Boats & Water crafts

[Bernard]

Dont know if japan ever operated any hovercraft this size, but impressive for a harbor!

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/Airfix-1-144-BHC-SRN4-Hovercraft-Hoverlloyd-BR-Seaspeed-/330492722485?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4cf2e6bd35#ht_500wt_893

 

cheers

 

jeff

Great find Jeff....never saw a hovercraft on a layout. Did you see that there are 269 parts, I can't image how big the craft is.

[cteno4]

Yeah come to think of it i dont think i have ever seen one on a train layout!

 

i dont think japan ever had these large ferry kind, only smaller passenger ones. i rode on a couple down in kyushu in 1984 as i could ride on them with my rail pass so i made a detour out to a couple of islands to take the ride and do something different. also rode in one they use to have from oakland airport to San Francisco airport (across the bay) when i was a kid. quite fun! great to run and down the ends of the taxiways at the airports into the water!

 

come to think about it the smaller japanese passenger versions would be pretty easy to model.

 

no i didnt notice it had that many parts! Airfix use to have great detailed plane models when i was a kid! this guy is about 10" long and 6" wide.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[Scaper]

That is such a cool ferry.

 

Great find Jeff. So cool.

[cteno4]

finally got my boats from england -- an ebay find. had gotten 6 in a lot for like $18 shipped so not bad. 2 launches, 2 cabin cruisers, and 2 small catches

 

they are resin casts by Graham avis details in the uk.

 

example of the catch

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/Graham-Avis-N-Gauge-Scale-B02u-Small-yacht-mast-/370447471208?pt=UK_Trains_Railway_Models&hash=item564063d268#ht_1279wt_700

 

its about 54mm or 26' boat. nice little catch.

 

they have a slimmer one but its much more expensive

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/Graham-Avis-N-Gauge-Scale-B03p-Large-Yacht-mast-/250713856999?pt=UK_Trains_Railway_Models&hash=item3a5fb5dbe7#ht_1174wt_700

 

they are some good forms to play with so maybe ill be able to come up with an interesting way to produce some simple boats!

 

cheers

 

jeff

[Bernard]

Jeff - How do you do it?! You always manage to find a great deal.  :icon_salut:

[cteno4]

lurk lurk lurk lurk! takes patience on ebay! good deals come along just have to wait for them and not let yourself pay more than its worth or more than a good deal!

 

these were really nice at a little over $3 ea shipped!

 

cheers

 

jff

[Bernard]

Hold the phone....this ebay seller has more than one boat....Thanks Jeff, but my ccard is "melting". 

[cteno4]

yep this other guy has multiples, i got mine from another guy just dumping the ones he had personally. this other guy with the multiples lists the sailboats as yachts so you have to use that for your search term! im not sure why the other yacht is twice the price, doesnt look that much bigger.

 

enjoy!

 

cheers

 

jeff

[marknewton]

Found this the other day, an interesting view of a simple ferry terminal, along with some cool-looking small boats.

 

http://www.panoramio.com/photo/6478441

 

A bit further down the river...

 

http://www.panoramio.com/photo/44688534

 

http://www.panoramio.com/photo/44723260

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[cteno4]

ok heres a little present i have been working on for curt's layout. we were talking about boats and i thought it would be fun to make a hobie cat as they have simple shapes and would be apropos vessel for the beach scene.

 

this was just a prototype to figure things out to how these could be made easily. i just ordered some more fine, straight steel rods that would be better suited for the rigging, stays, mast and framework. also made the mistake of not bending the mast as part of the main frame. few details i will do different in future ones. sail was fun to try to print out double sided on the printer and get it lined up! made it doing a small heel.

 

then to top it off i was just about finished with only some touch up painting to do and placing the figures and godzilla attacked. i must have knocked it off the desk last night and this morning when i stepped up to the desk there was an awful crunch noise and looked down and i had stepped right on it (luckily the mast was not sticking straight up, i have stepped on enough nails in my life). luckily for such a tiny craft it was not too hard to put back together!

