Spartacus by Javelin - 1/2000

[Glen McGuire]

3 hours ago, Javelin said:

After a lot of hesitation on the real order of installation

Always a challenge with scratch builds, especially on such a unique ship like this one.  But you are doing a marvelous job.  

[Javelin]

Again little was done over the past weeks, but at least we're making some progress. 

I believe this was a mistake in my sequence. I screwed myself by putting that anchorboom and barge loading pipes on portside, since I can't flip it on that side anymore for the work on the bottom of the vessel. I kept the propulsion for last, due to fears of its fragility, but I believe it would probably have survived some handling, while now, it was more difficult to install it... 

On the surgery table, she received her two "propellors", luckily for me they are mounted in tunnels, and 2 rudders. 

 

 

Propellor shafts are also mounted, centred in the tunnels. She does have a very large behind, resulting in short pieces of shaft sticking out of the hull. 

 

 

 

And I also gave her the anchor fenders and boarding platform on the side of the hull. The ladder wire, which determines the dredging depth is rigged, but not tightened. I'm using Veevus fly fishing thread for these as they are the largest diameter wires on the vessel, 85mm wires. Same for the wires going to the anchors. For anything with a smaller diameter I will use the Caenis thread. 

 

 

Due to a rather difficult rigging of this ladder wire, I glued it/fixed it, in the center sheaves and will then pull the thread on each side of the gantry tight. When tight I will probably try to glue it at each contact point on the upper and lower sheaves to keep it tight during the epoxy pour. 

The last free ends will then be glue to deck or a structure on the deck. (the original one passes in a pipe to two giant winches below deck). 

[Javelin]

Time for another small update. Got more modelling time in the past 2 days than in the last 3 months or so...

 

Something I truly underestimated came next... Although I had rigged that ladder wire, I still had to tighten it. I came to a point where I feared that I had to unrig it and tension each leg separately. The lines were so close to each other that it was nearly impossible to discern the loops. The rope also has a tendency to tangle, which meant that it was crossed on the "wheels" on the ladder and gantry. 

Luckily I did succeed in separating the loops, tightening them and gluing them on the lower "wheels" on the ladder without unrigging them. 

I basically looked for a the first fixed point, which was at the sheaves at the aft end of the gantry. I then inserted a 0.3mm copper wire piece and separated the loops from there. I inserted another between the second and third loop. 

I then tightened each loop, eventually ending with the free end at the aft side of the gantry. I needed to hold it close to the light in order to see it properly. I guess I should pour the epoxy as soon as possible, as I've noticed on previously glued ropes that they seem to lose tension. 

 

After the ladder wire, it was time for the side wires. The wires that pull the ship from port to starboard between the two big dredging anchors. The white (will be painted later on) sheaves are called the "tumbling sheaves", they are huge (34 ton each) sheaves that swivel up and down following the direction of the sidewires while the ship is going back and forth. 

 

Here you see the starboard sidewire dry fitted. The anchor is also just dry fitted and will eventually be glued in place with the sand-acrylic mixture show it embedded in the bottom. After the tumbling sheave, the sidewire runs up the ladder towards the massive winches in front of the accomodation. I've just wrapped it around the winch drum here without glue for the time being. I'll wait to glue them untill the second sidewire is fitted. 

 

@Glen McGuire, @O.B.one, I have to use the smaller Uni Caenis wire for the anchor hoisting wire, but it has a tendency to keep its natural curves/loops (in fact same for the Veevus I'm using for the sidewires), do you have any tricks to make these tiny wires keep a curve that you want instead of tangling around itself? I've been thinking of using CA glue, but it doesn't seem to get a hold on that Caenis thread. It does work for the Veevus. 
I assume I could glue it to the bottom at certain points to follow a wanted curve. 

[Thukydides]

It's looking great, that is some very fiddly work. I am not sure how you do it at that scale. I have enough trouble with blocks on a 1/64 model 😄.

Edited November 5, 2023 by Thukydides

[Glen McGuire]

4 hours ago, Javelin said:

I have to use the smaller Uni Caenis wire for the anchor hoisting wire

This is such a unique ship, I'm having a hard time figuring out what parts of the ship you are referring to.  Is this the anchor hoisting wire you are talking about?

