Jupiter, a Caledonian macBrayne Ferry

unfortunately when I was drilling out the centre, I inadvertently damaged the top flange of the funnels, and so have replaced those with a thin strip of 0.8mm plasticard.

photos to follow.

Can't you use a plug within the mold ? It would save heaps of resin.

was told on another forum to pour half the resin in as it is quick set in 4 minutes, and rotate the mould after pouring and whilst setting like on hollow egg chocolate moulds................so will try that on the next set........think it'll work as the resin is so quick setting. neil.

next "little" job is to make the lifeboat......these vessels were fitted in their time with either a lifeboat in their early days or a "sea rider" Rib in later times..........I have for our vessel decided to equip the model with a lifeboat, and so decided to carve one of each ( a transom stern and a double ender ) as the plans at the moment I can't make out which it is.
I love whittling a lump of timber with a few knives and abrasive paper, so this is no hardship........more a labour of love.

I start with a piece of obeche cut to overall dimensions, and mark first the plan shape onto the boat...........this has had to be estimated as I can't find a plan view of the boat at present.
Once this has been cut on my band saw, I marked both the sheer and the stem and stern shape which I have a shape for.

Once this has been cut, I have started carving with craft knives starting with the bilge area.

Some might ask.........but what about the stem and keel for the boat.................

ahh, I say.......once the boat has been carved to shape, I then cut it down the centre line on the band saw and insert a keel of correct shape between the two halves and glue it all together............simples.

the carving and sanding of the two boats have been done now and tomorrow will slice them down the centre line to install the keel........I really enjoyed that little bit of work tonight.

decided whilst in the mood to slice and dice my two lifeboats tonight...............and so through the band saw they went.
once I had done that I cut some 2.5mm ply and glued the two halves to them.............will cut down the centre keel tomorrow before I seal them ready for moulding.

the keels have been trimmed, the bulwark belting and bilge markings added and now just ready for sanding sealer before moulding into rubber moulds.........I now have to scour many photos to try to find which boat is the one for the ferry.......might take some time, lol

Neil, re your to heavy cars.
I know this is a touchy subject, but if its a one off, just for yourself, you could use the cast models you have and hollow cast them in resin, as your other parts. Would be much lighter, and as you already have purchased the original models, can't see any harm in doing it as a one off for yourslf.
cheers
vnkiwi

cheers matey................My daughter has decided that she doesn't want all of them on at any one time and so they'll be on a rotation basis I think..............as the decks were never full when I remember them from sailing on them.............but worth a thought...........the thing is I am going to have to think of a way of anchoring them to the deck or they would be nicked down the lake at Fleetwood............once had a trawl door nicked from one of my big trawlers.................what ain't glued down will disappear, lol...........I'd be left with no vehicles at all after a day on the bank.

Thanks for posting up the link to here Neil - mighty decent of you chap!!!
Now I can get back on with my education

(Was having withdrawal symptoms not being able to follow this build................. )

Carl

you are most welcome matey.................glad you came over
to view the build................and any questions you have, just fire away,

I finally found some photos on my files of the type of boat she carried.........it is the double ender, so luckily I didn't make only a transom boat...............will now be able to make the mould for the boat and make some mouldings.

I got down to making the davits for the lifeboats today...this has been a little bone of contention between me and ME!......
Firstly where there boats on both port and starboard, second, were they both double enders or transom stern'd..........I eventually found a picture of her port side and saw that that boat was a transom stern whilst the pics of the starboard side show a double ender................so vindication for me in making one of each boat.
Next was to find photos of the davits........................found some of a model I saw some time ago, and with those I have, plus ones I have found on the internet images, have come up with probably as best shape I can..........
starting with some rough sketch and then transferring this to card, I cut out a template, before transferring it to plasticard in 3 layers...the centre fillet a slightly different shape to the others to allow the cables to run up the rear of the davits.
the bases were made using the plans and photos to get what I could see as the shape on images, and the hydraulic rams made from plastic tubing.
In three separate sections, they will be set in plasticine this evening and moulded in rubber waiting for casting at a later stage

Very neat Neil.

Barrie

the mould boxes made, masters placed into the boxes and rubber cast..........the moulds are open faced except for the main davits which will be split moulded

the moulds are ready now for casting........and I am going to try something new with the two boats.......as they are open casts I am going to attempt to put a little surface tissue into the moulds and then pour some resin in........but will have to be quick as I have a 4 minute working time.........it's worth a try before I start using Umi's method of rotating the mould for a thin layer around the mould.

I'll cut the pouring tracks into the split mould later.

