HMS Lion by Ian_Grant - 1/150 - RADIO - RESTORATION - WW1 Battlecruiser

[Ian_Grant]

As I mentioned in the Naval History section I have decided to revamp this scratch model I made as a teenager in the 70's.  The model was built using Norman A. Ough's drawings, as purchased from David MacGregor Plans in the UK. Drawings consist of a sheet of "Lines" plus some cross-sections showing decks etc, and a second sheet showing overall profile and top view along with layouts of the various decks in the forward superstructure. There are zero details of the various ships' boats save for dotted outlines in the top view showing their stowage locations and their types/lengths.

 

I've been looking on the internet for photos of Lion and her near-sister ships Queen Mary and Princess Royal. They were all modified in the course of the war and it's quite confusing trying to reconcile all the photos. I've even seen one of Lion with that little walkway with a roof going around the stern, which I associate with Victorian warships for some reason.

 

Anyway pulling out the plans I see the teenage me omitted many details such as doorways, hull portholes, vent pipes at the funnels, beams reinforcing the blast screens, the foredeck windlass, the foredeck breakwater (or whatever it's called), all the weather deck hatches and skylights and coal scuttles etc. Plan is to add as much as possible without going too crazy; this is after all for RC not display.

 

In the 70's this ran with rheostatic speed controllers which wasted a LOT of battery power. She had two speed controls for her two 6V Decaperm motors. I think this time I will just use a single 60A brushed ESC to drive both motors. Also, she has movable forward turrets, servo-controlled, but they don't maintain the same angle as they rotate - what was I thinking? This time I want to have all four turrets rotate to the same side of the ship; probably will mean two or even three servos; trying to figure out how to get 180 degrees for the turrets. A rack and pinion system occurred to me but a cheap system for hobby use eludes my search. There are gear sets available for laser cutting; maybe I could cut a rack too?

 

Here are a few shots of a dusty Lion as she is now. Those men on the compass platform are wildly too large, at about 1/72 scale. Following  these is a shot of an experimental six-piece 3D-print of a stack. It looks pretty good to me but I fear the vertical seams are exaggerated. They're 1/32" square in this print; not sure how they would print at 1/64" thick but will try it.  I will get some micro brass rod and try to make the cages atop the stacks, which supported canvas covers when boilers were drawn.

 

 

 

Edited October 14 by Ian_Grant
corrected log title

[ddp]

so the 2 motors drive 2 props so why not 4 props like the real ship had? am i correct that the model is 56" long? i wouldn't worry about the seams on the funnel sides as would be out of scale but could use layered paint to simulate the seams. how much of a rebuild are you going to do as i see you are missing 2x4" guns in the forward superstructure & the hull appears to missing the bilge keels.

[Ian_Grant]

Hello ddp; thanks for commenting!

 

You're right, as a teen I missed the two 4" gun casements on the forward shelter deck for some reason. They're on my drawings.

 

After looking over the drawings I think I will be building complete new superstructures. According to a 3D rendering in the Naval Encyclopedia the aft shelter deck is supported by posts around its inner edges leaving what is beneath it as an opening. Difficult to pick out in  to tell in my drawing but now that I look again I see that it is so. The rendering also shows the aft  SL towers added after 1916 but oddly still with smaller twin SL's instead of larger singles as I have seen in other drawings. On the other hand, this same 3D rendering shows four 4" guns on the weather deck level on the forward superstructure and an open shelter deck, as well as the central funnel being round not oval, so how much can I trust it? On yet another hand, it shows another deck between the two forward funnels with some boats stowed on it. My drawings show no such thing but there is a photo in the Naval Encyclopedia entry "Loading Shells Aboard 1917" which does show a boat stowed above the weather deck on some kind of beam but no deck.

 

I'm hoping for clarity when my two book orders arrive.  ddp, it seems you may be familiar with this ship; can you comment on any of the above?

 

Yes the model is about 56" long.

