Almost there...

Well, after a year, the Vincent Black Shadow 1/6th scale master is almost finished. I finally got the etchings from France, via Portugal and glued them on. They were too fragile for solder.  I finally got enough pictures to make an operable front stand. Almost as abstract as the cylinder heads which I've done, but which need some cleaning up.  I made the exhaust today until the delivery of brass rod turned out to be 4mm diameter steel in 5" lengths.  I'm expecting the right stuff tomorrow.  Even just 2 apparently simple curved pipes are actually far more complex in shape and relationship than you'd first think.

We have had the wheel rims done by a process called SLA.  Some call it 3D printing, but it isn't.  A laser hardens a microscopic layer of resin in a bath of the stuff and then it pops up one layer.  There is also a complex support system which is very brittle, but he results were superb. Right down to the bumps from which the spokes issue. 

He is currently making tyre masters INCLUDING the writing on the tyre wall, Avon for the front and Dunlop on the slightly different rear.  Because all this stuff now has to be done from computer files, he is also doing the transfers artwork, equally beautifully.  Where, once, I did it all, my job these days tends to be one of not merely pattermaker, but "facilitator", harvesting work from the best in their fields.  It annoys me that they can all charge much more than I, even though I consider what I do to be beyond most of them and what they do something I could quickly learn if I didn't have to pay through the nose to do so (£500 a day plus accommodation!)  But these days it's the only way to get these things done.

I made the pattern for the hub recently. I was dreading it, but as ever with a feared job, it went swimmingly.  The caster is currently making 4 of them for me to modify into a set of parts. The front hubs have 5 bolts holding the spoke flange to the main hub flange and the rear has 10. I will get the 4 castings back and make one set with another 5 bolts.  The one side, front and rear has to be just the flange and the other, front and rear is the flange and hub cylinder, to be joined at one side.  Here's the brass pattern for the 5 bolt original. The ten slots round the etch take 2 spokes each and were done by drilling the hole centrally and then sawing out either side with a piercing saw. It went very easily. I was surprised and relieved!

Also made the chain guard. That was going to be two sides with a central piece sandwiched betwixt, but it turned out to be far more domed than that would allow, so the only way to make it was to beat two sides over at the top to get the curvature, then be filed straight and soldered together and filed to one curve. Then tiny fixings had to be made and soldered to it.

Why do photos taken with a mobile 'phone end up in a different orientation to that at which they were taken?

Well, with just a few final parts to be made and a final check that everything fits, we should be done.  Then, I have to make all the little changes that make it a Black Lightning and then a Series D.

And if that ain't enough, the next whole bike will be a BSA Gold Star with a Rocket Gold Star Twin to follow that!

Arf a sixpence...

Well, half a litre, anyway.  I went to my local paint supplier today, Kett's Autopaints (much recommended, no complaints) to get, I'd hoped, a 1/4 Litre of enamel paint in a nice off white for a model boat.
Unfortunately as they had to mix it, they could only do half a litre. Fair enough, but whereas a litre is 21 quid, HALF as much is over 16!  How is that right?  Not their fault, that's what the makers charge. It is good stuff mind you, so OK I paid it because I had no choice, but I'd have been happier with something around 12 quid as half of 21?

I wanted it for my latest Aerokits hull restoration. I bought this on ebay for 99 p. Yes, really! Must have been wrongly listed, I can't now recall.  I am not a huge fan of the Sea Hornet as designed. Too busy, too much intended to go on, on the upper works, so I decided to do a Chris Craft on it. I started thinking 2 cockpits, but even that was a bit fussy, so I found the Special Racer or sometimes called the Custom Runabout.  A heavily tumblehomed stern, but not quite as rolled as the Barrel Back.  Then I thought it would look good painted, for a change, instead of varnished mahogany.  Then I found this...perfect....

Of course, the model is a looky likey, rather than a spot on job, but nobody would know as nobody in this benighted land could give a shit about classic speedboats. And fewer still know one from a canal barge.  Whereas, Moi?  I detest tugs, tankers, traders, warships, torpedo boats, coasters, ocean tugs, footy yachts and springer tugs, prate galleons, clipper ships and square riggers of any kind, IOM yachts, modern yachts of any kind in fact, generic offshore power boats and silly overpowered Zenoah weed whacker powered stuff (although I do like the excellent finishes usually applied to the latter.  I am, in short, a fussy sod.  I like vintage yachts and classic speedboats and although I lived on an historic canal boat, I can think of nothing duller than a model of it on the water!

