Thermistor with the alloy block acting as a heat capacitor. (The production units use a small smear of heat sink compound between the heat exchanger and thermistor to improve heat transfer). A small volume (0.5cc) of fog fluid was then injected into the heat exchanger and it immediately flash vaporised into fog exiting the barrel. Despite reaching 230 C once wrapped in insulation it can be touched when operating but it is hot. I have used plumbers matt from B&Q as the main insulation and tie it all together with very thin copper wire to hold it all in place and this is then strapped down to the turret floor. Loft insulation is then used to pack out any free space in the turret. Obviously the more insulation the less heat loss and the quicker the recovery time and efficiency and lower current consumption.[size=78%]
[/size]The next item was to provide a measured amount of fog fluid on demand. After much thought I designed a long stroke piston pump which would be operated with a micro servo. The throw of the servo can be adjusted (on modern radio equipment) and therefore the volume of fog fluid can be varied to obtain the best effect. The pump itself is not a hard item to manufacture using K&S brass tubes for the barrel and piston and solid brass rod for the body. There are no piston or sealing rings to minimise drag so some leakage occurs but this acts as lubrication and sealing and as the pump sits in a reservoir of fog fluid leakage becomes irrelevant. Either way the pump will pump a consistent volume of fog fluid on demand. The pump valves are nothing more than rust proof ball bearings sitting in the natural drill shape using gravity to seal. I see no reason why the pump could not be made from plastic as pressure is extremely low. In practice the seals are not perfect but are good enough!
[/size]With this system everything can be made to fit inside Iron Duke’s turret and barbette so is very compact and other than batteries is completely self- contained with the lower part of the barbette acting as the fog fluid reservoir. The barbette is 75mm external diameter and 65 mm deep and holds 60 mil of fog fluid. The workings all hang off the turret floor (a working chamber) with the pump immersed in fog fluid. The mini servo is encased in a waterproof container. This structure is also very appealing from a historical structural perspective. As a bonus it also frees up a lot of internal hull space so facilitates a more logical arrangement of batteries.
[/size]A central 12mm brass tube is needed to allow power and servo cabling to exit on the center of rotation. On Iron Duke I winch the turrets round using small sail winches which works well. The attached schematics show the gun concept and detailed design of the pump. Other than the pump all items are easily and readily available and assuming you can drill a straight hole can be made by anyone.
[/size]A final item is the control system. The easy way is to use a servo/micro switch/relay to provide power to the PTC Thermistor and a second channel to manually operate the pump(s) and fire on demand. I am have inserted a high intensity yellow LED in the adjacent barrel and plan for a sound generator to produce the blast noise. The LED is a yellow 5mm 3 volt item from Maplin (cost 29 pence) and is sufficiently bright on an overcast day at 40 feet!
[/size]A more sophisticated control system would use an Arduino. The feature being that it would measure the temperature of the PTC Thermistor and after experimentation would limit the temperature to the most efficient level and only allow the pump to operate once up to temperature to avoid any spitting. It would also operate the LED and trigger the sound module at the right moment thus producing a flash, boom and a cloud of smoke. It could also be set to fire one gun every other second or with the flick of a switch fire a five gun salvo on demand every 15 seconds so should be very flexible.