 

As a teen I didn't worry too much about u/w details other than getting the hull lines correct. I think bilge keels would be too exposed and fragile for an R/C model which will be handled and carried around. The two props she does have are over-scale but again not visible when in water.

 

Rendering from the Naval Encyclopedia:

Loading shells 1917 - note the boat stowed high on beams. It's not stated which ship this is, Lion, Queen Mary, or Princess Royal, which all differed slightly.

Coal scuttle - what a job!  And no masks! I wondered what these actually looked like; they're exactly like manhole covers and are just small shaded circles on my drawing.

Edited October 15 by Ian_Grant

[ddp]

the Norman A. Ough's drawings shows the center funnel being round, correct? i think it should be oval like the aft funnel. you could cut a disk out of paper or whatever & place it where the center funnel is to see what the diameter dimensions do to the surrounding area. the coal scuttle is round as the cover is on the deck in front of the 2 guys standing & beside the guy in the coal scuttle. i would go "no deck" as per the photograph.

[Ian_Grant]

1 hour ago, ddp said:

the Norman A. Ough's drawings shows the center funnel being round, correct? i think it should be oval like the aft funnel. you could cut a disk out of paper or whatever & place it where the center funnel is to see what the diameter dimensions do to the surrounding area.

No, Norman's drawings show it as oval. It's the Naval Encyclopedia's 3D render that has it round.

Thanks, I will omit the extra deck.

[ddp]

go with oval.

[Javelin]

Hi Ian, I'll be following your upgrade project. Immensely handsome ships. Can't really help with any detailing though. I'll keep my eyes open if something pops up about the Splendid Cats. 

 

I do know HMS Iron Duke had the catwalk around the stern as well, so I wouldn't be surprised if Lion had it at some point. I do agree it was a bit outdated and rare by that period.

[Glen McGuire]

I'm on board as well!  Although I'll be a bit disappointed if, as part of the restoration, you don't add 3 banks of working oars to the battleship!  😃

[Canute]

I'll follow along, too. RN battlecruisers are faves of mine.😄

[Ian_Grant]

 

5 hours ago, Canute said:

I'll follow along, too. RN battlecruisers are faves of mine.😄

Yes, the Lion class appealed to me even as a teen because of the unusual (to my eye) turret amidships.  If I had to start from scratch now, I'd probably make a model of the Neptune class with its two midship beam turrets.

 

Received my copy of "British Battleships of World War One" which is quite interesting. It lists the naval estimates for each year from 1905, has many drawings and photos of each class, and gives detailed information about armour belt spans and thicknesses, armament, and most usefully a chronological list of modifications made in the course of the war. So in fact, I'd like to add the 1916 searchlight towers to Lion, but I also want to keep the torpedo net booms which were removed by then. Thus I may not be historically accurate.

 

The book also has colour drawings of various dazzle patterns which were tried out on various ships. Many of them are pretty wild.

 

Still waiting for a second book I ordered.

Edited October 12 by Ian_Grant

[KeithAug]

An interesting project Ian. I think I will tag along.

[Ian_Grant]

Glad to have you watching over me, Keith.

[Jim Lad]

Fascinating!  A really nice project to delve into, Ian.

 

John

[gjdale]

This looks interesting Ian. Thank I’ll tag along for the ride too.

[Ian_Grant]

Tore off the foredeck (while saving all the brass bollards, cleats, etc) to reveal things that I had forgotten......

 

I packed the forward inaccessible cavities with bits of styrofoam, I suppose to provide buoyancy in case of a leak. Or, it might have been to prevent the metal ballast from clunking around. Yes, I did put metal in there before adding the deck; I guess I did a flotation test in 1977 and realized that a lot was needed. Those of you who followed my recent RC Roman Galley build may remember that early on I weighed "Lion" sans motors and other equipment to provide a guess as to what the galley hull might end up weighing. Well, now I know why the bare Lion seemed so heavy, or, why the galley turned out so light and threw off my displacement estimates.

