Heavy duty sanding

 

You know I said I wouldn't be messing around fettling this kit? It seems I lied. 

On the manufacturer's website, the hull is clearly shown as a series of slices on their finished model. I didn't have a massive problem with this, but my lining up of the hull slices wasn't as perfect as I'd like. They were good, all within 0.5mm, but you could see the differences. 

So, down to the garage, and out with the Mouse. Fitted with the smoothest paper I could find, I attacked the sides. Handily, the laser-burnt edges acted like a guide coat of paint on a car. As I sanded, I could clearly see those that were inset more than the others. In theory, once all the burnt stuff was gone, the sides would be perfect. 

A coat of sanding sealer was followed by some Humbrol 33. This showed up areas that needed a bit more work, but after a couple of sessions with Perfect Plastic Putty filler, sanding, and paint, the result looks OK. 

I'm working on the basis that perfection is the enemy of good, or at least getting the model built. It won't be a show-winner, but hopefully I'll be proud of it. At £22.99, if I really want to, I could even treat this as a test, and aim for perfection on another kit. I doubt that will happen, there's plenty more in the stash to build!

 

Layering up the hull

 

Most of the MDF parts in the Petite kit, are layers that make up the hull. 

It's a simple job, fit the first two, and then add the internal walls. PVA holds everything together, but it's important at this stage, to ensure all the parts are square. The walls provide some positive location for all the rest of the hull slices. 

 

All this is made easier by the accuracy of the cutting, and that the slices arrive loose in the bag. No busting them out of a fret, then having to sand retaining nibs away. Just add the slices with glue between them, and clamp for a nice join. 

Incidentally, the hull is 22cm long, which I think means this is a 32ft long boat/  

A little barge

 

I'm starting to get back to normal after all the events earlier in the year, and one thing I'm determined to do is build a few projects for me. No worrying about publishing, other than on this blog. A chance to rediscover the fun of modelmaking. 

First kit out of the stash is a 1:48 scale kit for a small narrowboat from Petite Properties.  

I've built enough stuff from this firm to be confident everything is going to fit together properly. I'm not in the mood for a lot of fettling. Not that this will stop me making small changes, but fighting a kit is out. 

The model is an oddball addition to the range, which is probably why it appealed to me when I spotted the photos on social media. It's not normally on the stand at model railway show, so I had to pre-order for collection. Yes, I could order through the post, but I wasn't in a rush, and chatting is more fun. It's a popular kit too, it's often out of stock, so I was lucky. 

As with all Petite kits. what we have is a set of laser-cut MDT and cardboard parts. There's some wire in here as well. Instructions are included, although everything looks pretty simple. 

The prototype is a holiday cruiser. There is something similar in the Craftline range, although Petite's is shorter.  

Noch Hausboot (14224) build

 

My kit of choice from the Thun model shop, is the Noch Hausboot (14224), which has the benefit of being tiny - the box is 10m long, and I was able to find a tiny spot in the rucksack for the trip home. We'll gloss over the price...

Anyway, knowing I still have kits from my Australia trip a decade ago awaiting assembly, I decided to get this one out of the way ASAP. 

It's laser cut from some very stout 2mm thick laserboard. Everything is, as you would expect, cleanly cut. The minimum of tabs hold parts into the fret, making removal with a sharp knife, easy. 

Th very thin glazing is cut to size and fitted (Glue'n'glaze) before assembly of the sides and ends with Roket card glue. No allowance is made for the plastic, but it is very, very thin, so the designer assumed you won't need it, and so it seems. 

Under the "hull" are a couple of skids, which don't show in the photos, but raise it up a couple of millimetres. I think this is probably prototypical, as you don't want the deck at water level. 

The only painting required is the lifebelts, everything else is precoloured. Building the model took very little time, and wasn't too fiddly, even in HO. 

I suppose that the "ropes" between the posts would look better made out of thread, or fine chain. It's the sort of modification a more advanced modeller could chose to carry out easily enough. 

A fun little kit, and at 8cm long, small enough for the souvenier section of my model display cabinet. 