[/size]Items:
[/size][size=0pt] [/size]- [/font]If the PTC thermistor is placed vertically the 4mm barrel can be gently bent at a right angle such that it would be quite possible to “fire” a scale 1/96 scale 6” gun turret provided there is adequate depth/space below.- - [/font][size=0pt]n anti-aircraft gun also works as quick little movements of the pump produces little puffs of smoke – you are limited only by your ingenuity.[/size]- [/font]The connection from the pump to the heat exchanger is made using high temperature silicon fuel tube and apart from ease of installation this also operates as a safety valve should the exit hole ever become blocked.- [/font]With Iron Duke the inner barrel is wrapped with string as insulation to keep the outer barrel reasonably cool with a short 5mm silicon tube at the end to prevent wetting of the insulation. The whole turret will also be packed with loft insulation to minimise heat transfer.- [/font]Soft solder can’t be used as it typically melts at 180/200 centigrade albeit the end cap/nozzle is sufficiently removed from the PTC thermistor so soft solder works okay.- [/font]The entrance cap in the heat exchanger is an interference fit and has to be pushed in with a vice.- [/font]The inner barrel is copper to transmit heat and minimise condensation. In practice it was necessary to very slightly flare the inner end and tap in place with a coned drift from the rear to ensure a gas tight seal - Loctite retaining compound is also used.- [/font]For ID the thermistor sits on top of the heat exchanger as this brings the inner barrel into better alignment with the gun port.- [/font]I also insulate the floor of the turret with Kapton tape which is proof to 250 C- [/font][size=0pt]ID has alloy turret roofs so they can readily withstand a degree of heat and can radiate surplus heat to atmosphere[/size]- [/font]The fog fluid is fed in/emptied through a hole in the turret roof disguised as a hatch.- [/font]Whilst 10 amps may seem a lot we need to consider this is only on for 25 seconds or so. A standard 12 volt 7amp battery gives a theoretical output of 7 amps for one hour or 1 amp for 7 hours. So notionally 10 amps for 7/10[/font]th[/size] of the time. Now we know we cannot get all the energy out of a battery and it’s not this simple so let’s assume 50% usable power so on this basis we get:
[/size] 7amps x 50% = 3.5ahr x 70% x 60 (mins) x 60 (seconds) = 8,820 usable seconds at 10 amps.[/font]
[/size] So if each shot takes 20 seconds of energy we get:[size=118pt]
[/size]8,820 divided by 20 = 441 shots overall per 12 volt 7amp battery. This all seems impossibly high so if we discount a further 50% we still get 220 shots which still seems too high so again discount by a further 50% and we get 110 shots.
[/size]The test turret managed 90 shots with a 25 second warn up period and 15 second gap between shots and ran out of fog fluid so it should be capable of 100 shots in practice. With Iron Duke I carry 5 x 12 volt 7amp lead acid batteries so with five turrets we should get somewhere in the region of 450/500 shots which is adequate!
[/size]Barbette fluid capacity is 60mil and I can probably get 90mil as a maximum if required but it’s just as easy to top up if needed if sufficient power is still available. ID has a separate battery per turret to avoid the need to draw 50 amps through any single circuit and mitigate any current draw imbalances (A problem I had with the old system).
[/size]Ultimate reliability and performance is still to be determined but I believe the process/design has been confirmed albeit I would anticipate some further development/fine tuning to achieve the best effect.
[/size]After complete installation with the first proper test firing I achieved something in the region of 40/50 salvos from Q, X and Y but nothing from A and only about 20 from B which then just slowed down and stopped. The test was concluded to examine the fault with A & B and examination showed the mini servo had “fried” on B and was not operating full stroke on A. I don’t know why. These have been replaced with better quality servos so all should now be well. The LED effect is disappointing but may show up better on the pond.
[/size]I have an 8 channel system which is uses as follows:
[/size] 1) [/font]Throttle[size=0pt]2)[/size] [/size]Rudder3) [/font]Train A&B to port/starboard 4) [/font]Tran Q, X & Y to port/starboard5) [/font]Switch on all thermistors via 5 separate relays6) [size=0pt][/font][/size]A & B pump operation/on/off/fire/LED flash7) [/font]Q, X & Y pump operation/on/off/fire/LED flash
Iron Duke is a complicated ship to work on because of the five turrets. A twin or four turret ship would be easier as most of the wiring would remain in situ without the need to disconnect to get to the interior.[/font]
[/size] I do hope this system may prove to be of interest to other modellers and one day hope to meet another ship which fires back using my system! As always any ideas for improvements will always be most welcome.
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Now the plans: Enjoy. As soon as I can get some pictures of the actual firing I'll post them but the result is a more explosive effect which is audible as a "phwoof" type sound.
The pictures are really self explanatory but show three turrets sideways with the pumps clearly visible. End on view shows the mini servo in a waterproof box as the fluid level reaches the bottom. Top view shows the turret layout the PTC Thermistor is under the insulation. The two lots of pipework. Top left is the filler hole whereas the other pipe comes from the pump to the rear of the heat exchanger.
