A lifeboat build blog...........How a kit is made!

Very smart Neil



Alan

Cheers Alan.........they're gaining momentum, lol



today was deck fitting...yet again, lol


what would I do without old batteries and parcel tape.

deck overlays have now been glued to the main decks.just allow it to all dry for the next few hours. before removing all the weights.

Been there done that , If the glue gets a chance to foam between the to pieces you are Knackerd, you wont get it down , I was glueing 0.005mm fiberglass on top of the lite ply decks , very thin but gives a fantastic finish when painted plus will not ley the ply de laminate if it gets water in .



galso ot one of the sanders you bought Neil works great, I needed to remove some 4" x 1" in a cubourd in a tight place so It was an excuse to buy one for modeling , it riped through it very pleased I have to cut some light steel tomorow am going to try it ,



Peter

I'm glad you like it too, Peter......I have to admit for ripping down uneven surfaces, it has got to be the best tool I've ever bought.saved me hours on these builds...they are amazing.

I changed tact on these decks....didn't use gorilla type glue, as I needed more time to get them set, and I found that using a gas fire in my workshop, there was too much moisture in the air, and the gorilla glue was starting to foam before I got them set........so have used Evostick weatherproof white glue to set these.gave me a bit of working time and with decent slide to them.

I'm lucky in that I have a 8 foot double rad to heat my room plus a lot of insulation, tends to be like an oven, gas fires tend to efect my sinus .

Gorila glue is great but for anyone who hasent used it , squeeze a big dolop on your hands and rub it in....only joking use gloves or you will spend the next two weeks picking it of your hands, I get the blue one's and also use them when turning and milling brass, saves the splinters.

I ended up buying a Bosh saw, as axminster had them £20 off and we have one of there stores just up the road, so when the wife goes to M + S she can call in and get me Tools

Peter

However, even with the weight I had on the decks, AND the parcel tape that I used to hold the deck edges down, when I pulled them all off this morning...I still had a very small piece of deck on each model that hadn't grabbed down and stuck, so great care has to be taken to hold all down to the main decks.
Also on the bow of the Mary Stanford, there had been a small amount of "slip" on ther port deck sheet, and this left a gap between the deck overlay and the king plank, which had to be filled with a thin slither of 1.8mm ply.

However, hopefully this will all look well once all has been sanded and the coats of varnish have been applied.

It's amazing how what looks to be a simple job/task takes so much work and so many attempts are thrown away before you get the pieces to fit just as they should.
I thought theat the bow bulwark boards which will eventually incorporate the bow Gobeye and the two Fairleads as shown in the pics.

They have to follow the sheer of the boat, and also the curve of the bulwarks whilst standing virtical to the deck.
Finally got it right at the second attempt and then tried to "dry" bend one of the boards once cut....it didn't go well.....as I had cut accross the grain, leaving a "short" grain to the timber, and it snapped.......so back to the cutting board and yet another was made.

I then decided that it would be easier to pin the boards with 0.5mm brass wire and then glue the piece into the deck with cyano.
the fairleads were also glued into the boards to give them strength.

The white metal fairleads are generic fittings taken from my fittings bin....and those which were used on the Anne Letita Russell. However they have been re cut to the design used on the other two larger Watson boats of the period.

So a shortish job became a longer one than I thought it would.

Plans can be wrong!!!!

It's always wise when building from scratch to check ALL information before blundering on in your own little world of conceit and self importance.

|I thought that by following the plans for the only one of two of the boats produced that the boat would be built as planned........

I spent time making the bow bulwark boards for the Field marshall and Mrs Smuts yesterday, glued them on and ONLY THEN did I look at the photos that I have of her............only to my annoyance that I had made them far too long, so I then checked the photos of the other Watson H F Bailey, which were the same on plans.....only to find that the photos showed that they too, were wrong..............so this morning, both boats will have the snip......and they should look something like this.

the moral of the story is.........always check all forms of information before going further.