 

 

[Javelin]

Hi @Glen McGuire, 

Sorry for the confusion, the wire you've pointed at is the side wire, for which I'm using the Veevus (large diameter ).

 

The anchor hoisting wire is smaller in diameter, hence I'll use the Uni Caenis. It's not yet present in the pictures above, since it's somewhat loosely spread over the bottom during dredging. This is done to avoid pulling the anchor out during dredging. It's only collected and tensioned when the anchor needs to be pulled out and moved forward.

It's the spread that requires the Caenis to be in a natural/realistic curve, and that's a problem for the time being. 

For now I'm thinking of spot gluing it with acrylic gel to the bottom at certain points along its path. 

 

[Javelin]

Thought I'd elaborate a bit on all the wires involved in the anchor handling process. 

In below picture, No1, horizontal, is the "guy wire", used to manipulate the anchor boom (in and out). 

No2 is the stopper wire. When the guy wire breaks, the anchor boom swings out uncontrollably due to the weight of the anchor and an angled hinge on which it rests. The stopper wire prevents the boom from flying all the way forward and hitting the gantry or damaging other stuff. The stopper is hanging as a loop alongside the vessel when the boom is fully in (which I will make on my model as well, considering the diameter of that wire, I'll use Veevus for this one). 

No3 is the anchor hoisting wire, used to pull the anchor, it's veered out when the boom is swung in, to lay it in a curve backwards from the anchor. This avoids the cutter to catch the wire when swinging towards the anchor. When stepping forward, the vessel slowly drags the anchor hoisting wire with it, but due to the large curve, it prevents the wire to end up between the anchor and the cutter. 

No4 is the sidewire, which, in this picture just drops below the water next to the raised ladder, in this case it lays in a shallow curve that points towards the anchor, where it is connected to the shank. 

 

Thought I'd share a pic of the main "weapon" as well. This is one of the many cutter heads, it's still in pristine condition here, but after a couple of hours that paint goes missing of course. It has a double function, the teeth are used to cut the stone/rocks, while it's shape creates a suction/scooping effect that throws the soil backwards inside the cutter head. Inside that head is the suction of the pumps, so they take out the soil and pump it to wherever it needs to go. The teeth are sacrificial and get replaced depending on the wear. There are different types of heads, the one in the picture is for rocks, but there are also multi-purpose heads used for clay/sand etc. They can also be equipped with different types of teeth, ranging from the pickpoints you see in the picture, to narrow chisels or real flat blades for sand, this all depends on the soil that needs to be cut. Additionally the cutter heads have different amounts of blades, depending on the hardness of the soil, lower amounts of blades leave bigger openings and higher production rates, while harder soils require a higher amount of blades to break the stones in smaller pieces, sacrificing on production rates. Although this cutter is several meters in diameter, on the model I've only used a general shape in rusty colour. It's impossible to create an effect of teeth on this +/- 2mm cutter head. Kind of useless as well, since it's mostly hidden by the bottom of the diorama. 

 

[Glen McGuire]

Thanks for the diagram and explanation of all the wiring.  That really helps to understand what I'm looking at in your model.

 

Back to your original question about keeping that thin thread in the shape you want, rather than wrapping around itself.  The thinnest thread I use is Uni fly-tying thread 72D, 8/0.  To eliminate the natural curves and loops it has from being wound around the spool, I will cut a piece, drag it thru Aleene's Fusion Fabric Glue, pull it taut, and let it dry (the glue dries flexible so the thread is still workable).  See pic below where I did all of that and then lay the thread on a piece of paper with a couple of smooth curves.  It is just resting on the paper, not glued to it.   

Edited November 6, 2023 by Glen McGuire

[Javelin]

Although not strictly related to the model, as I'm not building the pumps, I thought I'd share a picture of one of the 3 dredge pumps on this beastie. Gives an idea of the size. 

