A Skipjack in Ireland

[trout]

Very nice!
I used old Apple laptop cases (white ones) and reclaimed the plastic from them. Made a very tight bond as you did by layering them and making a piston with them. Your tech rack is looking great. regarding David's comment about the speed, I have to be very careful with my Skipjack on it's speed. First, I believe my throttle is adjusted to 50% on the transmitter and hitting full speed even then it is like a rocket underwater. Then with the remaining throttle I probably do not go about 25 - 30% of that. Looking forward to your sub getting finished and running!

[The Boattrainman]

Hi Trout,

Nice to hear from you, apologies for the long break, I'm hoping to have the Skipjack in the pond this summer. To be honest, I'm a shockingly slow builder, between scratch building my own parts and adding extra details my builds are always epics in length. I can't believe my last build took over two years and that was with very few breaks!

As far as speed goes, I think most models I see are over powered for 'scale' operation. I don't want to be too pedantic but workboats trundling along at 50 knots are ridiculous. Even my extremely heavy Ben Ain at over 20Kg has to have the throttle on the TX turned down to 65%.

I also found these on Ebay, they would work as end caps with some work. Two of them for 5 Euro!




They are marketed as furniture leg protectors, they are 90mm in diameter and could be adapted for the 3.5inch/90mm tube, sheer stubbornness has me making my own caps.


I made this small fitting as an extra resting point in the hull for the WTC, there are only two fittings with the Caswell upgrades, now there are three resting points in total




The Boattrainman

[The Boattrainman]

I came across Arkmodel from China recently, they've some interesting stuff, including this 450ml piston tank for a staggering 100 dollars!

It's exactly the right dimensions because they have a Skipjack conversion kit, and it's over half the cost of the Engel unit, just never heard of Arkmodel before.

Might go with this if I could get someone to give a recommendation on the quality!





The Boattrainman

[The Boattrainman]

This odd shaped piece will go over the battery box, it is just two square pieces of 1.5mm styrene. The round holes are to let some air around the battery and the slot in the side and top will take a 'push-to-break' switch for the navigation lights, which be activated by the piston tank spindle.




There is an opening at either end for the piston tank spindle (simulated by the metal rod in the picture).The piece is screwed to the battery box with four M3 self-tapping screws, I use this screw and no other for all mounts etc, inside my models, so if I drop one or lose one I've a large batch. The screws are covered by short lengths of plastic tube to cover the exposed points.



This area will hopefully hold the piston tank controller on top, the receiver (Rx) in front of the piston tank spindle and if there is enough room the pitch controller.

The Boattrainman

[HardRock]

I like the idea of using the spindle shaft to turn the lights off.

[The Boattrainman]

Thanks HardRock,

Just trying to keep this as simple as possible, the nav lights will light when the main switch is activated and go off during the dive (via the switch on the spindle). One less radio channel!

Rob

[greenman407]

I came across Arkmodel from China recently, they've some interesting stuff, including this 450ml piston tank for a staggering 100 dollars!

It's exactly the right dimensions because they have a Skipjack conversion kit, and it's over half the cost of the Engel unit, just never heard of Arkmodel before.

Might go with this if I could get someone to give a recommendation on the quality!





The Boattrainman

Well I can vouch for the quality of the Arkmodel 1/48 type 7 model but I don't know anything about their other gizmos.

[The Boattrainman]

Thanks Greenman,

I've no reason to suspect their stuff is not up to scratch, so thanks for the comment, I suppose it's the way a lot of manufaturing is going, in that in can be made for a fraction of the cost in the East somewhere. The price is great, the ony drawback is the cost of shipping to Ireland, but it still puts it way below Engel. More drinking (sorry thinking) will have to be done on this!

Rob

[greenman407]

Heres a link you might want to look at. It has a couple of videos in it of it in operation.

[The Boattrainman]

Thanks Greenman, looking good for Arkmodel!

[greenman407]

Well I noticed that the videos didn't show the model in surface trim. I think I would check with Dave Merriman if 100ml of water is good enough for good submerged to surface reserve buoyancy. Perhaps you might need a bigger one. Check it out first.

[greenman407]

As near as I can figure, that's only 3.5 ounces, not nearly enough

[Albion]

Well I noticed that the videos didn't show the model in surface trim. I think I would check with Dave Merriman if 100ml of water is good enough for good submerged to surface reserve buoyancy. Perhaps you might need a bigger one. Check it out first.

the unit posted is 450Ml, might be ok for a wet hull. My koryu is dry hull and uses 500ml, but it doesnt need much freeboard

[greenman407]

I don't know where I got 100ml. It does say 450ml, right on the label. If that's the case then that's 15.75 ounces. Right?

[greenman407]

I would contact them here for clarification. Then click on "contact"