It makes us mortals feel better to know that even the experts get it wrong..

plenty of c*** ups with me, barry....just don't tell them all.the build log would be twice as long, lol

well, after the cock up last night of the bow bulwark boards, I set too and decided to look at the photos of the models I am building rather than use my imagination...so after much trimming marking and cutting of the pieces of 1.8 ply to conform to the sheer of the boat I was able to cut the six pieces thsat make up the curves of the kick boards lodged between the fairleads down the length of the boat.

the sections for the other two boats will be different and so the whole process will begin again tomorrow.

the kick boards are held in place onto the decks using pins made from 0.5mm brass rod drilled into the kick boards carefully and then will be cyano'd to the decks once other bits have been painted.

Today was the turn of the Field Marshall and Mrs Smuts for the kick boards.

However, unlike the H F Bailey where there are broken runs along the length of the deck with this boat, it is a continuous run virtually from bow to stern.

On the real boats the length would have been sections of plank scarfed together in a longitudinal joint..........but as I am working with 1.8mm ply, I didn't fancy that so one length it is.

It was a little problamatic getting the correct sheer line to the deck cut, but with a little sanding and cutting it was achieved.

On the fm & ms there is a gap at the bow end of the main longitudinal boards, port and sarboard, which on the boat is filled with a short length, recessed and fastened to the inside of the bow bulwark boards and the main kick board. thesae are shown on the first photo.

The planks were then transfered to draughting paper for later screen printing and then pinned in the same manner as the bow bulwark boards..

And finally I have done the kick boards and breakwater for the Mary Stanford...again different from the other two and using the same techniques to construct the kick boards for the H F Bailey and the Field marshall and Mrs Smuts.



From now on there isn't much construction left....more a case of using the fittings that I have made and cast, plus the generic ones ( some of which I have already used on the kickboards) and fine detailing the boats, so before I get round to that, i'll now have a good clean up of my workshop so that I can lay all fittings out ready for painting and arranging............in the immortal words of Cptn Oates.........I might be gone some time/"



































and a general view of the other two boats with their cabins in place to get an idea of the scale of the kick boards.

















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Magnificent....

thanks Barry.....they are getting there, slowly and surely.

neil.

Someone asked me by pm on another forum exactly how I pinned the 1.8mm ply with a brass pin so thought I'd put it on here for those with a steady hand.

I first used a tool (really it's a bit like the old bradawl for making holes to start a screw off).that I confiscated from a child one day who was throwing it at a bunch of other kids.............lethal thing but it has come in very handy. the steel tip is ground to a point, and I use this on the end grain to make a dimple into the ply.

once the dimple has been made, the very fine 0.5mm drill bit will not slide around on top, and can be drilled into the end grain of the ply to a depth of around 5mm....

make sure that you drill slowly and keep both the timber and the drill bit ( mounted into a dremmell drill) vertically.

finally cut some lengths of 0.5mm brass rod for the pins, put a little cyano onto a block of scrap timber and dab the ends of the pins into the cyano before inserting into the predrilled holes.

finally using a guideline for the centre of the kickboard position, mark off the positions of the pins in the kick boards, 3 at a time from one end, and just set the kickboards into those holes, before proceeding onto the next three hols in turn......a slow but sure process, that needs to have a firm hold for the kick boards, as these boards will, although bracketted with white metal brackets of those fitted to the Anne Letitia Russell, will need to be sturdy as they will also carry the brackets for the white metal stanchions and cleets/anchors etc.
they will eventually be painted and set in position with cyano once the hulls have been painted.

1. The first pic shows the tip of the "bradawl" with the indentation just to the right of the tip









2. Next is the drill bit going into the end grain of the 1.8mm timber....a steady hand needed







3. The pins have been set into the timber











4. The pin positions have been marked on the deck and drilled.







5. The kick boards set into position and the kick board brackets added.









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Nice Neil, very nice.

So, how many drills do you break



Alan

believe it or not alan........only 2.........mind you I've a packet full of them somewhere as spares...........and like everything else in my shed of sheds.......can't find em........so hanging on to this las one very carefully, lol

Today I did very little except to "cobble " up the surrounds for the bow gobeye fairlead.
It is the fairlead that ropes would be passed through for such practices as veering down on a casualty and as such is quite a heafty fitting made from bronze in real life.....but here it is a generic fitting with the Anne Letitia Russell, however it will have to be modified before it is finally set into place, and also the whole assembly will be filled and faired in to make a smooth entity in it's own right before passing "muster"





























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today, been cleaning up the edges of the printed decks to the kick boards and readying them for the kickboard brackets..........also been making up the bow fairlead for the Mary Stanford.

unlike the two Watsons which have a white metal fitting, the M.S. is just made up from two printed pieces of 1.8mm ply with a final addition of a bow roller ( not yet fitted) inbetween the two upright flanges of the fairlead.