Furthermore I've continued with the spiderweb of wires. Added the first anchor hoisting wire, the easy one... Glen's trick doesn't work on the Uni Caenis as it's a monofilament, which doesn't absorb any glue. It does work on the Veevus, as that's a multifilament, basically soaking up CA glue. I've also tried to stretch the Uni Caenis with a clothes pin and then treated it with acrylic gel to keep it straight. It seemed to have worked more or less. At least it's an improvement over the "dry" Caenis. I've also started by gluing it at each sheave and stretching it along the way, then glue it to the next sheave etc. To keep it in straight lines. 

The free hanging part that goes to the bottom was fixed there with acrylic gel, so you don't really see where it's glued. Sorry for the bad pictures, but the Caenis is that fine, that's hard for the camera to catch it without proper contrast. I guess at some point I'll use a white background or hold it into the light to show it in a better way. 

 

Since those wires are the last thing before pouring resin, I'm also proceeding with the multicat workboat. Added the bridge, crane pedestals and currently working on the large double winch.

 

For the winch you can see I've outlined the contour on a 0.3mm sheet, then drilled a hole for the smaller winch, where I inserted a piece of 0.8mm brass, while for the large, higher placed, winch, I've added a small disk of 1.5mm diameter to the side of the winch. I'll then drill a hole in the center of that disk for the shaft. The disk is also 0.3mm thick, made in the same way I've shown before. I'll soon start with painting on this boat. 

 

I've also been pondering on the floating line. A piece of 0.8mm brass with small cut-outs for the separate parts of the line wasn't feasible. Either it broke, while trying to cut or the cuts (with file edge) were too coarse and varied to be plausible. 

I've now found a piece of telephone wire (with several small wires inside) of appropriate diameter, where I can simply cut the insulation as a cut-out, while maintaining the copper wires inside to hold the thing together and bend it as I want it. We'll see how that effort works out. 

Since those floating lines are also anchored to the bottom, I'll have to find a way to represent this as well. 

[Glen McGuire]

2 hours ago, Javelin said:

I've also tried to stretch the Uni Caenis with a clothes pin and then treated it with acrylic gel to keep it straight. It seemed to have worked more or less.

Great idea!

 

This is such a unique rigging job.  Very cool to watch and see you pull it all together.

[Javelin]

Thanks Glen 

 

Enough of that rigging for now. Both side wires, anchor wires and stopper wires are now in place. So technically the main subject is ready for epoxy.

So now the focus has shifted a bit towards that multicat and the floating line. I've also inserted another bracket in the bottom for anchoring of that floating line. 

So here's the bottom of the multicat, with its propulsion and rudders added (indeed an odd 3 propellors and rudders). I'll go as far as finishing the hull, so I can insert it in the epoxy, the rest will follow later as it'll be easier to handle once it's fixed in the block of epoxy. (Same for the dredger itself, a lesson learned from bottling the Sea Installer). 

 

And the attempt for the floating line. Not sure how I'll do this, I guess I'll try to insert it when the epoxy is nearly hard. If that fails, I can still lay it on top of the epoxy as I'll finish the surface with acrylic gel after all. 

 

And I'm also getting the box ready for the epoxy. It won't be filled to the edge of course. Technically I could also use a cheaper, non-transparent material for the boundaries, but I'd love to see what I'm doing when filling, so I chose something transparent. This will be sacrificial, so no need for extremely clean edges. I'll also use some silicone to seal the corners and bottom edges to avoid the epoxy from leaking out. 

The painted waterline of the dredger will be my indication for filling the box. 

 

Some small paint jobs left on the dredger (tumbling sheaves, "chain" that connects the anchor hoisting wires to the anchor) and then I'm ready. 

[Javelin]

One more rigging pic. Here you can see the lay-out better, with a white background. The stopper wire is not tight of course and will be hanging partially in the epoxy. 

 

Last steps before epoxy. Something I haven't done nor tested before, is applying a coat of acrylic gel over the sand. I hope this will seal cavities and give a more smooth surface for the epoxy. I suppose, and hope, that this will eliminate or at least reduce the amount of air bubbles that are released from the cavities in the sand during the curing process of the epoxy. On previous tests, these bubbles were sometimes released only when the epoxy was in an advanced stage of curing, causing bubbles to get stuck midway, unable to rise to the surface, let alone get released on the surface... Although I haven't tested this separately, I assume this will count as a good test. 