Cheers
Geoff
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Hmm, still having trouble when I cut and paste narrative - lets try the pdf version!
Cheers
Geoff
Geoff, I have tried to alter the formatting sizes but it's not an easy job.
I would recommend not cutting and pasting text here as it comes out with the wrong sizes
ken
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It is not often that a radical alternative solution works so well. Thanks for the narrative and diagrams as they have clarified many points and indeed show how a complex system as described is less so when shown in plans and piccies.
I was pleased to see that you managed to retain the scale look of the gun barrels, which can be difficult especially when making them for BB/ cap firing.
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By way of an update I have now had two testing sessions on the water. The first was over a week ago in very windy weather. I successfully fired about 50/60 salvos albeit with an oddity insofar as if the rudder turned left the aft guns fired. Pesky computer controlled transmitters are kind of complicated at times! It took a while to resolve.
Also "A & B" turrets were erratic. A turned out to have a partly frozen servo so the pump didn't operate and after about 20 shots from B the servo fried and seized up. These have now been replaced with the same servos as Q, X & Y.
The results were positive but with the strong wind the smoke was blown horizontally but was readily visible from a considerable distance. Closer to there was a distinct "phwoooof" noise which was quite audible.
The second session was last Sunday in much better conditions. The only problem this time was that the limit switch on "Q" turret malfunctioned so "Q" didn't fire a shot. Again I fired about 60 salvos over an extended period of time.
On the basis a picture says a thousand words please see attached. The effect is much more dramatic than the previous system.
I think I can claim an "Original design" with this system and its now proven.
Hope the pictures wil be of interest
Cheers
Geoff
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Magnificent!
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A truly spectacular set of images Geoff :-))......... congratulations
In model scale of this enormity and complexity, it matters little that a an individual turret failed in operation........I have read transcripts where the originals [on occasion] also malfunctioned in sea firing trials
I suggest you are light years ahead in producing lifelike model naval warfare available for public exhibition over those continuing along the path of complex turret control/movement
Derek
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Truly amazing realism, after a long R&D development. Congratulations. Looks awesome.
If only the system could be reproduced in a manner that other enthusiasts could use . . .
(Wishful thinking !)
I hope to see it in action at Wicksteed, or any other show. I trust it is suitably drool-proofed (tee hee!)
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Very nice indeed,a very realistic result Hopefully you can now bring out a kit that we can all use!
Lots of time and trial and error,but very well done
Mick F
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I suggest you are light years ahead in producing lifelike model naval warfare available for public exhibition over those continuing along the path of complex turret control/movement
Thanks for your enthusiastic support, Derek. <*<
Geoff, the effects look great: well done! :-))
Andy
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I suggest you are light years ahead in producing lifelike model naval warfare available for public exhibition over those continuing along the path of complex turret control/movement
Derek
Silly Billy! - I think your crystal ball must be malfunctioning
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That looks pretty much like the real thing and is inspiring Geoff. I am very pleased for you and hope your problems with servos are quickly and painlessly resolved.
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Firstly the picture looks interesting, 3D printer heaters if I'm not mistaken and a peristaltic pump - okay whats it for, funnel smoke? My brother in law has been looking at these heaters as well to see if they are easier to use than the PTC Thermistors. For a gunfire system I don't think how the heat is supplied will make a lot of difference as ultimately it will take the same amount of heat and energy consumption to flash vaporise a given volume of liquid provided the ultimate temperature is sufficiently high.
Secondly, I hadn't any plans to provide a kit of parts for the gunfire system but I believe all the elements can readily be constructed by any competent modeller. Probably the hardest part is to drill the heat exchanger and whilst I have a small lathe this can be done with a pillar drill.
Whilst my pumps are brass there is no reason these can't be glued together using plastic tubing albeit I would counsel using brass tube glued in for the barrel and piston to minimise friction.
None of the elements are particularly critical in terms of dimensions as its really a question of how big the model is and if you can fit the heat exchanger and thermistor in the turret. If not there is no reason why it can't be fitted vertically. My belief is the concept is very flexible, for example there is no real reason why the pump has to be in the revolving structure as silicon tubing would give sufficient flexibility to mount it elsewhere in the hull. Its just the way I developed the system and having developed it, it is clear there are many possible permutations.
