Moonbeam

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

On the contrary, Bob – there's too much rest! I positively loath having to wait for paint to through-and-through dry, but patience is a virtue (they say! harrumph! and probably bah, humbug, too!), so virtous I must be …

Mattias

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

Well, a white top coat on an equally white base coat does not really show up very well in photos, but I have now put on a total of eight thin coats of gloss white paint to cover the area where the waterline will sit.

I will now leave everything as it is until Frday evening at the earliest, when the first couple of coats of white primer will have had 170 hours and tonight's coats of top paint 90 hours to dry. By then they should be sufficiently well set that the weight of the ballast pushing the hull down into the stand should not be a problem, so that she can be turned upright again and the waterline marked out and masked off.

To be continued …

Mattias

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

With all the white paint – primer and topcoat – properly dry, I rubbed the surface down lightly with some dry 2500 grit paper, just to remove any small irregularities in the paint surface, and then brought the hull plus some tools and other stuff up into the appartment and onto our dining table …

… where, using various shims under the stand, I set about getting the hull level athwartship, with the help both of a more traditional spirit level …

… and of a modern, virtual one.

I also adjusted the relative heights of stern and bows until the same pencil height at either end would produce a line at the distance from the outer ends indicated by the plans.

A quite thin, barely visible line was then pencilled in, all around the hull …

… and followed by a first complete turn around the hull with 3 mm washi masking tape, sat about half a millimeter above the pencil line.

The masking tape line was then doubled with a second turn just above the first, literally touching edges all along the midhships section (to give the suggested waterline width of 6 mm) but allowed to flare out at the bows and under the stern …

… as suggested by the instructions, to avoid the risk of the hull looking hogged.

Tomorrow, I'll spray some primer onto the insides of the shroud plates, and then it'll be time to once more turn the hull upside down and proceed with getting the main topcoats of red and blue on.

To be continued …

Mattias

Edited By Banjoman on 14/10/2016 22:13:00

Edited By Banjoman on 14/10/2016 22:14:25

[Bob Abell 2Participant @bobabell2]

Hello Banjo

You`ve certainly got the waterline nicely laid out on the hull…..And that`s all that matters

Can I be a nit picker and question the use of the spirit level across the hull?

The deck looks slightly cambered?

I would have used a straightedge across the deck and measured up from your dining table……..Although, your spirit level does look quite hi tech?

Apologies for my unwanted comments………You know me, by now

Your hull is looking magnificent btw………So graceful and smooth

Bob

[Dave MilbournParticipant @davemilbourn48782]

Your hull is looking magnificent btw………So graceful and smooth

Not like a plastic kit then, Bob?

The part of the deck or hatch under that spirit level looks pretty flat to me, not cambered.

Dave M

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

Bob,

Thank you very much for your kind words!

Yes, there is some camber involved, but not in any way that matters: the spot where I placed the spirit level is certainly the flattest part of the deck (although not quite flat) but what is more important is that, as Dave noted, it sits across a hatch opening! This of course means that there is absoutely no camber in the middle of the deck (just the void of the hatch) and that the sprit level therefore primarily rests on the fore-and-aft coamings of the hatch. If the deck outside of those two resting points have a slight downward camber, it doesn't really matter – what the spirit level measures is that the two hatch coamings, which are both level with the deck at that point and equidistant from the port and starboard sides respectively, are also level with the dining table top.

The spriti level is not high tech, but it is fairly high spec (0.5 millimeter per meter deviation); the smartphone level, on the other hand, is probably quite high tech, although I've no idea how high (or low) spec it is …

Mattias

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

Once the hull had been brought back down to the workshop, I took advantage of the fact that it was still the right way up, and painted the edges and insides of the shroud plates, as these surfaces will be inaccesible to airbrushed paint once the hull is upside down again.

I then made some final adjustments to the waterline masking tape curves at the bows …

… firmly pressed down all the masking tape and then sealed its edges with a thin coat of white paint.

The topsides (currently at the bottom) were then masked off with a paper skirt, before I began applying the bright red top coat to the lower half of the hull, here seen after the first coat had just gone on.

Yesterday saw the application of two more coats, which when sufficently dry this morning were lightly rubbed down dry with some 2500 grit paper …

… and followed by the application over the course of today of six more coats, i.e. a total of nine coats so far.

