Why do we do it?

[Boiler BriParticipant @boilerbri]

For my 13th birthday I was given a green and red star yacht. I really enjoyed sailing it – mainly in the sea around Anglesea on the beaches. I probably played with this 'toy' until it was put somewhere and forgotten about at the beginning of driving age. My dad made me a mirror dinghy which we used to sail-row on a small mill dam in NewMill – Huddersfield when I was about 14.

I think it's safe to say that I have liked boats and ships for most of my life. I was 8 when we started to go to Anglesea, my uncle was a foreman for Taylor Woodrow who were a contractor on the Wylfa nuclear power station. We used to camp at Elian bay camp site overlooking the main shipping route into Liverpool. There were two pilot ships that took the pilots out to the passing ships. It was great to watch them milling about between ships. In later years they has fast pilot boats stationed on the headland at point lynas. I can hear the roar of the engines now, they sounded superb, even at 3 in the morning. Tents did not do much to prevent the noise! I had a small observer book of the chimney markings of shipping companies and a pair of binoculars so that I could look them up. A bit of boat spotting I suppose. So I think all this in my childhood made me like the sea and boats.

So what made you get into modelling boats?

Brian

[Boiler BriParticipant @boilerbri]

[Tim CooperParticipant @timcooper90034]

Brian

I started with the Eezebilt kits after my brother started buying Model Maker, then onto a Veron Trident, which is still working. Model Railways when my own kids were young, then Warhammer figures from Games Workshop with youngest son in his teenage years. Back to Model boats as they started to leave home.

None of my 3 sons have any interest in model making and the grandsons are not showing any interest yet!

My wife asks why boats and not aircraft? Not sure I have an answer – I just like boats.

Tim

[Byron Rees…(Ron)Participant @byronrees-ron]

Brian,

I was not quite 5 years old when after the Queens Coronation street party in June 1953 I was taken to stay with my Grandparents on the Isle of Wight. He was retired Navy (Ships carpenter/Mate) from WW1 and RNVR (WW2) and bought a house in Ryde, 15 minutes walk from the sea.

He was very handy with a chisel and plane and made loads of stuff from old railway sleepers! Solid Oak and covered with tar, but amazing carvings, I would almost live in his shed all that summer and just watch him wood carving. I stayed there for 8 weeks as my younger sister was due to be born (I never remember my Mum with a bump!, )

One Sunday the Model Yachts were all out on the boating lake on Ryde Esplanade and the sailors running around with long sticks with hooks on them, they seemed absolutely massive to me and I loved them, even helped push a couple away from hitting the banks. I was smitten and asked Grandad if we could make one.

"We'll start with something smaller" he said,"What would you like?"……….."a Galleon", I said. So out came another chunk of railway sleeper, he sharpened up a couple of shortened chisels and taught me how to use them. I was 5 and you could have shaved with these things!!!, My Dad, who'd brought news of my new sister and also my pain of a 3 year old brother, was horrified in case I cut myself….."Are they sharp" he asked…"Of course they are, you can't carve wood with blunt chisels" Grandad said smugly, "Won't he cut himself"…..My Dad cried, thinking his father had gone mad, "Not if he does it the way I say, he won't, and if he does, it'll be a good clean cut and he'll never use one wrong again!.

It took me weeks of hard graft to carve that Galleon, he never sanded any of his carvings. I still remember him saying things like "Both hands behind the cutting edge, and let them see the chisel marks just make them smaller near the end" He'd take a handfull of shavings and polish the wood with them, then a dab of beeswax, it shone, and no varnish.

With bits of cut up bed sheet for sails and three masts, we sailed my Galleon alongside the big yachts at the end of August. The Sailors came over and asked Grandad about the little 12 inch ship and he told them "Ask him, he made it".. I've never been so proud of anything in my life.

The ship stayed on his mantlepiece for years as I grew up and when he passed away in 1970, I asked if I could have some of his carvings, nutcrackers, Hand shaped bookends, which I still have today, but no-one ever knew what happened to that Galleon. It probably looked a right mess but to me it was a marvel and I have been a modeller ever since. (And taught hundreds of kids how to carve)…..By the way, I have never cut myself with a chisel……Thanks Grandad.

RON.

