Rocking horse poo, Hen's teeth, etc...

A longish time ago now, I made a contact with a Swiss gent, who I managed to persuade to commission me to make a pattern of an Invicta Low Chassis S Type as a potential slot racer.  I had always wanted a model of an Invicta, it being one of my favourite pre War cars.  And an old friend, Mike Hyatt had always wanted a model of an Invicta as he was brought up in an Invicta owning and racing family.
Well, the model was made and delivered. The client was delighted with it and then we waited....and waited.....  Nothing happened. I eventually made contact and the client pulled the oldest trick in the book..."Oh, an expert has looked at it and there is so much wrong with it that I shan't be making it now".   Ha!  What you mean, my friend, is you have run out of money and can't afford to make it, but haven't the balls to say so.  Been there, seen that, so many times.

So I told him to send the model back and I would put right any problems.  To my amazement, he did! And what did I find?  About half a millimetre discrepancy on the bracket that holds the front axle on the static version of the model.   But the model would only be needed for slot racing anyway! Nothing else was found.
Knowing I'd get nowhere with the client, I decided that I would get my copy after all and so, after waiting so long, would Mike....he deserved it.
This morning, a parcel from Steve Francis, resin caster extraordinaire, arrived and in it are 2 sets of Invicta mouldings and the original master.
So, Mike, who is now officially a very happy bunny and I, have a model so rare, that nobody else has a copy anywhere else in the world.
This could be a slot car I actually build!

4 weeks on nearly...

And after my TIA, if that's what it was, I am driving again.  Nice, but I really did enjoy being ferried around. It was so nice to be able to look at stuff, rather than just vaguely see it rushing by.  There is a kind of trance-like turning in on oneself about occupying somebody's back seat while they mutter to their partner in the front and the world trundles by outside.
But, nightwork for the son-in-law and repairs to the daughter's Jeep forced my hand. Drive or starve.

Medically, I have a checkup on Monday about the TIA, I've had a checkup of no great conclusion, about the heart attack and I had a 48 hour ECG strap on me.
But I still have a slightly numb left leg that goes hot and cold and although my right arm is working fine again, my left arm is a little numb and gets coldfingers.  All things I will have to report on Monday.  My long term back ache problems are now more severe if I bend unsupported, but that can be dealt with.  I am finding the 30 minute exercise regime very difficult to keep up as walking round here will kill you with boredom!  I might get a pushbike again.

On Monday also, I am meeting a chap who I haven't seen since we were 17.  We first met as we both walked into Parklands school on out first ever day of what passed for education in those days.He was 5. I was 4 1/2. We're both now 63.  Amazingly he lives where we were for our 5 day break recently.  And used to live where we also visited. his Mum lives near us on the coast and he's combining visits.  It will be very odd to meet him again. Hehas had the most conventional of lives and I....have not.
No doubt his kids will have been to university and gone on to allegedly good jobs.

We shall see.

I have been doing frames and a building form for making a 152VO model boat. http://152vo.de/ I have even ordered an outboard, sans brushless motor.  No point in buying one of those till the boat is made.  Have also made a Group 44 Spitfire for a friend and am now doing a hardtop for a Mk1 version of the car.  So, keeping busy, but not exactly busting a gut over it.

What did I do, boss?...

As one or two of my regular chums-cum-followers will already know, on Thursday, I woke up only to fall over the furniture and get carted off to the hospital in an ambulance.  The nice Irish doctor reckoned the unsteadiness was down to my having a large, hard deposit of wax in my right ear and sent me away.  Back home I had a doze and woke to the right side of my face going numb and my left leg feeling strangely warm.  GP's called the ambulance this time and off I went again with twos and blues going at every roundabout. In for tests.  I had a CT scan in the late afternoon and was asked to stay overnight to have an MRI scan the next day, which I duly did.  Woken every hour (except one never sleeps in hospital until basically wrecked!
But, although all I could get were brown sandwiches on Thursday, my Friday was peppered with the usual excellent food from The Queen Elizabeth's own kitchens, until, at 1 o'clock I got an MRI scan.
Ye Gods what a weird experience that is.  It's like being inside the works bit of Doctor Who's TARDIS.  The noises are truly strange, the proximity of well, pretty much everything is frightening, but I shut my eyes and went into a semi-trance.  It lasted for maybe 25 minutes and the report was that what they thought the CT showed as a clot was, in fact, clear.  A discharge letter was typed and off home again.  None the wiser, really.  The general concensus was that I'd had a TIA, what some call a mini-stroke.
I'm left with the same numbness, slightly reduced and a right arm that sometimes goes a bit lazy and silly, restored by pulling it around and tensing it against itself.  Today, my ears were syringed and I'm waiting for that to ease the some time dizziness and instability.
I have today done some work on my model of Vanity, the Victorian cutter I once lived on, so I've used my bandsaw, having installed its new blade and glued new sections of keel in to the frames and the structure is now rigid.  But, I remain tired and my back easily aches these days.
I went to the no-nonsense quack at our practice and he confirmed that any remaining effects of a TIA can last for 4-6 weeks before going. He confirmed that my new non-smoking status (well, 6 months actually) is excellent, as is the attempt to eat healthily and remain active and that my current meds. are all suitable.  So "carry on Hoskins" seems to be the phrase of moment.

