Response

Re: Ollie ''G''

Thanks Doug, under the umbrella of not knowing much about electronics, I sourced a micro / nano 2 phase 4 wire motor and a 5v driver complete with remote controller and reduced the 12v supply accordingly with a regulator. I then retrained to be a "micro surgeon" to wire it! Results are not as good as I had hoped as the lowest speed is jerkey and the lowest smooth speed is a little too fast but I'll live with it for now and put it down to experience. Maybe it could be smoother with a Arduino controller but I couldn't find any constructive advice at the time and wasn't prepared to invest the study time. I'm guessing electronics is your thing 🤔 At least I learned something!😌

5 years ago by seafarer

Forum

CNC boat kits...?

Well, I've got my eShapeoko. I bought all the electronics and motors as well as the mechanical kit from the same source, which meant that I didn't have to do all the work to check compatibility. Total cost, including VAT and postage, was £563 - which is remarkably cheap for a machine with this size cutting bed. if I had wanted to save money and use the free LinuxCNC with a Chinese breakout board I could have dropped the price to around £400 - probably below £350 if I had gone for Chinese Ebay s as well. There are more things to get, of course. Tooling and workholding are the standard extras for any big workshop machine. The eShapeoko is designed to hold a Dremel clone, but I will probably be using a more delicate tool to cut out thin balsa shapes for EeZeBilts. The eShapeoko is quite capable of milling metals, but I don't expect to do that very often. So I can't see the total price rising by a lot - perhaps another £20 or so before I can be cutting my first parts. The first thing I did when I got the parts was assemble them roughly to check that it all went together properly. Here is a shot - minus the wiring and controls, of course - to give an idea of the size of the thing. With it I can cut keel lengths up to about 36". The maximum cutting width is about 14". I can easily expand it in length by adding longer rails, but this represents a balance between what would be useful and what would fit easily in the shed! Assembling it is just like making a Meccano kit. Which should present no difficulty to someone of a certain age...! For anyone interested this is the site I got it from: https://amberspyglass.co.uk

5 years ago by DodgyGeezer

Forum

CNC boat kits...?

Having built (well, assembled really) i am currently building a small CNC router with 3D printed parts. See https://reprap.org/wiki/Cyclone_PCB_Factory. Currently redesigning to be driven by GT2 belts and pulleys as I have some reservations about using 3D printed gears from the point of view of back-lash and wear. The motors are driven from an Arduino Mega running the GRBL g-code interpreter. There are a host of free g-code generator tools to be found on the internet. Some of them are a bit "knife and fork" but there are some useful ones out there and there is lots of helpful information too.

5 years ago by Delboy

Media

Carina

Trying to learn to use this forum properly I am publishing a video that shows an experiment I did to find out how fast the motor could turn. I am using in my model of the sailboat Carina 2 motors like the one shown in the video to work as a winch to control the position of the sails in a system solution where I am realizing this my own way to implement the sheets as shown on the original sailboat Endeavour. This requires my sheet control system to control the length of the sheet of the mainsail i.e. over a range of 8.3 meters. This requires the drum which is turned by the motor to make 21 full turns. Details will be published in my report from scratch of building my Carina.

5 years ago by Hellmut1956

Forum

Brass bashin' Chris Craft deck fittings...

Just got white metal castings back of the Chris Craft fittings and very nice they are too. They have started to burnish up a treat and will polish well as Paul uses a good quality metal. Nice and hard. Now I have to make the light lenses. Also put the blue bottom on her at the weekend using my one and only pot of Plastikote enamel paint, not the acrylic muck they've turned over to and it went on through my spray gun as smooth as could be. Even my masking worked. Just waiting for a gold pin stripe tape for the boot topping now. The final bit will be masking the deck to paint the covering boards and king plank with the same blue. For those not lucky enough to have a wee pot of proper Plastikote in the paint cupboard, I also got a couple of tins of Rustoleum spray, only 5-25 a pot, enamel (of course) in a nice French blue and a rich cream. These colours will look good on my Darby One Design single "WHO'S DARBY?". Very post War. I think the Oulton Broad One Design single will be Burgundy and the Whippet One Design will be varnished mahogany. I know of no other classes of British stepped hydroplanes. These will all be 1/6th scale as they're all around 12-13 ft. long. I'll probably put the same motors in them eventually. The Darby is well advanced and has a Speed 400, but I may go brushless. Any suggestions for a cheap Brushless/ESC combo will be welcome for, say, 3S Li-Pos. it would be good to see these period boats all racing together. I also plan to make reverse clinker Singer cadet and a Percy See Bugatti engined boat for which I have plans. I'm hoping to get a response from the current keepers of Berylla II about measuring that, too, since it also uses a Lea Francis engine, like the Whippet.

6 years ago by Westquay

Response

MV TEAKWOOD

Hi Doug - she does have navigation lights and a working radar. Did not turn either on for the pictures, was so please to see her sail! The has a maximum capacity of 3 amps. As am using a lightly loaded 500 size motor all seems well. Must get around the checking properly though. Would not want try a higher current draw.

