Type VII Build

[oztruck]

Good to hear you have had a win. Don't forget to take your camera with you when you get the boat wet.

Without photos it didn't happen!!

Cheers Chris

[Albion]

Im Snorting :)

Geez, i was having a really bad time with the vent valve, i was getting leaks or not venting at all. I was at stalemate. So i went back to the transmission side of things. I got my drive shafts remade. Re aligned my inboard bearings and generally made the boat more tidy (remember I'm not using the fittings kit! I got the WTC nicely installed in the hull, and realised they way forward now was to finish the WTC. I was glancing over the caswell website and found this

http://www.caswellplating.com/models/Sub-driverBal.mov

Doh, this is exactly what i needed, so three things to adjust
Wheel collars
Schrader valve ( I didnt know this, double doh)
and lastly the the vent valve itself.

Not realising the second part i was trying to make the vent valve work in harmony with the schrader, not realising the schrader could be moved. As David says in the video, last resort is the vent valve. I had been taking my vent valve on and off and resealing it and losing a day every time.

Anyway a couple of hours (i had to reset the RX and the ADF) and every thing is working well. Should be able to get it properly wet after christmas :)

The snort manifold on top of the WTC is sat with its RTV drying right now

[beeryboats]

Thanks to all your photos, I've found out where a couple of the parts to my Gato are supposed to be used! The wire strain block is for the switch and the dog bone with set screws is for the forward planes. I swear, building this sub is like putting together a puzzle without a box top photo to guide you. I think it makes a better builder out of you. It makes you really think.

[Albion]

Looks like the drive shafts from the WTC are just beyond the rear of where the saddle tanks fair into main hull. If thats the case i should have enough spacer length.

Here's the assembled WTC now using the sombra SL-8 which works flawlessly with the ADF.

Still slightly leaking through vent valve, which also doesn't seem to open very well. but we are getting there

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

WTC nearly assembled. Need to relocate the snort pump as the hoses are being blocked by the ballast servo. Also vent valve is leaving, do you need quite a bit of force to hold this shut???

Lastly with the WTC central lengthways in the hull and just off the bottom of the hull, the WTC shaft ends are about 1 1/4" from the output shafts, but with around 1/2" offset. Is this normal, looks like im going to have a noisy transmission with that kind of offset

Your running gear, from SD to shafts, should look like this:

[Albion]

WTC nearly assembled. Need to relocate the snort pump as the hoses are being blocked by the ballast servo. Also vent valve is leaving, do you need quite a bit of force to hold this shut???

Lastly with the WTC central lengthways in the hull and just off the bottom of the hull, the WTC shaft ends are about 1 1/4" from the output shafts, but with around 1/2" offset. Is this normal, looks like im going to have a noisy transmission with that kind of offset

[Albion]

Not much this weekend, had a wedding Saturday. Anyways tested the ballast tank, and firstly noted it holds just shy of 250ml, not bad considering.

Then noticed i had water getting into engine room area. Looking at the o ring it seemed to be seated ok, but there was just a whisper of water passing the o ring. Took the bulkhead screws out and wiggled the bulkhead and tried again, this time no leak. i suspect one of the screws was just pulling the lexan tube out of shape, and so i've backed off the screws a bit, they are only for axial location anyway.

Need to resolve the Rx problem now and get some wire.

[oztruck]

Impressive. Looks like you are having a lot of fun. Keep the photos coming

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

Congratulations, Doctor Meacham. You have successfully assembled your Interocitor. A rare achievement, indeed.

And, in so doing, you have passed our test.

Report to the air-field tomorrow morning for your flight to our facility.

Looking forward to meeting you.

Exeter,

[Albion]

Being a cheap skate I decided to buy the kit and assemble myself, can’t be hard can it, the motors and servos are already assembled along with the seals, so it’s a doddle.

Hmm on opening up the packaging and looking at what’s included there is a daunting variety of parts and screws. I remembered there was a thread about building a sub driver, so went to that and gradually got a picture for how it all goes together.

Step one was to connect up power to the ESC, and RX and ensure it was all working, as you may have seen on another thread I have a minor compatibility issue with the RX and the ADF, but otherwise all working ok.

Step two was to get the ballast tank assembled, something which I thought was going to be a mother of a job, however Tuesday was a public holiday, so I sat down and made a start. Aside from a couple of schoolboy errors (one bulkhead back to front, gas tank in wrong way round [there’s a cut out to clear the conduit]) the whole lot was together in less than an hour, and that included coffee, mistakes and general laziness 

I also fitted a switch to the dry forward end cap. Drilled a hole to accept the threaded part, then a slightly bigger recess, which I then dremmeled out into a rectangle to accept the switch body. Also drilled out the wiring strain relief block and epoxied it into place. Need to get some more silicon wire, and finish up the wiring now.

Lastly the snort manifold was slightly misaligned, so I opened the holes up and prepped this for attaching to main bulkhead

[Albion]

Having failed to get a RCABS working on this hull I bit the bullet and went snort. The use of the snort pump with the gas tank is a big step forward, and means you could use this in a pool without using any gas makes for an attractive package.

Before moving on to the new WTC, a quick review of where the hull is up to. I started this way before the fittings kit was even conceived, so it’s all using the kit appendages.
In my usual style, everything is over engineered and strengthened. Once I get a bit further on, I will profile the brass parts so they look more in scale. Strength has already been proven after one of the cats knocked the hull off the desk, it landed on the stern and slightly misaligned some parts but otherwise it escaped. Also shown is my A123 battery pack