 

 

Then comes the box. The sandwich of plates at the bottom wasn't very smooth on the sides, I could have sanded it smooth I guess... But I got impatient. In any case I built the box around it, glued it with CA in some places and then applied regular silicone to seal the gaps. When the bottom was done, I squeezed it on a rectangular plastic lid. The edge of the lid will contain any leakage and the bottom itself squeezed the silicone into the gaps. 

I never used CA on the transparent polyester plate (Vivak) of the casing. I see it's not really causing fogging, so that's something I've learned for the future as well. Apart from CA, it seems MEK is the only thing that can glue these plates together properly. 

I also sealed the corners of the box with silicone.

You can see the dried glossy acrylic layer on top of the sand base in this picture. 

Next step will be pouring the epoxy and mounting the multicat and floating line. 

 

I'll go for a lighter shade of blue than on the Sea Installer build. You might remember this picture from that log. This is the shade I'll go for. This was also the test bottle to see the effect of wires in epoxy, where I had the Spartacus project already in mind. 

Edited November 14, 2023 by Javelin

[Javelin]

Had a narrow escape today. 
I was all geared up to get that pouring job done this morning, but when I checked the contents of my remaining resin, I had my doubts about the remaining quantity. I required around 0.4L of epoxy for this diorama, and the resin bottle was only around 50% remaining, I forgot the wastage from the Sea Installer tests and the actual project. Together with the hardener I might actually have enough... 

In any case, it was open for a while and I had to use it sometime. 

During emptying the resin bottle, I did notice some white particles inside the liquid and when I was mixing with the hardener, those flakes remained in the mixture. During mixing however, the mixture remained opaque rather than turning back to clear, considering the low amount, I decided not to do the pour at all. 

When left to harden, the flakes slowly went down, but bubbles formed. The mixture also turned very hot, I was kind of lucky I mixed it in a glass jar rather than a plastic one. It also started to smoke (slightly), so I put the thing outside, where it was also colder than inside. Eventually it hardened, but there were certain "lines" in the mixture and large bubbles (what looked like a boiling reaction) formed from the bottom up. 

I 'm assuming there are 2 reasons for this: a) the stuff was too old / too long in opened condition before use or stored in a wrong temperature and b) the mix ratio was probably not good. I didn't weight this mixture as I had done several mixtures which worked ok, and I needed all of the remaining liquid. I suppose there was too much hardener left, creating a very rapid curing, releasing a lot of heat in a short period of time. 

I guess I was lucky, since I assume it would have melted the model if I had poured it in. Would have also been stupid if the amount was just enough to touch the bottom of the ship and not reach the waterline... 

 

She's shelved for the time being, need to order some stuff for several builds (finally need to finish that Sea Installer build as well). I'll see when I get to another attempt. 

 

Edited November 15, 2023 by Javelin

[Javelin]

Because a picture says more than a 1000 words... 

The bubbles were not visible, even after 1 hour, only after that, it started to feel warm and the flakes seemed to dissolve, creating strange "streams" from the bottom to the top. Back then it even still looked smooth, but with those flows going up, the surface had lines in them and isn't even flat anymore. In any case, luckily I didn't push through. 

 

[Roger Pellett]

Epoxy cures with an exothermic reaction.  In other words the chemical reaction itself creates heat.  So, while curing, heat needs to be transferred away as fast as it is generated.  In most cases the surface area is large relative to the thickness of the Epoxy so heat buildup is minimal.  In your case the Epoxy is thick and the space confined.  I have mixed epoxy in a 2oz piper cup and it got too hot to touch.  If possible, can you pour it in layers to minimize the volume being cured?

 

Roger

Edited November 16, 2023 by Roger Pellett

[Mirabell61]

phantastic work Javelin,

never seen such precise modeling at that scale before  !!!

 

Nils

[Javelin]

On 11/16/2023 at 6:28 PM, Roger Pellett said:

Epoxy cures with an exothermic reaction.  In other words the chemical reaction itself creates heat.  So, while curing, heat needs to be transferred away as fast as it is generated.  In most cases the surface area is large relative to the thickness of the Epoxy so heat buildup is minimal.  In your case the Epoxy is thick and the space confined.  I have mixed epoxy in a 2oz piper cup and it got too hot to touch.  If possible, can you pour it in layers to minimize the volume being cured?