A couple of lifeboats

Sorry, I'm a bit busy right now, so not much time for personal modelling, or blogging. Please enjoy a couple of photos from the recent KMBC open day of some visiting vessels. I like orange boats, wish I had to time to build more...

2023 - Review of the year

354 posts this year. A couple of breaks, one enforced by a trip to hospital, so not too bad I suppose. It certainly proves I can waffle a lot!

Visitor numbers remain constand at 250+ per day. Down from the highs of a few years ago, but I'm still very flattered that so many people drop in so often. More video would probably raise this, but I really don't have time to do more of that!

None of the projects I mention every year, and can't be bothered to cut'n'paste into this post, have made any progress, but then you will have guessed that. 

My Beetle still sits in the garage, as the person I talked to last year about a restoration didn't bother to get back to me. Frustratingly, a visitor to the recent  Rowington steam event was Fuzz Townsend of Car SOS and Practical Classics fame. I kept trying to have a chat, and everyone in the room seemed to conspire to keep me away from him. Another missed opportunity!

Still, how about looking at the models I did manage to build? 

The first project completed was a 1/4 scale VW engine. 

It works too - I made a video to prove it. Now living in a display box above my desk, it still gets the occasional run.

Next, for the garden railway, a Boot Lane Works steam tram. 

A Gauge 1 van from a half-built Slater's kit. 

G scale Lanz Bulldog tractor.

I tried to build a Bond Bug kit, but it all went a lot wrong at the painting stage. 

A replacement kit has been aquired, no easy job as they had sold out everywhere. Mine was picked up at the IPMS show, but when I was at Hornby, they also had some on the shelf. I just need to find the time and enthusiasm to have another go. 

And, apart from a half-finished Sentinal shunter kit, that's pretty much it for 2023. Another very not impressive year of modelling output. No layouts, no boats, half a loco. 

My excuse is that on the odd occasions I have the time for personal modelling, I'm still struggling a lot of the time for motivation. When I do have some spare time, which is less often than it should be, I'm too tired to get stuck into things. It would help if I wasn't so good at aquiring new projects. When they arrive, I'm all fired up to get stuck in, but the flame goes out almost imediately. 

Sadly, this means less interesting building stuff, and more random waffle. Thanks to all those who stick with me for that. I take it as a compliment that I'm not that boring! 

As I said yesterday, I've no idea what 2024 will hold. Trying to set myself some targets for the year, in an effort to provide motivation, the best I can come up with is getting abroad for a holiday. Lisbon is currenlty favourite, I wonder if I'll manage it? 

There have been plenty of shows of course, and a few steamups locally too. Getting away from the computer helps a lot. Being able to enjoy the social side of garden railways is great, and I could really do to make even more of it, especially since my lakeside trips seem to have dried up as Thursday mornings involve horrible weather, or a looming deadline that keeps me at my desk.

Thanks to everyone who keeps reading this stuff, it is appreciated, as are the nice comments posted occasionally. If I'm helping - I'm happy!

Does the duck swim?

 

You may remember that my "big" purchase from the model boat club auction, was a radio controled duck. You might even have wondered if the thing worked. After all, I only paid a fiver. 

The answer is - Yes. 

But not until I had worked out how it operated. The duck is a moulded body, which hides a radio control hull underneath. Rechargable batteries are charged from a USB port, and I duly plugged them in. 

Once fitted into the hull, the transmitter was fed some fresh AA's and swtiched on. A green light flashed on the side, but nothing else happened. I tried another battery, with the same result. 

Frustrated, i took the bird down to the boat club to enquire of the seller. At the price, I couldn't complain if this duck turned out to be a pup, but wondered if there was something I was missing. 

There was. I don't know where, but the hull has a liquid sensor. The props won't rotate until the model is on the water. Launch it, and the transmitter light comes on, and stays on. And the duck sails

Boiler testing day

 

I'm lucky, that my work is flexible. As long as there isn't a meeting, it doesn't matter when I work, just that the jobs get done. This allowed me to be at the model boat club in the sun for boiler testing day. Tha fantail launch sparkled as she sat on the bench, waiting for her turn with the club testers. 