Than you all for the positive comments
Cheers
Geoff
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Andy and C-3PO.... rereading my post, I certainly was not critical or your work, infact in the early part of the thread/s you are working on, I offered assistance with any technical aspect of multiple gun turret motion
Geoff displayed what I suggest is a brilliant representation of fire power as available for the public to see from that date onwards O0
This has taken many months developing the spectacular simulation firing from aboard his HMS Iron Duke
From this I should retract my term of Light Years and substitute Scale Light Years [which I think will be linear or in 2 dimension %) ]
I certainly await further progress with the great work you are achieving in your thread work :-))
Derek
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I'm getting frustrated now - more testing over the weekend and fired about 40 salvos in all. A & B just stopped working as the channel had dropped out for some reason - so no pump operation - it took an hour to figure it out back home and get all functioning again (pesky computer controlled transmitters!).
Y turret stopped working after about 12 salvos which was traced to a plastic lay shaft inside the servo shearing off so no pump operation. This has been replaced by a brass shaft and we will see how that goes. I have reduced the pump throw on Q, X & Y just in case this was responsible for fracturing the lay shaft in some way - running out of movement.
Q turret rang out of battery power so by the end of the day I was down to X turret which performed perfectly. I don't think all my batteries are of the same quality and some are getting a bit old but hopefully frequent usage will help to restore them.
I blew three engine fuses due to weed problems. I have a 10 amp fuse for the speed controller plus two 5amp fuses, one for each motor. ID was never disabled as the other motor and props got her back to shore okay each time. Its just annoying as I have to take the whole deck off to get to the engine fuses!
Other than that a good days sailing in glorious weather on the Sunday but overall still not getting the designed number of possible salvos.
Hopefully just teething troubles whilst I sort out all possible weaknesses. One item to think about is that if a turret is not working the heater unit is still energised so the turret gets quite hot and is causing some issues. If they are firing the action reduces the temperature and if I switch off the heaters I can usually get another 5 shots before deterioration starts with the smoke cloud getting too small. I may have to think up some more circuitry!
Overall it all works, just
Cheers
Geoff
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Your efforts with ironing out the teething troubles echos the same efforts made by the engineers when perfecting the electrically operated turrets on HMS Invincible, but without the sheets of blue flame and singed engineers.
You will indeed get there, and updating all the turrets with new components and electronic parts as you go should improve reliability.
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Okay, another day another sailing and another series of tests. Again I can't say it was a complete success as after about 12 salvos B turret stopped firing and Y turret never fired a single shot. Otherwise about 50 salvos from the others.
Okay what went wrong this time:
B turret the silicon pipe split at the heat exchanger so I just flooded the turret with fog fluid which drained back into the container. The insulation was absolutely soaked so needed to be replaced.
Y turret the pipe split at the junction of the pump so whilst the repaired servo worked fine it wasn't pumping fluid to the heat exchanger!
Now whilst this may seem a little frustrating I have given some reflection to all this and on average I'm probably getting about 45 salvos per turret. Some give more and others less, or not at all. However if we take 40 as an average we get 40 x 5 x 5 (sailings) and we get circa 1,000 shots which isn't bad and as the numbers climb its going to show up any potential weak points in the system.
Fundamentally the system works with the key components being the pumps and the PTC thermistors/heat exchangers proving continuously reliable so no fundamental flaws and I guess as above at about 1,000 shots I should reasonably expect some failure modes to show up.
More importantly I was able to fire a sufficient number of guns on and off for over 4 hours on Sunday much to the amusement of all onlookers. The audible "Phwoof" certainly startled a few dogs!
The effect is clearly visible at 40/50 yards.
In conclusion some more work is needed for the pipe connectors and to make sure the servos aren't stalled in any way. I think when the silicon pipe is cut if there is a slight scoring on the end this can lead to a weak point causing later splitting. Some of the batteries seem to expire before others so I need to find away to stress test the batteries. In itself this isn't a big problem but from a practical perspective I just then dribble fluid out the end of a barrel which is messy.
Hope this isn't getting too boring for you all as I iron out the bugs in this system.