 

i did manage to screw up my port and starboard when i was mounting the sails and ended up on the wrong tack for the direction of heel, so i just moved the rudders to be turning so the heel is from them doing a correction. oh well its been a few years since i had my feet wet in a sailboat!

 

cheers

 

jeff

[marknewton]

Good looking boat, Jeff - until you stood on it! 

 

Seriously though, how big is it? The sail looks very effective, too.

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

[Bernard]

Jeff - great boat, I never seen a hobie cat modeled before....lucky Curt!

[cteno4]

Good looking boat, Jeff - until you stood on it! 

 

Seriously though, how big is it? The sail looks very effective, too.

 

Cheers,

 

Mark.

 

Mark,

 

thanks, was a fun project. got me to think scale on details some and looking for small parts that could be used on other things and try to keep on scale.

 

well either i was playing godzilla or i wanted to see if i built it well enough to stand my weight...

 

its 18' long scale, bout 1.5" long, those are 0.5" grid marks on the board.

 

i got the idea for the hobie when i was looking around at toy boats. found micromacines made some 1/144 scale cats that were pretty simple. they would work at a bit of a distance, but closer in they look a bit too toy like, so i though i would see what i could do easily. figured i could make one as a test for curt's layout, so it would need some more detail as his beach is right along the edge of the layout.

 

for the sail i started with a hobie diagram and then created a reverse image for the other side and had to create the illusion of translucency of some of the graphic on the reverse side. many of the sails only have numbers on both sides, the logo and such on one side that bleed thru with backlighting. then it was fun trying to line up printing on both sides of the paper. turns out my color laser printer cant get left right alignment closer than about 1mm page to page. actually thats pretty good for a regular printer, this is not offset printing! in the end i had to make the back side bleed larger than the out line and skip the vertical lines so i could get it close enough... that actually took more time than the rest of the project really (baring the reconstruction after the stomping). it was a good exercise in fiddling and got my brain going on other things as well. i may do a small run of them for fun as i think i could whip a few out fast now. also have some much better metal wire coming to do the work.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[cteno4]

Jeff - great boat, I never seen a hobie cat modeled before....lucky Curt!

 

yep i had not either, just got the idea from the micromachines hobie cat

 

 

http://cgi.ebay.com/Micro-Machines-Catamaran-Sail-Boat-Water-Craft-Ship-/260680082825?pt=Diecast_Vehicles&hash=item3cb1be6589#ht_2188wt_754

 

bit too toy looking though up close maybe and i thought about maybe just repainting and redetailing the micro machines one, but i realized it would be faster to do it from scratch probably and i could make it much more detailed.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[Kamiyacho]

Jeff - great boat, I never seen a hobie cat modeled before....lucky Curt

 

I fully expect to one day be holed up in Jeff's basement, applying rocks and foliage to his layout in repayment.

[cteno4]

Jeff - great boat, I never seen a hobie cat modeled before....lucky Curt

 

I fully expect to one day be holed up in Jeff's basement, applying rocks and foliage to his layout in repayment.

 

Deal! you have to come with your tweezers to place figures and silfour clumps as well!

 

cheers

 

jeff

[cteno4]

Keiman just spotted a UK ebay seller with a sale on pewter n scale casting. one is jet skis! great price at 2 for $3 and good combined shipping terms.

 

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/SALE-UNPAINTED-2-PC-JET-SKI-1-160-N-Scale-/370462792734?pt=Model_RR_Trains&hash=item56414d9c1e#ht_500wt_949

 

one on trailer

 

http://cgi.ebay.co.uk/SALE-UNPAINTED-Jet-Ski-trailer-1-160-n-scale-/370462792155?pt=Model_RR_Trains&hash=item56414d99db#ht_500wt_949

 

cheers

 

jeff

[cteno4]

ok heres an interesting little watercraft for you. pendraken, a UK 10mm soldier maker, has vietnam era patrol boats for about $4.50. I just got one and its quite a nice little motor boat hull casting and metal castings for mast, canopy, guns etc. could easily be used to create some custom pleasure craft. just add some styrene sides and roofs for a more modern cabin. bout 60mm long so about 30'.

