I bought a ‘job lot’ of boats
and one of them was this 3ft long speed boat, it clearly had previously used an IC engine, not partial to the speed boats, prefer the scale stuff so it got put in the back of the garage..
It had a really nasty paint job, been brush painted.
There was a hole in the cabin, assume previously used for the exhaust from the motor.
I had an idea! Dave the painter! I bet he could do an incredible job on her and help me to fall back in love! I decided to approach him with another commission, this time it was a ‘Do what you like!’ I had confidence in leaving it entirely in his hands, and pictured a smooth silky job with maybe a bit of airbrush mastery!
Wow he did not disappoint!
You see when you get to know Dave you realise he is an absolute perfectionist, although I had only commissioned him for a paint job, the first thing he said was ‘I don’t like that prop shaft!’ it had a 3mm very poorly set shaft (I hadn’t noticed how bad!) so he organised me a shopping list and I had the parts sent to him, a 5mm shaft, new prop etc, and within days he had the old one removed and the new one set like stone into the boat.
Next step was to prepare for painting, he filled the exhaust hole in the cabin as I plan to use electric power, the rudder was missing so he went and made a new fibreglass one!!! He even mounted the motor and rudder servo for me, all he left me to do is add the ESC! (He would have done that if I had sent it to him!) so all set up and good to go, quick test with the tachometer shows 30,500 rpm at the prop! wow cant wait to see how she goes!
First run was a success, lovely and stable, and quick!
Only issue was water cooling not efficient enough, ESC got hot, (Enough to burn my fingers) so need to ‘enhance’ it
The water cooling inlet is 3 holes flush with the bottom of the hull, so Dad made a scoop to direct the water. Bolted on with some M2 bolts.
2nd test proved great, cool runnings! Slight seepage from the bolt holes so will seal them better and shes finished.