Looking good. 

you're up late matey..............or should that be early, lol.

using a product I have never used before..........finishing resin..........

this is to make the little moulds for my two ship's boats......

mixed some into the bottom of the mould to save any wastage and them laid pre cut shapes of surface tissue glass matting into the resin, having previously painted the mixed parts.....and laid up using the same stippling method to give each boat about 3 layers of the tissue......they will be light, thin and hopefully good replicas of the plugs once they come out of the moulds in around 4 hours time.

ahh well, Damien........there in lies a tale...............when I pulled the little mouldings out of the rubber tonght, the inner surface of the resin hadn't gone off and was still sticky, ......I think I had not mixed the resin properly as it comes in 50/50 two part mix, and so I re mixed some more painted it into the rubber and then pressed the sticky moulding back into the rubber mould..........It was also terribly thin and wafery, so I added another two layers of tissue into the inside of the mould..............will see what it comes out like tomorrow..........both mouldings were the same so I think I dropped one somewhere...........but practice will make perfect, lol

I'm confident they come out fine. Glad to see I'm not the only one who has these nasty whoops'es.

my life is full of nasty whoops'es, Damien...........I wouldn't be me if I didn't lol

Been mulling over for the past few days on whether I had enough decent photos of the next item to make an accurate portrayal of it...........the main radar mast atop the wheel house........and then found some good ones amongst my many photos of her..........the question is..........do I build it straight or with the twist on her as shown in photo 4 lol............that must have been some mighty big wave to crack that askew, lol

filler..........if a lot will do when little is needed..........I'm all for it, lol.....

take the mast for instance......

I cut the basic shape from obeche.........nice carving and sanding timber.............

carved the initial rounded shape to the leading edge of it and then sanded down to a nice even rounded shape.

I then added the rear flanges to the mast by adding to the sides, some 120 gram card, in two layers to give some thickness, before filling the thickness out by adding to the inner faces making up to the rear of the mast with a further two layers of the same card, before finally giving it a good dollop of polyester filler to fair in the card to the wooden core.

It will all be sanded off before giving liberal coats of sanding sealer..

what a bit of abrasive paper can do is just amazing.......a few coats of sealer and jobs' a good one.

I made parts of this anchor windlass a while ago including the end of crank compressor, but that turned out crap, and then I lost it, but as I am now "forging" ahead and making all the fittings before construction of the model itself starts, I moved back to the windlass.........turned the basic shape of a new compressor body and the warping and anchor chain drums...have put it all together with blue tac just for photos but it will be moulded in 9 separate parts....two still missing are the brackets for the brakes for the drums....these will be made tonight.

well, the windlass is now ready for moulding.
The brake mechanisms have been fabricated from plasticard and 0.8mm brass wire, soft soldered.

I have also been today working on the platforms on the main mast which hold the radar maintenance platform and steaming lamps. all made from plasticard.
I have also made the first steps to fabricate the main mast radar......this is made from layers of 3mm plasticard which will be carved and sanded to shape for a standard Racal radar set.

well, curiosity got the better of me and I wanted to see what she looked like with the main mast in situ so I had to put the upper flying bridge deck on.

using the age old method of small square section spruce ( or cherry in this case as I had just cut some at 5mm square) I ran some support around the inner faces of the wheel house.

Just a matter then of cutting a template from a copy of the plan I had printed and cut it from 3mm birch ply.

It was then just a matter of cutting out the side top bulwarks of the flying bridge and sitting the deck in place, before gluing with two part epoxy glue. I "clamped" the deck in place by using some of my many dead batteries.........make great weights to set a deck in place.

Then filling the rear end of the deck ( as my ply wasn't wide enough to get a full length out of it..........The whole area is going to be planked as a deck anyway, so the joints won't ever be seen.

tonight I have raised the surrounding bulwarks around the top and perimeter of the flying bridge, using 1.2mm birch ply and two part epoxy resin adhesive.

the two curved sections either side of the raised grp front section were cut from the end of the ply with the primary grain of the timber running vertically instead of the norm, horizontally, so as to aid bending around the curve..

next stage will be to clean up all the window and door recesses before filling all gaps with polyester filler and sanding smooth.

Looking mighty fine Neil.

cheers matey.......getting to enjoy the build a little more now that fabrication is taking place.

nhp651 wrote:

cheers matey.......getting to enjoy the build a little more now that fabrication is taking place.

