Seaview

[greenman407]

Just snap out of it will ya! You're supposed to be a man! Do I have to come over there and slap you around? Or worse, send HWSNBN?

But.......But.......But

[greenman407]

The work on the ballast vent went well and can be considered operational.

[greenman407]

You know what? I changed my mind. I can do that.....right? Why all the fuss. I have the factory gearing of 3:1 already, lying in my junk box. Instead of searching and modifying, why dont I just use the 3:1 gearing? Try it out on the 2 bladed empellors. If I need more ummph, Ill just change out the 2 bladed empellors for 4 bladed ones Dave sent me? All right, you convinced me. Its a plan.

[crazygary]

You betcha!!!

Go forth, and conquer!! Or, go third and really kick some tail!! Hah!!

CG

[greenman407]

Been recovering from my second bout with the Flu. Started today to get going on the installation of the gear reduction. Should have it in the water next week.

[crazygary]

Some pretty nasty flu strains this year, my friend!!
Take good care and "eat your vegetables"!! Hah!!

"Mom"

[greenman407]

Today I got the gear reduction on and running. Now I need to make two new drive shafts out of aluminum tubing , so Ill need to order new Dumas Dogbones.

[crazygary]

Lookin' good, Sir!!

Good call with the double click-ons for the pushrods!! Very cool!

CG

[greenman407]

Now that the dogbones finally got here, I cut and built the new drive shafts. I did that because everytime I make a drive configuration change the lengths change. The last time I cut and spliced them. Since I believe that this configuration will likely remain , I started out fresh with brass tubing so that there would be less chance of out of balance shafts. Once that was done I needed to seal up the ever increasing size of the slots in the empellor covers where the drive shafts exit. With the increase center to center of the drives, its almost a straight shot down to the empellors. Then to modify again the shape of the foam insert. Now on to the kiddie pool and the final trimming.

[greenman407]

Finally, into the water. Very enjoyable. A healthy increase in speed. Buoyancy is about the same, despite lowering the Subdriver in the submarine by 5/16" and the added buoyancy of a 3&1/2" cylinder in the stern. However, the 550 motors get pretty hot after a while.
The first thing were going to do is buy another digital fish scale and measure the thrust as is. Then Im going to lengthen the 1/8" Empellor shafts and install on them some thrust bearings. The reason being is that when you turn the drive shafts you can feel some resistance. Gotta get rid of that. After measuring the thrust again perhaps we will cut down the empellor blade width to reduce pitch. We will see.

[greenman407]

[greenman407]

[greenman407]

I neglected to say the other day that although the Seaview was moving along faster than she has ever gone before, there was no tendency to nose dive. She behaved well. I just ordered the shafts and thrust bearings from Mcmaster & Carr, and when they get in we will put them in and note the difference. Before I cut down the empellors, Ill probably install some 27 turn 540 motors with adjustable timing and all that good stuff. Im looking for more torque. Ill have to go to 7.4 volts for the motors. But to keep the weight nearly the same Ill use two 2s Lipos in parallel.

[greenman407]

Dave, how do you tell the difference between the 12 volt 550 motors and the 7.2 volt 540 motors? Is there some kind of mark on the case? I ask because there is a possibility that I got 7.2 volt motors installed instead of 12 volt.

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

The 12-volt motors have internal capacitors -- look for the wires coming out of the plastic back-plate that wrap around the terminal lugs. No wires, it's likely an old 7-volt motor.

M