HMAS/m AE2, Scratchbuild

[Bandsaw Steve]

53 minutes ago, John_W said:

[pulls up a chair]

Looks like we are going to get another masterclass...

 

Hmmmm...I could probably stretch to another 'muddle class' 

[Sprueloose]

Another interesting project! I shall just sit in the back here and learn something!  Looks like a wonderful opportunity for a bit of brass work!

[Bandsaw Steve]

Submarine Sandwich

 

Wow - up to Page two and I haven't even done anything yet!

 

Well I have sort of been working on this as I have spent a lot of time thinking about how to make this thing and what to make it from. Suffice to say there are many, many different ways of tackling this task and each have their own advantages and disadvantages. I've also been waiting on the plans to come back from my colleague at work who has been very kindly scanning and rescaling them to 1/100 scale. Thanks Tony! He has now plotted five copies of each set and returned them to me. I have had one set of each fully laminated. So it's time to get started.

 

 

The plans on the larger sheet will be the 'master' set for this build as they have a plan view and a lot more external detail, but the smaller set has the advantage of these full cross-sectional views - which will be important in helping achieve the correct shapes.

 

Now I've got to select which medium to build in. I've got some composite decking - a synthetic wood / plastic composite wood substitute that I'm keen to try when the opportunity arises but I've decided to stick with wood for this project - mostly just because I like working with it, but also because I recently discovered liquidambar (AKA American Sweet Walnut) and it carves so beautifully I'm looking forward to using it on a large scale. Here's the bit I have in mind, note how despite its size there is not a single knot in this piece. 

 

Check that the plank is nice and straight by looking down it like a rifle - this is about as good as it gets!  

 

And so to start work. Back to my personal favourite - the band saw! Cutting the liquidambar to the correct length and height. Watch your fingers!

 

In addition I have this piece of sapelli - a relatively hard-wood from Spain, bought from the local hobby shop. It's vac wrapped in plastic, so it has to be good! 

 

The main reason that I purchased this piece is that it is exactly the correct thickness for the central deck / structure that runs along the length of the boat. Sweet! it's very easy to adjust the length of a piece of wood and relatively easy to adjust it's 2D shape - but changing it's thickness is a bit tricky without some specialist tools, so finding a high quality piece of wood at exactly the right thickness is a great bit of luck.

 

And now it's starting, just starting, to come together. Get the big shapes right first - don't even think about details at this point.

 

You can probably see where this is going now. I'm going to start with a central panel of Sapelli cut to the correct profile and then add a carved piece on either side to represent the pressure hull and then another two pieces to represent the saddle tanks. Hope I am I going O.K. with all this nautical terminology - I have no claim to any real knowledge of matters maritime.

 

So as you can see above the basic construction method is going to be very simple - just build a submarine sandwich.

 

See you next time

Reconcilor  

 

 

 

 

[longshanks]

I've been wondering how you were going to go about this ............

This looks as good a way as any and better than most.

 

You worry about the woodwork and we'll worry about the terminology

 

Good start

 

Kev

[hendie]

looking forward to this.  I don't care about the terminology, just watching the shapes appear is mesmerizing

[Ripaman]

I too will pull up a chair, just read your M15 wip and that was wow

 

Regards

Richard

[Bandsaw Steve]

The middle bit

 

Oh well, there seems to be a fair consensus that no-one is going to get too upset about terminology so I'll just go with the flow on that - right now I'm going to build the middle bit of the submarine. The bit with the decking on it that the submariners would have walked on when getting a precious breath of fresh air. 

 

First though I've had to sort out the plans and make a translation of the points where the cross-sections off the second set of plans correspond to the first set. 

 

 

• 

I've also had to pick a base-line to build to. This is going to be a waterline model - but I have decided to build to a point about 1.5 scale metres (15 mm) below the surface trim waterline for three reasons:

• The plan view of the submarine, obviously enough, gives the full beam view of the vessel - not the waterline view so to make the plan view accurate I have to honour the widest point of the vessel, which is below the waterline in this case.
• I think it will be much easier to carve out shapes that terminate in a 90 degree angle with the surface that the model will rest on than it would be to carve out the very 'open' and variable angles that occur at the true waterline.
• The water setting that I will put this in might be made of either very clear or quite rough water, either way some significant amount of the submarine that's below the waterline will potentially be visible.

 

So I'm building down to the red horizontal line in the view below. 

Now it's time to start some work on the middle bit. If anyone knows the correct name please let me know...

 

In my Mig15 build I used PVA to attach paper plans to the wood I was working on and it sometimes made a pretty bad mess. Various people have made some really good suggestions on what to use as a less permanent and less 'messy' adhesive including low-tack repositionable spray-on photographic adhesive. I'm going to try that one day but have not got around to buying any yet.  When I was about to start this though, I spied some of this stuff that my daughter uses at school and I've given it a test run.

 

Despite its outrageous purple colour it actually dries clear.

 

Voila, cheap, semi-permanent, but allowing very clean removal of the paper (so I have subsequently discovered). This purple glue stuff might not be ideal - but it is pretty good.

 

Now of course the length of sapelli gets the bandsaw treatment. 