I had noted that things seemed to have speeded up Coming along nicely

Barrie

cheers Barry..............it's all about inspiration..........and although the fittings are what make the model, it's b***** tedious when you have to make them all, as none available commercially.........it's only when you are on top of them all ( or most of them) that you can get back to enjoying a build.

anyway........now and then when I need a little inspiration I need to put my model together with all it's fittings and have a little look at where I am going to next.....

this morning was one of those moments, lol...........

anyway, back to the grind now and on with the construction, lol

well, I couldn't stop myself this afternoon.......got the chain/cable stoppers done from plasticard and then the deck anchoring plates........these are a facsimile of the real things as at only 8mm square they look close enough but lack absolute detail.........something that with my arthritic fingers I would never have been able to replicate, but once painted and at a distance and covered on the car deck with vehicles they wont look that out of place.....I need close to 40 of those for the deck so made 20 to open cast.
finally I made the small short range radar for the main mast from some layers of 2.5mm plasticard glued together and sanded to shape.

Amazing detail

Barrie

cheers barrie............more to come, lol

I am getting to the stage now wherethe building takes over from the fittings and as such I have a couple of problems..........

both the shelter decks of the car deck and the deck above have to be fitted out before the next layer goes on as there is a wealth of detail under each shelter deck...........

the lower car deck has had it's superstructure added and can now be detailed, but the plans for the vessel are a little vague and I spent some time today studying photos set along side the plans, and have finally worked out where the superstructures for the aft end shelters go and are located.

Tonight I fabricated this rear set of structures from 3mm birch ply, which not only gives correct detailing but also a good support for the grp moulding of the superstructure to be added once detailing has been added...........

pictures below of the construction of the superstructure to be fitted.

Looking bloody good Neil

I find this so inspirational..............

cheers carl..................guess what these bits are.............

answer in a photo below lol

for the last three days when time has permitted I have been fabricating the heated air supply unit and the exhaust vent fan that sit on top of the upper wheelhouse roof.
most parts have been made from small blocks of obeche..a lovely easy to carve and nice grained timber that, with a liberal coating of sanding sealer and rub down with wire wool gives a good enough finish to mould with minimal sanding once out of the mould.

some finishing brackets are made from plasticard

a couple of lockers and the upper deck companionway have been made as "one offs"......will not be moulded as are easy to produce and are hollow to save weight.




.

and smaller but no less important detailing is now being made as I continue to look through the photos I have of the vessels.............tonight working on a raised boarding section at the foot of the inner side of the wheelhouse roof front flying bridge............

I can't see a purpose for it, as there are no seats for crew, so can't be foot rests, the bridge bulwarks are low enough for the crew to see over whiteout standing on the raised section, so what it is for.....I don't know............but it was there so on it goes.

all made from 1.2mm plasticard.

the rear of the main car deck and the deck above which are open to the rear are supported by steel forming a bulkhead and safety rail for "B" deck.........bit of an odd shape with viewing openings cut into the steel. The top of it also supports"A" deck aft and this will also support the grp mould that I have made for the superstructure.
To get it right I carefully took measurements and then made a card template, offering it up to the space to be filled. Once the template was correct and fitting well, I transferred it to a piece of 1.5mm birch ply, cutting out the perimeters with a carpet ( Stanley) knife and then to cut out the openings for the viewing windows I got out my trusty vibro saw.
An Aeropicola vibro saw, it was the first power tool I bought back in 1981.even then  it had had good use at the school I taught at , but now obsolete for use in school I taught in I bought it for the princely sum of 15 quid, and it has been giving valiant use when I need it, ever since.

Cutting out the windows is an easy job with this tool.

finally I put a wooden support flange onto the rear of the frame to support the deck.

Well, I have amazed myself this evening............all the measuring that I did on the rear bulkhead had actually paid off and it fits to the decks like a glove.

Now that I have a good oversight as to how the whole thing will now shap up, I can fit out with all fittings, pipes etc, the underneath of the shelter decks and fit the B and A decks with the superstructure, and once these tricky little areas with limited access have been fitted out and painted, I can then concentrate on the rest of the vessel..........
At last I know which direction I am heading in.

every time I look at the photos, thinking I am ready to put the decks on, or even thinking of detailing the bulwarks, I find yet more fittings that need to be made before I put the decks on..............

last night it was one of the extraction vents, and some lockers.........so made those last night......more to add to the ever growing collection of things to paint and some to cast, lol.

the big problem is that there are no measurements for quite a lot of these fittings, as they are not shown on the plans available so they have to be gauged from other fittings around them and from the height of a scale 6' figure............so some is guess work.........but as the ship went for scrap long ago, anyone who would wish to argue has one standard reply aimed at them, lol.........If ya can do better , then go away and show me.

And just to show that I am no rivet counter or a stickler for exact precision......the black top to the vent stack.......was actually made from the top cover of one of my daughter's make up pen's..........was just the right shape for me........so what she doesn't know is missing, won't hurt her, lol..........she'll never miss it anyway, and looks fine to me.