Decking taking shape

A bit more progress. Decking taking shape.

Purchased on well known auction site. Boat very dusty/dirty but sound. it is from a Robbe kit that was around about 10 years ago and has timber decking, built-in auxiliary motor, navigation lights, etc. A deep clean followed by a re-paint of the superstructure, rub the decking down and varnish, followed by a complete rub down and re-paint of the hull brought her back to a fine yacht. She is about 40 inches in length and sails beautifully and has great presence on the water.

Well this is the 3rd version I have made of a springer tug.

Grp Hull and this time using 2 mm plastic.
Balsa wood and again what ever I could find laying around.

The decking is just printed paper and stuck down with Varnish.

Just needs some ballast and it is ready to go.

This is a 30-inch static model of the trawler that had suffered damage and had most of the deck fittings missing when I got a hold of it.
It was 'de-constructed' by Victor Marcham of the Mablethorpe Model RC Boat Group. Being a static model, it had to be bored through to fit a propshaft, a motor and rudder, and had new decking, mast and working LED lights.
It has yet to be weighted so pond trials can begin.

Built from a plan in 'Model Boats' in the 80's with a balsa hull and ply decking. Powered by a single cylinder 'Unit Steam Engine' from the same era, and a meths fired boiler. Only recently has radio control been added.

My scatch built 200th scale model of a KVG V class Battle Ship, the Duke of York. Based 0n 1/720th Revel plastic kit, 30 years old. First sail after a "refit" after being laid up in Garden shed for 10 or so years, fortunately was not as damaged as the Bismark store in same shed, as it was in a drier part of a leaky shed, just replaced some decking (with plastic sheet), added some missing small armament, lockers, Gun directors, Walrus Sea Plane etc I'd left of earlier model. She was original powered by 4 - 540 size motors, running 2mm Props (.50p each those where the days), upgraded her to run two on just twin props (4mm), leaving outer pair as dummies, may re connect at a later date. Brought her electrics upto 2.4 Ghz standard. Sailed well very steady on this her first sail after refit, at Ethrow Park.

Hi, I'm sorry if these pictures are on here already, I did search through and couldn't see any.... I'm after a few peoples opinion on colours etc 💭 As the pictures are all black and white (grey scale) it is difficult to get the colours correct. A lot of model boats seem to be grey on the deck with white roofs, some with wooden decking, some just white and any number of variations. I'm trying to rebuild mine to be as close to the real thing as possible. in my opinion it looks like the top is all in white (as it matches the shade of the "FIRE" sign). The handrails appear to be brass ends with wooden rails?? Most of the other fittings seem to be either white to match the boat or silver for the tie-offs. The spot light seems to be darker than the monitors so I'm not sure if that is a dark silver or maybe black? Any thoughts??? 😉

HI to all you Fire Boaters,
I have decided to finally bring my Fireboat out of the closet and up for inspection.
This is the first of my many boats I am showing, I will probably show others in the future.
I started to build her back in 2006 after being off work and having a shoulder operation. She was not going to be a R/C boat, just a bit of something to do whilst on recovery.

I have a 34" still in the box unmade, purchased back in 1994 from Aerokits.
I drew round all the parts and then shrunk them on my scanner. She is 27" long I think that's
just fraction over 1/20th scale . She is almost all balsa except the 2 under skins that are balsa laminated with 1/64th ply. The hand rails are 1/4" balsa blocks I cut from a strip and the rail is ally tubing.
The mast is made from plastic strip from packets from the model shop.

When I returned to work she was put into the shed and left unfinished.
I stumbled across the Fireboat website and registered in 2009 when I was off work once again. This then made me think more about working on her again and I decide to turn her into an R/C model. So out she came and I fitted an Electomax Delta 480bb motor and a M3sonik esc.
I also purchased a couple of Robbe fire monitors, put them together shortening the nozzles and cutting the bottom of the base of to try to look a bit moreto scale. I know they are not the correct type but if I want to go down the road of getting them working then these ones will.

Then off I went to Wilkinson's and bought some paint. Then set out to paint her, as I brushed on the paint it seemed to be drying almost as quick as I was painting her. Dragging the paint I had just put on with next brush stroke. What a TOTAL DISASTER !!. I gave up on her and back into the shed she went.

2010 arrived I started again rubbed the paint down a bit and bought some Tamiya spray acrylic and started spraying, underside red, it seemed look all right. I used a nice new roll of low tack masking tape, taped up the underside and the decking and sprayed on the black on the sides. I thought that look all right. Took off the masking tape, which also took off the red paint and the dope from the decks. Another DISASTER. Back in the shed she went once again.

A couple of months went by and I was up in Norfolk on my own boat and watching the workers in the boatyard, ideas came to me and when we returned home, out she came and I repainted the sides
and then with red oxide paint I painted her undersides to make it look like antI foul paint. I used some white stripe to cover the join of the two different paint colours.
I had bought some roundels in Anglia Model Shop in Gorleston and some lettering in a shop in Norwich and after painting put these on.
Not looking fantastic but passable I was a little happier with her, but still not satisfied, back in the shed she went again.

Now after so much nagging from my brother out she has come, I've started again. He talked me into changing and trying a brushless motor and a smaller esc he had in his tool box from his helicopter he was shelving as its rota head was damaged beyond repair.
I have now fitted them and if they work I will change the esc to a forward/ reverse esc in the future at some point.

Sea trials are still away off more than likely in the spring, because the decking has yet to be painted. That will be the next job.

I think that's all for now, as I have probably bored you all to tears. I hope update as I progress further.
Just to let you know I'm Tom (alias BOATSHED).

The hull of this model was my own design in 2004 and was sailed for 2 years, and then a new upper decks and battery system were added during the winter of 2005. The hull performed well enough but my original cabin design was too crude to keep.

The boat shown here depicts my effort to copy a 1958 ChrisCraft Cabin Cruiser at a scale of 1" = 1'.

The hull is 1/8" thick pine planks on frames with hand cut Walnut decking and 3/16" Walnut cabin sides. No epoxy or glass was used on the hull - just a good paint job.

The big change was to replace a bulky & heavy 12VDC leac acid battery with 9 AA dry cells connected in series. Bathtub testing indicated I could expect about 2 hours running time at full speed and that estimate was about right. A Dumas 12VDC motor and mechanical speed control were used with a JR XR 2 control.

The reduction in battery weight made a very large speed and appearance difference. Availability of the AA cells was an economic plus.