Also I have been filling the small gaps between the edges of the deck overlays ready for spraying the areas of none slip grey onto the decks and gunwales before also painting the kick boards and finally the decks.

for filling these small gaps I use knifing putty from any car accessory shop, which is cellulose based and covers light scratches and gaps well.

tomorrow's job will be to sand down and fair in with milliput , the white metal fairleads, the Mary Stanford fairlead and the decks,and then adding a few brackets and such for the fenders, grab ropes and rudder before possibly painting the hulls later this week.





















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you would not believe how long it has taken today, just to mask up the decks of three models ready for spraying the antislip areas to the decks, and the deck surrounds..........just unbeleivable, but now it's done, some colour on the models will encourage me to get on with the topside cabins and detailing.

I sprayed the antislip to the parts of the deck needed with a textured paint which dries with a gritty type look, and although not the colour I need for a classic lifeboat, the texture isn't far from what I need, so, not being a true purist, I'll settle for it, with a colour wash later to the lighter grey that I want to match the kick boards.



Masking up.















the inner parts of the front cabins of the H F Bailey and the Mary Stanford posed a little dilemma as I had no combings to stick the tape too......so I coated the inner walls with masking tape and then shoved an old rag into the well to cover the floors.....hope it works, lol















And before I sprayed the textured paint which would almost certainly bung up the small 0.5mm holes that I had drilled to take the pins for the kick boards I inserted some longer brass rod into the start and finish holes to locate the kick boards once the paint had dried.









And then using the textured paint and here is a picture of the textured paint can I use for the none slip deck coatings I did a little shaking and then got down to the serious stuff, and added my first colour.

OOOOHHH.can feel the sap rising, lol









With the end result.



















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Feeling nervous about now Neil???

why's that, Barry?

You have to peel all that tape off and hope it did its job....I know I am always nervous when removing masking tape...

yeh, but the excitement when it goes well, lol....mind you.......I've had some incredible disasters over the years, lol

today's job, after clearing a little space for working on the 3 boats was to seal the kickboards with cellulose sanding sealer.....3 coats were given and then rubbed down with fine grade wire wool.

Finally I painted them with humbrol enamels.the mary Stanford and the field Marshall and Mrs Smuts were painted a light shade of matt brown tan. (which will be given a coat of satin varnish later)......whilst the H F Bailey boards were painted in a mid satin grey.























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also whilst I was looking at the paint drying........very theraputic and avoids boredom, I dug out some pieces that I had made some time ago for the boats to see if they were still there and not lost.........luckily I had made double sets for both the watson and the Barnett class boats, and as the watson has changed in design for the second boat somewhat, I was lucky in that I had only lost one piece which was nort needed on the second boat.......the pieces........oh yes..........the timber gratings for the bottom of the floor for the well decks.

The original 5mm square grating was made as an A4 sheet for me by a mate in his woodworking shop where he had access to a radial arm cross cut saw.we riged a jig to lock into each spur in turn to make the grating "teath" (The crossed halving joints that make up the joints) absolutely square and interlocking into the cross members. It was a fete of woodworking and took hours to cut..........we used Obeche to make it, and I was going to use it on a 1:12 scale model of the Duke of Northumberland water jet drive lifeboat of 1886 vintage.

However after producing a mould and a hull for the boat about 18 years ago I lost interest and my mate dumped the mould and moulding, so the only thing that ever got made for that lifeboat was the grating.......so it came in very usefull for the new boats, being the same scale.

I cut sections off the A4 sheet and then edged it with some mahogany "L" shaped banding that I made, also from two pieces of timber.

the smaller section gratings are for another section of the boat and were bought from an ebay supplier.

They will eventually be varnished with a gloss finish ( possibly satin.............yet to decide).



The last of my A4 sheet of grating.





























