Fisher 34 motorsailer

[Ray Wood 3Participant @raywood3]

Hi George,

Silver is always a nightmare ! and yes the Humbrol always seems to stay soft, are you airbrushing or brush painting ? Although I have airbrushes I seldom use them as I can't be bothered with the cleaning, as a brush you throw into a jar of turps

The airbrush can build up 20 – 30 layers of fine paint drying instantly (almost), but I didn't know if the Admiralty would allow spraying ??

Regards Ray

[Chris FellowsParticipant @chrisfellows72943]

Hi George

I don't know if you can get it, but I'm going to try the Guild Lane Silver as listed by J Perkins. It is acrylic and can be handled in an hour! It is a high gloss silver and looks like chrome.

Graham Ashby reviewed it which brought it to my attention but I can't find the post now.

Chris

[geconParticipant @gecon]

Ray,

experiences last summer suggest that you cannot easily get a gloss finnish with an airbrush. I airbrushed the hull of the Colin archer and the Fisher. Sprayed over with acrylic clear gloss and managed an acceptable silky finnish. Airbrushing is OK with Admiralty, but must be on the balcony where the temp will be too low for many weeks to come.

It helped to read that you have noted that silver/matallics don't dry/cure too well. Small print on the tin even says metallics cannot be painted over! But there is a diagram showing that it can be painted after 6 hours! May just give it a miss and try my 'windowframe' Titanium silver acrylic. Been sanding down the silver fingerprints with 1200 grit all morning and now put it all away to cure 100% while I consider what paint to use next.

Chris,

doubt if I can get J Perkins here and don't think that the pulpits are so desperately important that I can't paint them with what I can find locally. Just a bit afraid to paint anything at all yet until I read up and then have a another try.

Thanks to you both for inputs.

George

[geconParticipant @gecon]

Pulpits painted humbrol silver 11 for the second time! Just had to try one more time to see if thinned paint would help. I suspect that the paint has thickened somewhat during the years that it has been lurking around in the cellar storeroom! Trouble is that adding white spirit will dull it slightly. Any way, testing…testing…one..two..three etc.

Ordering aluminium tube this evening. Intend to produce the pulpits in polished alu' if the new silver coat does not cure this time. The test paint I did the other day hardened OK, but was painted directly on to brass -not that I have an opinion on whether or not that makes any diff!

Cut and made the main and mizzen sails today. Will fit battens, eyelets for sliders and reefing during next week.

George

[geconParticipant @gecon]

Sails have been produced and are draped over their respective booms ready for an eyelet-punching session.

Stantions have been loose-fitted onto the bulwarks and threaded with .6mm elastic.

The infamous pulpits are stashed away for drying/cureing/whatever. New alu' and brass tube has been ordered and is en-route from Oslo just in case I have to start again. The thinned Humbrol seems to be drying better than in the first attempt.

George

[geconParticipant @gecon]

I have had a feeling for a while now that there was something wrong with my "stantions". They are not stanTIons but stanCHions. . You are all too polite.

Anyway, these thin metal 'fence-posts-with-knobs-on-top' will be epoxied into the bulwarks later this week.

George

[geconParticipant @gecon]

More delays,

the super 'boom sliders' I bought from CMB over a year ago are just that…BOOM sliders. They slide nicely in the BOOM slot. They are not however big enough to stay hooked into the MAST slot! They are made of nickel plated brass so I think I can file off the plating on the underside and solder on some brass wire to increase the diameter of the baseplate which is supposed to slide inside the mast slot. Trying to locate some small brass washers or thin plate but no luck so far. Already have brass wire, so will try that later today. Sliders shown here on luff of the mizzen sail.

Admiralty getting first Covid injection this morning.

Never a dull moment!

George

[geconParticipant @gecon]

The boom sliders where 'adapted' slightly yesterday. The base which fits into the boom slot was enlarged with some brass wire and solder. Could not source any thin brass plate locally but did cut a piece of 3mm brass tube lengthwise! and flattened the half-tubes into a 'plate'. then short cut-offs were soldered to the base of two sliders -as a test. Worked OK too but going for the soldered brass wire otherwise I have to fabricate the brass plate from 3mm tube!

