Midwest Boothbay Lobsterboat Build

Umi_Ryuzuki wrote:

Looks great,  What are the eliptical holes at the stern? Did you get enough room to vent the heat from the motor?

Do you mean the ones in the sub deck? Never quite figured out why Midwest put them there. Access maybe if you make the top deck removable?

Looks great,

 What are the eliptical holes at the stern?

Did you get enough room to vent the heat from the motor?

Its been a while, and I know that I do not have all the steps that it took to get me to this point, but I am about 75% finished.

The motor may get warm while you are running.

You might consider building a small cabinet over the motor to let the heat rise and vent. Ohh, how about a galley stove. when the motor get hot, the stove top can be your heat sink.

I decided to scratch build a lower cabin deck piece that will hide the bottom hull. I didn't like just putting all the eletronics down in the hull, and besides, it just didn't look that pleasing to the eye, so I made this piece to cover the bottom of the hull. It also covers the motor and all my eletronics can mount to that platform that I made.

Donnie 

I do believe that I have a picture in my mind as the way that you describe. I don't think I would have a problem fabricating something like that.

thanks

Donnie 

I can't find the picture I had of one so let me try to describe it. What it would look like on the model is 2   3/6 inch wide strips 1/16 thick or so formed in a U attached to either side of the hull bottom. These two strips would have a number of small diameter rods glued to both strips one after the other. It would end up being a guard to keep the prop from fouling in kelp and protect it from hitting rocks. Not all of them have it but it does make the model look more interesting.

Just a thought

Uh !!!  What ?? - Now how am I supposed to find something like that? that reminds of those things you put on one of the trolling motors on bass boats. Well, you got me there - I guess I should do this. Guess I am going to have to do some googling on the net to figure this one out, unless you have that tip for me !

Thanks

Donnie 

Latest !

This is two coats of Rust Oleum Satin White (paint on) not spray can. Before hand with alot of sanding with medium course and fine course and wet sanding. I did some more sanding even after the first coat of paint.

I had read that painting (by hand) vs spray on gives the boat a more natural appearance rather than spray on.

I think I plan to give it one more coat of paint before moving on. It is amazingly irritating to see how many imperpections, bump, crevices, ripples you run into and I guess it is from the using the fiberglass and epoxy is not an exact science or at least I haven't discovered this first go round, but at least it has added to my learning experience. BTW, it is hard taking a picture of nothing but white Hull and it have any kind of detail. Anyway, thanks for tuning in - more later.

Donnie 

Donnie wrote:

This is my day to be stupid. What kind of sand paper do you use for wet sanding?  Everybody now can beat their chest laughing !!!   Donnie :-

Not stupid at all.  Using just any sandpaper, since it could fall apart, will cause scratching, scoring, and leaves grit that must be cleaned off.  I prefer to use plastic backed automotive sandpaper for wetsanding.  I used paper backed and cheap sandpaper before and after a few minutes, ended up with a mess.

This is my day to be stupid. What kind of sand paper do you use for wet sanding? 

Everybody now can beat their chest laughing !!!

Donnie :-)

Wet sanding is the only way to go.  Also have a tube of Spot Glaze Putty to fill pits, dents, and pin holes as you find them.  It is better to fill them or else you might concentrate on trying to sand them out, thus creating a low spot and a wave effect along the side of the hull.

Sanding one of these glassed hulls out is a bear to be sure. When you are done though you just can't beat them. If you haven't already done so apply a cost of sealer on the inside as well. This will insure protection on both sides on the hull.

Keep the paper wet when sanding and you will do fine. The water keeps the paper from clogging up so fast and the ehat level low from sanding on the glass.

Tug Guy - you are not kidding when you say that the gray primer will show imperfections ! man oh man! Well, I thought I had done some sanding up until now, ofcourse, I am a little hard on myself. Well, lets see, to be honest - don't know much about wet sanding - don't even know what kind of paper to get - but off to the Lowes to see what they got and I will of couse follow your suggestions.

"This is where we seperate the men from the boys as they say"

you aren't kiddin' (and I hate sanding !!) Oh well - the life of modeling.

Donnie 

ps - thanks again for your suggestions and tuning in to this build. 

You have enjoyed your build up to now. This is where we seperate the men from the boys as they say. Any sanding you do should be done with wet sandpaper. If you are going to do more than the one coat of resin probably you should plan on 3 coats. Sanding will thin out what you have done in a hurry. The end result of all this sanding will be a smooth as glass finish. You will be able to eye ball it with light reflection and not see any distortions.

Starting out with wet 220 is ok you will end up with maybe 400 grit. I sanded on my hull for quite a while smoothing out all the imperfections. I kept handy a rubbermaid type container with water and placed the hull on a old towel to soak up the run off and dipped the sandpapaer in the water. Have lots of sandpaper on hand you will use it. You will know when it is done by the flat finish. Don't be surprised if you don't still have to spot putty some imperfections. Paint will reflect any imperfection not fixed. A spray coat of primer will show much. A trick I learned was to spray 2 coats of different primer colors. That way when I sanded I knew when I was at the base surface.

I would give the hull at least 24 if not 48 hours to dry and degas  before I did any sanding.

