Pwllheli Mersey Rebuild

Well I picked this Mersey up today very cheaply I may add.It was built around 10 year ago by a Member of the Gwynedd Model boat group and it used to sail on LLanberis Lake in Snowdonia.Now no way am I getting converted to the Lifeboat clan this is as close as I 'll get...The only Reason I have bough tit is simple really Grandfather used to be a cox at the Pwllheli Station and i have allways admired this model.

Well I definatly needs a full rebuild or in this case start again simply as it is far to tired for a sympathetic paint job 
When I got it home i started making soe investigation work...well I was shown it working but it had a very noisy motor...MMMM turned out to be a bent shaft ARGHHHHHHH...Never mind.

Upon inspection I soon realised it needed a new deck due to it being cracked....the coaming around the superstructure was also cracked HO HUM.

Whist inspecting it I used my nail just under the windows nad result they literally fell off....new ones me thinks.
Now me being ME I decided to prise the cracked deck and low and behold it was so so easy to remove the whole deck...another result which now means I can get at the stancheons very easily without damaging them another result .

There is a possibility I have a bent shaft i will remove them again and find out if it is or not...more on that if it is the case so to speak.

The props are far far to small and will be replaced in time and the jury is out motor wise.Now OMG the rudders are well how can i put it well NOT exactly central to the probs.....redrill and refix methinks !!!!!!

Now i'll let you guys make your own mind up when you look at the pics...please dont laugh to much...In MY MIND it is a good starting point and I simply will not be doing an interior simply as I am not a purist and rivett counter...this will be a model that will be used and not a show queen !!!!!!!!!!!

IMG_4215 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4216 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4217 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4218 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4219 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4220 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4221 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4222 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4223 by David jones, on Flickr

The bent shaft is on the right hand side motor as you look 

IMG_4224 by David jones, on Flickr

Underneath the superstructure

IMG_4226 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4227 by David jones, on Flickr

OOPSY not in line with the prop

IMG_4229 by David jones, on Flickr

Windows peeling of...Held methinks with eveostick

IMG_4230 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4231 by David jones, on Flickr

Oh Dear Me the deck sort of fell off 

IMG_4232 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4233 by David jones, on Flickr

So whats next yes crawl intro the corner of the shed and cry cry cry///Me thinks it is time t get the paint stripper out, strip the paint off the hull and remove all the gaash wood and get a bare hull and start again...OH the JOYS of model boats

Dave NOT the lifeboat nutter

matey, i'd have given what you paid for that...…..bit of hard work and some tlc………….and you are the man for a good paint job...…….a bit of brass silver soldering [ which I could do for you, and you'll have a spanking good Mersey...………..

I can see mike p's  mouth watering himself...……….it gives you an almost blank canvas to start anew....re arrange the scruffy interior, and make some new stanchions from tubular brass and she will look great. 

totally agree you need bigger props and some decent blades on them...…….those on it wouldn't push a poo down the bath, lol. 

enjoy the build, it reminds me of what I did with that Atlantic 21...……..a good rebuild to your own satisfaction and good level, and she'll be a cracker.

and whether you like it or not, you are now one of the lifeboat crowd, lol. 


and whether you like it or not...….you have been a while, lol. 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-PxrVm185l4&t=19s

Er excuse me all I was doing was taking a picture, of course I had Nothing to do at all with the controller that was beside me I DENY all KNOWLAGE of controlling a lifeboat  or was I 


Dave

I HAVE YOUR PRINTS ON MY HITEC CONTROLLER, LOL.

OMG what on earth have i bought oh yes a right hesp of cow dung believe you me god knows who moulded this hull it is 100% no a models by design hull far to thin,thin i hear you say more like paper i kid you not.

I will have no option but to lay a 2oz layer all over the inside of the hull and an extra layer around where the deck beams will be to try and rescue it,where the tunnels are you can simply put your fingers though,numerous holes have also been found.TBH i wish i had accepted an offer i had when i first bought it.I dread to think what i will find when i do the superstructure.

