R/C Naval Combat

Okay... by now, everyone (more or less) should have a 1/4" square stick at least 33" long for a keel, and a few ribs (or many ribs!) cut out. 

Take the keel and lay it on a flat surface.  You will be using you ruler for this part.  Make one mark 1/2" from one end.  measuring from that mark, now use the ruler to make one mark every 2 1/8" along the keel.  The mark 1" from the end is the BOW end of the keel, and is for Frame 17.  I like to number my markings, but it's up to you   The keels will go either just forward, or just aft of those marks.  Either is fine in our scale, just be consistent with which one you use on a particular ship.  The frames forward of 17 and aft of 4 will be on separate, shaped keels.  I will be posting the jpeg (prints on an 8.5x11 piece of paper) with both the forward and aft keels on it, this morning.  It is at the end of this post. 

Below, you see a solitary frame being lined up on the keel.  It has been placed just aft of the marking on the keel (numbering the marks helps when you are using one of the middle frames first!), and lined up perpendicular to the keel using two square blocks of plywood, which will be joined by 2 more.  These hold the frame vertical, and true to the keel as well, while our temporary dollop of super glue (CA glue for the purists) cures.  *It occurs to me that someone might ask, 'gee, perfessor, why start in the middle?'...  and it would be a good question.  The reason is that the middle frames are much wider and can hold the whole mess upright by themselves, whereas the frames towards the bow and stern are skinnier along the keel, and the whole mess would fall over.  To the bottom right, you see another frame waiting to be glued on, and to the top right, you can see a very unhealthy assemblage of caffeine and high-fructose corn syrup, which I waste a lot of time at work encouraging my patients to stay away from.

Anyhow, after the first frame is securely glued to the keel, move along and do another, and another!  Below, you can see that I used a random piece of 1/4" ply to make sure that the second frame to be glued on is level with the first frame.  This is continued as we add more frames.  On WW2 ships, which tend to have a lot of upward curve to the bow, you can still do this to make sure that they're square (i.e. the deck won't be twisting from left to right).  Note the stack of plywood blocks on the forward frame being glued on.  

POP QUIZ, CLASS!  PUT AWAY YOUR TEXTBOOKS!  Bonus points to whoever counts the correct number of ships/ship projects visible in the picture above!  Super bonus points to the person who correctly names the most ships from the picture!  I will be posting a second pic tomorrow with ships circled and named.

 Here is the drawing with the fore and aft keels.  Lesson coming!

  www.rcnavalcombat.com/Portals/0/Use...%20aft.jpg

1 Pommern,  1 edgar quinet a can of dew and 5 more ships.

no beer cans tho whats up with that

IMPORTANT NOTICE!!! WHEN YOU NUMBER THE KEEL, THE FIRST MARK 1" FROM THE END IS FOR FRAME 17!!! I WILL CHANGE THIS IN THE LESSON, BUT DON'T PUT FRAME 20 THERE!!!

EDIT: I changed the lesson from last night to explain why Frame 20 doesn't go on the keel.  It's one of those things that I wouldn't have missed if we were in the shop doing it, and I'm sorry if anyone has already glued frames 18-20 to a keel  

Got some serious cutting, sanding, and gluing done today!  Below is the cut paper form of the stern keel.  Love those lines!!  The little crosshatched area is to be cut out so that fitting the stuffing tube (the tube that the prop shaft goes through) won't be a pain    The prop in the drawing is a hair over 1.25" diameter, which is great, since we will be going with a 1.25" prop to push the fully scale rudder.  MWCI guys, technically speaking we must use the standard 1.75 sq.in. rudder until (if!) the BOD grants permission to use the scale rudder.  I will be emailing my documentation to my BOD members for Region 3 to (per the rules) substantiate that Edgar Quinet's rudder is >1.75 sq.in. in scale.  Since my documentation is the original French shipyard plans, I'm reasonably hopeful of getting permission. I will post here when I know which rudder we can use.  In the meantime, I'm building with a scale rudder because it looks cool.

Below is the stern keel in vivo for your viewing pleasure.  The prop is a 1.25" prop just for scale.  We will be making props in a later lesson, as a pair of nice pre-made ones costs like $20.  Ignore the big fatty notch just aft of frame 3.  It was for an idea that I discarded.    DO note the 1/4" high, 1" long notch on the front bottom of the keel where it mates up to the main keel.  All in all, I like how the stern keel came out.  The French drew some nice lines when they designed Edie

A few pics looking through the ribcage... since the top one was taken, the rest of the ribs were added.  I'd have done a new pic, but the camera was in the house and it was raining.

View por detrás...   Forza!   (Ships way off from left to right: Elorn Maru, Kongo)

and from the bow...

And a gratuitous pic of Inspector Tuxcat, cause he's awesome.  Working tirelessly to ensure that your lessons meet BuShips exacting standards...  Lord only knows the debt owed to this paragon of shipbuilding excellence by battling noobs everywhere (including myself) 

Currently, he is chewing my finger to check for adequate resilience in battle.

Tomorrow, subdeck adventures!!