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[chris gillespie]

Hi everyone
Ive taken the plunge and decided to make my first model boat, ive been at it for a month or so. Thoroughly enjoyable and addictive, alot more goes into it than meets the eye.
Iam making a FV Northwestern from Deadliest Catch, i love the elegant old girl and havent seen too many try and make her, so hopefully ill do her justice.

Total Scratch build

I am a complete novice so some methods may seem bizarre, started out by carving her hull out of high density foam, which was reasonably fast and productive. having already made myself full sized 1:32 plans. I struggled for a while to adequately seal the foam for future fibregalss layup, but i got there in the end with plain old pollyfilla yes i was surprised how well it worked, it was easily sandable and took to the foam well.
So my journey onwards full of self discovery lol, alot of materials id never used before, the next was fibreglass, which was reasonably priced, my technique however for a first time was pretty good, the odd tear in the gel coat where i added the matting, however the resin and strength was all good.
Hull is ready for deck and rib fit outs, wheelhouse is formed, sadly the cold weather has halted recent progress, however nothing is lost and i have whipped up 100 odd pot frames.




Foam sandwich




Taking shape 1




Taking shape 2




Taking shape 3




Foam sealing




First Fibreglass




Deck and ribs




Deck and ribs 2




Pot Frames

[bosun]

Hy Chris.
Welcome to the forum, I will watch this build with interest, it's looking good. Any more info on how you made the pot's.
Bosun

[chris gillespie]

Hy Chris.
Welcome to the forum, I will watch this build with interest, it's looking good. Any more info on how you made the pot's.
Bosun

Yes they are made of matches, technically the pots should be round however i feel with the netting and the buoys they look the part, dirt cheap which is great as starting out ive spent a small fortune kitting myself out with this and that. On the bright side my next model should be cheap. Ive used about 3000 matches to make a 100 pots i still have 2000 left to get me up to 170 odd which would be pretty realistic.

[hopeitfloats]

those pots do look good. i thought the Northwestern actually does have square pots anyway. it will certainly look the part with 170 of them stacked on deck. please keep us up to date with the build.   craig

[hazegry]

wow great first go what else have you built you obviously have some building experience.

[hama]

Yes that hull looks really great! Northwestern is my favorite too. You made your own plans? It looks very accurate. Will follow with great interest.
Good luck.
Hama.

[chris gillespie]

those pots do look good. i thought the Northwestern actually does have square pots anyway. it will certainly look the part with 170 of them stacked on deck. please keep us up to date with the build.   craig

Yeh sorry they are square however they are made from round bar. The 5000 matches cost £4, the paint approximately £20 so pretty cheap, just loads of time cutting and glueing.

wow great first go what else have you built you obviously have some building experience.

I built a birdhouse http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrisgillespie1/sets/72157623021119251/ I am a bricklayer by trade, ive never made scale before, carved, used fibreglass.

Yes that hull looks really great! Northwestern is my favorite too. You made your own plans? It looks very accurate. Will follow with great interest.
Good luck.
Hama.

Thanks Hama

[MikeA]

Have a pat on the back for such a succesful first attempt at scratch building. Talk about jumping in the deepest bit of the deep end!!

[MikeK]

Very impressed for a first attempt at scratch building, you must have a natural skill hidden away 
Regarding the pots, if matchsticks look right for scale, surely cocktail sticks would be also about right - and round ? Just thinking out loud Chris if someone else was thinking about trying it 
Looking forward to more news on the build as well


Mike

[chris gillespie]

Very impressed for a first attempt at scratch building, you must have a natural skill hidden away 
Regarding the pots, if matchsticks look right for scale, surely cocktail sticks would be also about right - and round ? Just thinking out loud Chris if someone else was thinking about trying it 
Looking forward to more news on the build as well


Mike

yes cocktail sticks would do, however they would be way more expensive all in, the trouble also 7x7 pots the matches and cocktail sticks are just too short , so have to glue extensions on. the cocktail stick bond was less strong than the matches. If i had a smaller scale they would have been fine.

[MikeK]

yes cocktail sticks would do, however they would be way more expensive all in, the trouble also 7x7 pots the matches and cocktail sticks are just too short , so have to glue extensions on. the cocktail stick bond was less strong than the matches. If i had a smaller scale they would have been fine.