 

Deck removed: (Why did I leave that red pin in there in 1977??).

Styrofoam removed.....oops, there's ballast in there.

Brass sleeve for "B" turret pivot shaft, after barbette removed. (More metal!).

I pondered how to get 180 deg pivoting at the turrets. Simplest thing I can think of is to mount a toothed timing gear on a servo arm and connect via a toothed belt to another toothed timing gear on the turret pivot shaft. Making the gear on the servo triple the size of the other gives 180 degrees at the turret from a 60 degree servo. I found very nice aluminum timing gears and belts on a robotics web site. Couldn't get ratio=3 exactly, just 2.8 with not-too-large timing gears. Close enough.

 

So the plan is to have a setup like this for each of "Q" and "X" turrets, ie two individual servos y-connected to a receiver channel to move in unison.

 

Fingertech provides a simpletool for calculating the required centre-to-centre distance of a given pair of gears with a given belt. See here:

 

https://www.fingertechrobotics.com/how-to_pulley_belt.php

 

In the case of the belt joining the "A" and ""B turrets shafts, using two 18T gears and a 70-tooth belt yields centre-centre distance of 78mm which is exactly right for the inter-turret spacing at the scale of this model.

 

There is a complication for "A" and "B" turrets; they need to turn, in unison, in the opposite direction as the others; eg "X" and "Q" pivot clockwise (seen from above) to train to port, "A" and "B" pivot anti-clockwise to train to port. Plan is to drive "B" shaft from a servo via either two meshing gears, or via belt from a servo which rotates in the opposite direction given the same signal as the other two. I read rumours that this might exist; someone said Futaba servos move opposite to the norm but I will have to check this out. If I find such a servo, it will connect via the belt to a second timing gear on "B" shaft, again with a triple-size timing gear on the servo. If I can't find such a servo, I will connect it to "B" shaft via two laser-cut wooden gears. "A" of course will move in whichever direction "B" moves.

 

I found an on-line tool which generates an .svg file to laser cut two gears, after you fill in a table of numbers of teeth etc. See here:

 

https://evolventdesign.com/pages/spur-gear-generator

 

As in anything I build, this hull is very solid; keel plus four stringers a side, 1/4" plywood bulkheads, many solid. I need to carve out the centre of the engine room forward bulkhead; you can see where I hacked holes to get alligator-clipped wires to the motors. Being older and wiser I'll now use bullet connectors meaning the solid ply would be in the way. That blue tube is the RC-aircraft-style cable guide for the rudder linkage. Loose U-joint is for absent motor.

 

 

Bow shows a badly-patched square. This was due to my brother's idiot friend George who dropped the unfinished hull while looking at it. Ah, memories!

 

On another topic, I got tired of having to sit in front of the library's 3D printers waiting for them to finish. Plus, you only get a maximum 3 hour window for a print so there's no time to make anything significant. I decided I want my own 3D printer. Impatient, I bought a Mingda Magician X2 this week, a very nice printer with features making it easy for beginners to use. However, I'm having second thoughts. I was torn between it and a Bambu A1 Mini. Until I get rid of some clutter I can't set it up, and we're away for most of November, so I am going to return it (unopened) and wait to see if the full-size Bambu A1 comes down about $100 on Black Friday at the end of November. This would bring it down to the price of the Mingda and I'm convinced it's an even better printer. If not, I will probably go with the A1 Mini and save $100.

Edited October 19 by Ian_Grant

[ddp]

the lower bow needs to be more curved as per attachment.

[Ian_Grant]

Yes, I was noticing that myself. Will fix it when I improve the patch. Thanks!

[Ian_Grant]

STOP THE PRESSES!!!!!

 

I just noticed on the Bambu web site that their Black Friday sale starts on Monday morning!!

 

The sale price on the A1 is $379, as opposed to $450.

The Mingda will be go for $230, as opposed to $320 which I just paid.

