T37 Model Sailboat Build Log

If this is your first visit, please realize that the posts are in backwards chronological order, so this is actually the last step. You may want to start with the Introduction . Now that everything is done, she is ready to sail. I still have to trim excess lines and brass wires, decide if I want to add pin stripes and perhaps numbers on the sail. For now, I want to go sailing. Here are a couple of very brief videos of the first sail in the lake behind my house (just keep in mind that Blogger is not great with video quality): Here are a couple of photos of the author (me) sailing on the real deal: And here are some videos on my YouTube channel of some sailing. The first was a great overnight race with my two sons and two sailing buddies: 2015 Maryland Governor's Cup Race: https://youtu.be/gf0-OIOlIFs The second is a bit longer but some nice shots of the Beneteau 49 I regularly sail on: Sailing down the Potomac River and the Chesapeake: ht...

Wow! Finally at the last stage of this whole process.  This phase of completing the running rigging starts with some steps I did not take photos of, but the instructions should be clear on those. Here is what I did capture: Attach the jib clew to the end of the jib boom with a piece of the brass wire. I left mine for trimming later when I was certain everything was the way it needed to be: The Main boom sits below the main and attaches to the open screw eye on the lower mast: The jib and forestay tube attach to the bow screw eye and the the boom attaches to the forestay screw eye above or inside of the bow screw eye. Note that you can add spectra to the jib tack grommet and jib head grommet to add luff tension. I did not do this yet: At the top of the mast, I removed the tape that had been holding the plastic tubing that runs down the mast in place. To this I taped the masthead fly: Here, the forestay and jib attach to the open screw eye 5...

The instructions for these steps are very clear, here are some photos to illustrate them: Attach the rudder control arm with the control rod attached and running up to the RC deck: Feed the included spectra line through the hole in the center forward hole of the deck. The mid-point of the line is fed through a crimping collet, then through the sail control arm and then back through the collet (no easy feat) to be crimped. The trick I used was to tie the doubled over mid point on the spectra to a single thread which I passed through the collet and then pulled the doubled over portion through and then crimped it: You don't want to let the spectra slip back into the hole while working with it: Control arm with spectra attached waiting for the next step: Close up of the control arm and crimped spectra: RC connector module: Here the servos, batteries are connected to the servo control unit. The black closed loop was unused in my case. The i...

The key to any great glossy finish is rubbing it out. If you are not familiar with this process, it goes like this: First, you ensure that your clear finish coat is completely cured. Second, you sand the surface with progressive grits. In my case, all sanding was done wet and progressed through the following grits: 320, 400, 600, 1000, 2000, 3000. Third, use an automative compound and preferably a RO polisher (or sander) with an applicator pad attached. Finally, use an automative polish, which can be applied with the RO and hand buffed off. Be extremely careful about sanding over the edges. Edges hold barely any material, whether primer, paint or clear coat, and you can sand right through them with only the gentlest of passes with ANY sandpaper. IF that happens, just touch up the affected area, clear coat over it and continue. I did not take photos of the sanding process: The products I used for compounding and polishing are shown below: Note that even with the sat...

Over a two day period, with 20 to 40 minutes between coats, I applied a dozen coats of clear, satin, poly-acrylic finish using my HVLP sprayer. The entire outer surface will be coated: Here is the HVLP sprayer, not at all expensive from Harbor Freight: Here is a very brief video of the spraying process: Once the bottom was done, I set the boat upright and applied the same satin poly-acrylic finish to the deck and toe-rails. The paper towels under the boat are to avoid any possibility of the semi-cured finish from the day before sticking to the stand:

Perhaps a bit unusually, I elected to use the Kilz as my primer AND my finish for the rudder and keel. Since I will be applying a clear poly-acrylic over the entire vessel, I suspect this approach will work perfectly. I also choose to paint my hull blue. That procedure starts with removing the rudder and cover the keel so it receives no blue paint: Here is the first coat of blue paint - a spray oil-based paint. Same issues with paint drying and a bit of orange peel with this method. My preference would be to use my HVLP sprayer. Why didn't I? Don't know: After several coats, things were looking just fine: I removed the tape and touched up and problem areas: Here you can see the contrast with the keel: Not an absolutely perfect margin between the two colors, but not bad for painters tape. A little touch up cleans it up nicely: