Party (fishing) boats

[Ken_NJ]

The danforth is white metal and was a solid casting. I had to get in the tiny space to separate the shank from the stock and fashion a pivot point so the stock would pivot. I have two of them and wish I could get more but I have no idea where I got them from years ago. Not thrilled about the ones that Harbor Models has. They would need a few mods.

[Ken_NJ]

A few fast updates

The aft rub rails are epoxied in place.



The upper deck rails are soldered up. The rails are 3/32" brass tubing and each joint is pinned with a 1/16" brass rod.



Started work on the pilot house and upper deck bulwark. Eventually the bulwark will have a sign on it that I'll have Callie Graphics make up.

[Bob Gato]

Hurry up Ken the cod fishing season is almost upon us...

[Ken_NJ]

I have no detail pictures around the deck so I have to guess what things look like or how they operate. The cabin doors appear to be on slides and not open like a traditional door. Since they don't make brass channel the size I need it I had to make my own. I took a pieces of square stock and removed one side with an abrasive disk and cleaned it up with a file. I needed short smaller sections to fit on the top and bottom of each door and longer next size up sections to act as the section the doors slide in. Determination.





The doors are nice thin GRP. Each door will get a section of acrylic for the window. Here you can see the smaller brass sections slipped onto the doors.



These are the parts that will be mounted to the cabin which the doors will slide in. The bottom section will be glued to the cabin sides. I soldered studs onto the bottom ones to help give those a more solid way to adhere with the glue. So that I have a way to insert the doors after everything is painted and to service them should they ever need servicing the top one have 080 size studs soldered on them which a nut will hold them in place hidden in the cabin. I just cut the head off of the 080 machine screw then solder it to the channel. Get the jist of that?

[Ken_NJ]

Jumping to another area, the speed controllers. When our club was more prolific we had people that really did things. A good friend of mine who recently passed away designed a 10amp speed control and made it into a club project, which we had to pay for. I've had these sitting around for 10+ years. And now I have a perfect use for them! They required assembly of all of the capacitors, resistors and other components. There were a few problems after they were assembled and tested. The instructions stated not to solder pin 8 and pin 10 of the IC chip which was in a socket. Pin 10 provides power to the IC. I don't know why he said not to solder those pins. I joined and electronics forum and posted the problem with the instructions and schematics. The knowledgable people there had me test a few things and in the end they said to solder those connections. Once they were soldered the speed control worked. One other problem with one unit was I was getting 8.5v when it should be 5v as the BEC supply voltage. That turned out to be a bad 7805 which I replaced. So this was a fun project to build something my friend Charlie designed for our club.

[Ken_NJ]

Making seats for around the cabin. I previously made this jig to cut the planks for the deck. I modified the plank width by making a new mount for the razor blade, making the plank width narrower.





I stained the wood prior to glueing as the CA would not accept the stain so nicely. I made a fixture and spacers to get uniformity in the slots between the slats. A cross member was glued at regular intervals. The cross members will be glued to styrene supports which will be CA'd to the cabin sides.



Completed seats.





Glueing the styrene supports for the seats.



Seats placed on the supports. They will e glued in place once the cabin is painted white.

[Das Boot]

Very nice builds.

[Ken_NJ]

Thanks Casey.

For my series of party boats I'll be using a Radiolink AT9S Pro. The right vertical stick would be the throttle for most models but I will be having to control two motors with independent speed controls in these boats. The right stick is spring loaded to return the stick to the center position. I'll be using both vertical sticks to control the motors so I do not want the one stick to be spring loaded. I contacted Radiolink from their website and asked about getting the 'friction control' hardware so I can add it to the one stick. This way both sticks will have the same feel. I just had to pay $5 for shipping on Aliexpress. In the picture below I will be removing the spring and lever marked with yellow arrows. The shinny metal strips you see to the right I will be adding to the left one. The blue arrow points to the serrated portion of the stick the metal piece will be going on.



Removed spring and lever.



Friction parts from Radiolink.



Spring and lever removed and friction part in place.

[Bob Gato]

Awesome -you build the electronic speed control ...but you have the friction band shipped in from china, lol, (of which you had a model match spring on the L/H stick to copy) ...I know - you only have two hands and one operational foot!
Ken the boat looks amazing!

[Ken_NJ]

Thanks Bob, appreciate the kudos.

I used rattle cans to paint the hull. First went the hull white, then the bottom paint blue then the boot stripe red. Once that was all done the bulwark was painted a vintage gray. The railing was painted separately and then glued to the bulwark. If you recall, the epoxied hull was scribed to simulate a planked hull. You will see in later pictures how that came out. It was an experiment but an experiment I knew would come out to my expectations. I also tested this on a test article from learning from David with air brushing and weathering.

Before painting.



Here you can see everything is painted and the railing is installed. You can also see the simulated planked lines. Also note the spray rail along the chine.



The graphics templates were done by Callie Graphics. We had many emails between us to get the graphics to my satisfaction. For this template, you peel the backside, adhere it to the model, press and press to be sure of the adhesion, then peel the front side, mask around the template, spray, then remove the masking and template.

You can also see here the detail of the 'planking', nice job on the railing paint, the drip rail and the worn, used bollards.



Ready for masking.



Black spray paint



All masking removed and touch up done. It came our great!! Very satisfied.

[Bob Gato]

Looks fantastic! ...Callie it's super I'm having her cut some chrome vinyl for my Regulator logos and a 1/8" bootstripe with the word Regulator printed on the forward quarters of the stripe... I usually make my own decals but I can't work in Chrome like she can... I never thought of doing stencils... Very slick- Did you have you her cut extras in case you mess one up... I did with the boot stripes but I never asked her to do the extra logos I guess I'll be holding my breath on those...

[Ken_NJ]

I'll have to ask her how thin of chrome decal she can make that I can use on the rub rail. The one that wraps around the stern of the boat. I was thinking of someone masking it and painting it but a decal might work better. It would have to be like 1/16". It would also have to be sealed in place with a clear coat. That is why I was thinking chrome paint/clear coat would be better. Thanks for mentioning it.

[Ken_NJ]

Did you have you her cut extras in case you mess one up... I did with the boot stripes but I never asked her to do the extra logos I guess I'll be holding my breath on those...

The first set she sent me where back lettered decals, she knew I needed it as a stencil, minor oops. She resent a pair of them as stencil, I only asked for two. If I messed up figured I can ask for more.

I did this stencil thing before on the bow of KAAMA.

[Bob Gato]

Cool...BTW I saw that boat run at point pleasant back in the 70s piloted by Betty cook... Sorry Ken so very off topic!.

[Ken_NJ]

Not off topic... decals.... but a good off topic... still boats!

I have lots of film photos I need to convert to digital of the Benihanna back then. Always got out in our boat to see the boats go by. Back then it was a 300 mile race going from Pt. Pleasant to Seaside to Sandy Hook back to Pt Pleasant. These days they circle Pt Pleasant to Seaside but they are not the bigger offshore boats, more of a local race. Hope to someday covert those negatives to digital. Have some great shots.