IMG_4234 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4235 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4236 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4237 (1) by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4238 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4240 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4240 by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4241 (1) by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4242 (1) by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4244 (1) by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4247 (1) by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4249 (1) by David jones, on Flickr

IMG_4250 by David jones, on Flickr

I suppose the only 2 good things that has come to light is that the shaft that i thought was bent is not the noise was down to a poorly aligned shaft and both motors and speed controllers are ok.

Now where is that can of Stella think i need one or three

Dave

Good job you didn't try to sand the paint off Stavros

Barrie

Corect m8 it is THE WORST HULL I HAVE EVER  come accross it is so so  thin it is unbelevable


Dave

that is the worst hull I have ever seen also

the preverbial bears backside comes into thought, lol...……...happy grp'ing mate......at least you'll get joyfully high whilst doing it...….get the heaters on, lol.

as I said any help you need mate...……..you know where I am with stippling brush in hand. ………..on this site mate, we offer our help free, not 20 quid an hour, 

It's not all that bad Dave. I've had to deal with worse hulls than that!!  

Mike

Aw shucks Guys and if anyone thinks I would ever Pay to get my model done THINK again and that Ego systical big headed IDIOT who posts on a forum moderated by even bigger headed School teacher who can ONLY build Shelving Couldnt repair this one and that's FACT...He cant even solder properly PMSL


Dave

Well it seems i've had my orders from the Captain and my Mersey is going on holiday up to fleetwood to be repaired THANKS NEIL to say it is paper thinis an understatement Neil cna tell yo all about it.

I have been assured that Neil will post on here not only his findings but HOW he is approaching the repair Warts and all as he says.So it is over to you Neil Package will be sent out on tuesday


Dave

JEEEEZE...…...that's been a long 5 days without my computer...it crashed last Tuesday n went in for repair. ….began to have withdrawal symptoms after 36 hours...….but back on line now In trying to get my favourites up to a reasonable list again, even though currys were supposed to do a data transfer of all photos, and stuff, none seems to be where I can find it....so if anyone has a link to the US site that I have recommended to others could they please send me links to them via pm please and any others you think I might like. cheers.

stavros wrote:

Well it seems i've had my orders from the Captain and my Mersey is going on holiday up to fleetwood to be repaired THANKS NEIL to say it is paper thinis an understatement Neil cna tell yo all about it.

I have been assured that Neil will post on here not only his findings but HOW he is approaching the repair Warts and all as he says.So it is over to you Neil Package will be sent out on tuesday


Dave

looking forward to the challenge matey...….should be fun, and I can get high on it too. lol

Well the boat is not only packed away but it is also on it's way up on Holiday to Neils' and should be there on monday....cant wait to get it back so I can get on with my fav part Painting lol.The obviously the Hard work and spending starts begins.

Dave

I shall look forward to receiving it mate...……….what I will do with it then, god only knows.

Fill it up with wood and give it a viking funeral maybee 


Dave

Well blow me top marks to Delsol couriers I dropped the Parcel off at 345 yesterday and was told it will be there for monday Well low and behold Neil received it this MORNING and not even damaged either ...Bonus....Neil has already started on it and he will post pics up as soon as he can 


Dave

"she" was dropped on top of me whilst I was asleep in bed this morning at 10.15 hours......

its not the sort of female I had in mind for sharing my bed this Christmas, but beggars can't be choosers I suppose, 

and without the ability to download my pics from my camera onto this new computer, all the pics I have taken are A B S O L U T E L Y  bloody useless until I can fathom it all...……..but I can say that I will have the job of re glassing the boat done, long before I've figured out how to transfer these photos I've taken, lol.

onwards and upwards. I couldn't find any brushes tonight to start, so will buy some cheapies for glassing up tomorrow from home bargains and get the job done in one go tomorrow.

got my resin, got my matting already cut, and got my rubber gloves...………….only need the brushes now and all set to go.

right, for some reason, my sim card miraculously started working whilst I was messaging stav……...and have now down loaded todays photos....

