Bedford

Thanks Michael, it's that "thinking outside the box" I do, I'm always looking for simple solutions and that generally means coming up with something completely different.
 
Robbyn, welcome back aboard! 
I was joking about selling her but to be honest I'm not sure where she will make berth in the long term because I don't have a huge house.
I do keep working out the issues and as I have said before, that's why I am building her but they just keep coming so I sometimes tend to just walk away from her for a while now and then.
 
As for my next project I'm tossing up between an RC square rigger or an RC 2 masted schooner called Altair, you can see her if you do a google images search, she is rather pretty. I also have the Royal yacht Caroline (kit) that I must do for reasons shown in my "signature", I think she will be next.

After a lot of googling and researching I have bought a UBEC that can deliver 6 volts and 8 amps with a peak of 15 amps. The device is designed for LiPo batteries which are quite a bit lighter than the NiMH battery I had and the connectors are new and different so I decided to bite the bullet and go LiPo.
 
I bought a bunch of the new connectors too and re-fitted the whole system, they are gold plated and should make better contact than the old ones but the wires have to be soldered on which in my case is no problem as I am an old hand with a soldering iron.
 
She is starting to get a bit busy below decks now.
 

 
This is the UBEC
 

 
The new battery jammed in to the port bow area
 

 

 
I know we have all seen her with sails raised before but this is the first time they have ALL been raised by the radio and it is running very smoothly with no dramas thanks to the new UBEC and when I plug the ESC (speed controller) back in its supply will add to the available power so I am feeling pretty confident that my electronic problems are behind me.
 

Not much to see after hours and hours working on it but I have now got all the ribs seated properly and by marking the centre line on the deck section of the ribs and laying a plank along the deck I am able to make sure all the ribs are vertical, centred and the line of the deck flows properly.
 



 
This is my home made building stand. It was never intended for ships of this size.
 

 
It should suffice !!
 

 
Only problem is the clamping screws and stop screws which keep the jaws vertical are only 25mm long which is normally more than enough but they are just long enought to hold the bare keel but I am going to create a rabbet by attaching 1.5mm planks onto the keel, this will make it 13mm wide so it's off the the hardware store AGAIN !!
 

Jim Lad, She should stand in the back of this one, I will have to lay her over a little to get her in.
 

 
Failing that if I take the back seat out, which is dead easy, she will fit fully rigged in there.
I have another large 4 door sedan with a fold down rear seat too so if I make a suitable cradle it would lie in the boot of that.
 
He said, hopefully!
 
Steve

I have done a bit of machining today, I needed to make easily removable posts to stand her on. 
 
I will use the sailing keel attachment posts as the stand posts by screwing extension posts into them which will then locate into brass bosses in the display stand. I think this should make the change between sailing and displaying pretty easy.
 
The boss will be epoxied into the display base and the post will just slide into it.

 

 

I have done a bit of machining today, I needed to make easily removable posts to stand her on. 
 
I will use the sailing keel attachment posts as the stand posts by screwing extension posts into them which will then locate into brass bosses in the display stand. I think this should make the change between sailing and displaying pretty easy.
 
The boss will be epoxied into the display base and the post will just slide into it.

 

 

I have done a bit of machining today, I needed to make easily removable posts to stand her on. 
 
I will use the sailing keel attachment posts as the stand posts by screwing extension posts into them which will then locate into brass bosses in the display stand. I think this should make the change between sailing and displaying pretty easy.
 
The boss will be epoxied into the display base and the post will just slide into it.

 

 

I have done a bit of machining today, I needed to make easily removable posts to stand her on. 
 
I will use the sailing keel attachment posts as the stand posts by screwing extension posts into them which will then locate into brass bosses in the display stand. I think this should make the change between sailing and displaying pretty easy.
 
The boss will be epoxied into the display base and the post will just slide into it.

 

 

Truth be told I bet many of the members of this site have felt the same way at one time or another.  I know I have felt this way at times.
 
Michael

Bedford,
 
Great model.  Very interesting mechanisms to make it work. 
 
Walter Biles

Today has been the first real time I have had on the schooner for a while and while I am achieving a little I am taking about 5 steps back for each step forward.
 