That's sorted that then ! Length did cross my mind but thought there wouldn't be much difference to matchsticks. I'll shut up now and wait for the next update from you  

Mike

PS Agree with your choice of Northwestern, she has lovely lines and looks brilliant butting into a head sea in the series. There is a couple of others of similar design but the rest are ugly things, but obviously good sea boats !

[chris gillespie]

That's sorted that then ! Length did cross my mind but thought there wouldn't be much difference to matchsticks. I'll shut up now and wait for the next update from you  

Mike

PS Agree with your choice of Northwestern, she has lovely lines and looks brilliant butting into a head sea in the series. There is a couple of others of similar design but the rest are ugly things, but obviously good sea boats !

She has lovely lines indeed, i spent a while researching alot of the dutch harbour boats. Iam a forward wheel house guy, the stern wheelhouses just do nothing for me. This guy has loads of pictures of most of the fleet if your interested 700 odd http://www.google.co.uk/url?sa=t&rct=j&q=fvalbum&source=web&cd=1&sqi=2&ved=0CB0QFjAA&url=http%3A%2F%2Fs229.photobucket.com%2Falbums%2Fee92%2FFValbum%2F&ei=5WYAT7veIMugOvidgKsD&usg=AFQjCNFtbqXzEo2ssNiEW6xGrHw8ETEPwA

[MikeK]

Thanks for the link Chris, there are a good few hours viewing there ! I knew obviously that there were far more crabbers than seen on the DC series but not quite so many ! Are all the Dutch Harbour boats crabbers or do they go after other species ?

Mike

[chris gillespie]

MikeK
There is only about 80 boats fishing king crab and same again for oppies, since they changed the quota system 3/4 years ago. There are numerous other fisheries though like tanner crab, brown crab which dont get the glitsy deadliest catch attention.
Not all boats that fish king, fish oppies also i think it really does change yearly depending on who leases certain portions of quotas etc.

The fvlbum link has a great diversity of most of the boats, some are dedicated to boats that have sunk, there is also a huge amount of trawlers there also.

[chris gillespie]

So i did my first water test last night, watertight and is very well balanced. However im going to need an awful lot of weight/ballast.

Iam planning to include a fair bit of hardware which shall hopefully bring the weight up. This will include 2 12v lead acid batteries in parrallel, feeding the motor and a large diesel sound generator.......6V lead acid in the bow for bow thruster, all the lights, bilge pump, radars and working crane mechanism.
Hopefully and with some good planning ill be able to fit all this in. Its not just about hiding it under the deck as i want an area accessible to incorporate maybe ballast tanks as this might help my dilemma.



I have a selection of motors, this is because ive been given some contradicting information i may have to trial and error it. There is a Johnsson 600 which some claim will be too fast..i think it might be the best option as the northwestern model will be very heavy and will need power, in real life she does 11-14 knots which is pretty decent. The other engines are a 540 6:1 which ive been advised as giving better scale speed, i have my concerns as scale speed is diffult to get right, at that size the water is like soup as opposed to water therfore more power is needed, which maybe makes it look a bit faster. The last one is a graupner 600 that is 8.5 volts so id need to run it off of a 6v battery. A friend has a lifeboat which is a bit shorter than my model but has twin triple 7s, this worries me as the speed isnt that fast. Anyway plenty of time later on to decide.



I did a mock up of the wheel house just to see how it looks, the wheelhouse was only taped together and put on temporary supports, the wheelhouse and captains quarters need to be trimmed too, but im very satisfied with the look and realistic form. I may have to look at the bow as it appears a bit sharp, not a lot though.




























Another amateur mistake i made was to buy poundland epoxy, it was terrible stuff, didnt set properly and was very brittle when an area did eventually set. I already did my ribs and deck with the 'rubbish' epoxy so redid it with araldite which im sure will be far superior and trustworthy.






http://www.flickr.com/photos/chrisgillespie1/sets/72157628647156587/

[oldiron]

Very nicely done!

John

[nick_75au]

What size are the props you intend to use, This info will help to make an informed decision. In any case you probably don't need more than 6000 RPM unloaded shaft speed. In most cases this will require a geared motor.

