Hello! I am just finishing up a plug for a (under IRCWCC) USN Brooklyn 'A'. Class 3, 3 Unit Shp I will be making a fiberglass mold of this to enable me to pull more from it. Am I waisting my time (I could not find fiberglass hull of these for sale anywhere) or is this a good Idea. I am gaining more experience with my molding and mold making. Later I could offer some to some of you if they meet my quality standards as i do not want to make something for someone that is not what I want to sail. I currently have 3 molds and Brooklyn will be my forth, am always looking for another project. let me know if you can buy Brooklyn anywhere (mine will actually be Savannah when completed.)
HI guy well the Brooklyn is available from Battlers Connection. I have heard of guys makeing them in to Clevelands but I know the bottom part of the hulls is different. A friend of mine and battler are working on makeing a good hull of the Idaho class battleship after the extra bulge was put on, after Pearl Harbor. I would be interested in some help makeing a mold! Buddy
Where abouts do you live? I am in Ontario Canada I can try and help through e-mail and here but best would be in person. First part is making a "perfect" hull shape of what you want to mold remembering that you will loose about 1% when making mold and then 1% when taking hulls from that mold, this is due to the properties of fiber glass molding. then also leave room for the 1/32" balsa skin. That is the hard part, once you have a good sized and shaped plug and it is as smooth as you can make it you can start waxing it. If you have a fiber glass shop near you get some PARTALL #2 if not able to get this get some CARNUBA wax (little more expensive) You will want to wax/dry/buff the plug about 10-20 times to make sure the surface is really smooth and shinny and has no areas that have any pores or rough spots or areas that the mold will lock onto. Take a look at what you want to mold, and decide where you want to put the mold break line. This will be where you will be taking the mold apart to be able to get your part out of the mold. On a hull it is generally down the outside center line from bow to stern. This parting line needs to be defined by taking some rigid object like thick plastic sheet, metal, wood, or cured fiber glass. you take this and build up your center parting line about 2"-3" tall off the spine off the hull, at the same time you do this to the edge of the hull you will be making the first half of the mold of (the clean side of your parting line, again with a 2"-3" flange all around it. Where you cannot get a perfect fit with your rigid parting line you take modeling clay (Non hardening) or plasticine and fill all the small gaps to make it a perfect fit, any extra clay is removed so you have as close to a perfect fit without any radius at the fit points. You now make sure the flanges and everything is also waxed well to allow it ro release well. Now you build up the half of the hull you have prepeared and make your first half of the hull by spraying or brushing on PVA release agent (NOT PVA Glue!, Poly Vinal Alcohol) over the waxed areas, this should be light coats. once dry be careful not to scratch or rip this as it becomes like cling wrap. When dry you mix up a batch of tooling gel-coat which is harder than normal gel-coat and more wear resistant (And more expensive) and paint or spray this onto the mold until you get a good coverage, this is best if the gel-coat was mixed with a dark color pigment (like black) so air bubbles will be easier to see when molding parts.let this dry till little tacky but finger comes away clean. then add first layer of fiberglass matt and wet it out with mixed resin, then keep adding layers and re-enforcing corners and large flat areas, after a few layers you can add some wooden supports for strength or to help you to keep mold flat when in use, class right over these and make them part of the structure, sealing them in for good. Once you have a thick enough mold you let this dry for at least 24 hours then come back and remove your flanges and the center parting line you made. Drill in some dints carefully into yur center parting line with a large drill but make sure you do not go through it you are just making dints that will help line up the 2 halves of the mold later. Wax this second side of the mold like the first and ensure you wax the new parting line and dints you drilled carefully as well as the hull top flanges again also. You can now build up the second half of the mold just like the first except that the center flange is now just the first half of the mold. (And you should not need any clay) Let dry for another 24 hours minimum, should be hard everywhere. take a small drill (clearance for a 8-32 bolt) and drill some clamping holes through both sides of the mold along the center flange fairly close to the hull but far enough away so you will easily be able to put bolts with washers through them and a nut to hold the mold together for use. By doing