Firstly I have commented in the past that when I power up the radio system some of the winch servos travel in and out which causes great concern because it is all at once and I have no control. While the extra BEC I bought to supply power to the system has cured the glitching that was occurring with all the servos connected it has not stopped the servo "reaching" that occurs on start-up so I went and bought a few more servo extension leads of different lengths so now I have the joins in accessible places meaning I can stow her with these servos disconnected and when I power up the system I can connect them one by one with no misbehaving. Problem solved.
 
However!
 
In trying all this and making sure it all worked the main gaff lazy jack gave up and broke, I can't see why, there was no big harsh snap like before, it just seems to have failed so I will have to replace it and am still considering whether or not I will increase the size of the line which means replacing all three of them but may be worth it I think.
 

 
And then!
 
I tried the motors just to make sure all is well...................................dead as the proverbial Dodo!
I checked the switch and it isn't the problem so the speed controller itself must have died for no apparent reason.
 
Anyone want to buy an unfinished schooner?
 
Seriously though, it is more of a challenge than I was hoping for but one day I will win.
 
Oh and I floated her just to see how the weight is going and she is heavy in the stern as I expected because of all the servos down there as well as the motors and she is listing a few degrees to starboard which I figure is mainly due to the location of the servos in the aft deckhouse with the rudder servo being in the centre so I have relocated it as far to port as I could. You can see the holes where it was mounted right beside the winch servo.
 

 
Now to really plan where everything else gets mounted because I want to level her out with essential hardware rather than with added ballast because that would mean less weight for the sailing keel. I have read that you want such a vessel to ride a bit high in the bow, makes them sail better, so it is heading in the right direction.
 
I MAY however decide to ditch the motors as they are quite heavy and if I learn to sail the yacht I may not need them in the schooner.

Today has been the first real time I have had on the schooner for a while and while I am achieving a little I am taking about 5 steps back for each step forward.
 
Firstly I have commented in the past that when I power up the radio system some of the winch servos travel in and out which causes great concern because it is all at once and I have no control. While the extra BEC I bought to supply power to the system has cured the glitching that was occurring with all the servos connected it has not stopped the servo "reaching" that occurs on start-up so I went and bought a few more servo extension leads of different lengths so now I have the joins in accessible places meaning I can stow her with these servos disconnected and when I power up the system I can connect them one by one with no misbehaving. Problem solved.
 
However!
 
In trying all this and making sure it all worked the main gaff lazy jack gave up and broke, I can't see why, there was no big harsh snap like before, it just seems to have failed so I will have to replace it and am still considering whether or not I will increase the size of the line which means replacing all three of them but may be worth it I think.
 

 
And then!
 
I tried the motors just to make sure all is well...................................dead as the proverbial Dodo!
I checked the switch and it isn't the problem so the speed controller itself must have died for no apparent reason.
 
Anyone want to buy an unfinished schooner?
 
Seriously though, it is more of a challenge than I was hoping for but one day I will win.
 
Oh and I floated her just to see how the weight is going and she is heavy in the stern as I expected because of all the servos down there as well as the motors and she is listing a few degrees to starboard which I figure is mainly due to the location of the servos in the aft deckhouse with the rudder servo being in the centre so I have relocated it as far to port as I could. You can see the holes where it was mounted right beside the winch servo.
 

 
Now to really plan where everything else gets mounted because I want to level her out with essential hardware rather than with added ballast because that would mean less weight for the sailing keel. I have read that you want such a vessel to ride a bit high in the bow, makes them sail better, so it is heading in the right direction.
 
I MAY however decide to ditch the motors as they are quite heavy and if I learn to sail the yacht I may not need them in the schooner.

Today has been the first real time I have had on the schooner for a while and while I am achieving a little I am taking about 5 steps back for each step forward.
 
Firstly I have commented in the past that when I power up the radio system some of the winch servos travel in and out which causes great concern because it is all at once and I have no control. While the extra BEC I bought to supply power to the system has cured the glitching that was occurring with all the servos connected it has not stopped the servo "reaching" that occurs on start-up so I went and bought a few more servo extension leads of different lengths so now I have the joins in accessible places meaning I can stow her with these servos disconnected and when I power up the system I can connect them one by one with no misbehaving. Problem solved.
 
However!
 