I will now leave this to dry until tomorrow evening, when it should be dry enough to check for evenness of tone and depth of colour – in its current state, with some paint wetter than other, it still looks a bit mottled. I will also decide tomorrow whether or not a further rub-down is needed (most likely, yes), and after said rub-down if more red paint is needed (which I don't expect, but you never know).

I will then again leave the paint to fully cure until next weekend, before masking off the parts now painted red; I do not want to risk any paint coming off when said masking is removed, so enough drying time is necessary.

To be continued …

Mattias

Edited By Banjoman on 16/10/2016 17:11:26

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

Alas!, when appyling the 9th and what was supposed to be the last coat, I managed to get some runs in the paint, and instead of doing the smart thing (leave it to dry as is and then sand down) I panicked, and tried to even the paint out by applying even more of it, hoping that its excellent self-levelling properties would come to the rescue.

They didn't.

Once the now rather thick paint was reasonably dry, I tried sanding it down, but found that it was still unstable enough not to take kindly to the friction of the paper …

… so in the end I applied more paint, and left pending the question whether or not to try once more when the paint has really and truly gone off completely.

In the meantime, I decided to push on with the topsides, and duly removed the paper skirts …

… instead masking off the keel with some bubble wrap …

… and proceeding with the first coat of cobalt blue.

This blue paint has excellent covering qualities, and already after three coats the paint job looked pretty much good enough. However, after it had been left to dry overnight, I decided to go over it once more, first with some 2500 grit paper and then with a piece of kitchen roll, followed by two more coats of blue paint.

As the filters from my half mask show, the last few weeks of airbrush painting has produced a fair amount of paint dust; thanks to the mask I can say that I am well relieved not to have breathed in too much off the stuff …

With the keel masking removed, the hull now looks like this. It will be left as-is until at least next weekend before I attempt to also remove the waterline masking tape, and in the meantime I shall further reflect on what do to (or not) with the not-quite-so part of the keel where the paint run occurred. It doesn't look to bad for the moment, but I still think that it might be worthwhile going over it once more – otherwise I will just keep noticing and being bothered by the imperfection every time I look at it … But we'll see; time will tell!

To be continued …

Mattias

Edited By Banjoman on 23/10/2016 13:49:26

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

And time has told! The uneven patch of red paint on the lower starboard part of the keel was found dry enough to be sanded already the other day, so all the ridges in the paint were removed with 400 and 600 grit dry paper, after which a small group of shallow pits still remaining were filled in with dollops of paint applied with a brush.

This was left to dry overnight, and then sanded smooth …

… the topsides and waterline masked off with some clingfilm …

… and six thin coats of red paint applied, the final two of which well thinned down for a slower drying time and (even) better self-levelling properties.

I also judged that, after respectively at least 220 and 60-odd hours of drying, the red and blue paints bordering on the waterline were hard enough to allow the latter to be unmasked, and I thus began removing the tape …

… one piece at a time …

… until the moment of truth, when the long, continuous edge tapes could be very carefully pulled off.

In a few spots around the bow and stern curves, the paint did not come off at the edge with the tape, but this was easy enough to remedy with a new, very sharp scalpel blade and some cautious cutting; the important thing was and is that no paint that should still be there came off with the tape.

On the port side (thus hidden here) the tape had also let a small amount of blue paint slip in under it. However, this will also be fairly easy to sort out with a brush and some more white paint.

On the whole, I am reasonably well pleased with the result: the edges are mainly sharp enough, and the curvature of the waterline sufficiently smooth to my eye to pass muster. In other words: whew!

To be continued …

Mattias

Edited By Banjoman on 26/10/2016 07:36:45

[Bob Abell 2Participant @bobabell2]

Hello Banjo

Nearly there now?

Will you be adding a final clear lacquer coat, to finish off?

The last two pictures show the quality of the spray job in it's full glory!

Just in time for the Winter sailing season……eh?…………Sorry

Bob

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

Hello Bob,

And thank you very much! Yes, I shall definitely add a nice, strong coat of clear gloss varnish, to protect the paint, but also to give all three colours of the paint job the same level of gloss appearance — and as this is a yacht, I feel free to go town on the glossiness …

More specifically, once I've finished touching up the waterline, I will put on a few first coats of gloss varnish and then, when that is dry, apply the name decals and some gold trimline around the top of the hull, and then seal all that in with more gloss varnish, after which it'll be time to also varnish the deck.