Ignorance is.....everywhere!...

Whilst researching a boat maker quickly this morning I came across this:-

Boat Description

a once in a life time to own and see this superb craft

this craft has rear well  door s and full sliding roof with her large area  to sprawl in the 37 foot class she has plenty of room

she started life in Herbert wood s hire fleet built, in 1965 as golden light class to be the next big thing ,they  built several  and smaller versions too with great success

elsie with her super fitt out under went a refitt a few yrs ago

she was taken out of the water and spent a few years stripping and rebuilt inside to a high standard and open plan design with numerous hidden features too all bespoke to the current owners design

all top grade wood s oak, best marine plywoods and hard wood used too

the inside will speak for it self

she still look like a standard golden light out side but far form that inside this  little broads flag ship from the 60,s

with her new 50 hp nanni engine and warm air  central heating, inverter to  power an ything and shore power too she will cruise all over

all wiring  plumbing is all new all new rebuilt inside

new decks new roof new cabin sides

inside is a dream …………

as she has been stood all season owner has requested she is lifted and goes into our boat shed for a spruce up ……….

avail to view now but won,t be sold till she is shinny again

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Can you really believe that in this day and age, there is anyone quite so appallingly ill-educated as to actually publish such barely readable drivel on the internet, much less their own website?

I emailed to register my disgust and this is what the knuckle dragging retard sent back:-

"simple ans go poke your posh stupid ponsy attitude up yer areese

see how yer like that ...

now orf my larnns if all yer got to doo its rite ponssi emails then yer sad ole bawl

bit rorf new for yer to I,m ojne of the biggest sellers here on the bruds not bad for an iltlirtae twat from nrofilk ....

just check me out we sell boats daily and for good money too

so my cutomers are happy

jon"

Would you buy an overpriced old tub off this throwback?

Welcome to England in the 21st century.

Gotta love a woody....

Well, I think so anyway and you ain't never gonna persuade me otherwise.  Yes, we made them in Britain to some extent, but it's America and to an extent that few realise, Canada, where they were so much a part of the marine scene.  In fact I would go further and suggest that Canada actually gave us much finer craft.  They came from the Muskoka Lakes and Thousand Island areas of Ontario.  Ditchburn, Minett-Shields, Peterborough, Duke, Shepherd and, of course, my favourites, Greavette.
A company that so nearly didn't make it, Greavette made some of the most elegant boats in the region.  The Streamliner with its rolled edges to the decks and adaptable interior and the Gentlemens' Racer are two that grabbed me straight away.  Greavette also made the famous oddity, the Dispro or Dippy.  The Disappearing Propeller Boat.  I received a plan, amongst many, from my old boaty chum, Rich, which was merely (mis)named "Excaliber", but had no make name, but I reckoned it looked Greavettish, so I resolved to make a Gents' Racer from it.

This is where we are currently.  I finally, despite a broken bandsaw blade, got the Steamed Pear covering boards and king planks fitted and the engine 'ole in place.

That's a good place to hang it up for a while as we are soon moving to a new place (we hope!)

So I had a crack at making the brass bits that will be plated and fitted at the end of the build.

With that in mind I did the steering bracket this afternoon. It took maybe an hour.  It'll take a lot longer to polish prior to plating!

Eventually it'll be mounted on the transom and cavitation plate.  I intend the steering to actually work via this piece,flimsy though it looks, I couldn't bear beefing it up, "just in case".

This is what I'm trying to make, eventually.

I tested my new Bassett-Lowke motor, 70 years old and newly cleaned up.  Intended for the Greavette, on 13Volts it ran superbly and so noisy that I hope it'll sound like a real boat.  I hate that pathetic little whirring noise most electrics do.  I could not slow it with my finger, so I think a nice big pitch prop is called for here.

Compensation week!....

Actually that's a period of a week, not a calendar week.
Last week I tried to get a bank account changed so that I was not paying a tenner a month for 4 preposterous insurances that nobody would want.  I had no idea they were there, but they had been since my Mum started the account. I then went joint on the account when she went down with dementure and took it on when she died. It's my only account, joint with my wife since the PO bank got closed.  I spent three days last week trying to achieve this and still it hasn't been rectified.  Their computer doesn't recognise a letter from our health centre to Chris at this address as proof of her ID. By Friday they'd paid up for the daft insurances and put a considerable sum in our bank account. Then the more I complained about their corporate hypocricy and shear incompetence the more they paid in as compensation!  Even another visit to the branch is forced upon us will attract a ten pound compensation.  Struth that pays for petrol AND a coffee in the CostaFortune corner shop!