 

Roger

True that in this case it remained enclosed in a glass jar since I didn't pour it. The actual piece would have a much larger surface vs thickness ratio. The final piece is 14cm x 14cm and somewhere between 1.7 and 1.9cm thick. That would also allow bubbles to escape faster. 

On the other side, too much hardener does create a faster chain reation, creating more heat in a shorter time. 

 

I've ordered new epoxy and this time I will weigh it carefully. Should arrive somewhere next week. She's on hold for the time being, since I won't put additional time in this until I'm sure the epoxy works fine. 

(worst case, I'll saw the whole bottom off and it becomes a waterline diorama 😁)

 

Thanks Nils, not that accurate I guess, but a very different way of building than large scale. In this tiny scale you have to very carefully consider what you will and won't represent.

Edited November 17, 2023 by Javelin

[Glen McGuire]

2 hours ago, Javelin said:

this time I will weigh it carefully.

I find it interesting that you weigh your amounts of resin and hardener.  I assume that's per the product's instructions.  The epoxy resin that I use is very strict about measuring equal amounts of resin and hardener before mixing but does not mention weight.  I would think there might be a slight difference in weight between the hardener and resin because their viscosities seem a bit different, but I've never considered it before.  Do you use equal measures of resin and hardener based on weight?

[Javelin]

The product I use only mentions masses/weights, not volumes. Kind of normal considering chemistry is mass based. Volumes change with temperatures and pressures for a given mass. (although arguably less important for epoxy than with polyester with mixing ratios of 97%-3%)

 

I use Epodex, which has two very different sizes of bottle (hardner and resin) and the mixing ratio is therefore also different from 50-50. 

It's practically made two mix the bottles completely, they don't really consider partial mixes. That said, it can be easily calculated. 

The only issue is that they don't give densities, so when you need a certain volume of epoxy mix, you need  guess the densities and convert it. It did work so far, although I believe I used too little hardner in my first trial, resulting in too much hardner remaining in the end...

 

[KeithAug]

Yes a miniature miracle indeed. Very impressive.

[Roger Pellett]

An answer to Glen’s question.  

For every Epoxy brand/ formulation there is a unique density (weight divided by volume) for the resin and for the hardener.  The chemical reaction works by the weight of the hardener combining with that of the resin.  So weights cause the mix to harden. For many applications, however, volumes are easier to measure so manufactures using the densities of the two components provide ways to convert measurements to volumes.  West System, for example, sells calibrated pumps that measure by volume.  They also sell a scale for mixing by weight.  In a boatyard mixing by volume is probably easier.  Mixing tiny quantities of resins that require precise resin hardener ratios weight probably works better.  For tiny quantities used for gluing I personally find the hardware store tube resins to be more user friendly as eyeball measuring of drops squeezed from each tube is good enough.

 

Roger

 

Note after rereading Javelin’s post above:  He is absolutely correct that mass not weight causes the reaction.  For those of here in the USA, (thankfully) still using the Imperial System ratios based by weight (lbs) are the same as those based on mass (kg.)

Edited November 24, 2023 by Roger Pellett

[Javelin]

So, although you were all mislead by me finishing that Sea Installer and updating the Chaconia topic, I've actually performed the Epoxy pour on this one as well 😁.

 

So, new epoxy arrived and I didn't waste much time. 

It started well, smooth, little to no bubbles. However, the foggy looking areas you see in the pictures were actually there. It's not a camera distortion or anything. There seemed to be turbulence and turbidity caused by the chemical reaction. 

After a while, small bubbles did form again on the bottom, however they came up quickly and I punctured them with a small piece of 0.3mm steel wire. 

When things got more solid, I helped them to the surface to pop there as well. Unfortunately the whole process took longer than I anticipated, and I had to go out of the house for a while. When I returned some bubbles had formed on the bottom and the piece of wire didn't succeed to get through to them anymore. It is what it is, I do believe those bubbles are formed as part of the reaction and not really coming from cavities in the sand... (in the failed attempt in the glass jar as shown before, there were also a lot of bubbles and no sand on the bottom after all). 