Anyway the mizzen is 'in the groove' for the time being.

Looks like the leech curves 'concave' but it does in fact have a slight leech allowance = 'roach'. Considered having a more scale (larger) roach area but was afraid the sail leech might be too floppy and curl over. The sail cloth is very lightweight. These sails will be the first I've ever made so I expect a Mk2 version will be produced if the yacht is a sucess ie. floats!

George

Edited By gecon on 25/03/2021 06:24:55

[Chris FellowsParticipant @chrisfellows72943]

Getting there George!

Of course it will float!

Chris

[geconParticipant @gecon]

That's good to news Chris. Hope it's not 'fake news'.….. I'm not known for my optimism.

George

[geconParticipant @gecon]

Fiddled with the sliders and managed to make something which worked well enough. Sails can now be hoisted. Still a lot to get done before launching though. Forecast not that good, so may have a few extra days due to the wx. Took some quick photos. Allways a lot of 'clutter' in my pics due to not bothering to move items out of the way! Flower pots, lamps, salt &pepper etc. Will do some better photos prior to launch…..in case they are the last photos above the surface!

George

[geconParticipant @gecon]

Good glue-day today…did a lot of small fiddly jobs which have been on 'the list' for a while now. Have to do things in the right order though.

Many ready made items epoxied in place, bollards, fairleads, roller furling winch on port coaming.

Also took a chance on the silver paint and epoxied the pulpits to the bulwark cappings. No fingerprints on the pulpits this time! Guard rails threaded through the stanchion tops and 'stretched' in place.

Still some work to do before ready for floatation test at the local lake -or maybe the shopping centre water-park where I tested the Comtesse last year.

George

Edited By gecon on 29/03/2021 18:38:45

Edited By gecon on 29/03/2021 18:49:04

[geconParticipant @gecon]

The anchor windlass was fitted yesterday together with Bruce anchor and chain. Manual operating handle and a slightly strange stemhead fitting for the anchor were produced from car windscreen wiper bits. Fitting not glued in place yet because I'm not sure I'll use it.

Weather report is OK for the next couple of days so may well have a ceremonial launch tomorrow or friday. Not much breeze forecast -and I don't really want much either!

Trying to revive an old-ish Roam3 action kamera to see if I can get some onboard photos. A bit optimistic, but worth a try.

George

[geconParticipant @gecon]

Whatching batteries being charged is as exciting as whatching paint drying. This particular job is a 'major event' for me prior to launch in a day or two. Looking out for any signs of smoke during charging!

One can just see the wing keel lingering below the hull….bolted on of course.

George

[Chris FellowsParticipant @chrisfellows72943]

Your work has certainly produced a first class model George. It will look as lovely being displayed as being used. Looking forward to seeing it on the wet stuff!

You need a very small bottle of champagne!

Chris

[geconParticipant @gecon]

Funny you should mention that Chris. At 1730 local time I was trying to locate a bottle! Couldn't fin a 1/12th scale magnum anywhere! The whatchman Chopper kindly donated his magnum of 'RHUM' which I think he nicked from the good ship Venus as a souvenir!

It's shown here at the ready. Not sure if the chocolate bottle will break though!

George

[geconParticipant @gecon]

I was inspired by Neil's fisherman anchor-stowage last week.

Made stowage chocks for the reserve plough anchor. Chain's a bit shiny though….we'll say it's all stainless steel as aposed to galvanised.

There'll be less 'hogging' of the album space from me after the launch. Will post a few sailing photos -I hope- and then close down this scratch-build log/blog.

George

[Colin BishopModerator @colinbishop34627]

I think we have all found it interesting George. It's a great looking model.

Colin

[Tim CooperParticipant @timcooper90034]

George

I'm sure we have all found your build interesting. Like to see the pics on the water.

Tim

[geconParticipant @gecon]

Launched at 1245 local time. A slight offshore breeze took her sedately away. Sailed very well in fact. Had wedged my Contour Roam 3 action-cam in the wheelhouse doorway on a foam base. So have 10 minutes of video. Post a couple of photos from the PC screen. Get something onto YouTube eventually.

