Innehållsförteckning för August 2023 från Model Boats

There can be few readers who haven’t witnessed or even experienced a model unexpectedly stopping during a sailing session. If lucky, the model will drift back to safety; if not, it will drift into an inaccessible place. At this point any nearby modellers will usually leap into the Samaritan role, requested or not, and attempt to use their models to push the errant one back to the lake/pond side. What follows can be highly entertaining – well, to any spectators, but probably not to the owner of stricken vessel. The tactic most salvors appear to employ is to aim the rescue vessel at the largest target, which means trying to push the model sideways. However, since most models have rounded if not pointed bows, this causes problems. Unless the recovery…

Open wheelhouse tugboat I’ve just finished building a 1930s’ steam tugboat model, complete with 3D-printed six-cylinder engine, boiler and crew. I designed this so that you can either put in a live steam unit or leave everything as is and go electric – it also has a smoke generator. It’s modelled on an actual tug, which features an unusual ‘wheelhouse’, open to the elements and designed so the captain can get 360o viewing for hook up, towing, etc. My captain figures is positioned in this wheelhouse looking towards the stern so he can supervise his crew and hook up. The model measures 1100mm in length, with a 350mm beam. The hull and all the fittings, etc, were supplied by Float-a-Boat here in Melbourne. The model is currently up for sale…

Signals 1:64 SCALE KITS New to the Vanguard Models range Two 64 scale period ships have been added to Vanguard Models’ prestigious range of high spec kits. The first of these two kits, resulting in a model of 880mm in overall length, 577mm in overall height and 312mm in overall width on completion, is the Baltimore privateer schooner Grecian (1812), priced at £325 (plus shipping). This kit includes: ◼ Laser cut and engraved parts in MDF and pear wood.◼ Laser etched and cut lime wood deck with treenail detail 3 sheets of photo etched brass High resolution 3D-printed parts.◼ 20ft cutter boat for the modeller to build up from 3D-print and wooden parts.◼ Double planked hull in limewood for first planking and pear wood for second planking.◼ Walnut dowel for…

The St. Patrick Golly, where do I begin? How is it that a fellow living in a tiny hill town in Western Massachusetts, USA, came to build his first scale R/C boat – let alone a model of a RNLI lifeboat? It’s hard to believe I’m actually sitting here, sipping my coffee, fending my Siamese kitty Gracie off the keyboard, pondering an article about it! What do I want to accomplish here? After all, the idea of writing an article for an international model boat magazine whose pages are full of exquisite examples from veteran model builders is, to say the least, just a bit daunting! Well, I guess that’s the point – every journey starts by taking that first step, so the aim of this article is to encourage…

Paddle steamer project PART ONE I had always fancied the idea of building a paddle steamer and tackling the unique challenge that a paddler model represents, but for a long time (bearing in mind I’ve been a modeller for 50 odd years now!) other projects always seemed to end up taking priority. During 2021, however, the opportunity arose to have a closer look at this type of model, and PS Bilsdale is the result. Paddler history Apart from some 18th century experiments, steam powered paddle vessels were progressively developed in the early 19th century, initially as an auxiliary source of propulsion to sailing ships, until superseded by the more efficient screw propeller for ocean going vessels in the second half of the 1800s. However, the paddle remained a common…

Flotsam & Jetsam The first ever nuclear propelled vessel, the SS571 Nautilus, was launched in January 1954 and commissioned the following year. It immediately began to break all records for submerged speed and endurance, its nuclear power plant making it free of the need to re-surface for air and able to realise for the first time the dream of unlimited underwater travel that fiction writer Jules Verne wrote of in 1869 when he penned 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea. Design In 1946, when it began to look as though a nuclear power plant might be possible for a submarine, a proposal was put forward to base the design of the submarine on the Type XXVI advanced German U-boat, an unfinished World War II project (see Flotsam and Jetsam, June 2023…

Steam Basics Pt. 143 You may remember back in the February 2023 edition of Model Boats we looked at a new steam plant from Miniature Steam Models in Australia, named the Econo plant. While initially this could look to be an almost identical article, I can assure you it’s not. Previously I covered the vertical 2-inch gas fired boiler with a twin cylinder Avon oscillating engine, all mounted on a common base with the gas tank and separator included: a very compact and lightweight plant suitable for a smaller model (see Photo 1). This was, and is, also available with the Tyne, single cylinder engine. While that plant is in a size range to be able to compete with many solid fuel fired boilers and still offers the flexibility and…