Moebius (Revell) Skipjack Build

[trout]

Well, as David shared, my original Skipjack (photo in prior post) is going to a new home.
David took pity on me and sent me some rejected, dusty, neglected piece of work. O.K., it is pretty nice, but his note was SO David.


Just in case you cannot read the note, here it is:

I am glad he put the other "O" in there.

So here we will bering the assembly of a Skipjack and how I got it to be ready for a pond.

[Scott T]

No critic on the packaging? ;)

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

No critic on the packaging? ;)

Way to stir the pot, Scott!

[trout]

No, David did as he preaches and everything was packaged up real well.
double boxed and small appendages and bits and pieces inside the hull. Unlike my Frankenstein box, David's looked like it was made for the submarine.

David, fill in the history as to why you did not finish this hull. I have these photos for reference and I am assuming this is the hull shown in the photos.
Correct me if I am wrong, this paint schedule is a just launched scheme - did they keep this until the trials were over?






















From what I can gather, this used rattle can paint that you put into your airbrush. My initial look over was this project was stopped early on. I noticed the paint was brittle and chipped off in areas (will document). The craftsmanship is the standard great work that David does. It is fun to hold and examine his work.

[trout]

Went to work on putting things together.
The planes use 1/16" rod. Measured the location of the grub screw with a Sharpe. This will be the area I file flat for the grub or set screw to lock into.
First, I love the shading and work David put into this. His abilities as a master shines through.


Tested the fit and checked that the set screw hit the flat area.

You can see the circle from the cup of the set screw. Call this one done.

I will use a Z bend to connect the pushrod. Since the aft end is glued, It will take a little to get things connected.

I love Z bending pliers.



Now a trick I learned from David is to put a drop of CA to the connection of the rod and the plane control.



This keeps it from flopping all over the place as I try to align it with the rod going through the plain. Once it is installed the CA breaks free pretty easily.

[trout]

I needed to make sure the parts aligned O.K. and put another rod through to test. Being a soft metal, it is not unheard of it getting bent. A quick twist here and there and all lined up.



Then holding your tongue in just the right position, the plane will slide into the control arm. On the rudder, had to file and sand the base of the planes were the rod enters the casting. There was a buildup of paint creating a bind. This looks like it is 1/8" rod.

Looking in the hull towards the aft end.


Range is more than needed for this little rocket.



The sail planes went on easily.


I need to customize this sub a little. You know put my signature on it so to speak.......
I will add lights to this sub!

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

Excellent photograph, Tom. Very good composition that takes potentially confusing steps and explains them away visually. Good stuff, sir. What kind of camera are you using?

The effect of 'oil-canning' of plate between frames and stringers is done with paint, but at a distance does adequately render the look of surface deformation -- in reality a consequence of wave action and the natural tendency of elastic metal de-stressing over time, not 'pressure'.



David

[trout]

David,
Thank you. Most of these photos were taken with my iPad. I have an older Canon SLR that I use too! I noticed that your posting has vBulletin links to something, not showing what though.
peace,
tom

[He Who Shall Not Be Named]

Yeah. The vBullitin logo pops up when I use the 'Upload Attachments' save feature. No lost pictures, just a ghost in the code.

David

[Tugfan]

Are the WTC in a England cheaper and have more to them?

[trout]

Let me see if I understand, are you asking if WTCs in England are cheaper? If so, the answer is it depends on how you look at it. Straight dollar wise which vendor are you looking at? One is less expensive and one is more. However, that does not take into effect of service or what your preference is. I know and have seen David take a person’s Sub-Driver and help repair it years after it was purchased. Not everything comes down to saving a few dollars. Of the systems I am thinking of, each works differently. So you cannot do a feature to feature comparison. All of them will get your sub down, and if setup correctly, back to the surface. Dollar to Pound conversion makes adds to this discussion.
If you are not asking that question about price wise, then ignore the above and please restate your question.

[trout]

Let there be lights! or hopefully at some point.

I look at this Skipjack that David painted and it is like a Leonardo da Vinci painting. Can you imagine what those curators must go through when they work to restore a piece of art. One slip and you destroy it. This sub feels that way with me, I do not want to destroy it, but I do want to make it my own.

The Skipjack had Navigation lights on each side of the fairwater above the planes.



The Revell Skipjack has the Nav lights in a closed position.

Love the painting. You can see the location just above the would be installed fairwater planes and hatch.

I went to my computer and in Fusion 360 created my version of the deployed lights (using photo posted earlier).


There are three items here, the final revision of the sail light housing. Light lens (to make a mold from) has an area cut into it that will fit the LED lens into. Rudder light Bezel more on that later.



This is an early prototype that I used extruded clear plastic fo a lens and simple black spray paint on the housing to see how it will look. The final version of the housing I increased the diameter of the protective rods going around the light. There is a slight amount of thickening of the walls just to boost the strength a little.
I have not gotten my courage to drill into the side of the sail yet. Then one of our wonderful members here (Ken) said, oh I might make mine working! What a terrible thing to say to me...... Can I do that? Do I want to do that??? Must think on this.....

Let us move further back on this sub, the rudder light.

[trout]

The hardest part about the rudder was just getting the hole started. I filed a flat area on top of the molded in light dome. Then gradually stepped up the size of the hole. No special tools just went slowly with the hand drill. Frequently pulling the bit out and cleaning off the shavings.


I angled the hole to shoot for the base of the rudder were the brass rod exits.


The hole had to be enlarged to accept the lip at the base of the LED.



The LED was soldered up and tested. This light is a warm white light (super bright and not to scale).


Fitting the LED in to verify it will look O.K. and is at the a height I like.


Because of the lip on the LED and the drill sizes needed, it wiped out most of the bezel that went at the base of the light. There was also some chipping of the paint that made the edges a little ragged.
I decided to just flatten the area create a rudder bezel.

I got the wires to the base and put a notch into the brass rod. This notch or groove will protect the wires while the rudder rotates to make turns.






The rudder bezel is attached to clean up everything.



And lights on.

[trout]

It took several ways, but I got the wires threaded through.


I will attach the heat shrink portion to the hull to keep it from interfering with the shaft or rudder travel.

The next target for lights is the sail. It was a big struggle to even drill into the sail because if I mess up, well it would bum me out. David's work is top notch.

I survived and the sail did too!
The LEDs I am using are 1.8mm in size. I cut a strip of styrene and put a slot in the center at the top. The saw blade's kerf was really close to the thickness of the legs. What worked out real nice is the height of the LED base is equal to the wall on the sail. Putting it on this strip allows me to install it easier.


I will be running these lights from a 3.7v source. I saw that RC airplane guys run their LEDs from the LiPo balancing plug. These LEDs use about 1.8v at 20ma. If I did my math right, 95k resistor is the beginning resistor. Theclosest I had was 100k and red LED it worked perfectly. The green was WAY to bright. I wanted both lights to emit the same brightness, so I kept swapping for higher resistance. Once I got to 3200k it seemed close to the red one.


With that decided, it was time to solder it up.


To seal it up I engulfed it in RTV rubber.

[trout]

Once the RTV cured the styrene sticks were used to place the light in.



The light housing glass originally I was going to pull from Clear styrene, but had a lot of trouble getting consistent size and once I got the hang of it, I ran out of stock, so since I needed to cast two zinc strips (David through in what bits and pieces he had), I cast some light glass.

The housings were painted black (and later a gray to match the sail's color) and mounted to the sides.

Fired up the LEDs.

Yeah, they worked.