 

 

 

I also discovered that styrene models don't float on epoxy. I attempted to "mount" the multicat several times, but it sank pretty fast. Funnily enough you really can't escape physics. The after part, with less volume (=buoyancy), always sank faster, creating a trim on the multicat. However, I then decided to wait much, much longer and wait untill the epoxy was nearly solid before inserting that multicat. The floating line I didn't even try until at the very end, since it's electrical wire, it definately would sink. 

 

Here everything is already solid. The green sticks in previous pics were there to hold the anchor cable for the floating line and the wire between the anchor of the floating line and a small neuring buoy. That buoy and wire are used to retrieve and reposition the anchors when the dredger moves. 

The floating line was positioned so it would touch that anchor cable. 

 

And here's the reason I put inside that plastic lid (yes, it's standing on its side for the picture, it's really solid 🤪). 

The small leak actually occured when I was trying to lift it on the side. The vessel has a serious list, I was trying to compensate that by tilting the waterline. That would have looked odd, so I accepted the list. The anchor boom is out after all, so she would have a list in this action (however, not as severe as it is in the model). 

The leak stopped when the base plate was put on the lid again, so I didn't really lose much inside my box. 

 

The blue colour has somewhat ligthened the sandy bottom and gave a nice contrast with the side wires under water. Although I'd need the acrylic gel to touch up a few places and hide a few faults in the epoxy surface (and perhaps hide the air bubbles a bit), I'm now in doubt whether I would put acrylic on top or if I keep it like it is... 

 

[Thukydides]

Despite the bubbles I think she looks really good. You can’t really see them from the top. Epoxy can be quite frustrating at times. 

[Glen McGuire]

I think you overcame the challenges quite nicely.  The side shot showing the underwater part of the ship is very cool.

[Javelin]

Thanks Thuky and Glen, 

 

Since this hurdle was passed, it's time to finish this thing. 

First was something I dreaded for a long time... Putting windows on that accomodation. Decided to make a tiny mask from a piece of masking tape, with just the upper and lower boundaries of the windows, so  I could at least have them straight. I then used a fine tip marker to put the windows between those boundaries. 
Since I was free in positioning the windows, I could use the same mask for 3 sides. Only on the aft I couldn't use it since I had already placed the outside decks there. 

 

Apart from the accommodation, I only have to put lifeboats, crane, the cutter platform forward, and the masts and exhaust pipes on the Spartacus. 

 

Most of the work is remaining on the multicat. I gave the superstructure a coat of white and started building its two heavy cranes. They are telescopic cranes without a wire. The hook is directly connected to the extendable jib. Since she is underway in the diorama, the cranes all fully retracted and folded in sea fast position on deck. A typical case of keeping a handle, I drilled a 0.5mm hole in a 1mm thick piece of styrene, then cut further to shape. I then glued the "jib" in that hole and the last action is to rease the tiny crane body from the piece of styrene. I then glue it to a 1.5mm dia x 0.3mm thick base plate. The foundation of the cranes was already glued inside the hull before, I used those to keep a hold of the hull during pouring. 

 

Here you can see the rigging that got loose between the gantry and the ladder and the anchor boom and the anchor hoisting wire. I believe overall the epoxy shrank and pulled the vessel down a bit. The wires inside the epoxy are straight/tight, but once above the "water" it all got loose. Also the edges of the epoxy block are somewhat raised, which, I believe, means the center shrank during curing. Not much, but at this scale... 

 

 

[Glen McGuire]

2 hours ago, Javelin said:

Also the edges of the epoxy block are somewhat raised, which, I believe, means the center shrank during curing. Not much, but at this scale... 

I've encountered this as well with all my epoxy pours.  For me, it's usually inside the bottle so it's not a problem because it's hard to distinguish raised edges from distortion looking thru the glass.  However, when I did my base for Archimedes' Claw, the epoxy noticeably leeched upward into the rocks at the base of my seawall wall.  I do not believe the center of the epoxy shrank during curing because I know what level I poured and the edges ended up higher than my original pour.  The edges seem to crawl upward during curing as they are in contact with another surface.  There's probably some chemistry or physics behind that, but it's well beyond my expertise.  Perhaps @Roger Pellett could weigh in on this phenomena.       

