Innehållsförteckning för June 2023 från Model Boats

A first look at… Following on from last month, the remaining work on the main structures (from the internal bulwark walls with their staggered port openings to ensure they could be levelled out evenly and horizontally to the installation of the engraved decks) I found to be very straightforward. Before adding those exciting touches to the decks, though, a series of strips and composite strips need to be attached to the external hull to create the various rails. For this job, I tend to use Gorilla Glue CA gel, as this product allows a few seconds to realign things if they appear to be wrong. At this stage, the pre-cut gunwales, which require no adjustment in shape or curve, are installed too. Even though this kit is classed as ‘Master’…

A lifebuoy for beginners At one of our club open days a passerby started asking questions about the models on display. To precis the following 20 minutes or so in discussion, he initially wanted to know if they were kits. We then started to talk about model boat building; kits, semi-kits and scratch. In essence, it transpired he was absorbed by the process of turning a ‘two’ dimensional plank of wood into a ‘three’ dimensional model. Various factors emerged: although quite knowledgeable in other areas, there was little experience nor confidence in hand skills; with a young family, there were critical demands on disposable income and his spare time; and there was little space at home in which to work. But clearly there was a great keenness to learn. Those…

All hands on deck! HMS Cyclamen Further to Richard Simpson’s two-part feature [see the March and April 2023 issues of Model Boats] in which he put his own spin on a mass-produced Graupner RTR model, I thought you might like to include an example that I’ve also been personalised to a great extent in the Your Models section. Gone is the port flak shield – there never was one because this was where entry was made to the ship forwards. Instead, I’ve added railings and extended them along the hull under the bridge wings (let’s face it, Graupner omitted them even though every corvette had them). Gone, too, is the bread store above the engine room, as my model represents the ship as she was when attached to the South…

OUT AND ABOUT Flotilla: 100 Years of Getting Our Ships Together This newly opened temporary exhibition at the Lancaster Maritime Museum, Custom House, St George’s Quay, Lancaster, LA1 1RB will run until July 9, 2023. Open from April 1 through to September 30 each year, the Museum occupies two historic buildings on St. George’s Quay, the city’s main 18th-century harbour – once a bustling place of import and trade from all over the world. Its exhibitions and displays are aimed at stories of Lancaster and Morecambe’s relationship with the ocean, the challenging lives of those living and working in the places between land and sea, how the area’s inland waterways have shaped the lives, work, and leisure of the local population and the dark legacy of the Transatlantic slave trade.…

When I migrated from England to Australia on the SS Strathmore in 1963 at the age of five, the sea entered my blood and ever since then I have been building models of boats and ships. My latest completed project commenced in the late 1990s. I wanted a subject with the grace of the age of sail but with the ease of operation of a powered craft. I found a book by Alan Deans on the steam yacht Ena, a 100 ft yacht built in Sydney in 1900 and now part of the Sydney Maritime Museum. She has been described as the best example of an Edwardian steam yacht still in existence and is woven into Australia’s maritime history. I knew as soon as I saw the book that this…

Propelling a submarine underwater requires a means that is independent of the air, and by the turn of the 20th century designers had universally settled on electric propulsion via batteries to achieve this. Among the advantages of electric propulsion was the instant availability of reliable power, but along with it came the disadvantage of low underwater speed and endurance possible due to the great weight and limited energy storage of the batteries. The search had long been on for an alternative, and the one that came closest to providing the answer – until it was rendered irrelevant by atomic energy – was the Walter turbine. Hellmuth Walter Professor Helllmuth Walter (1900-1980) was a German engineer who became intrigued with the possibilities of hydrogen peroxide as an oxidant in the early…

If ever there was a single workshop process that everybody involved with modelling has to perform at some point and which is probably the one process that more people than not do either incorrectly, badly or, in some cases, even dangerously, it’s drilling a hole. I’ve never really worked out why so many modellers struggle with this. Is it, I wonder, because it’s deemed such a simple task it’s not considered worthy of a second thought? Don’t get me wrong, I’ve made my fair share of blunders, but I’d like to think that at least I tried to take all the precautions to minimise the risk and, also, that I’ve learnt from past mistakes and now avoid what led to them. Consequently, this month’s Boiler Room topic focuses on nothing…

Got views to air or information to share? Then we want to hear from you! Letters can either be forwarded via email to editor@modelboats.co.uk or via post to Readers’ Letters, Mortons Media Group, Media Centre, Morton Way, Horncastle, Lincs LN9 6JR Long lost design concept Further to Mike Newell’s ‘Identity Crisis’ letter and photos appealing for information on his ‘mystery model’ published in the March 2023 issue, I would like to add to the subsequent responses from fellow readers. Back in 1974 when I joined Short Bros (builders of the SeaCat missile system) we had on display a large model of a Vosper Thorneycroft patrol boat equipped with a SeaCat. The Veron model at 52 inches sounds about right for size. Unfortunately, some years later it disappeared, fate unknown; I…

Need-to-know build info As a modeller who enjoys seeking the unusual and constantly challenging myself, while recently pondering my next project it occurred to me that I’ve built a round ship (Vice Admiral Popov – see the April 2022 edition of Model Boats) and a square ship (SS Ernest Bazin – see the November 2022 edition of Model Boats), so how about a triangular ship? While surfing the net, the advancing image of Sea Shadow that jumped out at me seemed near enough to fit the bill here, and, equally, on researching this vessel a little more, I became fascinated by the ship’s SWATH (Small Waterplane Area Twin Hull) flotation system. For your eyes only The Sea Shadow was built in 1984 to examine the application of stealth technology on…

Something old, something new… A couple of years ago, when I spotted an early 2000 vintage Aquacraft Atlantic tug offered for sale inexpensively on an online auction site it seemed too good an opportunity to pass by, as I knew that Dennis, a dear friend of mine who wasn’t in the best of health, had always wanted an R/C tug that would be small enough to carry and yet large enough to have “pond presence”. The vendor freely admitted he’d bought the tug from a thrift shop, and that it had certainly seen better days. I was confident, however, that with a little bit of effort I could upgrade the electronics, make it more realistic looking and add LED lighting, smoke and sound effects, and so duly purchased it. There…

Much earlier on in this series I commented on the well made two-function sets that Flight Link Control (FLC) designed and built especially for marine modellers, specifically mentioning the second of them – a little radio called the ‘Duette’, and (elsewhere) I expressed a willingness to purchase a nice example of the firm’s earlier ‘Launch Link’ if anyone still had one lurking in a loft or shed after so many years. Well, I wasn’t that lucky, but a couple of kind modellers did get in touch. Duette One of the kindly boaters who wrote to me was Ian Bell of Northants, who corresponded by saying (edited slightly) ‘’When I started sailing radio control boats it was with a small yacht in about 1977. I sailed as part of a group…