The orange peel is the cloth still showing through the resin. If you sand this it will go to wood very fast. This is why I say 3 coats of resin. You want the coating to remain after sanding.

 Have fun and let us see the finished pics of the hull.

Well, I certainly appreciate both of these tips. I have already finished with the Fiberglassing - just following the directions in the book. I have found however, that even though I am getting really good results, that the finished hull seems to have (in places) a strange orange peel surface which is brought on (in my opinion) of the Fibergalss being way too thin. I mean this stuff is really thin and shear. Let me add that the "coat" of resin looked kinda skimpy, and this might be some of the problem. Even though it seemed at the time, I was using alot of resin, perhaps it soaked into the wood, etc and left the small amount of orange or lemon peel effect. I did lightly sand down the hull with some 220, but that grit didn't seem to phase it at all. Then I thought about just simply putting anothe rcoat of resin on the entire hull. That seemed to do the trick in getting rid of that orange peel look. So, it might be that perhaps even one more light coat of resin might make things really smooth.

BTW- Unless I am missing something, I am not having much luck with this 220 grit. It just slides right along, not making any type of progress.

Donnie 

Hi Scottrc,

I have heard about this glue down the cloth method before. I have always worried that by gluing down the cloth you are putting up a barrier for the resin to adhere to the wood. I have never used this method as I was afraid that I wouldn't get 100% absorption by the wood from the resin. I don't like the ocassional bubbles you get but they can be cut open when doing the next layer. Boats take about 3 to 4 coats of resin unlike planes. I guess this is why I haven't used your method yet.  I am not saying it doesn't work just asking if it works 100%?  I can see how nice the cloth will lay around those pesky curves being glued down.

Donnie wrote:

Got the hull done with the supplied balsa. Even though the directions do not say, I had to really wet down the balsa to make it fit the curves. You had to glue two sheets of balsa together and take this large sheet and glue it down. Yep, it saves a lot of time in (not planking), but dealing with large sheets of balsa has its own problems. What you see here is starting to fiberglass the hull halves.      Donnie

For future reference, have a spray bottle full of water mixed with vinegar and spray the sheets as you curve them around the contour.  I have used this technique many times on the three F4U Corsairs and other scale RC planes with a ton of sheeting that I have built.

On laying the glass, some prefer the static electricity method where you rub the glass cloth over a wool cloth in order for it to stick to the balsa via static electricity.  I prefer to use 3M adhesive spray for large radius contours.  The tackyness of the spray allows enough hold to be able to stretch out any wrinkles and roll out the air bubbles with a small ink roller.   It also makes it easier to apply the resin by eliminating the risk of the cloth lifting during the cure.

One picture is worth a thousand words as they say. It looks like what Midwest sells as 6/10 or 3/4 oz cloth. It is pretty nice to work with. I have been using a bit heavier cloth now 2 oz it seems to follows curves better.

Well, I have zero experience up until now, using Fiberglass. The parts list that came with ship only says "microglas cloth". There is no designation as to the weight. What I can do is give you a picture - all I can say is that I do not have any previous knowledge to know if this is really thin or what - but I can say that whatever weight it is - it is very thin and shear !

Donnie 

Hi Donnie,

I wondered what weight cloth you were using the 3/4 oz or a bit heavier? When I planked my hull I used 1/32 plywood making a template first of card stock. I remember those curves quite well. The work continues to look real good.

Don

Got the hull done with the supplied balsa. Even though the directions do not say, I had to really wet down the balsa to make it fit the curves. You had to glue two sheets of balsa together and take this large sheet and glue it down. Yep, it saves a lot of time in (not planking), but dealing with large sheets of balsa has its own problems.

What you see here is starting to fiberglass the hull halves. 

Donnie 

Rough outlines of the hull are coming together.

Donnie 

Donnie wrote:

Thanks ! ... The lines of the planks show up only becuase I had used that dark stain to begin with. I couldn't get the stain out of the crevices and nail holes of the planking, so it came along as a blessing in the end. Sometimes I have found that mistakes can work for you in the end! This kit had alot of warped wood. The flooring or subdecking is almost horrible. It is good that I am armed with alot of clamps - and to whoever esle buys this kit - get alot of clamps!  BTW - thanks for your compliments Donnie

 I was going to mention that the dark stain worked to your advantage and looks great between the planks, ...

 But you already noticed!!

Hi Donnie,

What I have done in the past with another companies warped wood was to lightly soak it in water and sandwich it between 2 pieces of waxed paper until it dried with weights on top. Thanks for reaffirming that it wasn't just me that had problems keeping the xacto knife on track in this type of process. It is difficult but you have done very well in it. I wish I had a template to use. Next time I will make one up and remember this process.

 The dark stain looks real good between the planks. A new technique I just read about involves using a powered paint, mixing it with white glue and injecting it with a hypodermic needle in between the planks. I haven't tried it myself yet but those that have seem very happy with the finish look. It sands easily retaining the color. I haven't yet tried to search out the powered paint they talk about. The process sounds promising I have a F/G hull lobster boat 36" long to build and will try it out on the decks. Good build so far I look forward to more posts.

 Don