[Boiler BriParticipant @boilerbri]

Now those are great replies. Thank you.

I can understand the airplanes thing. They usually come back from a session in kit form 😬 or ours did.

Brian

[Ray Wood 3Participant @raywood3]

Hi All,

I have been very lucky as my family, dad,uncle,grandfather all enthusiasts of boats,planes & trains, I always have had access to a workshop, like Ron once I cut my thumb at 7 years old I had a lot more respect for the Stanley knife, and having stitches made me a hero at school I like to produce objects ie models, I have been flying RC for 40 years and built my first live steam aged 14 a 3 1/2" gauge tank engine, but boats have been a passion for the last50 years !! Time in researching a new model & building it is as good as it gets

Regards Ray

[S MParticipant @sm83187]

I began building model planes for my brother, and constantly repairing them every time he crashed them, I decided at least with boats I could wade in or swin to recover it if it stopped or ran out of glow fuel, or at the very worst I could wait for the wind to bring it to the side where I could recover it.

From there I found many local places I could take boats, unlike his planes which were very limited even back then, where they could be flown and I could put a boat in the back of my bike and take my pick of lakes, canals, and even rivers within 10 minutes riding of home.

After starting work as an apprentice I found many more tools to learn to use and became more creative by casting hulls i aluminium or even fabricationg them in steel, and made many mistakes, this spurred me on to rectify my mistakes and to work with many more materials including the copper hull I made totally with a hammer and soldered in the superstructure.

Now it is a gentle pastime solely for relaxation at the building stages, a way of teaching youngsters to create something by learning new skills, and as a way of spending time with the family which is ever expanding as I get older, and a form of socialising with them at the lakeside with a picnic while relaxing more boating.

[Martin Field 1Participant @martinfield1]

So many excellent tales.

I had always liked boats anyway, but when I was seven, my Dad's best friend made and gave me an Aerokits Sea Urchin. It had a Kako motor and a twisted tinplate prop. It still has and I restored it 2 years ago. I am 66 now! I have cine film of me carrying it up to the car from Borth-y-Gest beach?

That friend of Dad's died very young, but I still treasure the model, which remains steadfastly free of any R/C gear, but now has to have 4 AA cells as I can't get the flat bell batteries any more.

Then I was presented with an Aerokits Crash Tender for my 11th Christmas as a kind of pay-off I suppose for the fact that I was suddenly to cease to be an only child and my play room would have to become the new brother's bedroom. So I got the whole kit and caboodle. I no longer have the REP single channel RC gear as it was stolen, but I have this year finished the job started 55 years ago! Taycol Supermarine motor et al.

My Dad also had a friend with an ex Dunkirk Little Ship at Paglesham on the River Roach in Essex and Dad was always being roped in to help keep it going. We would have trips on it quite often and stay aboard for long weekends. A High prow, 32 foot Thorneycroft with a wonderful Meadows 4ED petrol engine that only my Dad could coax into any kind of reliabilty. The wheelhouse contained the famous plate confirming her service at Dunkirk.

Well that and the trawling trips in Vanguard, which was moored a few yards away from her, another Dunkirk boat, I was hooked. I've have tried aircraft. My son bought me one of those "uncrashable" foam jobbies. Took a couple of slates of my daughter's roof. And the insurance and club membership for aircraft is more than I want to pay.

Cheers,

Martin

Edited By Martin Field 1 on 17/08/2018 10:54:37

[Bob WilsonParticipant @bobwilson59101]

After one or two kits, my parents said I couldn't have any more as they couldn't afford them, but if I "had anything about me," I would just build them myself. A few days later, I was given a small toolbox containing coping saw, small plane, archimedian drill, two chisels, pliers, screwdriver, scissors, modelling knife and a few other small tools, and told to "get on with it" Never looked back. Not being very good at school, I was allowed to go to sea 9 years after the photograph below was taken (1952), remaining there unril late 1992, and leaving because I found modern ships too ugly, and too complicated for me to feel at home in them. I built models before, during and after going to sea, and still build them now at age 74, but these days, they attract little interest amongst fellow ship model builders, although they are normally snapped up shortly after completion by collectors.

Bob

Edited By Bob Wilson on 29/09/2018 09:00:08

Edited By Bob Wilson on 29/09/2018 09:01:01

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