Moxis

Yes Bill, I have tried that. However the result was that there were so many rubbish pixels even in the drawing of one bulkhead which had to be cleaned one by one, so that it was not worth the work. So I did my bulkheads in the old school method by making first a template of all bulkhead halves, drew the complete bulkheads on plywood using those templates, and sawed the bulkheads away. Much faster than clean those rubbish pixels.

Yes Bill, I have tried that. However the result was that there were so many rubbish pixels even in the drawing of one bulkhead which had to be cleaned one by one, so that it was not worth the work. So I did my bulkheads in the old school method by making first a template of all bulkhead halves, drew the complete bulkheads on plywood using those templates, and sawed the bulkheads away. Much faster than clean those rubbish pixels.

And here they are finally on the deck of Le Cerf. Not yet rigged but otherwise finished:
 

 
Carriages made. I know that there should be a thin chain at the trunnion fastening piece, but I couldn`t find chain thin enough. The smallest chain I found was a silvery one made of 0,3 mm wire, but that looked like anchor chain at this scale. So instead of chains small rivets:
 

 

This is my first attempt with carving. As I said earlier, my new project needs some simple carvings at the stern. After having read all tutorials available, I chose to use rotating tools for this work, because it feels easier for me than to use knives and chisels and the quality of carvings might be better, at least for me with no previous experience.
 
So the first thing was to obtain suitable wood for this work. Having read from different sources that boxwood would be the best choice, I started to look for that. Soon I found out that this kind of wood couldn`t be found anywhere in this country. So I ordered a lump of good looking boxwood fron the supplier in the UK.
 
Next I thought to start from the most difficult thing, the letters for ship`s name. These are very small, about 3,5 mm high, and preferable made with old type font. Laser cutting was first tried with fonts found in Corel Draw. They were scaled and sent to laser cutting company, but results were not at all acceptable. It was not possible to have these small letters not to be burnt by the laser, and removing the unevitable char from them would have been almost impossible. So next I turned into my dear old cnc router, and after some testing and changes the results were improving until acceptable. Letters are cut from 0,6 mm thick boxwood, letter height is 3,6 mm and they were cut with dia. 0,3 mm cutter. The font was found from the CADCAM program`s (Vector) font library.
 
A nice picture of red deer was found in Internet, scaled down with Corel Draw and printed on paper. This was glued on 2 mm boxwood and cut with a jeweler`s saw, and edges rounded with the rotary tool, using old dentist`s cutting bits.
The remaining parts were also cut of 2 mm boxwood and "machined" with rotary tool.
 
Finally all parts were glued into the stern of the model and stained with light walnut color.
 

 

My son Michael recently offered me for Father's day, a new product that he got from Ukraine. It is all made of wood, laser cut and uses rubber band for a propulsion system.
 
It took a long time for this kit to arrive in the good old states of America and the custom office kept it for a quite a while. I suspect they wanted to assemble the kit but did not find the time or patience to do so.
 
Anyway, it looks like some of the products offered by uGears (Ukrainian company) are now imported by Model Shipways, which should hopefully ease the transit through our customs bureaucracy.
 
I have not started the kit yet, but intend to do so, as soon as I am done with the restoration of a Bally Mata hari pinball machine. In the meantime, I wanted to show you in pictures, what this is all about. The offering from uGears is quite impressive with tons of models for different tastes. Most kits are capable of moving or have some kind of mechanical system built in. My son picked that beautiful locomotive as he knows my very intense passion for trains, and specifically for steam engines.


The quality of the cut is amazing and extremely precise. All kits are assembled with absolutely no glue and use wax (from a candle) for lubrication of the mechanisms and gears. It is truly a kit taking you back in the old times, when creativity and resourcefulness were the necessary qualities of hobbyists and do-it-yourselfers and when materials were simple and had to be found at home. From an environmental point of view, this is a kit that is perfect, uses renewable materials (wood, rubber), no chemicals and will last a long time if taken care of.
 

The instructions is comprised of a very thick manual, explaining the various phases of assembly. All is very precise, and tells you exactly where to find the parts on the various sprues/plates of wood.



Stay tuned as we will be starting the construction in a few days or a couple of weeks. Thank you Michael, for this beautiful gift.
 
Yves
 

Well, if the Theatre took you just an afternoon, this locomotive is another story.
 
I started assembling the kit, by following the instructions very closely. I have to say, their instructions booklet is a little marvel of precision and explanations. It is like a Lego kit or an IKEA kit: all is done with drawings and icons to guide you.
 
The quality of the cuts is amazing. I had no idea such precision could be attained with a laser and plywood. When I compare these cuts and what some model ship kits are offering, it is like night and day. Those Ukrainians have really done their homework and their products are near perfect.
 
So, we go.....

We have no less than 16 rubber bands and that assembly is very tight.


All the parts are locked with tooth picks. No glue. The fitting is perfect, just tight, very well designed. Now, the insanity starts: A roller bearing made of wood.....