After about 5 minutes on the water the 'lady' inside my transmitter voiced several times a warning about LOW receiver power. I did not realise what 'she' was saying until I had no control of the boat! Luckily after my son in law started taking off his jeans to start swimming, Fiffi turned for the shore! Took several minutes of turning with the wind before I could wade out and get her. One photo shows my waders off the port bow just before retrieval!

At home when I swithced on again to do some tests everything worked perfectly. Wiggled the swithches and wires but could not reproduce the problem. So I do not yet know why the Rx low battery warning sounded. The transmitter screen showed that there was 0.0v in the receiver immediately after the shut-down, but back at home it was again showing the expected 5.0v from the BEC system.

I should have tried swithching the Tx off and on again at the lake -as my grandson suggested. Might have had a longer sail today.

May try everything again tomorrow as is. I considered some months ago to use a dedicated RX batt instead of BEC. So if the problem crops up again, it'll be twin batt-packs for the Rx. I have two speed controllers so I can try the BEC from the other controller.

George

[Chris FellowsParticipant @chrisfellows72943]

Hi George

Sounds as though your system for the rigging worked Ok, even if only for a short sail.

Meant to ask, what method have you used for bolting the keel on?

Chris

[geconParticipant @gecon]

Hi Chris, if you mean the genoa sail, yes it worked just as I'd hoped. If I'd utilised the whole internal length of the hull I'd have achieved another 5cm of sheet travel each side and that would have been perfect. The Fisher will not sail close to the wind so it does not matter if the genoa cannot be sheeted tight into the shrouds.

Post photos of keel from my album. Keel is boltet through the hull. The wing is the same as on the Comtesse yacht from Krick. The 'legs' are galvanised angle-irons! Four equally spaced carbon rods were drilled through the keel and through the iron/lead shot ballast. I used the two holes which gave best balance and covered over the other two with cloth and resin -and paint!

George

 

Edited By gecon on 01/04/2021 19:45:14

[geconParticipant @gecon]

As mentioned earlier today -after the Rx power fail- I have now decided to eliminate the BEC circuit to the Rx and I have fitted a dedicated Rx battery. I remember reading somewhere that som BEC supplies do not 'like' lots of winch servos on line. Don't know why I received Rx battery low and subsequent shut-down AND everything worked normally when tested back home. The same winches were 'online' at home too!

A bit too cold for lakeside investigations and I was glad to have retreived the yacht so scarpered back to home base. Should have tried switching the TX off and back ON again instead of standing there with my thingies submerged in cold water and waiting for breeze to do something helpfull!

Reminds me of … "when you're up to your a*se in crocodiles it's not easy to remember that your mission was to drain the swamp"!

Off for a new test sail tomorrow. This time I'll keep the Fisher nearer shore so the water does not flow over the tops of my waders!

George

[Chris FellowsParticipant @chrisfellows72943]

Hi George

Yes, the genoa, glad it worked Ok, it looked pretty complicated!

Thanks for the keel info. I will start building the Fisherman 27 motor sailer before too long and am still thinking about how to attach the keel.

Chris

[Tim RoweParticipant @timrowe83142]

Hello Gecon

A wonderfully successful project.

I think you are on the right tack installing separate Rx batteries. Winch servos can draw a lot of current.

It is not surprising that the set-up worked at home because when the winches are simply "on-line" they are hardly drawing any current. You were not necessarily replicating the conditions afloat.

I would be very wary of turning the Tx off and on. The convention is that you always turn the Tx on before the Rx. This means that the Rx can immediately receive normal instructions to send to the servos depending on the stick position. If you turn on the Rx first, the servos can overtravel and strong winch can do a lot of damage. As a further safeguard I always position the sheet stick to fully out (in may case away from me) before turning on so that if there is any twitching of the servos, nothing is going to get pulled tight. On the IOMs, the sheeted-in position is very close to the main sheet post and jib sheet guides and even a trim out of position could mean over sheeting.

Tim R

[Author]

Posts