Tuesday, August 11, 2020

The perils of a 2nd hand kit



"Bollards", I said as I scrabbled in the bottom of the box looking for the the final parts to complete the model. The trouble with a second-hand kit is that you can't be sure all the parts are present.

One missing piece was the front bollard - but that was easily replaced with a bit of plastic tube and a 4mm diameter disk made using the handy leather punch.


At the back, the winch was missing one end, easily replaced with a bit of Plastikard even if it doesn't have the rivet heads that should be there.

Tricker were a pair of capstans. If I had a lathe to hand, I'm sure replacements could be turned up. As it was I improvised with a couple of brass bushes supplied with the servo. I've never really understood why these are included, probably an aeromodeller thing, so it's nice to find a use for them. More plastic disks from the punch (I must buy a proper set) and once they are painted, no-one will notice.

2 comments:

Mark said...

Nice use of the brass bush. It actually looks better than the plastic one next to it given it doesn't have a line of flash along it's side. The perils of close up photos!

Anonymous said...

The bushes included with servos (& the rubber mounts) date back to the vibration from ic engines. They fitted inside the rubber mounting pads to stop the rubber being compressed when the mounting screws were tightened.

Out of interest most people fitted the bushes upside down. They were supposed to be used with the wide flange end against the wood that the servo was mounted on and the narrow bit at the end where it met the screw used for fixing the servo.