I am under that bloody box on my bed somewhere.........dropped unceremoniously on my head by my daughter at 10.15 this morning!





then it was down to clearing off my benches.







and then removing the model from the box...……...the moment of truth...………..it wasn't the biggest disaster I have ever seen...…….there was Chernobyl, Nagasaki and Hiroshima, and even labour's disaster last night, and so I thought...…….this is easy peasy in real terms...…...so get on with it neil and do what you do best......wing it, lol.





and so I got down to it. I decided the easiest way to repair the damage was to tape up the holes and bite marks out of the top bulwarks of the hull with two layers of tape, and lay up to that with multiple layers of matting, and so that is what I did.













and then I checked the resin to see if it had lost its shelf life but that was fine to go, and finally got down to cutting and splitting the layers of glass mast to make it thinner and easier to lay up. I always by 2oz chopped strand matting, and split it into two layers of 1 oz......that way it is 50% cheaper than buying double area meter wise of 1oz chop strand...…….more economical………… now, you don't get that information freely on mayhem, lol.



 


so!!! until tomorrow …....that's all folks.

the first layers [ 2 of] have gone into the hull.

I have a chart for resin to catalyst that I use depending upon the temperature both in and outside my workshop, and the chart shown is with heating on and a nice sunny day, and isd the maximum normally for those conditions.

however during winter and the heaters only just keeping an ambient temperature, I would normally add another 40% catalyst to resin.

but in this case I kept the mix to the maximum for a hot day, the reason being that the hull is so very [ and I mean VERY] thin that if I add more catalyst, I would get a "hot" mix and the chances of rippling or even distorting the hull would be probable, NOT  possible.

so will just have to show patience and let the first layers go "off" on their own before I trim the bulwark top.

once trimmed i'll leave it to harden and semi cure over night before adding a couple more layers of 1oz chopped strand mat.

then we will see how strong and rigid the hull is and whether it needs more treatment. 

hull has now been trimmed at bulwark level, and its just now a waiting time until the first layers have set hard.....couple of hours I would say, before I can add the next layers. 

WOW a master at work that looks simply stunning there is HOPE for it yet 

Dave

I've been out to the old girl in the last 10 minutes and although the brush I used had gone rock hard, the interior surface on one side , the side I finished working on last is still tacky to the touch, ever so slightly but the other side has set well. the temperature is dropping outside but my oil heaters are just keeping heat inside, and so!.

I have decided that I will lay up the other two layers tomorrow morning, giving the stuff laid on today the chance to set tonight, and now that the first layers have taken well and made the hull much more rigid and firm, I'll add a little more catalyst to combat the cold damp outside atmosphere. and by tomorrow night, Mr Stavros Jones, will have a hull that a fart wont blow a hole in. 

the hull is now in a state of turning from setting to curing, but as of 22.30 it is far too cold outside and the ambient temp in my workshop has dropped it is futile to put anymore matt/resin on the boat tonight and so I have just cut some 12mm square strips and cross cut them in two directions to use as the deck support stringers ready for "implanting" them onto the moist  final layers of matting that ill put on tomorrow...…..and then Dave will have his hull back, nice solid and rigid, ready for him to work his magic on....

there is an ulterior motive to all this though...……...I want him to spray my Tyne Class lifeboat, when I eventually get round to building it, lol. 

Get it ready then and ill do them BOTH sort of 2 for the price of 1 lol


Dave

it will be a while yet mate...…..I have to finish these two sailing lifeboats and then make the plug and mould for this steam lifeboat that I need to mould  to give my friend who donated the steam plant some hope that it will power a model...…….so it isn't going to be worked on until late next year.

FINAL layers of matting have been laid around the deck level and the obeche strip has been bonded in to the matting to give strength both to the hull and the deck when laid. 

the use of copious spring clamps to help bonding is also helpful, lol.

once the resin has gone off this afternoon I shall trim the obeche and ragged edge of the matting to correct deck level with my power sander, and then repack ready for return to north wales.

i'm not highjacking Daves thread by any means, but just thought I would do a little appendage to my fibre glassing.

after putting on the last two layers this lunch time the temperature has dropped outside and the temp in the workshop is hardly holding its own, 

and so I got the hot air gun out of hibernation and set it going from one end and then the other, and to recirculate the heat I roughly covered the top as best I could with a sheet of hardbopard…….it seems to be working and the tackiness has been arrested, but it took an hour at least of high heat to blow just enough into the hull to turn the process.