 

Leaving us with this basic shape.

 

Which we can trim and tidy with a variety of simple tools - here a coping saw.

 

Leaving this - the middle bit...

 

So far, so good.

 

Regards,

Reconcilor.

[hendie]

2 hours ago, Reconcilor said:

right now I'm going to build the middle bit

 

2 hours ago, Reconcilor said:

Now it's time to start some work on the middle bit.

 

2 hours ago, Reconcilor said:

Leaving this - the middle bit...

 

if you want to get really technical - you call it the center bit !

 

 

we're off !     'scuse me while I get comfy

[Martian]

Nice work, I do miss having access to a woodworking shop.

 

Martian the Supportive

[Buddyboy12]

Looking forward to this! Great work on the mig btw!

[Horatio Gruntfuttock]

Wow - this looks like a real labour of love and I do like the forward planning and careful techniques that you are using - what will you seal it with?

Just a teeny, wheeny niggle - American Sweet Walnut is known in Oz as 'liquidambar', all one word and with no 'e' as that is its Latin species name. 

[Bandsaw Steve]

Yes, quite right, however my spell-checker sometimes gets a bit hyperactive! 😀

[Bandsaw Steve]

As for what to seal it with that remains to be seen. I have heard that liquidambar is not as 'dimensionally stable' as some other woods, in other words it might swell and twist over many years, especially if moisture can get to it. My submarine, ironically enough, will not go near water so I'm not anticipating any trouble but it might be that some good sealing undercoat will be a good insurance policy. Any suggestions welcome.

[Bandsaw Steve]

Making the bow

 

I was thinking I might be 'witty' and call this 'taking a bow' but that's pretty feeble so I'll just stick with something prosaic.

 

As you know the 'central bit' is now cut to the correct profile and mercifully, on this submarine most of it's vertical surfaces are dead parallel, so there's very little contouring to do at this stage. The one place where a bit of shaping is required is right at the front.

 

Before I hack away the marker paper all around the bow though i thought I would permanently mark some key landmarks. In particular the anchor locker. The easiest way to do this is just to drill some holes at the correct spot. in this case at each corner of the locker.

 

Now stick on a plan view of the tapering first few metres of the structure.

 

Having achieved the correct outline in profile I draw a red stripe on the centreline. Those of you who followed the Mig15 build will have seen this before. Essentially I just paint a red line on the correctly profiled surface; during all subsequent work if the red line remains, then the profile is still correct and I have not damaged the established shape that I want to preserve.

 

And now I started to carve away the surplus wood either side using a flat chisel. The only problem was that this wood is very hard, it actually seems to be a lot like mahogany, and the flat chisel working on a flat hard surface just sort of skidded over the surface and didn't actually cut much wood. 

 

it cut OK across the grain like this - but cutting like this tends to leave a slightly rough surface and I did not want that.

 

So I switched to a fairly tightly-cambered scoop chisel which got much better purchase.

 

Once the basic shape had been roughed in with the tight scoop chisel I reverted back to a flat chisel which could now remove the high ridges.

 

I found that this relatively open scoop chisel was also very good at achieving a nice compromise between cutting effectively and getting a nice smooth surface.

 

Not looking too bad.

 

Time for a bit of clean up with some sandpaper. This stuff is new to me it's washable fabric abrasive, longer lasting than sandpaper and can be unclogged after use. It's not bad either, but seems more like a polishing than an abrading tool to me.

 

After sanding, the result looks like this. As per the Mig15 symmetry is everything. I'm reasonably happy with this.

 

And at the end, the paper peeled off with no protest leaving very little residue behind. What was left was cleaned up quickly and easily, so the purple glue has kept its promise!

 

That's it for tonight. Thanks for all the interest shown. Might have another update soon as I am getting a bit of time in the shed most nights after work.

 

Reconcilor.

 

[Ray S]

Hello Reconcilor, that is great work so far, and a fab tutorial for one such as me who is unknowing in the dark art of woodworking. 

 

I am looking forward to seeing this progress more!

 

Ray

[Murdo]

Excellent stuff!

 

[Bandsaw Steve]

Something that looks a bit like a boat

 

Now we need to start on the pressure hull. This is going to all be a bit predictable probably - but here we go anyway.

Cut out and glue on the relevant profile views to the 2 previously cut bits of wood.

 

Run them both through the bandsaw.

 

Trim any detailed shapes at the end.

 

Place them both alongside the central deck layer to see if they look alright - I'm happy at this point.

 

Note that there are some small gaps in the last few centimetres toward the bow. This is because central bit tapers to a streamlined point. This is not really a problem, I believe it can be very easily dealt with later.

 

And now we have this, which still doesn't look much like a boat - so let's carry on a bit further.

 

Change to plan view and, once again, cut out the relevant shapes.

 

Stick the plans onto the top of the two bits of wood in question. In this case I am sticking onto a slightly curved surface due to the contour left by the previous cut, so there is a tiny bit of foreshortening - but so little that I did not bother to correct for it on this occasion.

 

Back to the bandsaw. The repetitive nature of this process just goes to show how building this way is actually quite simple, you probably need half a dozen or so basic skills and just end up doing variations of them over and over again.