There's still a fair amount of work left after that, though: the various deck houses have to be built up, painted stained and varnished, as will al the deck fittngs, and then there'll be the mast, spars, sails and rigging to contend with, so at my current rate of progress, I think the Spring sailing season looks like more of a candidate than the Winter one for the maiden voyage …

Mattias

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

As alredy mentioned, the masking tape on the port bow and let a slight shade of blue slip in under it and onto the waterline …

… but with a brush, some white paint and as steady a hand as I could manage, this was not too tricky to sort out …

… nor were a few other spots along the waterline that could also do with a wee touch-up. I'll have one more look in a few days to make sure I haven't missed anything, but on the whole I'm reasonably happy with the result. If one were to get out the magnifying glass, it is would be found rather less than perfect, but it'll do for normal viewing.

To be continued …

Mattias

[Dave MilbournParticipant @davemilbourn48782]

Mattias

That's twice this week that words have failed me. In your case it was in wide-eyed amazement; your attention to detail that others wouldn't even consider is truly awesome.

The other occasion was on Mayhem…say no more.

Dave M

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

Dave,

Many thanks for your much too kind words! Being up close and personal with my build, I do of course know only too well which closets has the proverbial skeletons in them, but yes, I try to at least think about details to the extent that if I do nowt about them, it is because of a conscious decision not to.

That piece of blue dusting into the white of the waterline, however, I can hardly imagine anyone overlooking, it was that much in-yer-face … and while I don't think that things have to be perfect (and believe me, they're not!), I do want them to be good enough to not actively bother me!

Mattias

[Dave MilbournParticipant @davemilbourn48782]

I suppose it depends how close up to the model you put your face.

Just this week I found myself cutting and pasting images from various full-size manufacturers' websites into CorelDraw and arranging them to make a 1/16 scale version of the instrument panel on H31 – that's 24mm x 17mm overall. It will then be printed out on self-adhesive vinyl.

I guess it's what drives us to make these things. Liz would say it keeps me off the streets!

BTW if anyone building the model would like one of these panels then just send me a PM. I also have the Fairey wings logo as a waterslide transfer.

Dave M

Edited By Dave Milbourn on 28/10/2016 08:40:49

[Ray Wood 3Participant @raywood3]

Hi Dave

Thanks for those dials etc, control-print-screen has its uses

Whens your 1/16 scale 31 kit going to be available ??

Regards Ray

[Dave MilbournParticipant @davemilbourn48782]

Ray

I've replied via PM for fear of highjacking Mattias's thread. O – and Windows' Snipping Tool is much better than Cntrl+Print Scrn!

Dave M

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

No worries, Ray & Dave … But we now return to the normal programming

I won't be doing much in the way of building over the coming three or four days, as we're have friends to stay, but before that, and inbetweenst vacuuming the living room and cleaning the bathroom for said visit, I popped down to the workshop to remove the final masking, i.e. the one covering the deck!

So off it all came, first the paper covering the interior surface, and then, bit by bit, the masking tape around the edges …

… until it was time to pull off the final strips of 2 mm washi tape against which the paint had been applied.

I am quite happy with the general result, but when the tape came off, I realised that I had made a basic mistake when planning the paint job. I should have known – and do know! – better, and ought to have kept in mind that paint has a thickness, too! It might not be a lot, but it is there, which means that on the top edge of the paint, the inner layers of white primer are clearly visible. The layer may be only about a tenth of a millimeter thick, but it still shows up very clearly.

This is of course no big worry – an hour or so with the smallest brush in my collection and a very fine bead of blue paint along the edge should take care of things. Obviously, though, the proper way to go about it would have been to have used a fan mask to keep the top edge of the hull increasingly free from primer paint, so that for the last few millimeters of the top of the sides, only blue paint had been applied.

Well, we live and learn

Otherwise I'm reasonably well pleased with the result.

The deck of course needs to be varnished – so far it has only had two coats of sanding sealer – as does the hull …

… but the waterline looks as though it sits more or less where it ought to be.

To be continued …

Mattias

 

Edited By Banjoman on 28/10/2016 20:02:53

[Ian GardnerParticipant @iangardner62867]

Looks very fine Mattias- and will look even better when you have added the final clear coats. Just a thought- how about a thin, bright finished rubbing strip around the hull at deck level to cover your slight white line. This would go on nicely with impact adhesive, masked off beforehand. I built one of these hull years ago and did the same- it looked very good.

All the best,

Ian

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

Thank you very much, Ian, both for your kind words and for the suggestion!

In the earlier stages of this build, I spent quite a few hours mulling over how to do the joint between deck and hull – the instructions (based on the preprinted plywood deck of course) suggest painting the outermost mm or so of the deck the same colour as the upper hull, but I was never very keen on that.

I also toyed with the idea of doing the outermost edge of the deck in 1.5×1.5 mm walnut strip instead of having the pear waterway planks go all the way out to the edge, but abandoned the idea because of the difficulty that would have been involved in trimming the waterway planks down in perfect parallell with the hull.

Idem for a similar idea of lining the outer edge of the deck with plasticard strip.

Also, I very much aimed to achieve the current effect of a basically smooth transit from hull topside to the deck, and consequently already rounded off the outer edge of the waterway planks.

All in all, this has created a set-up where the available space for an additional rubbing strip would be approximately 0.75 high and 0.2 mm deep, which is not a lot.

I thus think that I shall first try to remedy the problem in the way already mentioned, i.e. by going around the top edge of the paint with the smallest brush in my collection (and that is a very small brush indeed) to add a very thin bead of blue paint. If the result is not to my satisfaction, I can always come back to the rubbing strip idea …

Still, many thanks once more for the suggestion!

Mattias

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

A wee additional comment, just to put the dimensions of the thing in perspective: the original thickness of the planking material was 1 mm, so after planing, scraping and sanding I*d say the deck is now on average +/- 0.8 mm thick.

The black cartridge paper used for the caulking is 0.225 mm thick, while the walnut dowel used to simulate the bolt hole plugs had an average diameter of 1.06 mm.

If you compare tthese measures with the thickness of paint visible in the below photo, I think it should become clear that although there is a tiny shelf where the paint ends, it is really very small indeed, and that once it is of a uniform blue colour it is, I think and hope, well with the limits of reason that the transition to the planking should look sufficiently smooth to give the effect I wish for.

(he said, crossing his fingers and spitting over his shoulder)

Mattias

[Ian GardnerParticipant @iangardner62867]

Hello Mattias,

I guessed you would have thought around this thoroughly before embarking on the job. I'm sure your solution will work out well- everything else has!

Ian

 

 

Edited By Ian Gardner on 29/10/2016 19:53:16

[Bob Abell 2Participant @bobabell2]

Hi Banjo

What about, as a last resort……..The humble felt tip pen?

Bob

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

Hello Ian and Bob,

Well, we'll have to see how it turns out – I'll be getting on with it tomorrow or Wednesday at the latest. I'm not sure that a felt tip pen would work well on this job – it'd be tricky to find one, I think, that could produce a line at the same time thin (+/- 0.1 mm) and strong enough, and that'd be a sufficiuent match in colour.

However, I do have a plan B: trimline! Either in dark blue (which would come fairly close in colour) or more probably in a nice contrasting colour of either white (to match the waterline) or red (to match the underwater hull). The thinnest varieties are 0.5, 0.75 and 1 mm respectively, and one of those would probably look alright, producing a crisp, even line and posing no problem when going around the curves at the bow and stern …

But we'll see: that is as yet very much Plan B.

Mattias

[BanjomanParticipant @banjoman]

Well, here we are, then! After going around the paint edge with a fresh scalpel blade to remove a few extraneous small pieces of paint, I masked the deck edge with some 1 mm washi tape just above the paint edge …

… and with a brush filled in the gap with blue paint.

The general result turned out OK, I'd say, although certainly not perfect …

… but at least the white line disappeared completely …

… and at least from a normal viewing distance it looks good enough, I'd say.

I have ordered some trimline, though, and once that arrives, I'll have a go at applying some 0.5 mm wide to see what it looks like. If I don't like the effect, the current state of affairs shall have to do …

To be continued …

Mattias

Edited By Banjoman on 01/11/2016 18:28:50

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