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Whilst all the masking tape was still on the deck, I mixed some humbrol paints this morning to a colour match with evedence I have in photos of what those areas look like on the real boats.
I then added some white spirits at a ratio of around 70 - 80% spirits to 20% paint, and "clour washed" the areas around the gunwales and the hatched areas with the very thin paint wash to give the sprayed textured areas a near colour match to the real boats.....something like a light blue/grey.
I also found evidence that the original painted colours for the kickboards for the Mary Stanford was grey, so these were also repainted this morning from the light brown twn colour.

there looking great , dont you get a day off ?

by the way where do you get the A4 size grating or did I read it wrong

by the way what are you going to power them with ?



Peter

Hi Peter.....the A4 grating.....me and a mate madeit on a radial arm say....mounted a blade in it, checked the width of cut and then we cut a thin plank of Obeche....thicknessed it on his thicknesser/planer to the same width as the cut of the blade, and then he made a jig, that would lock into consequative groves as the cross cut made it's cut into the plank, half way through, each time a cut was made, the jig with a swinging arm to the same thickness as the cut, (in steel) was lifted, the timber plang was moved one notch along and then the jig was lowered to lock the plank in place.....it was a slow process cutting one grove at a time.....but we knew that each grove was equally spaced. the plank of obeche was about 8" long and around 3 ' long.

Once all the groves were cut across the plank, the plank was then cut into strips the same width as the width of groves on a very sharp band saw with a fence to guide it.........in that way, all the strips and groves interlocked to make the grating.............but that whole length made just the one A4 size grating.

I'm sure now adays with lazer or water jet cutters the process would be far far easier.....but this was going back at least 18 years, in a home workshop type place.

as for days off...............I am enjoying these builds so much, I can't wait for the next day to come..........for the first time in about 8 years I am making something for myself......and it's great.

I'll be powering them with some big Buhler motors that I have had for years.......but will need a few more of them, so if anyone out there has some going spare for sale, give me a shout please.

They are slowish revving and great torque.......these don't sail any faster than about 4 -5 mph what ever motors you put in them....just liker the real boats the tunnels restrict the speed of them to a maximum...they would never plane or go any faster than physics will allow.

cheers, neil.

well, I stripped the masking tape off the decks today and found I'd dropped a b*****s with one section of one of the boats.........I'd not masked it up properly and it had left a small area not painted that should have been, so had to re mask and spray again....after a couple of hours and a quick colour wash job it had blended in with the other areas that had been painted.....so all was not lost.
Also I found that there had been very little weepage under the masking tape of the very thin paint wash and this was soon scraped off to leave clean edged.
I repainted the kick boards for the Mary Stanford to grey and then painted some fairleads in antique bronze and a full 3 sets of kick board brackets in grey.
To end off the day's work I made a mould from 3 old grab rails I had made out of room temperature vulcanising rubber, plastecine and Lego building blocks which I will eventually cast for deck fittings for the mary Stanford and H F bailey.




























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I told you I was nervous of that masking tape!!!!

They really are starting to look the business Neil.

thanks barry...this is the part I now start enjoying......all the bits start adding to the joy.

Seem to have made one step forward and two steps back today.

I made a set of moulds yesterday for making some grab rails for the deck, but for some unknown reason ( and I've never had it happen before) the both halves set (at different times) with humps in the centres of the mould........so that when I sandwich them between two pieces of ply the outer edges of the moulds don't clamp up properly and they weep any resin that is poured into the moulds.
So I have had to make the boxes again to fit the mould halves and tomorrow I'll mix some rubber and catylist and pour the rubber into the moulding box, and then place one half at a time over that rubber.......this will then give me some "flat" surfaces that when sandwiched between the ply backing sheets will give equal pressure all around the mould.
But that wasn't the end of the story..........I bought on line some Polyurethane quick set resin a few weeks ago.
now this stuff is supposed (as I have always found in the past when casting) to remain subtle and not crack or shatter, and is actually carvable even when months old and fully cured.
Well this pack of stuff that I bought from a new supplier ( to me...They've been around some time though) is possibly a bad batch, as the resin shatters even when splitting the two haves of the mould.........it is more brittle than polyester grp resin........

so hopefully the company will be able to give me some hints as to what is wrong with the stuff when I phone them tomorrow....don't know what's wrong with it though.......not the norm as far as I know from past experience.

but at least I managed to get all the kick boards fitted this afternoon...which, after the disappointment of the moulds and resin cheered me up a little ..ggrrrrrr







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Hi Neil, there are different grades of Polyurethane resin, some stay flexible and some don't.... Did you check the product code? PU 365 is quite brittle where as PU 364 has a bit more flexibility...