We were in the company of some serious kit too. Proper boats, with steam plants that cost several time more than my model! For these, the serious testing kit is employed. For insurance reasons, the models must be tested every year, so we don't blow anyone up while sailing, especially on a public day. 

The simple plant of the fantail gave the testers a bit of a problem. Boiler pressure is low, 20-35psi, and there isn't a normal safety valve, just a length of neopropaline pipe that should be the weak link if anything goes wrong. 

Tester Chris had looked into this, and it seems the rules are sligthly different for an "Lo" type steam plant which is how mine is categorised. We discussed it a little and decided that the best plan would be to stall the engine and see if the pipe blew off. 

A few seconds before this photo was taken, the whole thing was smothered in steam. After a few seconds at stall, the pipe blew off, and emptied the boiler of hot gas. It was quite spectacular! Of course, this leave fire under the boiler and not much water in there, so I will need to point the model at the bank and hope momentum gets it there before anything melts .

All this satisfied the test, and the model has now been certified. 

I'm quite chuffed (pun intended) with this. I've never been certified before, and take this as me having done an OK job with the construction. 

At this point, I should have taken the launch for a little sail, but when reassembling it, I hadn't been realistic about the state of the rubber coupling. 

A replacement is in order, and adding the tube to my steam engine "flight box" for bankside repairs in the future.

Clean up and first run

 

No point in getting clever, the first place to start cleaning up the engine is down at the kitchen sink. 

A good scrub with soapy water and an old toothbrush removes the fur from the mazak, and a lot of the muck from the fuel pan too. I couldn't resist a quick polish with the springy metal stuff used for really stuborn muck on pans. I know it's going to get dirty again, but I find cleaning things theraputic sometimes. 

Obviously, there will be Brasso. If it's metal, I do my best to bring it up to a reasonable shine. Again, there's no logic to this other than it looks nice. I think I hope the boiler tester will be kinder to a gleaming engine than a mucky one. 

I prefer Brasso wadding, it smells a bit less, and is very handy for all sorts of quick cleaning jobs around the workbench. 

With everything cleaned and oiled, it's outside in the sunshine with a pack of solid fuel tablets. I'd forgotten the smell of these. Nothing like and nice as meths, but certainly evocative of a time spent trying to persaude a Mamod loco to find a happy medium between stationery and Mach 1. 

Anyway, a table and a half placed in the pan, and the engine dropped on top, I'm glad of my Accucraft flame/heat proof gloves for all this, and we have lift-off!

Prepare the steam boat!

 

A new event is on the horizon. The boat and railway clubs have joined forces for a steam day, with boats on the water, and trains on the new tracks. 

I have trains, but it's a very long while since my fantail launch saw the water. But, I want to be one of the few, possibly the only one, operating in both areas.

Exhuming the launch from storage, being out of use has not been kind. All the basswork has taken on a distincly green tinge, and the mazak (I think) parts of the engine are a bit furry. 

Add to that the radio reeciever is 26mHz, there's a bit of work to do before the model is ready for a boiler test. Yes, we are now official, so it will have to submit to one of those. I'm not looking forward to this as the model doesn't have a normal safety valve, and I soft-soldered the boiler together! 

Navy Day 2023

I'll admit, I'm not into grey boats, but it's still worth a strip down the boat club for Navy Day. 

Some superb modelling was on show as ever. The highlight for me though, had to ba a stunning steam launch. No guns, so presumably the way the admiral and other senior ranks, would be taken to battleships. Whatever, it is an amazing piece of work. 

Cake was excellent with some delicious lemon meringue tarts. I only sampled one, but it was tempting to have a repeat visit...

More photos from the day over on Flickr.

This boat won't float

 

I've been pretty good about not adding to the model boat kit collection  recently. Despite being very, very tempted at the club open day, I managed to leave with two less boats that I arrived with, thanks to the "Bring and Buy" stand. 

However, on a visit to the Cheltenham Model Centre, I was taken by this diecast stern-wheeler from Corgi for a couple of quid. It's a bit odd, I mean why make a non-floating boat? 