Cheers
Geoff
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It is your thread Geoff and you can keep at it for as long as you feel it is beneficial and want to submit information. If we are getting bored we have the choice not to keep checking in. This will still be a useful reference for anyone taking the plunge with their model warship.
As a demonstration of how to proof a complex system in a field many of us are interested in; namely how to make our battle ships look cool on the water, it takes some beating. It is a topic that has morphed almost completely from how you built a ship to how you created and perfected a gun smoke system.
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I think any updates will be further apart from now on. Another sailing session on Sunday and all worked perfectly! All five turrets worked consistently. After about 55 salvos B turret began to slow down but still worked for another 5 salvos approx. Eventually B stopped altogether but A continued for another 15 + salvos until it too dropped out. Nothing wrong with the system and just the batteries running down. I clearly have one weak battery as all the others continued and I would guess on average about 70 salvos all in so something in the region of 350 plus shots fired.
Fog fluid consumption is in the region of 3/4 of a jam jar full for each session. The limiting factor now seems to be battery capacity but I'm not surprised as some of the 12 volt batteries are quite old. I just need to identify the weak ones and replace them. Candidly I can live with 350 shots in a session which I think is adequate!
Of more importance is that reliability seems to be improving as well as nothing actually broke, all pumps worked, all thermistors worked, all servos and relays worked, no pipe splits.
All in all I was very pleased with the sailing on Sunday.
Cheers
Geoff
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I am so pleased for you Geoff. It sounds like the process will be a while yet to completly proof, but 350 shots has to be good in anyone's money :-))
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Another sailing session on Sunday and I'm pleased to advise all went well - another 60/70 salvo's with all turrets firing pretty nearly to the end.
I picked up a local curiosity - a 2.5" high teak barrel made from Iron Duke's deck with a little brass plaque confirming its provenance - Jellico's flagship at Jutland 1916. Really quite pleased with this find.
Cheers
Geoff
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A truly beautiful model Geoff, and your gun fire system is a work of art.
I hope I may get to see it a show this summer?
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That will be a high spot of my weekend.
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Now I have seen it at Wicksteed this weekend - Wow ! Truly magnificent effect, and so consistent.
To produce this, without pyrotechnics, is a wonderful accomplishment. .... I am blown away with it.
:-)) :-)) :-)) :-))
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Thank you for your kind comments which are appreciated. ID performed well at Wicksteed and fired in the region of 65/70 salvo's again. I must find a way to accurately count the salvos as once you start shooting at the other ships (targets) it kind of hard to stop!
I hope one day for someone to fire back at me with the same system.
It was a lot of fun trying to sail in formation with Dreadnought, Superb and Suffolk and as usual really quite hard to keep formation due to different turning circles and speeds and windage ete. I hope to be able to sail with Agincourt at some point in the future.
A great weekend - well to be fair I was only there on Sunday so I git the better of the weather!
Cheers
Geoff
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I hope one day for someone to fire back at me with the same system.
Geoff: With your kind assistance and information, that might be me O0
Bob K
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I think its probably time to conclude this blog as I've been sailing ID with the new gunnery system for some time and the system seems to be completely reliable and effective so maybe some reflections:
- The system works and I consistently get in the region of 300 to 350 shots so 65 to 70 salvos
- The PTC Thermistors and heat exchange design has proven totally reliable. I could possibly improve this by having the fog fluid injected at 90 degrees as it would be structurally easier within the turret.
- The pump design has proved to be ideal and again is entirely consistent and reliable
The Turnigy 9XR transmitter has proved ideal with both servo throw and speed adjustments. In particular controlling the forward and aft sets of turrets with two of the pots has proved ideal.
- Turning the turrets with servo sized sail winches using fishing line to pull them round has proved reliable and effective.
- Self centring is a little erratic but because I can adjust each turret set independently this is not a problem and on the water all is fine
- Early teething troubles were with ancillary components, pipes and servos and the fundamental design and concept has proved sound.
- The heat effect on the turrets was greater than anticipated. I used a plywood frame covered in plastic card using evostick and the evostick gives way with the heat causing some delamination. I have now replaced the sides with ply so this should solve the problem. The turrets were never that hot but just enough to cause adhesion problems which could not have been anticipated. Fibre glass turrets would be ideal.