I am a fan of the mahogany hotrod.  And very little else.

Here's my 99p Sea Hornet with its new deck.

The long engine hatch will have to be made to its own frame to maintain the crown of the deck. I have the smaller hatches for access to steering servo (side) and tiller (aft).  The transom should be slightly curved but you gotta stop somewhere when modifying a standard product.

The deck will have to be slightly engraved to represent the planking, before painting.  But painting it all will save me hours which need to be spent on the Spitfire kneeler outboard, Greavette Gent's Racer and Darby One Design in the shed, not to mention the finishing (after 55 years) of my Crash Tender.  Oh and the Vanity Victorian Cutter model, which is very close to finishing.  Something tells me I'll be carrying this lot into Winter rather than the usual diet of slot cars and scenery.

And den I got diss and diss and den dat and...

Another birthday, another haul of goodies.
I got a Hobgoblin T-shirt to add to my other one, yet I have never drunk a pint of that beer.  A bottle of Southern Comfort, most useful.  A nice coffee cream cake and an Indian takeaway...Chicken Achar. Yum, my favourite Indian meal on a stuffed paratha.
Chris bought me a set of ancient Yeoman white metal fittings for the Crash Tender, a bag of Modelling Timbers very final glazed hand turned portholes and a set of new RC gear.

There, happy with that lot.  I'm just finishing cleaning up the white metal fittings. Nothing too much required. Just a coat of primer before final colours.  AND, the portholes are perfect for the wheelhouse too. Saves me the hassle.  The RC gear, ludicrously inexpensive, works perfectly too and will go in it as 2.4Gg frequency doesn't suffer from early sparky electric motors. And my Crash Tender has a Taycol Supermarine of considerable vintage.  Not the fastest, but then this type of Crash Tender would have spent very little time flat out anyway. It just didn't have the fuel capacity at 65 gallons per hour PER ENGINE!  Of which it had 2.
So, my finishing off of the CT is nearly there.  Filling, sanding down, a bit more filling, then final paint.  The window frames are made with windows and the gutters added over the cabins.  Mast made of brass.

Time for another Southern Comfort, methinks...

Annual leave...

When one is used to working for oneself, long hours and all the rest, one rarely gets a chance for an annual holiday. 
And it occurred to me that now I am retired I don't have to think that way any more, so I decided to push my me time on weekends rule to a full week, maybe even more.

With that in mind,  I have got the 54 year old Aerokits Crash Tender out of my son's loft and determined to finish it, once and for all. Yes, I had a 54 year old model which I had never actually finished!  I'd used it, often as a kid, but just never put all the final bits on it.  In fact, somehow, it had lost odd bits of itself. 
There has had to be an element of restoration as time has had its usual effects on even good quality plywood and a few areas needed gluing to correct small bits of  delamination, but generally it just needed finishing, rather than re-finishing.

I first had to clean the muck of ages out of it with a pointy stick, a stiff brush and a Hoover with a clever micro tubes attachment on it.  Then an all over go with epoxy resin which behaved itself beautifully despite its age.  This would have strengthened it up internally and helped waterproof externally.  The epoxy was filed and scraped down and then painted several coats with a thick cellulose primer and rubbed back.  That is now ready for a spray coat to get a nice finish.  I had noticed that round the bottom of the cabin sides there was a batten to aid waterproofing on the real boat so that was added, as was the toe rail on the deck, the dummy door framing and the rubbing strake round the hull were also put on with another hatch and runners on the middle of the wheelhouse roof.

I am currently making the window frames and gutters for the windows.  The mast has been made from brass.

I will be using the original Taycol Supermarine motor, because it is only right and proper. I would have insisted on using the  original REP radio gear, but some bastard stole it years ago, so I will use a modern one that doesn't risk being interfered with by the radio frequency "dirtyness" of the old motor.  I'd hate to lose this old girl. 