The boat can be played with in the same way as a toy car - it runs on a roller, and band around the paddle wheel. Clever really. 

A little digging online reveals some answers, thanks to Mike Pigott's article here. This small range was produced in the 1980s, when hardly anyone would remember what a cowboy film was. Even then, this is a oddball in a range of horse powered vehicles. 

It's still fun though.

 

Boxing Day sail

 

Another festive tradition - while, according to breakfast TV, the good people of Liverpool were hammering on the doors of the shops (at 7am!) I decided that the only sail I was interested in again, was at the model boat club. 

The lake is currently as maximum capacity thanks to recent rain. It was also dead calm, and the only weather problem was too bright, and low a sun. Moving to the shelter solved this, and apart from one corner of the water, I could clearly see what I was doing. 

The boats chosen were Mis-Cheif and Felix - both known to be reliable and a joy to sail. Aiming for a relaxing day, I wasn't in the mood for a trickier vessel, and the lack of modelling this year means there isn't a 2022 boat for me to bring out. Maybe in 2023. 

Felix isn't a fast boat by any means, but the bow wave was sufficient to get a bit of water slopping noisily down the overflow pipe. Not to worry, more rain is promised to replenish the levels. At the moment, the lake looks as big as it can. In theory, this means we are less likley to find the bank with a boat, although I demonstraited this was only a theory last week...

A couple of hours fresh air, and seperation from tempting foodstuffs. Just what I needed!

Merry Christmas

 

Merry Christmas to all the readers of Phil's Workbench!

Desperate, random use of chemicals

 

How do you get paint off a hull moulded in ABS? 

Well, you can't use Nitromors for a start. That's a good way to make holoes. And while I do own some paint stripper that is safe for use on plastic, not nearly enough to attack a boat this size. 

With the hull on the garage workbench, I tried a Scotchbright pad in the sander. Nothing. Hardly scratched it. Could I replace this with something more abrasive? Probably not, stopping at that point between removing the paint and going through the plastic wasn't likely to happen. 

In desperation, I cast around for other chemicals I could try. By this point I'd decided that if I couldn't have a smooth hull for painting, at least I could extract the working parts for another boat. 

Meths seemed to do a little, but not much. Cellulose thinners though, now that shifted the paint, especially when followed with a metal, kitchen scouring pad. 

Trouble is, the cellulose turned the paint into a slurry that had to be scraped off. Washing with meths seemed to help move it a bit, but the slurry hardened too quickly for easy removal. 

Still, there is progress, but I need to go and buy a lot more thinners!

Oh, and it stinks. Future paint stripping will be carried out outdoors.

Debranding disaster

 

Removing the "UK Border Force" lettering was easy enough. The vinyl letters peel off reasonably easily. Start the peel by sliding a knife under the edge of each letter and it comes away reaonably cleanly. Half an hour, saw the characters removed. 

One thought - I wondered if the letters were hand-cut as they are an "intersting" typeface. My guess is not, but someone really needs to take a look at themselves if they think a British boat is going to be emplazened with such a childish typeface. It's one step away from the evil Comic Sans. 

All was going well until I started on the front "SAR" letters. Suddenly, the paint came away from the hull. Picking at it (probabloy not a great idea), the orange seemed to adheared very poorly. In fact it lifted in sheets, just like those letters. 

Oh dear. 

SAR boat on the water

 

Batteries charged, it's time to take the pilot boat to the lake and see how it handles. First though, I tie the superstructure to the hull with a length of wire. It's held in place with magnets, which seems pretty good, but I prefer this belt and braces approach on all my models. If the top comes off, you can always tow it home. 

Fired up, the boat actually works. 

But not very fast, or for very long. It moves OK, but not as rapidly as I'd have hoped. Worse, the duration was about 5 minute sfrom one pack and 3ish from the other. OK, neither pack might not have taken a brilliant charge, but I need to look at this. 