In trying all this and making sure it all worked the main gaff lazy jack gave up and broke, I can't see why, there was no big harsh snap like before, it just seems to have failed so I will have to replace it and am still considering whether or not I will increase the size of the line which means replacing all three of them but may be worth it I think.
 

 
And then!
 
I tried the motors just to make sure all is well...................................dead as the proverbial Dodo!
I checked the switch and it isn't the problem so the speed controller itself must have died for no apparent reason.
 
Anyone want to buy an unfinished schooner?
 
Seriously though, it is more of a challenge than I was hoping for but one day I will win.
 
Oh and I floated her just to see how the weight is going and she is heavy in the stern as I expected because of all the servos down there as well as the motors and she is listing a few degrees to starboard which I figure is mainly due to the location of the servos in the aft deckhouse with the rudder servo being in the centre so I have relocated it as far to port as I could. You can see the holes where it was mounted right beside the winch servo.
 

 
Now to really plan where everything else gets mounted because I want to level her out with essential hardware rather than with added ballast because that would mean less weight for the sailing keel. I have read that you want such a vessel to ride a bit high in the bow, makes them sail better, so it is heading in the right direction.
 
I MAY however decide to ditch the motors as they are quite heavy and if I learn to sail the yacht I may not need them in the schooner.

Today has been the first real time I have had on the schooner for a while and while I am achieving a little I am taking about 5 steps back for each step forward.
 
Firstly I have commented in the past that when I power up the radio system some of the winch servos travel in and out which causes great concern because it is all at once and I have no control. While the extra BEC I bought to supply power to the system has cured the glitching that was occurring with all the servos connected it has not stopped the servo "reaching" that occurs on start-up so I went and bought a few more servo extension leads of different lengths so now I have the joins in accessible places meaning I can stow her with these servos disconnected and when I power up the system I can connect them one by one with no misbehaving. Problem solved.
 
However!
 
In trying all this and making sure it all worked the main gaff lazy jack gave up and broke, I can't see why, there was no big harsh snap like before, it just seems to have failed so I will have to replace it and am still considering whether or not I will increase the size of the line which means replacing all three of them but may be worth it I think.
 

 
And then!
 
I tried the motors just to make sure all is well...................................dead as the proverbial Dodo!
I checked the switch and it isn't the problem so the speed controller itself must have died for no apparent reason.
 
Anyone want to buy an unfinished schooner?
 
Seriously though, it is more of a challenge than I was hoping for but one day I will win.
 
Oh and I floated her just to see how the weight is going and she is heavy in the stern as I expected because of all the servos down there as well as the motors and she is listing a few degrees to starboard which I figure is mainly due to the location of the servos in the aft deckhouse with the rudder servo being in the centre so I have relocated it as far to port as I could. You can see the holes where it was mounted right beside the winch servo.
 

 
Now to really plan where everything else gets mounted because I want to level her out with essential hardware rather than with added ballast because that would mean less weight for the sailing keel. I have read that you want such a vessel to ride a bit high in the bow, makes them sail better, so it is heading in the right direction.
 
I MAY however decide to ditch the motors as they are quite heavy and if I learn to sail the yacht I may not need them in the schooner.

Here is the last sail raising video you will see until she is in the water, 
 
It is a great relief to finally have all of them done, all that remains now are the sheets for the stays'ls which will pose their own challenges.
 
I have tried to show how the rings work to raise and lower the stays'ls through differing ranges of travel but I can't do slow motion. Basically I have made the outer stays'l the master since it travels the furthest, I tied a ring into that line and another into the other two lines at the appropriate places and ran each line through the ring of the next so that when it reaches the next ring it pulls it down and raises that sail etc. I did the same in reverse to lower the sails. 
 
When the sails are all the way down the top ring goes above the cross tree so I had to thin and fair the timber on one side to allow it to slip through without catching and you will see at the 14 second point that there is a loop that forms above the cross tree, this was prone to catching on the cross tree when being hauled down so I added a brass wire guide to keep it from doing so. You will see that in the pics below.
 

 
 
 
This pic shows the slack line that was catching on the cross tree, the wire guide did the trick!
 

 
This shows the faired cross tree timber.
 

 
 

Today has been the first real time I have had on the schooner for a while and while I am achieving a little I am taking about 5 steps back for each step forward.
 
