It was back to the build recently.....
I have changed the gear ratio on the paddle drive system by fitting one-one pully wheels on the shaft instead of one-two.
This has the effect of doubling the paddlewheel speed. When tested in the lake, the ship moved with a better power to weight ratio and also the steerage improved greatly.
Spurred on by this , I then wired up the smoke machine to the 24 volts required, and had it switch on and off by using an ACTion switcher unit. Unfortunately, this involved fitting two 6 volt lead batteries on each side of the unit in front of the motor, which made her Bow heavy.
I took her to the lake on Sunday and noticed this on the water, but tried a little sail. When underway she seemed to be dipping the bow so I brought her in.
Good job I did because the water had been pouring in through the square windows at a rate of knotts and she would have sunk. The amount of water inside gave me the biggest fright of my life. I was horrified to think of the consequencies.
I think I may have reached over my weight limit now, so I'll have to think of further Mods to get her back to the water line. Still, for one glorious moment she looked good with all lights on, smoking like a good un, and sound generator blasting away (pity about the speaker cone getting wet !!)
ken