As if that wasn't enough, I did a deal with a chap on my Facebook Vintage Model Boat page whereby he sent me the old iron in his newly acquired vintage boat and I sent him all the brushless crap I had acquired in a deal with a Frog 100 engine with a bent pushrod.  I never paid for that in the first place!

Now, I discover that this new motor is none other than a Bassett-Lowke Marine, possibly pre War!
A really fine addition to my cussedly beligerant collection of old electric motors.  And to top it all, whilst looking for evidence of the motor I came across pictures of a nice vertical single cylinder steam engine which had come as part of a swap deal with a Stuart Double 10 than I'd paid fifty quid for.  It turned out my new engine was an "Eclipse" by....guess who....yup, B-L!
Now, I have never been a huge fan of Mr. Bassett-Lowke, for yes that WAS his name.  Or rather, a fan of his company.  B-L made very little in life.  He amused himself buying companies that DID get their finger nails dirty, like Shipmodels Ltd., E.W.Twining and endless other small outfits who already coud make high end stuff to order.  Like George Brough and his over-blown motor bikes, W.J.Bassett-Lowke was a kite-flyer, a self-publicist who managed to get HIS name known for other people's work.  I wonder who really made my engine and motor.  I once met a man in a water-mill who seriously offered some woman (then owner of Bassett-Lowke) 50 pence for the name.  He was writing a book about it all.  He had been their workshop foreman for absolute years and knew the shenanigans intimately.
But, I suppose there is something about the name after all and I'm happy to have this to play with....when it arrives.

And the steam engine?

Identifiable, it seems, by the 3 pillars and the cast in, unsplit bearings.

Oh and the other engine?

This little beaut. runs on a breath of air and dates from 1888.

Gad, it's hot!....

So damned hot that I had to find something I could do in the shade outside my shed.  I had previously got the primer on the Marblehead and felt that should stay at that level while all the moving home went on.
I noticed a deck stringer, cut ages ago, slopping around on the framed hull of a Greavette gentleman's racer I made from Gary Griswold plans.  My dear friend, Rich Redfern of Forida, he of the much missed Model Boat Wizard website, had sent me a huge pile of plans, all of which I will get round to eventually, but oh dear, Mr. Griswold, you didn't build the Greavette, sir, did you, to check your drawings!

Ye gods!  I'd quickly traced the frames onto 3mm ply and bandsawed them out, glued them to the keel and put a bit of chine stringer on.  Then it got put aside ages ago in preference to some other designs intended for the Vintage Boat Company, but he got busy with re-launching laser cut versions of the old Aerokits range, so my ideas became my hobby boats!  One of those was a Darby One-design hydro, from Oulton Broad, where a need was felt for a 1500 cc inboard stepped hydro class.
I happened to have the design and even a build article for a real one in Motor Boat and Yachting Annual for around 1951, I think. Here's a real one racing in the day:-

Here's the model so far:-

As you can see it's further on than the Greavette.

It has a rare offset rudder as evinced by the slot on the right of the divided transom.

Here we have the Greavette as at today's effort to get a bit of strength into it.

The diagonal is to put some opposite twist in the hull.  My hope being that after the glue sets, the nasty twist will be gone or very nearly so.

And once that's done, I will go round filling the gaps where the notches were also badly drawn and then I'll add some ply to the frame edges to bring the frames out to the correct width and shape.  It all sounds mighty long winded, but it isn't, because you do a bit and then go away and do something else while it sets. And I'm quick anyway, so I can do this kind of thing in a flash.  That and the fact that I am notoriously tight-fisted and waste nothing.  I have almost no 3mm ply left, just scraps, so a re-frame is out of the question.

One day it really will look like this:-

Did you ever see a more elegant ventilator?

Now the dilemma.....

I have a set of four mahogany dining chairs.  They were made by my Grandfather in the 20s or 30s.  They came with a table which my daughter and family still use, but the chairs fell apart years ago because of glue fatigue.  OK, I have a pack of pearl (hide) glue, I have a cast iron glue pot to melt it in, I even have a butcher's thermometer to make sure all is correct, BUT.  I really don't have the time to scrape the joints meticulously clean, for, if you don't, hide glue will never stick a damned thing.  Ask me how I know!  

So...here I have a very nice supply of Cuban mahogany.  Not Philipino, not West African Redwood, but real, solid Cuban.  Red as a cheap whore's lips, dense, beautifully figured, so long seasoned you can measure it in generations, not just years.

Suitably ripped on Bazz's saw, it would supply a good load of materials for the model boats.

Yes, I KNOW I always sing the virtues of steamed pear, but it would be a real nod to old Grandad Field if his (I'm sure he'd admit) knackered chairs had a new life.  And I promise not to use hide glue!