- Overall I'm very pleased with the effect on the water
The bright LED's in adjacent gun barrels work okay but is probably not worth the extra effort
- Maybe I should add a sound module?
Cheers
Geoff
One final question, what do I build next? %)
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your blog has been an adventure and a course in how to develop and install complex equipment. Thankyou for months of interesting reading.
As for your next project, how about a Cruiser? The forst world war ones are a bit sparse, but still worth looking at, and there are the fifty odd Inter war and WW2 Cruisers of various classes. They combine grace with size and complexity. That assumes you are thinking of a Military subject?
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Hi Geoff,
If you're contemplating the military side AND your armament system, won't the gun size have a bearing?
Hows about going earlier to something of this type?
And the plans for most of them are FREE!
The only thing you need to develop now is how to get dark smoke!
Brilliant Iron Duke and good luck for whatever your choice is.
Tony
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Many thanks Geoff for a totally riveting step by step adventure. I have enjoyed each and every instalment.
Here is hoping I can replicate something similar in some of my smaller twelve inch turrets :-))
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Yes Geoff...even from afar....reading of the turrets that didn't fire, mechanical mal-function, thermal problems and the occasional turret that would not return to it's home position......[one could have been reading actual reports and notes from 100 years ago]
Finally achieving .....300 to 350 shots so 65 to 70 salvos in a day is a Naval engagement of tremendous proportions in itself....
This morning, I also see your thread has been viewed 73,691 times ........congratulations :-))
Derek
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Oh yes, a French Pre Dreadnought! That tumblehome is indecently pleasing:O)
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Thank you all for your kind comments which are really appreciated. Now what is next? Whats going through my mind is:
Invincible 1914 (more of the same - can't have too many battleships!)
Boridino - Russian battleship 1906 - black with tumble-home!
Victorian cruiser - Aboukir/Hogue/Cressey type. Black/white/yellow and two 9.2" guns
Napoleonic 28 gun frigate - no gunfire though - just a square rigger!
Gun size isn't actually a problem as the inner barrel is only 4mm in diameter so at 1/96 scale this can do a 6" gun or a 9.2" gun easily. Battery weight is the limiting factor unless someone can figure out how to use lipo's with a voltage cut out so they don't over discharge.
Cheers
Geoff
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All excellent ideas Geoff. A man after my own heart !
Invincible: Nick has started building one.
Boridino: Wonderful shape
Cressy class: Lovely ship. I started one many years ago, but never completed it.
Frigate: That should provide interesting challenges.
PS: I now have a 12 inch turret for Agincourt. Thermistor assy would be a very tight fit inside.
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Bob, as a though if you were to bend the barrel at 90 degrees the thermistor could then be vertical inside the barbette. The question then becomes where does the pump go but this could be outside the barbette using a longer silicon tube.
Drop me another e-mail for ideas if you like
Cheers
Geoff
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Hi Geoff,
Zvezda do a decent 1:350 model of Borodino. I've made the sister ship in the past as a 3D guide for an earlier project.
Price, however, seems to have gone up a fair amount to £20.00 plus.
Tony
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There is no harm in building an Invincible class Battle cruiser especially as each one would have had subtle differences, and seeing almost a full squadron of our first class of Battle cruisers on the lake at Wicksteed in a few years would be fabulous :}
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Hi Geoff
I certainly wouldn't mind if you wanted to build an Invincible class Battlecruiser but I'll give one suggestion:
Go for Inflexible or Indomitable!!!
It's not because I want to hog the name 'Invincible' but there so much more photos of these two compared to Invincible- its almost like the Navy didn't want to take pictures or anyone who took them easily available in this day and age! Clydebank Battlecruisers by Ian Johnston has some fabulous build photos of Inflexible being fitted out.
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I hope this is the correct thread, but wasn't this a research topic a while back..
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Royal-Navy-Batleships-photo-magic-lantern-slide-2115-/132233661208?&_trksid=p2056016.l4276
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HMS Inflexible would be an ideal partner to Invincible, both of Battle of the Falklands fame.