The battery pack used is a six-cell (7.2v) 2000mAh Ni-MH set and I think the solution will be more volts and more amps.Looking at the maximum capacity of the speed control, we could be good for twice as many cells, so a bit more omph should up the top speed. 

However, I'm wondering if it's time to take the dive into a LiPo battery for this boat. More power for less weight is very appealing, but I've always fought shy of them. Techincal and possible to explode, neither appeals much.

The one-minute model boat stand

 

When working on a model boat, having the thing rocking around on the workbench is a bit of a nuisance. The correct thing to do, is build a proper stand for it to sit in. 

It might be the "correct" thing to do, but I want to get this boat on the water to make sure I haven't bought a lemon, and wooden stands take time. 

Then I spotted a piece of polystyrene left over from another project. It looked about the right size, so I cut a quick channel down it with a craft knife, and there we have it. A servicable model boat stand!

Of course, clearing up the little white balls will take longer than a minute...

Fire up the jets

 

Looking inside the SAR boat, the installation of the working bits is very nice. Everything is firmly fixed down. Neat wiring too. 

I've no idea what should be in there, but the speed control is a Quicrun 860-Dual driving a pair of 560 brushed motors. Servos operate the directional nozzles, and reversing buckets. 

The intention appear to be that there is a pair of battery packs, with Deans connectors. I can only find a single suitable pack in my collection, and can't locate the connections for the charger, so I've made up a Tamya connection. Not sure what the advantage of the Deans connection offers, for me, I suspect that a common connector will make my life easier. 

Then the reciever was changed for a HobbyLink one. Again, that's a Parker standard. 

After half an hour's fiddling around moving connections on the reciever, the model worked. It's a bit odd as the reversing buckets need to be on a toggle switch, they don't work automatically when you stick the model into reverse. In fact, there's not point in sticking a jet boat in reverse - it's just sucking in air and squirting in out the bottom!

Is one battery pack enough? Will 7.2v move the boat forward fast enough? We'll have to get it on the water to find out.

HMS Gammon?

 

£60 from the KMBC "Bring and Buy" stand at the annual Navy Day. I wasn't looking for another model boat. In fact I was very much not looking to add to my fleet, but this one spoke to me. 

For a start, it's bright orange, and I love orange boats. And orange cars. And orange chocolate. 

It's also a jet-powered boat, and I didn't have a jet powered boat. 

Best of all, it's pretty much complete. All the drives, speed control, servos and even a reciever (Spektrum I think). Pretty much just add a battery and it's good to go. 

A post on ModelBoatMayhem reveals that it's a Graupner multi jet - kit price £225 plus the jet drives. They look like CEM Mini Jet 20's - £77 each. The more I look, the better the bargain this model looks. 

The construction looks pretty good too. Those handrails might be a bit skinny, but they are well made. I can see a bit of body smoothing to be carried out around the top of the superstructure, but nothing major. 

At just over 60cm long, it's as big as I want. Not a problem to move around and it will just about fit on my work area. 

One issue is that this is all I have. Any fittings and details will have to be bought in, or scratchbuilt. Fortunatly, there is a build on Mayhem. Hopefully, there isn't that much to do - it should be (famous last words) a quick project. 

What don't I like? 

The "UK Border Force" stuff on the side. For a start, it doesn't look like border force boat. Here's one: 

Photographed in Ramsgate last year. It's a lot bigger than this vessel! 

Also, this is losely based on a Swedish Pilot Boat. There's a nice photo from Graupner. 

Love those colours. Plenty of orange there! 

I have a nasty feeling that the border branding tells me a bit about the builder. Regular readers of this blog may have worked out I'm a bit of a lefty. The Daily Mail would probably call me "woke" because I hate racism and misogyny. And when there is a story about asylum seekers drowning in the channel, I hate it when I see the "good" people on social media gloating over dead children. Yes, it does happen, far too often. 

"UK Border Force" has, I suspect, been added to the side in the same way some modellers love adding guns to things because they spend too much time watching old war films. It's a macho thing, and I'm not a fan. 

So, removing that vinyl lettering will be an early job on this model! I've also orderd a set of transfers from Germany.

First though, let's see if it works.