[Thukydides]

1 hour ago, Glen McGuire said:

I've encountered this as well with all my epoxy pours.  For me, it's usually inside the bottle so it's not a problem because it's hard to distinguish raised edges from distortion looking thru the glass.  However, when I did my base for Archimedes' Claw, the epoxy noticeably leeched upward into the rocks at the base of my seawall wall.  I do not believe the center of the epoxy shrank during curing because I know what level I poured and the edges ended up higher than my original pour.  The edges seem to crawl upward during curing as they are in contact with another surface.  There's probably some chemistry or physics behind that, but it's well beyond my expertise.  Perhaps @Roger Pellett could weigh in on this phenomena.       

This will happen with any epoxy pour. The issue is the epoxy is adhesive (it sticks to other things more than itself). So it has a tendency to try and creep up the sides due to a combination of the adhesive nature and the surface tension (it creeps a bit and then the surface tension pulls more up so it creeps more etc...) This is counterbalanced by gravity, but if it has lots of things to "grab" then it can climb very high. This a particularly pronounced problem if you have a small crack. I have had it creep up a thin gap so it was way above the rest of the pour and had to hide it with paint etc...

 

You can try to solve this by:

1. Designing around this (making sure there are no thin cracks it can creep up, leaving space so you can cut off the edges etc...)
2. Putting your sides only to the height you want to pour to. This allows you to fill all the way to the top and the surface tension will hold it level.
3. Pouring in multiple thin layers (still doesn't perfectly solve the issue)
4. Sanding down and polishing the raised edges. Note: I have never tried this on something that I wanted to be perfectly clear like water, I have mostly used epoxy for ice and so I can just cover those bits with snow and make it looked scratched etc and it doesn't matter.

 

EDIT: I can illustrate this by showing you some pictures of a figure I did a ice pour for. The picture below shows the figure before the pour. You can see how I have a lip I want to come up to.

Then below you can see after the pour. I don't have a picture before I added ice, but you can see how the resin is level around the edge. However, under the rock, the reason there is so much snow there is because it crept up the bottom and I had to hide it with snow.

In the following picture you can sort of see where it has crept up most of the back of the hand.

Edited November 27, 2023 by Thukydides

[Keith Black]

When dealing with unexplainable phenomena I turn to Professor Maximus.

 

[Javelin]

On 11/27/2023 at 4:14 PM, Keith Black said:

When dealing with unexplainable phenomena I turn to Professor Maximus.

 

Professor Maximus looks suspiciously much like a Penguin. Since he could solve the epoxy problem, I even thought about putting a tiny penguin in my diorama. Unfortunately it's not possible to make a recognizable scale-penguin in 1/2000. Would have been a nice one to put on the multicat deck. 

 

@Thukydides, thanks for the explanation. It indeed seemed to behave like that. I scored the sides of the dio a bit, but will leave a small edge as that will allow me to have a good boundary for the acrylic gel. It doesn't explain why the rigging got loose though. The best solution would have been to keep the top part loose and tighten it afterwards I guess. But that would have been difficult with so many wires at different places. 

 

I finished the multicat Auxilia by now. You can also see the mess of epoxy around it. This was caused when I inserted it too soon and it started sinking. When I pulled it out, the gelly epoxy got stuck to it and made a mess. It sort of forces me to put acrylic at the top for the was. I made a test on a spare piece of epoxy. 

 

 

I might detail the mast a bit more before painting, but I consider her finished. I'm currently building the cutter platform, which is the platform on the fore part of the gantry. This platform is used to change teeth on the cutter or the change the cutter as a whole. The lower part can fold up and the whole thing can be moved upwards for sailing, to avoid it getting damaged in the waves. I'm also busy detailing the funnels with exhaust pipes and masts. 

 

[Keith Black]

 I love the last photo, it appears an absurdly large coin has drifted into the work area.