W..

no |I didn't windy........actually didn't know that there were two different types................bummer.......and sod's law that they sent me the wrong stuff.

neil.

I'm going out to the workshop to check which stuff I got. lol

There is actually a lot more than 2 types. Have a look here.... http://www.alchemie.com/category/products/polyurethane-resin/

W.

yes......just checked and it's EPCU3652 that they sent me.........trust me.........

Windy wrote:

There is actually a lot more than 2 types. Have a look here.... http://www.alchemie.com/category/products/polyurethane-resin/

W.

OMG.......now that has really complicated matters, lol............sort of baffles the brain on which one to pick.



cheers, neil.

anyway, apart from that little debacle.....I at least managed to get some building done and put the kickboards and brackets on to all three boats today, so a litttle detailing has taken place.

Well Windy, many thanks for all your help and advice regarding polyurethane resin.
the problem is now sorted.
I rang East Coast glass fibre supplies this morning and spoke to the technical advisor called Martin......and he couldn't have been more helpfull and apologetic for my dilhema and totally understood what I was trying to do..........in their defence the technical data sheet says that the minimum thickness for a mould is 3mm, and I was trying to mould 4mm thickness so was right on the edge.
Martin agreed with me that the resin was not suitable for what I was wanting to do, and as such said that if I reurned the twin pack of resin to him he would give me a full refund for the product, even though I had opened the tins and used a little.

I CANNOT ASK FOR BETTER SERVICE THAN THAT, and my thanks and praise go out to East coast fibreglass supplies....many thanks.
neil.

That's great service Neil.

yes it is, Damien, and it's nice to be able to tell people of such good service in these days of "the business is always right, as opposed to the customer".

after sorting out my resin and rectifying my mould( I hope so anyway), I spent an hour cleaning up the "gobeye" faileads on all three boats....all a little different, and this one in the picture has a roller set outside similar to the old Anne Letitia Russell.
Also added the bracket to hold the rope fender in place.

The photo behind is from the bow of the H F Bailey.

I have never known one single mould cause me so much hassle and bother..........firstly as I said in a previous posting yesterday, the mould for the hand rails came out with a hump on each reverse side (i.e. the back of both halves.)

and when I tried clamping together the outer edges sprang open..the only way to correct these was to make a box for each half...lay some rubber into the bottom of the boxes and them lay each half back into the box with the back face making contact with the new rubber............and no release agent between the new rubber and the mould..........the idea being thet the new rubber would adhere to the old mould...........normally without rubber this would happen..............not with this mould for some reason.
firstly the rubber, which had set yesterday within a couple of hours...............took the heat from the radiator all day to go off...........and then when I took the lego away from the newly "repaired" moulds, sod me if the rubber had stuck to the lego but not to the old mould...........I just can't believe that the same rubber from the same tin, with the same amount of catylist can behave totally diferent on two separate days............
I have made hundreds of these rubber moulds over the past 20 years, and never ever have I had so many problems in such a short time.........it has stumped me..............if it don't work this time then it'll be the bin and start again.

I got me fingers crossed agin boss!!!!

Barry........it'd have been quicker making a new mould lol.

Hi Neil, bet you wished you hadn't got out of bed, especially with the cost of RTV silicone rubber.....

Nice chatting with you the other day and pleased you sorted the resin issues....

W...

I bounced back, having had a chat with you windy.............good to talk.

to today's little foray into modelling.
spent some of the afternoon sorting out some deck fittings that I cast earlier last year for the three boats.....some fairleads, cleats and some filler caps and bilge pump caps..........also made up three compass binacles and wheel sets, but the initial coat of primer is drying at the moment.
here are the fittings which now need cleaning up, and a little sanding and getting rid of resin globules formed by bubbles in the rubber.

Roller cleats




Deck light surrounds






Deck filler caps







single cleat






splayed cleats, port and starboard








bilge pump and filler caps