 

What to do?

 

I'll be talking to the 3D store people tomorrow.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

High end printers, I’ll be very interested to see the results.

[Ian_Grant]

5 hours ago, Kevin-the-lubber said:

High end printers, I’ll be very interested to see the results.

Kevin, what have you heard on the street of the Mingda  X2? Black Friday priced less than an A1 Mini.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

I hadn't heard of Mingda before, but when I googled earlier, their background seemed to be high end industrial printers. I can't find that page now, but no matter, for the price, the X2 seems to be a great buy. Self-levelling, quiet steppers, direct extrusion, these are great features. The max temp for the hot end and build plate are a little higher than my creality ender 3, this is good. I have no experience of a steel build plate, I only use glass, so it may or may not be good and, even if it isn't, a glass plate + 3DLac is cheap.

 

A quick read of reviews suggests the main complaint is that printing is slow. I can't see from the spec what this translates as, nor for that matter have I seen or used any of the supposedly fast printers on the market, but would add this: print speed is largely determined by the print medium. There is an ideal print temperature range and the right speed is whatever allows fusion within that temp' range. In other words, I'm ever so slightly sceptical about 'fast' printers, but I could be wrong to be so. For what it's worth, if I decide to buy a bigger FDM next year, I'll be taking a close look at Mingda.

 

Bambu labs are well known here, posh printers. If the Creality (and Mingda) are the Toyota family saloon of FDM printers, the Bambu's are the Mercedes. I don't know if the extra cost is worth it but I'm sure owners would say it is.

 

My tip is to get a filament dryer box from the outset. They cost about £40 but will save you hours of frustration. I reckon 90% of FDM print issues and failures are down to moisture in the filament and there is no substitute for temperature controlled drying. When I started, I tried everything under the sun to cure all my printing ills, largely to no effect, but they went away overnight once I started using a dryer. In my case it's the original Sunlu, but they are all much of a muchness.

 

 

 

[Ian_Grant]

Thanks for the drying tip, Kevin!  I assumed the sealable bags were sufficient but hours on the spool while printing could be spent absorbing humidity........

[Kevin-the-lubber]

When you get your machine feel free to message for tips etc. I'm no expert but I have learned a few things through trial and error!

 

ps. Just remembered an important thing worth mentioning before you buy. These budget printers are great for printing common materials like PLA and PETG. You will struggle to print ABS and exotic materials which  require higher hot end or bed temps, or high ambient temps and so on. So while you’ll see lots of advertorial around different filaments, it’s as well to be aware that most of these will be outside the scope of your machine, regardless what the blurb implies.

 

 

Edited October 20 by Kevin-the-lubber

[Ian_Grant]

3 hours ago, Kevin-the-lubber said:

When you get your machine feel free to message for tips etc. I'm no expert but I have learned a few things through trial and error!

 

ps. Just remembered an important thing worth mentioning before you buy. These budget printers are great for printing common materials like PLA and PETG. You will struggle to print ABS and exotic materials which  require higher hot end or bed temps, or high ambient temps and so on. So while you’ll see lots of advertorial around different filaments, it’s as well to be aware that most of these will be outside the scope of your machine, regardless what the blurb implies.

 

 

Yes I was aware of this. I have no plans to print ABS as it is toxic and we have a parrot in the house. Birds are very sensitive to odours and airborne chemicals. The Envirolaser people assure me I can print "PLAwood" etc with a stainless nozzle as opposed to a hardened one.

 

I decided to go all out and get an A1 tomorrow. Looking forward to trying some prints.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

I’m sure you’ll be very happy with that choice and I’ll probably be envious!

[KeithAug]

On 10/19/2024 at 10:17 PM, Ian_Grant said:

Tore off the foredeck (while saving all the brass bollards, cleats, etc) to reveal things that I had forgotten......

 

I hadn't realised I was also signing up for an archaeology thread.