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Especially as Nick has Scharnhorst in the pipeline :-))
At the end of the day Geoff, build what takes your fancy. After all, it is not up to us to fill your house with our dreams, we have to realise them ourselves.
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Excellent talk today at Alfold. A fine model and a very clever system, it was a pleasure to have a crash course on your design all in two chats. I was the enthusiastic supporter of analogue, clockwork and anything avoiding technology..us luddites must stand together against the Arduino flood tides ( only kidding..). I can see the system being useful to simulate AA fire on warships or a certain WWII Pedestal tanker :-))
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I just found this clip of Oron Duke firing both in real time and slow motion - kind of neat!
Thank you!
Cheers
Geoff
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w5qwwQkFF1E
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She also looked awesome firing at Wicksteed Park Geoff. Now, If only I can get my HMS Agincourt to do that O0
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Bob,
You can!
Cheers
Geoff
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Geoff,
Remarkable gun development work and a truly great approach!
Sent you a message, but have no indication that it went through.
I have been developing a "fog" gun system for carronades on a 1/24 scale brig, Syren. Your work has advanced the approach to fog guns tremendously - thank you.
Looking forward to communicating with you for some help with the brig and for thoughts on Arduino control of these systems.
Video of prototype fog guns firing on 1/24 scale brig Syren:
https://youtu.be/lxWut2Jioow
Best
ps....thank you Jerry Todd for alerting me to Geoff's work.
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Geoff,
Some quick thoughts....likely not new to you...
Per your comment about rudder jerk...Erratic servo jerks have occurred when I initiate heavy amp draw. Resolved problems by grounding all circuits and components to a common ground bus.
Sound....I have tried all sorts of on-board sound and none give satisfactory volume when out on the water. Not tried yet, but an approach that may work is an on-shore, large sub-woofer. The sound track, with appropriate timing delay and echo effect, would be triggered as gun fire is triggered. Deep bass sounds from a subwoofer can be very non-directional, so perhaps the sound would seem to come from the model, especially with the visual cue of gun flash and smoke.
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That is a realistic effect you have created there Dan. The vapour hangs around for a reasonable time.
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I have to be alert, we need all the lerts we can get! :)
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I thought I'd add a final comment or two - I've been sailing Iron Duke consistently now and figure I have fired well over 5,000 shots in the weeks I have been sailing. The system seems to be both proven and reliable with only minor issues - a broken operating arm put one turret out of action but easily fixed but otherwise everything seems to be working okay. Overall I'm extremely pleased with the result and the overall effect. I'm just waiting for someone to fire back!
What next, well I'm helping a friend by constructing four gunfire units for his battleship and have also laid the keel of HMS invincible 1914. I will be incorporating some mechanical improvements to the gunfire system which should provide a better linear pull for the pumps and reduce the strain on the servos and feeding the fluid in from the side which shortens the unit by 1cm and is easier to connect and avoids potential kinks in the piping.
Cheers
Geoff
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... I'm just waiting for someone to fire back!
As you know Geoff I am planning to provide that response, hopefully in time for Mayhem at Wicksteed. Your system is without doubt the most spectacular gun fire system - short of using live pyrotechnics. I have been inspired by your long development program and success. I am sure your latest improvements can only enhance reliability and effect.
For anyone who has not yet seen Geoff's Iron Duke in action . . .
(https://photos.smugmug.com/General/i-FK8N2zZ/0/41433f63/M/Iron-Duke-M.jpg) (https://bobkiralfy.smugmug.com/General/i-FK8N2zZ/A)
Looking forward to seeing your HMS Invincible in action :-))
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Great results! The best features are the smoke density and repeatability. Adds a whole new dimension to warship models.
Still working on final control system on Syren guns. Will let you know when I get the system working.
Thanks for sharing your development details...much appreciated.
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I reckon the quality of density is because the steam doesn't have to travel very far at all, so less steam has condensed in the system, the heating system need not have so much redundancy because it isn't catering for distance, and each system is feeding its self only, so is more efficient.
It is still amazing, and if elements could be 3D printed then it would be a splendid product especially allied with the turret control system that fellow Mayhemists are experimenting with :-))
We need a few of the kaiser's fleet to add some smoke to the skies.