however, what to do in that hour or so...…...I decided to trim the cabins on my recently acquired 3rd or 4th hand owned Tyne class hull and cabins.

it was not until then that I found that the cabins were nearly as thin as Daves hull, and each time I marked the cabin bottom and linished to shape, a bit more gelcoat crumbled off, and at that point I began to realise that these two models were possibly moulded around the same time with minimal thickness, both in matting and gelcoat covering...
c'este la vie

we have the technology, we can repair.

sod your Shannons, they are becoming as common as pugs these days, and I know, I have one.

my two favourite "modern" lifeboats together...the Tyne, I now own and Dave's Mersey after her new inner skin

Having stripped it down, trimmed it up and sanded to the correct bulwark level including the deck support timbers, I can honestly say it's "chunky". 

To be honest it is considerably heavier than it was and will need the two 900's to get her on semi plane as she should be at full speed, but she WONT  need any ballast at ahh. Ii actually weighs about the same as my Tyne hull, which to me is a little flimsy as you can push the hull inwards. The Mersey hull you cannot. It is rock solid..

Perhaps she might have got away with two layers of 1oz chopped strand, but the holes were still visible through 2 layers so I opted for 3......still less than some manufacturers that use 2 x 2oz chopped strand, and far more durable than a single 2oz layer which can, in my humble opinion feel very flimsy.

so here it is, trimmed up and sat next to my Tyne…………...would like to see these two together on a lake one day going to a shout at full chat.



 

The G Clamps are just holding a few bits of deck supports on that broke away when I  was using my Worx power cutter

Well, back from the mayhem of another place, 

I now hand this thread back to Dave, as his Mersey hull has been sent back to the depths of north wales for him to carry on with the restoration of this, his first encapsulation into the world of lifeboats.

and I can get back to working on my classic lifeboat models.

I enjoyed my sojourn back into the realms of glassing...……….but please...……..anyone out there, don't ask me again until the weather gets a lot warmer.

just as an afternote, I forgot to give the insides a good rubbing down, matey to get rid of the "needles" from the strands of glass, so give it a good go with course grit...

also I forgot to take off the tape in the tunnels, all in the rush to get it in the post.

Right then the hull is in work getting a coat of primer filler so I decided to strip the superstructure down....well that didn't take long as everything simply fell off !!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

First thing i noticed as soon as I started to strip the paint down with nitromous was a line of filler around 10mm along the length of the deck line MMMMM WHY.......after some careful measuring from the rnli plans I found out that the cabin sides were 13mm to high....The superstructure had not been sanded down to the correct height but in fact had filler added to get the correct line between the deck and superstructure....never seen that one before.

All of this gloop has been removed and sanded down inside to find the original line...ODD isn't it the superstructure is as pathetically thin as was the hull....fun and games indeed.This will obviously realayed up with a single layer of 2oz matt as soon as the rest is paint stripped....Many of you will shudder that \I am using ordinary Nitromous paintstripper and not a propriatory one for GRP,I will not allow the stripper to be on for longer than 5 mins and will strip the layers off slowly and wash it off in between applications,thus minimising andy chance of damage to the gell coat .

Remains of the mast etc

IMG_4342 by David jones, on Flickr

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well, matey, all I can say is its a very steep learning curve for any members with little knowledge of working grp to be reading this resto, and how to make a silk purse from a sow's ear...….

I have faith in you mate...……..onwards and upwards.

There is one of the main reasons that I avoid grp superstructures, either too thin, too thick or the wrong size!!

If I'm going to make a cock up then I would much rather it be of my making and not somebody elses idea.

So it was time to repair the superstructure so it was out wit the resin and matting,all the widows were masked up on the outside with silver metal tape amd every hole was also plugged and a simple 2 oz single layer was applied all inside the superstructure adding strength to it.

Must admit I was well impressed with myself as i have not done any grp work for  a couple of years and the edge of it is uniform with no real work to on it except recut the window holes  and a quick sand to get rid of any spikes.

IMG_4350 by David jones, on Flickr

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Dave

sending you a message matey

ooooooh…...I can smell the resin from here...…...good job done...……...i'm redundant, yehhhh