Firstly I have commented in the past that when I power up the radio system some of the winch servos travel in and out which causes great concern because it is all at once and I have no control. While the extra BEC I bought to supply power to the system has cured the glitching that was occurring with all the servos connected it has not stopped the servo "reaching" that occurs on start-up so I went and bought a few more servo extension leads of different lengths so now I have the joins in accessible places meaning I can stow her with these servos disconnected and when I power up the system I can connect them one by one with no misbehaving. Problem solved.
 
However!
 
In trying all this and making sure it all worked the main gaff lazy jack gave up and broke, I can't see why, there was no big harsh snap like before, it just seems to have failed so I will have to replace it and am still considering whether or not I will increase the size of the line which means replacing all three of them but may be worth it I think.
 

 
And then!
 
I tried the motors just to make sure all is well...................................dead as the proverbial Dodo!
I checked the switch and it isn't the problem so the speed controller itself must have died for no apparent reason.
 
Anyone want to buy an unfinished schooner?
 
Seriously though, it is more of a challenge than I was hoping for but one day I will win.
 
Oh and I floated her just to see how the weight is going and she is heavy in the stern as I expected because of all the servos down there as well as the motors and she is listing a few degrees to starboard which I figure is mainly due to the location of the servos in the aft deckhouse with the rudder servo being in the centre so I have relocated it as far to port as I could. You can see the holes where it was mounted right beside the winch servo.
 

 
Now to really plan where everything else gets mounted because I want to level her out with essential hardware rather than with added ballast because that would mean less weight for the sailing keel. I have read that you want such a vessel to ride a bit high in the bow, makes them sail better, so it is heading in the right direction.
 
I MAY however decide to ditch the motors as they are quite heavy and if I learn to sail the yacht I may not need them in the schooner.

Thanks Nigel .
Bowsprit is attached to the hull. A few pictures of the gammoning and rack-blocks. .

Thank you for all the likes, And Bob and Steve for your comments, its been a long couple of days fiddling with some finicky numbers, I had to make a couple of small modifications to my Mill Drill so that I could use some dial verniers as read out dials for the table travel. I had already set up the depth one a few years ago and because I have slip dials on the mill I have been able to manage up until now . However machining these tiny dimensions with a centre Zero was challenging to say the least. so now I can clip in the vernier and use it as a poor mans DRO (digital read out, only this is an Analog read out )
First I cut a piece of 1 inch square brass and then re cut it to 1.375 x 1 x .625 inches the first task was to bore the main holes to form the inside of the water jacket shell these are .625 diameter and almost 5/8 deep. then bored the holes that will mate with the combustion chamber in the top piece. After the big hole were machined I flipped it over to reduce some of the metal and then machines the small holes for the valves and water passages to the top part of the head.
Next I made a couple of support keepers out of some 3/4 diameter brass rod to fill the bore holes and reduced the diameter at the top to use as location stubs for the top part this also allowed me to thread some 10 - 32 cap screws through the spark plug holes  to hold the whole shebang together. after the inlet and exhaust ports were machined which seemed to take forever, I was finally able to get on with some finish filing.
 
 

 
I like to have a ground safe edge on some of the files it really helps to keep things square
 

 
The parts are beginning to look like the top of the engine.
 

 
The valve rods will be fabricated from some largish sewing needles these are .046 inches in diameter which works perfectly, they obviously need some work yet.
 

 
Time for a break.
 
Michael

Impressed Michael, very impressed!

Making the spark plugs and all, you're a better man than I Gungadin !

Here is the last sail raising video you will see until she is in the water, 
 
It is a great relief to finally have all of them done, all that remains now are the sheets for the stays'ls which will pose their own challenges.
 
I have tried to show how the rings work to raise and lower the stays'ls through differing ranges of travel but I can't do slow motion. Basically I have made the outer stays'l the master since it travels the furthest, I tied a ring into that line and another into the other two lines at the appropriate places and ran each line through the ring of the next so that when it reaches the next ring it pulls it down and raises that sail etc. I did the same in reverse to lower the sails. 
 
When the sails are all the way down the top ring goes above the cross tree so I had to thin and fair the timber on one side to allow it to slip through without catching and you will see at the 14 second point that there is a loop that forms above the cross tree, this was prone to catching on the cross tree when being hauled down so I added a brass wire guide to keep it from doing so. You will see that in the pics below.
 