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Whilst the fog fluid is made up of de-mineralised water, glycerine and a certain type of glycol I don't think we are seeing steam. I believe that the water flash vaporises which in turn atomises the glycerine and glycol forming tiny droplets which in turn refract the light giving us the fog, so the water is the "flashing" medium and the glycerine/glycol form the small droplets which give us the "smoke". Otherwise just pure water would work and it doesn't - tried it!
Cheers
Geoff
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I meant to add, that the purpose of the alloy block is to store the heat energy so it can flash vaporise the fog fluid. Fundamentally it takes "x" amount of energy to change a liquid to a gaseous state in "y" amount of time. So all the stored energy can "dump" into the fluid and the rate of heat transfer is governed by both the alloy mass and the maximum amount of energy it can store and the surface are of the central hole to transfer the heat which in turn builds up the pressure so its ejected down the length of the barrel.
I suspect there is probably an optimum relationship between everything but I just don't have the sophisticated measuring equipment to analyse further. I also suspect at the small scale we are working at that there would only be minor differences anyway.
Cheers
Geoff
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Yes, sorry Geoff, that is what I meant to say in my post 22:00 way! I think looking at the images, you have probably have the constituent parts pretty well balanced.
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After about 5,500 shots I was checking the guns and realised that the plastic barrels have distorted with the heat at the muzzle end which is somewhat annoying.
I know we strive for realism in our models but the god of models is taking it a bit far when I have to change barrels every year or so but I guess I shouldn't be surprised as its really over 1,000 shots per working barrel! Just like the real thing after extensive firing the barrels need replacing!
I'll try to replace them with a metal version so I won't have to replace them again. I also found that X and Y turrets the insulation was soaking. I can't see any evidence of a leak so it may be the filling tube was passing fluid - I'll monitor the situation.
Cheers
Geoff
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When I was at Wickteed Park over the weekend a gentleman kindly took a video of Iron Duke per the attached link.
Thank you
Geoff
HMS Iron Duke 1/96 scale, over 6ft long with working turrets (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lnN82Td2LY)
RC HMS Iron Duke escorted by 2 destroyers (1/96 scale) (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YmHfCfL3lW4&feature=youtu.be)
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Really great videos Geoff. I posted the first one on my Facebook. :-))
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Both your escorts belong to Tony who is a fellow Mayhemer. In the mosaic of videos shown at the end of the latter video, I saw his escort fleet shown in another of RC Model Warship's videos of the Warwick show.
The children's enthusiasm was lovely to hear and shows that traditional models with some technological marvels still capture their imagination :-))
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Geoff,
Great videos...and great firing effect. Congrats on developing such a great approach to firing guns.
I finally ordered some PTC's to build some prototype carronades for my brig. Will keep you posted on progress.
Thank you for writing up all the details of your work. Much appreciated.
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By way of an update I was having some reliability issues with the gunnery system - mostly servo issues and link failures so I decided to completely strip one unit down to see what was going on. To summarise:
1) The PTC Thermisters continue to work perfectly - no issues
2) 4 out of 5 gun barrels have distorted near the muzzle and need replacing. In checking this out I found the barrel insulation soaking for its full length - the "O" ring seal at the muzzle end was not holding up well so this would wet the insulation creating significant heat transfer to the barrels and a drop of in performance and distortion. I have now used a high temperature silicon gasket sealant from Halfords - max temp 350 centigrade and of course more flexible.
3) I removed the end plug on the heat exchanger and found some internal discolouring (black) but no debris of furring up at all so they are working very well. Its worth mentioning that each "gun" has now fired over 1,000 shots so very pleased no internal problems evident. I replaced the end plug with a "L" shaped fitting to preclude any silicon pipe kinking - just a suspicion as the angle was very acute.
4) The servo operated at the top of a relatively long lever. I have now introduced a lever pivoted at the center so the "pull" is now much lower down and more linear to the pump piston. This should reduce strain on the servos and give a better pull.
5) I also found that the center hole in the base of the turret had got wet and was a tight fit so this was filed out and the turrets now fit much easier.
Overall it took about 2-3 hours per turret to remove, modify and refit!
Cheers
Geoff