By the way, can you post your motors, propellers and ESC's setup because I know several potential builder of the Amati kit would like to know this ?
Mike.
Hmm, well I am not sure my experience counts for much as none of my boats have seen a pond yet! Actually I am lying a little - I did some trials with my Bluebird of Chelsea which looked beautiful on the water but was already sitting slightly below the scale water line - that after I'd followed David Metcalf's notes on displacement to the letter, and still with a bunch of other finishing fittings (more weight) to be added.
But anyway, my approach for the Riva is as follows, so far:
1. I am (sort of) using the Amati transmission kit (comes with noisy plastic gearboxes and twin 540's I think. Cannot see branding on the motors. I reckon they are too big anyway...)
2. ESC is an Action Electronics Mixer (P94 I think) - this thing is very twitchy to set up, very hard to get both props running together and stopped together. But anyway, I threw good money at it, so it stays for the moment.
3. Rudders - I was using the ones from the trans kit but they are a bit hefty so I also made some brass ones that look a lot sleeker - I can swap them easily and see if they make any difference on the water, but when the boat is back on display gathering dust, it can have the brass ones on it for keeps! I moved the rudders back 10mm (with internal modifications), to give me more room for bigger props and to better match the 'display position' for the rudders.
4. Props - the plastic ones supplied in the trans kit may work well but boy are they ugly, I replaced them with twin handed 3 blade Raboesch, yes I think they were the 35mm ones.
5. Prop supports are brass struts 'Araldited' deep into the hull, with silver soldered bronze bushes. They are supposed to take the shaft reaction, so they are reasonably beefy. A bit of a gamble, but with adjustment the thrust could be taken up by the gearbox bearing, not the motor itself because of the layout.
6. Prop shafts (4mm) - the props run exposed outside the hull and through the bronze bushes; the shaft tubes are ground back flush with the hull line and will be painted so that they cannot be seen. There are very small bronze bushings pushed just out of sight inside these tubes.
7. I have shortened the trans kit gearbox propshaft output itself to suit the arrangement - with the motors mounted in place under the seat, the gearbox shafts pass to a pair of Huco couplings and then out to the props shafts themselves through the hull.
If it works at all, I'll be amazed!! Should look good though which is my primary concern to be honest. If it doesn't sink on the lake and can idle along besides the odd yacht and generic tug at Maldon, I'll be more than happy.