 
 
 
This pic shows the slack line that was catching on the cross tree, the wire guide did the trick!
 

 
This shows the faired cross tree timber.
 

 
 

Here is the last sail raising video you will see until she is in the water, 
 
It is a great relief to finally have all of them done, all that remains now are the sheets for the stays'ls which will pose their own challenges.
 
I have tried to show how the rings work to raise and lower the stays'ls through differing ranges of travel but I can't do slow motion. Basically I have made the outer stays'l the master since it travels the furthest, I tied a ring into that line and another into the other two lines at the appropriate places and ran each line through the ring of the next so that when it reaches the next ring it pulls it down and raises that sail etc. I did the same in reverse to lower the sails. 
 
When the sails are all the way down the top ring goes above the cross tree so I had to thin and fair the timber on one side to allow it to slip through without catching and you will see at the 14 second point that there is a loop that forms above the cross tree, this was prone to catching on the cross tree when being hauled down so I added a brass wire guide to keep it from doing so. You will see that in the pics below.
 

 
 
 
This pic shows the slack line that was catching on the cross tree, the wire guide did the trick!
 

 
This shows the faired cross tree timber.
 

 
 

Here is the last sail raising video you will see until she is in the water, 
 
It is a great relief to finally have all of them done, all that remains now are the sheets for the stays'ls which will pose their own challenges.
 
I have tried to show how the rings work to raise and lower the stays'ls through differing ranges of travel but I can't do slow motion. Basically I have made the outer stays'l the master since it travels the furthest, I tied a ring into that line and another into the other two lines at the appropriate places and ran each line through the ring of the next so that when it reaches the next ring it pulls it down and raises that sail etc. I did the same in reverse to lower the sails. 
 
When the sails are all the way down the top ring goes above the cross tree so I had to thin and fair the timber on one side to allow it to slip through without catching and you will see at the 14 second point that there is a loop that forms above the cross tree, this was prone to catching on the cross tree when being hauled down so I added a brass wire guide to keep it from doing so. You will see that in the pics below.
 

 
 
 
This pic shows the slack line that was catching on the cross tree, the wire guide did the trick!
 

 
This shows the faired cross tree timber.
 

 
 

Here is the last sail raising video you will see until she is in the water, 
 
It is a great relief to finally have all of them done, all that remains now are the sheets for the stays'ls which will pose their own challenges.
 
I have tried to show how the rings work to raise and lower the stays'ls through differing ranges of travel but I can't do slow motion. Basically I have made the outer stays'l the master since it travels the furthest, I tied a ring into that line and another into the other two lines at the appropriate places and ran each line through the ring of the next so that when it reaches the next ring it pulls it down and raises that sail etc. I did the same in reverse to lower the sails. 
 
When the sails are all the way down the top ring goes above the cross tree so I had to thin and fair the timber on one side to allow it to slip through without catching and you will see at the 14 second point that there is a loop that forms above the cross tree, this was prone to catching on the cross tree when being hauled down so I added a brass wire guide to keep it from doing so. You will see that in the pics below.
 

 
 
 
This pic shows the slack line that was catching on the cross tree, the wire guide did the trick!
 

 
This shows the faired cross tree timber.
 

 
 

Here is the last sail raising video you will see until she is in the water, 
 
It is a great relief to finally have all of them done, all that remains now are the sheets for the stays'ls which will pose their own challenges.
 
I have tried to show how the rings work to raise and lower the stays'ls through differing ranges of travel but I can't do slow motion. Basically I have made the outer stays'l the master since it travels the furthest, I tied a ring into that line and another into the other two lines at the appropriate places and ran each line through the ring of the next so that when it reaches the next ring it pulls it down and raises that sail etc. I did the same in reverse to lower the sails. 
 
When the sails are all the way down the top ring goes above the cross tree so I had to thin and fair the timber on one side to allow it to slip through without catching and you will see at the 14 second point that there is a loop that forms above the cross tree, this was prone to catching on the cross tree when being hauled down so I added a brass wire guide to keep it from doing so. You will see that in the pics below.
 

 
 
 
This pic shows the slack line that was catching on the cross tree, the wire guide did the trick!
 

 
This shows the faired cross tree timber.