The parts are lubricated with some excellent Wax, that I use for the playfields of my pinball machines. At 78 Degrees, the wax is almost liquid and lubes the wood very well.
 
And this is where we are: the engine of the steam locomotive is almost completed.

Overall, this does not start as an easy kit. I suspect that the most delicate phase is the implementation of the rubber engine, with its levers, locks and clicking mechanism.
 
We will see how it goes in the next phases.
 
Yves
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Thanks cog and amateur! I am working hard to produce the video that many people have wished. When I tested the rc equipment a few weeks ago, I noticed that the electronic speed control unit was dead. A new unit was ordered from China, and immediately when it arrives and is working correctly, I will make the video. 

Thanks cog and amateur! I am working hard to produce the video that many people have wished. When I tested the rc equipment a few weeks ago, I noticed that the electronic speed control unit was dead. A new unit was ordered from China, and immediately when it arrives and is working correctly, I will make the video. 

Thank you all very much for your kind words! The ship has been standing on her cradle for a while now, and I have kind of lost interest in her because of new projects.
However now I have got back the lacking interest in her and have tried  her in the bathtub to see if she will keep on surface, and in which position. She proved to be too light, so more weight must be added. Because of this I decided to install at least two loudspeakers with a sound unit and amplifier inside her, and have it programmed with sounds of engine, original steam whistle and telegraf bell.
So hopefully there will still be a maiden voyage with a video in the future.

Thank you all for your kind words & likes. Very motivating to get feedback like this. Updating of the project has been a bit slow, due to nasty influenza, traveling in southern Europe and summer, which has finally arrived here. So there are a lot of other activities outside too, than sitting in the dark and dusty basement building the model.
 
But finally I have made all the details on the boat deck too, like the funnel with steam pipes & whistle, lifeboats including davits, and masts with their simple rigging. So we could consider the model ready. What is still missing are the functional tests and maiden voyage. And if the model is sinking or captisizes immediately, let`s keep it as a static model. But if it behaves reasonably, it may offer nice moments when sailing at it`s own surroundings.
 
A few words about the details on boat deck. The funnel has been made of solid balsa. Spark filter on top of it is made of admiral`s tea strainer. (please do not tell her about that). Lifeboats are made of solid balsa. First I thought to make them with POB method, but that would have taken too much work and time, and because they are covered with tarpaulin, nobody could see the inner parts of them. Davits are 4 mm round aluminium rod, bent and upper parts sanded flat. Blocks for davits are styrene.
 
So here we are. The model is ready and I hope that it behaves nicely on water so that I can make a nice video of it soon. Because I think you all are waiting it very eagerly.





 

Small update for bridge equipment, a compass, telegraf and ship`s bell. All turned of Sikablock, airbrushed first with gloss black, and when dry, airbrushed with Alclad`s polished brass.
Compass and bell under construction. Pedestal for compass milled octagonal.

 
 
 
Components installed on the bridge. Dials for telegraf drawn with Corel Draw and printed on paper.


 

Thank you all very much for your kind words! The ship has been standing on her cradle for a while now, and I have kind of lost interest in her because of new projects.
However now I have got back the lacking interest in her and have tried  her in the bathtub to see if she will keep on surface, and in which position. She proved to be too light, so more weight must be added. Because of this I decided to install at least two loudspeakers with a sound unit and amplifier inside her, and have it programmed with sounds of engine, original steam whistle and telegraf bell.
So hopefully there will still be a maiden voyage with a video in the future.

Thank you all very much for your kind words! The ship has been standing on her cradle for a while now, and I have kind of lost interest in her because of new projects.
However now I have got back the lacking interest in her and have tried  her in the bathtub to see if she will keep on surface, and in which position. She proved to be too light, so more weight must be added. Because of this I decided to install at least two loudspeakers with a sound unit and amplifier inside her, and have it programmed with sounds of engine, original steam whistle and telegraf bell.
So hopefully there will still be a maiden voyage with a video in the future.

Now, when no deck has been built yet, it is very easy to install brackets for rc equipment, like drive motor, propshaft, steering servo, battery, etc.
 
Because the draught of this model is reasonably small due to shallow lake waters where the ship has been used, no heavy equipment like lead batteries could be used. This is why I selected a 2 cell 7,4 volt 5,0 Ah LiPo battery as the power source.
Very nice and silent electric motor made by German Gefeg was installed as a drive motor. It is a 12 VDC, 3300 1/min unit which fits nicely into the hull.
Speed controller is a programmable Sidewinder, made by Castle Creations. It was programmed for brushed motors, and both accelerate and braking curves were set linear.
Steering servo is a tiny taiwanese unit which is connected to the rudder arm by threaded rod. I hope it has torque enough to turn the rudder.
Propeller is a four bladed brass one with 60 mm diameter bought from Cornwall Model boats. And propshaft is a 4 mm diameter brass rod. It is running in a 5 mm ID brass tube, where bushes have been made at both ends.  The tube has a small connection inside the hull, through which the tube will be filled with grease, to avoid water entering into the hull.
 