 

Here's the basic outline of  half a pressure hull.

 

Once again I have used a chisel to make some minor shape adjustments. 

 

 I find in most projects there is a moment where I first 'see' the subject in the model, on this project the photo below was that moment.  Finally - something that looks like a boat!

 

Best Regards,

Reconcilor

[longshanks]

Enjoying your tutorial, this is going to be fun................

 

Certainly got the basic shape there now

 

Kev

[Bandsaw Steve]

Waisting away

 

Now I'm coming to a tricky bit in the build; dealing with the saddle tanks. The use of saddle tanks in a submarine allows far more living space inside the pressure hull and was a very new idea when the E class was designed. It was a key innovation that allowed this class to operate and patrol over long distances.

The cross section below illustrates the concept quite nicely.

 

From a model-building point of view though, this segmented cross section complicates the job somewhat. Instead of having a nice even cylindrical shape, the external shape must have a sharp and curvilinear delineation between the pressure-hull and the saddle tanks. Getting that curvilinear contact between the pressure hull and the saddle-tanks is likely to prove the most challenging part of this entire build. I hate to say it, but it's probably a critical pressure point! 

 

Anyway, after a fair bit of thought here's how I'm going to try to do this. Here I've marked out the curvilinear trace of the contact line between the pressure hull and the saddle tank and marked up the parts of the pressure hull that have to be removed.

 

Here I've used the bandsaw to cut a closely spaced series of guide cuts that very carefully define the volume that needs to removed.  This method allows greater control on the next cut than can be readily achieved by just hacking into the cut.

 

Hack into the cut! Well not really, I'm actually doing this fairly carefully.  Note that the guide cuts allow small pieces to spall off the job as the blade advances. This means it's easy to stop at any point and adjust the blade's position if needed. This is why cuts that need to be very precise are best made this way.

 

Leaving this. A fairly carefully defined cut that must be reproduced carefully on the other side of the hull.

 

Yep, seems to have worked OK.  Remember the three S's of model building - 'Symmetry, Symmetry and Symmetry'. I think I got close enough in this case.

 

As you can see, I've now cut a 'waist' in the hull - it looks a bit like an F105 Thunderchief or a Hawker Hunter's fuselage in this view. I'll leave it to you to guess whether-or-not that's a hint regarding future projects.

 

Hopefully in this plan view you can now see clearly why this waisted shape has been cut. The really tricky bit will be cutting the saddle tanks to just the correct contour so that they fit with a nice sharp contact with the pressure hull.

 

That'll be the next post...

 

By the way, I'm considering a name change on Britmodeller... 'Reconcilor' was a name chosen in haste and it's more to do with what I do at work than what I do for a hobby.

 

 I've heard it said that  'Reconcilor makes me sound like:

• A marriage guidance councillor
• A race relations specialist
• An accountant
• A catholic priest

FYI, I have nothing against any of the professions above - I'm just not in any of them!

 

What I am keen to know is - if I get my display name changed do all of my past posts and threads get the name change applied to them retrospectively?  Or does the name change only apply from the date of change forward?  I've asked this of one of the mods but he hasn't come back with an answer yet. I think that all of our mods are very busy fighting the good fight at the moment so I don't want to harp on about this to them. If anyone knows please feel free to drop me a P.M.

 

Regards,

Reconcilor...(for now)

 

 

 

 

 

 

[longshanks]

 

Gobsmacked 

Truly amazing work going on here, I would not no where to start

 

Came across this article in an old Model Boats magazine, might be of interest

 

 

 

 

 

 

If you need better quality on the pics I can play around with the scanner and email them direct

 

Kev

[Martian]

Just dropped by to add my bit of encouragement, it is really starting to look like a submarine now.

 

If you get Mike to change your name, all your previous posts get carried over. That's what happened when I officially became a Martian.

 

Martian

[Bandsaw Steve]

Long shanks, Thanks for that article will read the whole article on the way to work today. I see someone has built a working example in 1/48! Now that is skill!

 

Martian,

just to be clear, I assume by 'all your previous posts get carried over' you mean that the new display name gets applied retrospectively and all previous 'Reconcilor' posts will show the revised name, correct?

 

i also assume nothing else changes - no impact on any other aspect of profile, Reputation etc?

[hendie]

I just spent this afternoon trying to figure out what you were doing.... I was looking at the underwater sinky thingy you're making and telling myself 'it's a constant cross section for the most part'  - Sorta like a dinosaur..... very, very thin at one end, thick in the middle, then very, very thin at the other end.   I'm looking at your work thinking the floaty sinky thing isn't waisted (not wasted!)- or am I looking at the drawings wrong ?

 

then it hit me.  I know what you're doing now.

 

 

I can be a bit slow at times, me.

 

 

54 minutes ago, Reconcilor said:

no impact on any other aspect of profile, Reputation etc?

 

no, we'll still respect you in the morning

 

 

[Bandsaw Steve]

I'm pleased you know what I'm doing now Hendie. I wish I did!😄

[Norman]

This is very interesting , keep up the great work !!!