[Ian_Grant]

On 10/19/2024 at 7:53 PM, ddp said:

the lower bow needs to be more curved as per attachment.

I took another look at my Norman Ough drawings. I can see why the teenage me made the forefoot squarish thinking that's just the way these old ships were, but looking now it seems that there is a gadget placed over the forefoot and clinched in place by lines/chains to the cleats on the foredeck.

 

Some sort of cable cutter ,maybe? Or something to do with paravanes?

[Ian_Grant]

I finally unboxed the A1 3D printer. 

 

Is it just me, or is it harder to figure stuff out without an included printed manual? Their included "quick start" comprises about eight 3"x2" pages. My first problem was encountered while attempting to screw in 10 machine screws to attach the printer head frame to the base. The six central ones simply would not go in. I took it apart and tried again twice before finally noticing the six threaded holes in the base were covered by very tough transparent tape which of course peeled off in tiny shards. There is absolutely no mention of this in the "quick start". And no apparent reason for the tape, at least to me.

 

I had problems trying to produce a sample print. What do I as a raw beginner know? This is supposed to be a beginner's machine. After plodding my way through getting the printer to bind to my Bambu account and giving it a name for the network, and waiting about an hour for it to do a full self-calibration, I could not get it to notice the filament I pressed into the tube. What is there to know, I thought? Just push the filament into the plastic sleeve until it enters the printing head and stops. Then I tried to get a pre-stored sample design (a little boatie) to print. Nothin' doin'.  I had to google to youtube to find out that I have to go through menu screens to find "Load Filament" and press it and then the thing warms up the head and tells you to push the filament in "now" ( and by the way before you do this you have to find the menu locstion to tell it exactly what type of filament you propose to use.  It then failed to see the filament and bleeped "retry" several times with me pushing the filament each time. Then it spent about ten minutes doing I don't know what, with the head moving around sometimes touching the base plate and sometimes going over to the head cleaning attachment while I wondered what was wrong. Finally it started the print and came out with a beautiful print in less than 15 minute , which surprised me because it was moving so fast the desk and floor were shaking. It's blindingly fast compared to the library printers. I think I will set the speed to 60% from now on, which is the next option down from 100% which was the default.

 

I find it annoying that I needed to blunder around on youtube to find out such basic info instead of it being provided in the box on just a few sheets of paper. It will be interesting to discover if there was needless delay because of some other menu option I am not aware of, or if the head cleans itself several times before every print.

 

Anyway, the print is beautiful and I'm sure I will get used to printing with time.

 

Next up:  Have to figure out Bambu's slicer program. Another thing I have never used. At the library "Makerbot" just does it for you with no manual intervention necessary.

[Ian_Grant]

Butchered inside the hull for "A" and "B' turret linkage. Hacked out the centre portion of the two bulkheads involved so I can get my hand in up to beneath "A" turret.

I'm not sure what the assembly sequence will be vis-a-vis locking the timing gears on their shafts, given that the deck and barbettes must be on before the turrets are added.

I'm about to make a plywood "base" which will define the spacing between the brass tube liner shafts for the turrets, and the required servo. I realized that I can reverse the servo's rotation simply by mounting it upside down which also has implications around fixing the gear to the servo arm below the servo body.

 

The good part is I can use the laser cutter to form this plywood part, with shaft pilot holes and servo mounting holes drilled with pinpoint precision so belts/gears will work well.

 

Bulkheads hacked out.

Here is all the metal ballast from the bow compartments. It's a considerable weight. I'm not sure what battery I will be using, the 70's gel-cell was itself very heavy yet all this extra metal was needed. I can see I'll need to buy a battery and build a shallow tank in the shop for some flotation tests before the decks go on again.

 

I lubed the two motors for the first time in 40 years. The prop shaft stuffing tubes sound absolutely dry too.

 

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Ahhh, you take me back a few years, to the utter frustration phase of printing 😄. Before you know it, it’ll all be second nature.