 
 
Rudder and propellor. Hull bottom colour looks a bit odd due to lighting. In normal light it is more like dark green.

 
 
 
Steering servo with connecting rod.

 
 
Motor and propeller shaft. Connection for grease filling can be seen at the top.

 
 
Battery and speed controller. A 2,4 GHz receiver will be located into superstructure to have better connection to transmitter.

 

Next I started to think about all the different lists outside the hull. Old iron ships had many different profiled lists on the hull, and so did this too. There are round, half round and more complex grooved lists to be installed. The first two are easy, just go to the nearest hobbyshop and buy styrene strips with right dimensions. The grooved ones were a bit more difficult. After having thought hard, how I could make them, I finally made a forming tool of an old window scraper, and used 3x4 mm abachi strips for material.
 

Form tool and strips made with it.
 
 
 

Form list glued at stern.
 
 
 

Those lists under the waterline were difficult to keep on place during glue curing. For this work I made some long nose clamps according to old shipwright manner.
 
 
 

But the first clamps were a bit shaky due to hinge made of leather. These improved ones work much better and are easier to use.
 
 
 

And finally all the lists and window frames are installed and the hull could be taken for painting.
 

Plywood is very seldom straight enough to be used as a base. To eliminate that I have attached straight angle irons below the plywood with screws. That keeps the base straight and heavy enough for building the hull.

When making seizings for the breech ropes for the cannons of my Le Cerf model, I got frustrated with the loose ends of ropes. After thinking about making a fixture for this work, I finally made this. Very easy to make in about ten minutes, and fulfills it's task perfectly.
 

Nice work Aviaamator, you have a well equipped workshop to do what ever you like.

Nice work Aviaamator, you have a well equipped workshop to do what ever you like.

Thank you all very much for your kind words! The ship has been standing on her cradle for a while now, and I have kind of lost interest in her because of new projects.
However now I have got back the lacking interest in her and have tried  her in the bathtub to see if she will keep on surface, and in which position. She proved to be too light, so more weight must be added. Because of this I decided to install at least two loudspeakers with a sound unit and amplifier inside her, and have it programmed with sounds of engine, original steam whistle and telegraf bell.
So hopefully there will still be a maiden voyage with a video in the future.

Thank you all very much for your kind words! The ship has been standing on her cradle for a while now, and I have kind of lost interest in her because of new projects.
However now I have got back the lacking interest in her and have tried  her in the bathtub to see if she will keep on surface, and in which position. She proved to be too light, so more weight must be added. Because of this I decided to install at least two loudspeakers with a sound unit and amplifier inside her, and have it programmed with sounds of engine, original steam whistle and telegraf bell.
So hopefully there will still be a maiden voyage with a video in the future.

Thank you all very much for your kind words! The ship has been standing on her cradle for a while now, and I have kind of lost interest in her because of new projects.
However now I have got back the lacking interest in her and have tried  her in the bathtub to see if she will keep on surface, and in which position. She proved to be too light, so more weight must be added. Because of this I decided to install at least two loudspeakers with a sound unit and amplifier inside her, and have it programmed with sounds of engine, original steam whistle and telegraf bell.
So hopefully there will still be a maiden voyage with a video in the future.

Thank you all very much for your kind words! The ship has been standing on her cradle for a while now, and I have kind of lost interest in her because of new projects.
However now I have got back the lacking interest in her and have tried  her in the bathtub to see if she will keep on surface, and in which position. She proved to be too light, so more weight must be added. Because of this I decided to install at least two loudspeakers with a sound unit and amplifier inside her, and have it programmed with sounds of engine, original steam whistle and telegraf bell.
So hopefully there will still be a maiden voyage with a video in the future.

Thank you all very much for your kind words! The ship has been standing on her cradle for a while now, and I have kind of lost interest in her because of new projects.
However now I have got back the lacking interest in her and have tried  her in the bathtub to see if she will keep on surface, and in which position. She proved to be too light, so more weight must be added. Because of this I decided to install at least two loudspeakers with a sound unit and amplifier inside her, and have it programmed with sounds of engine, original steam whistle and telegraf bell.
So hopefully there will still be a maiden voyage with a video in the future.

Thank you all very much for your kind words! The ship has been standing on her cradle for a while now, and I have kind of lost interest in her because of new projects.
However now I have got back the lacking interest in her and have tried  her in the bathtub to see if she will keep on surface, and in which position. She proved to be too light, so more weight must be added. Because of this I decided to install at least two loudspeakers with a sound unit and amplifier inside her, and have it programmed with sounds of engine, original steam whistle and telegraf bell.
So hopefully there will still be a maiden voyage with a video in the future.