For annual leave, this has proved well worth the effort.

For every supermarket...

Time was.....choice...

Time was...I used to draw what I wanted  photo-etched, with a Draughtsmans' pen (remember them?).

I'd draw it 4 times bigger, so that a)it was easier to draw and b) it would be crisp as you like when reduced to actual size on the local printer's repro camera (remember them?).

He liked a lemonade or two , so I would wait till about 12-30 and find him in the Crown, where I'd buy him a beer.  At about  1-ish we'd roll back to his little graphics office and he would make me 2 negatives, emulsion side down, one for the front, one for the back, charge me a fiver and I was on my way.  I'd turn the back one into the correct a/w for the nature of the work with a paint called Rubilith, a real of the sticky tape version of which I'd got from said printer a long time previous for another pint.  The registration gunsights were bang on because they were on the basic artwork I'd drawn.
This then got sent off to Photo-Etch Consultants, Photofabrications or Chempix and a week or so later I got an 18x12" sheet of 10 thou. brass or stainless steel for £18.  Done.  Because I'd sent them camera ready artwork, they had no need to make a "photo tool" for which they would charge me. I'd given THEM one, all they needed from me. 2 negs, emulsion side down, same size.

NOW, the artwork has to be drawn on a computer and a special file type produced. This is sent off to the etchers, who will then check it over and make their kind of phototool, for which they will charge you. In fact every minute they spend doing something to your a/w, a/w you'd thought you'd finished, they charge you at maybe £25 an hour, much more than you can charge for making the model that these bits will go on, even though you are, by far, the more skilled man.
If you can't work Corel Draw or Illustrator, you will have to pay someone else (at at least £25 an hour) to interpret what you give them. They will NOT be model makers, probably not even draughtsmen, (remember them?), pipe optional,

yet they will regard themselves as worth a bloody fortune an hour for merely redrawing what you gave them.  That job used to be called tracer and paid way less than a proper draughtsman. Usually trainees.  You know, like paying £60 an hour at the garage to have some gormless grease monkey "fix" your car.

So, finally you have a chance of getting your etch made weeks later and then the etchers cock it up and send you a fret exactly one third smaller than it should be. They will not, they will NEVER admit fault and so expect you to pay for their mistake. You couldn't have checked what the computer nerd drew as the file is not what a normal machine can read or open.

Time was, exactly the same crap for having decals made.  Black drawings per colour, each on a separate sheet of drawing film, gunsight registered with a Pantone reference for the colour to use. Send it to the screen printers and pay pocket money a week later.  Not any more. More bloody computer files required. Then a print that means no carrier film, weak, flimsy ink and a need to cut carefully round any image before water sliding it.  All because silk screen is now so rare and expensive, because negatives are no longer made because the chemistry used is no longer made, etc., etc., etc.  A vicious circle that has made these two processes impossible for me to do and therefore makes life difficult for the people for whom I used to make patterns AND offer an a/w service for etchings and decals.

Oh, but computers give you so much choice!
BOLLOCKS!!!

Look what I found in Dadddy's garage......

When I look at most videos of old cars it is quite obvious that the average age of the owners/drivers/attendant viewers means they are set to croak in no more than 15-20 years, leaving the cars/boats/aircraft/motorcycles where exactly?

One exception seems to be the Chain Gang.  That collection of reprobates who populate the Frazer-Nash club, mainly the owners of the Chain driven cars, along with their mates in the Morgan club and the other chain driven oddball clubs.
These seem to have as many young strutters as old farts. Even the old farts seem to have some extra life from somewhere.
The big question is will the Ollies and Justins of the world be real enthusiasts?  Will they be prepared, halfway up the Stelvio, to take the left cylinder off their J.A.P. KTOR V twin to see what that mystery knock is?  Could they improvise a repair?  Will they keep the club going?  Well, since anyone with a 'Nash nowadays needs to be stinking rich they will probably know enough of their public school chums and Uni. muckers to keep those all-nighters going at the Club dinners and, even if it is by a newer tradition than most of us can come close to, financially, at least, keep one club's long traditions going.
As to the rest of the clubs, those with few if any such traditions, I fear the cars will just be put away and forgotten about.