Nick

[chris gillespie]

What size are the props you intend to use, This info will help to make an informed decision. In any case you probably don't need more than 6000 RPM unloaded shaft speed. In most cases this will require a geared motor.

Nick

its to scale at about 55mm

[nick_75au]

OK, you need to aim for about 4500 RPM under load, for a direct drive motor it should turn at about 75% of unloaded RPM so 6500 RPM unloaded.

The 8.4 speed 600 at 12 volts would need a reduction of 3-3.5 to 1 or about 2:1 at 6 volts.

The MFA 6:1 motor at 12 volts will turn at about 2600 RPM, which would be too slow IMHO, the 2.5:1 ratio would be better at 6300 RPM

You need to determine the RPM per volt of the unknown Johnson to determine if its suitable. See here...

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1035433&highlight=measuring+brushed+motor+kv

There is such a vast range of Johnson motors that without some data no one can make an informed opinion of whether a motor is suitable or not

You can run a motor at any voltage (within a reasonable range of its nominal voltage, as you double the voltage you double the RPM and amps but power goes up by a factor of 4, vis-versa halving voltage)

A Speed 900 or Action/MMB 900( I cant keep up with who has them any more   ) would be ideal at 12 volts direct drive, it has the right RPM and enough torque, gearing the other motors at the suggested ratio will give the same result.

Hope this helps

I have seen your post over at RC groups as well, I will copy this info over

Cheers
Nick

[chris gillespie]

OK, you need to aim for about 4500 RPM under load, for a direct drive motor it should turn at about 75% of unloaded RPM so 6500 RPM unloaded.

The 8.4 speed 600 at 12 volts would need a reduction of 3-3.5 to 1 or about 2:1 at 6 volts.

The MFA 6:1 motor at 12 volts will turn at about 2600 RPM, which would be too slow IMHO, the 2.5:1 ratio would be better at 6300 RPM

You need to determine the RPM per volt of the unknown Johnson to determine if its suitable. See here...

http://www.rcgroups.com/forums/showthread.php?t=1035433&highlight=measuring+brushed+motor+kv


There is such a vast range of Johnson motors that without some data no one can make an informed opinion of whether a motor is suitable or not

You can run a motor at any voltage (within a reasonable range of its nominal voltage, as you double the voltage you double the RPM and amps but power goes up by a factor of 4, vis-versa halving voltage)

A Speed 900 or Action/MMB 900( I cant keep up with who has them any more   ) would be ideal at 12 volts direct drive, it has the right RPM and enough torque, gearing the other motors at the suggested ratio will give the same result.

Hope this helps

I have seen your post over at RC groups as well, I will copy this info over

Cheers
Nick

Thanks very much Nick, much to think on, im also not very electrical so this whole project is a leap into the unknown, am i right in assuming i could stick the 12v rated johnson 600 which is a nippy motor apparently and just set my speed controller at start up ? ive been recently advised that is an option.
Thanks again
Chris

[nick_75au]

I cannot answer that question without knowing the specs of the motor, but I dont think it would work as well as matching the motor RPM to the prop RPM.

 Setting the speed controller to only give partial throttle generates extra heat in the ESC, for constant running I don't think this is desirable especially with the large capacity batteries you are using.

Nick

[hemayann]

are you putting twins in it?

[chris gillespie]

I cannot answer that question without knowing the specs of the motor, but I dont think it would work as well as matching the motor RPM to the prop RPM.

 Setting the speed controller to only give partial throttle generates extra heat in the ESC, for constant running I don't think this is desirable especially with the large capacity batteries you are using.

Nick

MMMMM interesting, the guy giving advice is treasurer for local boat club, lets say he has had a few boating incidents from what im hearing lol.....
i shall thoroughly investigate this when the time is right

are you putting twins in it?

No she is a single screw 

[chris gillespie]

Nick
i found my purchase slip for the Johnsson,

JOHNSON 600 SIZE 3 POLE MOTOR WITH INTEGRAL COOLING FAN 6V - 12V OFF LOAD CURRENT 1.57A     20.000 RPM

DIMENSIONS L;65MM  D;36MM   3.2MM SHAFT
 
so where does that leave me?  lol

thanks again

Chris

[MikeA]

who suggested these motors for you?