 

http://pendraken.co.uk:80/VV4-p4782/

 

cheers

 

jeff

[Kamiyacho]

My son had a modelling suggestion last night and, as I'm not in a position to retrofit it into my layout, I offer it here for anyone who would like to try it:

 

Could you use the Tomytec bus system to make a boat move on the water?

[KenS]

I would think so, if the "water" was relatively smooth (no waves) but had enough texture for the wheels to grip.  The magnet follows a wire underneath the styrene road surface, so you could paint the guide wire and bury it in a layer of resin.  The hard part would be ensuring the surface had enough texture for the wheels to grip, and the boat would need to be relatively small (or the wheels would be more likely to slip).

 

Cool idea.

[cteno4]

interesting idea! so you are sucking him into a bit of being a train nerd! ha dad dragging his freak train friends through even had an effect on a seventeen year old!

 

sure could probably work although the tomytec version would be tough as it looks like the guts are built as one big block of stuff and might be hard to fit into a smaller boat. ive not had one in hand yet to tear into to see how much it could be disassembled, but usually when they do that thing of combining everything into a single block it gets hard to rip it apart.

 

the faller system on the other hand is just parts laying around inside the unit that could easily be moved around to fit (makes it really easy if you want to retro fit the mechanism into other vehicles). it would easily fit w/in a tomytec fishing boat or tug and if balanced properly it might run them around, but they do weigh a lot more than the bus shell does! maybe you could kitbash a small motor cruiser that would work.

 

another big difference between the faller and tomytec seems to be the tomytec has a much stronger steering magnet than the faller (to find the wire buried in the plastic roadway). so you would need to have the wire really near the surface with the faller, which could be an issue modeling a water surface. could try to put a stronger rare earth magnet on the faller steering arm.

 

one thought is your water surface would need to be very flat/calm water in your boat path. any waves might be hard to maneuver with the flat boat bottom right on the surface (dont want a large gap there visually!) also what about the wake effect visually, would that seem weird to have a larger boat passing w/ no change in the water surface for a larger vessel? you also might sort of rub a path into your water surface with repeated use that may look odd.

 

faller has some moving little boats like this on a little lake. they use a conveyer belt under the water surface that has a magnet on it to drag the boat around on the top. they also have a lawn mower like this in a yard. doesnt look as odd here as they are flat surfaces like ponds and little canoes or row boats so dont really need to see a huge wake visually...

 

tell your son we want to hear more ideas!

 

cheers

 

jeff

[scott]

I wonder if you could get some sort of low-friction plastic sheet for a boat to slide on, rather than having wheels hidden underneath. Are the wheels critical to the Tomix system?

[rankodd]

I wonder if you could get some sort of low-friction plastic sheet for a boat to slide on, rather than having wheels hidden underneath. Are the wheels critical to the Tomix system?

 

The bus system uses the wheels to propel the unit, just like a car. Are you thinking of having a moving magnet underneath the water pulling the boat/bus along?

[cteno4]

I wonder if you could get some sort of low-friction plastic sheet for a boat to slide on, rather than having wheels hidden underneath. Are the wheels critical to the Tomix system?

 

The bus system uses the wheels to propel the unit, just like a car. Are you thinking of having a moving magnet underneath the water pulling the boat/bus along?

 

thats how the faller boat and mower system work, magnet on a belt that runs through fixed pulleys under the surface to drag the boat or mower along on the surface in a set pattern.

 

jeff

[rpierce000]

There is a store on eBay called something like Paula's hobbies that sells, among other things, hand built container ships. They are pretty nice looking, but not hyper detailed. They run about $150-200, but I have not bought one. I have bought some bulk, undecorated containers from them, they are OK, but solid castings, not hollow boxes.