"Luck" submerging tugboat

[Lockleer1]

I've been asked a couple of times to write something and post pictures of my little wooden sub, "Luck" so here goes. He was designed as a submerging tugboat, fully designed and scratch built by yours truly. I really didn't think anyone would have interest in it, but I was obviously wrong. Truly, I'm rather proud of my little sub and it is a joy to play with in the water. To start with, I started the design and build as a complete rc submarine rookie (not that I'm not now) right after I was introduced into the submarine world. We were working the estate of Warren Wilson and that is where I was fully introduced to the hobby. In working his estate, a few of us gathered his subs and get them running. I ended up with a 1/96 USS Nautilus and a Jules Verne Nautilus. In doing so, I found a slew of videos online to help with some general knowledge, and one person in particular, Bob Martin, stuck out as having the most videos readily available. One day (September 2024) watching one of Mr. Martin's videos, he mentioned that "wood is an easy material to work with but should never be used in rc submarine applications" not a direct quote but close enough. I paused the video and in about 15 minutes I finished my first iteration of what became "Luck". Within a couple of hours I had a redesign, patterns then keel and ribs cut out to start planking;"Luck" is plank on frame. I very much agree with Bob in that, any little crack, imperfection, or any exposure of the parent material to water can and will cause absolute chaos on the hull, but I knew it could be done if done right. "Luck" is 1/4" birch ply keel and ribs with Sapele planking for the majority of the hull. There are accent planks of Teak and the "stinger" on the rudder is Peruvian Walnut. Of course, Luck wasn't done for Subfest due to way job and the storm that postponed Subfest until the Redux. Having met all the guys out at Subfest, we had a wonderful time and once I got home, I got back to work on Luck's hull, hardware and driver. He Maiden'd at our local club regatta in October 2025, first launch by Ken Griffin. The complete build took me about a year. Original design was for a 36" model, but then I wanted to shorten it up to look more like a tug and also, a bit more maneuverable. I'll follow up with more on the story of the build as I post pictures as well.

[Lockleer1]

The original ship length was reduced to 24" as mentioned in the first post, I just like it short and chubby. Gives him a better Tugboat look. the driver is 3"dia and 12" long. The "Tube" is transparent PVC and the wall thickness is probably about 3/16" or so. The original motor I used was an Mtroniks 1100KV and it worked ok, but I'm swinging a 3" prop as well and I like it to swing slow so I wanted a way slower motor, I found a 580KV motor where the can just fits in the allowable space and it runs great. The servos are actuonics linear servos, they work well, a bit slow, but I'm in no hurry. The motor has enough torque to move the prop well, even with a vessel in tow or pushing. "Luck" has made at least 8-9 recoveries so far, even without the push knees I originally put on it, but I really did not like how they looked. He earned his eagle for recoveries and he displays it on the pilot house (I'll find or get a picture of it).