6 years ago by Rowen

Response

MV TEAKWOOD

She looks superb Rowen, winter very well spent. Hat Off 👍 A wisp of smoke, a light or three and a flag or two and she'll be Peerrrfect! 😁 The voltage is a neat trick! What current can it handle? Cheers, Doug 😎

6 years ago by RNinMunich

Forum

rotating radars off mast

Hi smiggy I have a couple of these motors and they are good and mine run off a 1.5v battery (max3v). Planetary gears but relatively quiet at low revs (volts). Mine came from http://www.gizmoszone.com/shopping/agora.cgi and cost about £6 ea. Your link should be https://www.precisionmicrodrives.com/gearmotors. Well worth a look. The motors I have are 10x14mm (including the shaft) and are direct drive. I will be posting a thread soon showing more details Nice scale model Dave

7 years ago by Dave M

Forum

rotating radars off mast

Dave, Thanks for the tip about using the motors. I found some 6mm x 6mm motors on ebay which will be ideal for mast mounted radars on a future project. Roy

7 years ago by Trillium

Forum

rotating radars off mast

Hi seafarer You do need a four wire motor driver. I used my Arduino as I have one. The pot varies the speed thro the Arduino so it can't be used on its own. I have some ic chips that can be used as drivers but I have not had time to program and develop so far. I have used geared dc motors but if in a quiet display area they can be noisy, which is why I intend to use this type of motor. I will do some more research and get back with possible alternative forms of electronic drives.

7 years ago by Dave M

Forum

rotating radars off mast

Hi Seafarer You can buy very small 4 wire motors that will fit. I bought a ruck from China via E-Bay for a few pounds and they work fine. The smallest is less than the size of my little finger nail and I need my scope to see the wires which I sourced from Component Shop at Haydock Show. You do need a motor driver and can control the speed down to single steps with a simple pot. I used an Arduino to test and the program is on the Arduino website. When I get time I might just do a blog showing how. Dave

7 years ago by Dave M

Forum

Tank Steering

Hi Dave, it didn't twitch back and forth, it jumped (!) like it had a motor !? I tried it on the Robbe servo tester and it seemed OK. T'other was still dead 🤔 Both servos are fairly recent. The jumpy one a mini Hitec HS-81, the dead one a Conrad (🤔) 8gm micro. If the dead one stays dead the insides will end up in my 'Useful bits' rack! I have a reasonable servo stock so it's not really worth spending much time repairing it. BUT I do like to know how things work and above all why they don't! Bonner: Did you mean the one with the 6 pin plug ? Can't ask the chap who gave me them, also Dave (!) an ex RN Captain I met at the Ostpark lake, I think he died about 10 years ago - RIP. We used to go flying over the Alps at weekends in his ancient Cessna, great fun BUT LOUD. My little daughter loved it 😊 The then wife you couldn't get within a 100yds of it! I don't expect any range problems either, 100yds to the other side of the lake to wake up the sunbathers (Whoop whoop!) is enough for me😉 Cheers Doug 😎 PS: think maybe I'll start a separate thread to continue this saga; testing and product review etc. Just like old times - designing and presenting Comms systems 😉

7 years ago by RNinMunich

Forum

3D printing

I wasn't sure that the Ultimaker original+ is still available but I just checked and it is at 995 Euros. It comes as a flat-pack with all the necessary pieces and, with mine, a free spool of filament. The frame is made from high quality ply wood and the quality and accuracy of the laser cutting is astonishing although you might need to ease a few of the joints with sand paper for a not too snug fit. I sealed my frame with cellulose dope floor a quick-dry finish. The electronics and motors are easy to fit as is the setting up of the transmission components although the latter are a bit fiddly. All in all, it was good fun building the beast. Printing with it is easy, you download the Cura program which will build your G-Code files from an STL file and allow you to set up the printing parameters for the job. I've had a few disasters but generally get good results with PLA printed at 205 degrees with a bed temperature of 50 degrees. I've found PLA from Rigid ink gives the best results but, to be honest, I haven't exactly 'played the field's with filament providers. One point in favour of Rigid ink is that, once you are on their email distribution list, they will send you hints and tips for printing which is a boon as Ultimaker don't provide a pilot's operating hand book or much further reading on it. Would I get another one? Probably, yes.

7 years ago by Delboy

Forum

Couplings

Hi All, a quick question, I've seen these motor couplings used on a lot of European boats on YouTube, they are really cheap. Why don't we use them in the UK? Cheers Wayne

7 years ago by Midlife306

Forum

Couplings

There are loads of these motor couplings on eBay Cheers Wayne

7 years ago by Midlife306

Forum

Couplings

Wayne I suspect it has to do with alignment. Many model boats have motors and prop shafts that are slightly out of alignment and benefit from a universal joint type connector that allows for this. motors and their loads are usually build to tight specs where the drive and load are in absolute alignment. I inherited a box full of similar couplers but with heavy springs in the middle (where yours have slots). The previous owner used to build his own equipment and was into mechanics and lathe work as well as electrics and model boats. If you can get the drive train in line I believe they should work. if you are considering using on your model a further post on the outcome would be great. Dave

7 years ago by Dave M

Response

Bluebird K7

Hi Wayne, thought I'd chip in on this thread when I saw the words arduino! The motor mayyy need a motor controller. Something cheap like a ULN2003 to go between the UNO and the motor. I'm not sure the direct outputs from the arduino UNO will offer sufficient current. s can require quite substantial currents, especially if they stall or are told to "pause". There are some great libraries available for s too. I recommend the Adafruit library. Just make sure the correct pins are identified in the software. if it judders instead of rotates, it's most likely the wrong pins have been assigned to the wrong motor windings. If you get stuck, I'm happy to help with questions too 😁 Stephen

7 years ago by fireboat

Response

Bluebird K7

Hi Wayne The motor on the actuator will require an Arduino or Raspberry to drive. I assume you will be able to replace with a brushed motor if you have neither. I also have an interest on model trains and we use small servos to operate the push rods for points. The retract switch on a Tx would provide the two positions needed by the servo. You are really cracking on with the project and the results are looking very impressive. Dave

7 years ago by Dave M