it now you are sure this is how the molds should line up and it gives you a second way of ensuring the mold halves are lines up when you go to mold. Now the moment of truth, you carefully try to release your plug from the mold, you are 'breaking' the mold for the first time, pry it apart a little and then put a small wedge in it(wood is fine, careful not to scratch the mold!) keep doing this all along the joint line until one side or the other "pops" off if it is being difficult you can try pouring in warm/hot water as this will dissolve some of the PVA and make it easier to pop. Once you have the first side off the next is easier as you have someplace to pull the plug toward and out of the second side. Now once out check the mold and repair any defects with resin mix and lots of careful sanding then lots of coats of wax. you now have a mold, stand back and ohhh and ahhhh at it, really! [] ok enough of the ohhh and ahhh, back to making hulls now you want to use the mold, again clamp it together and then wax the heck out of the mold again, for the first few times you will need to wax it about 10-15 times, later you can start to reduce this as your mold is used more and pulls become easier. Mix up some jel-coat and paint or spray this into the waxed mold being careful never to get more than 1/8" anywhere as otherwise it can wrinkle on you and you will have to take it out and do it again., let this dry or almost dry the lay your pre-cut fiberglass mat in the mold and pour your mixed resin over the matt and then move it around to get rid of all the bubbles, extra layering should be put around the bow/stern/props/sides of the hull to ensure these areas are strong, you have to be careful when doing destroyers or light cruisers as they can be weight sensitive)again make sure all air bubbles are worked out. When resin hardens to just past jelly stage you can trim the extra hanging out of the mold with industrial scissors. now let it dry for 24 hours. Now play taps and have a drum roll (in you head if needed) and take the bolts out of the joint flange, mark any overhanging mat that still needs to be carefully cut off after removing from the mold (use sharpy) and then start to get your part out of the mold just like we first did for getting the plug out, now you just have to be careful that you do not damage the mold or the hull. Now when it comes out, its champain time (ok a beer will do) and you have your hull, final trim with a dremel tool and cut off wheel and it is done ready for someone to make into a combat hull after a careful check by you that nothing is wrong with it. Always use Resin and Gel-Coat that DO NOT CONTAIN "Air-Dry" or "Wax" as these can leave a bad waxy surface and if you need to add layers will mean lots of prep to make sure the layers stick to each other. Ok hope that helps give you a idea br/>So you can see it can take you a good week to make a mold and try the first pull, and if its wrong, you start all over.....[!] Send me a e-mail and I'll get you more answers on specifics, but for now i think I have exceeded my message length maximum and Tuggy may be not so happy with me, good luck!
The BC boats are Cleveland Class Boats, (CL-55) and Brooklyn is (CL-40) a slightly smaller type of vessel. Cleveland CL Brooklyn CL Disp 10,000 T 9,700 T Length 610'+1" 608.3' Width 66'+6" 61.7' Speed 32.5 Knt 33.6 knt Guns: 12x6" 15x6" 4x tripple 5x tripple turrets 12x5" 8x5" 6x twin 4x twin 32x40mm ?? Have to check 8x quad So you can see they are close but not quite the same ships, profiles slightly different depending on actually hull measurements of molded hull you could get close to making both I guess. but mine is definitely of the Brooklyn (a) if under IRCWCC Rules (the narrower one, as I made a boo-boo on the plug and it went from the wider version to the narrower version (don't ask))[xx(] I never want to make a mold of something BC is making as I like their hulls and will continue to buy them and why should I make something that is already out there. []
Hi I am bad I got them mixed, your right BC makes the Cleveland hull and swampy use to make the Brooklyn.
Ja, I was worried that after working on the plug that BC might have beaten me to the punch, but all is good, I actually sent Rick a note telling him i was making a Brooklyn plug/mold so I'm sure he would have let me know if he was making one or had one (At least I hope so).[)] I am mainly trying to make some boats and hulls so guys in our local area can get on the water fast, I will make a hull, cut/sheet it and then add everything to make it float and go with some basic superstructure and then they can go to BC and get the guns etc that they really want to put in it.[]And later on they can go to him for bigger or other hulls to get them building their own and learning more. I am not out to cut into Ricks business, In fact I will be encouraging anyone who gets one of my hulls to go and see him to fill it up. Being in Canada the hardest thing to get here is the hulls as they are the worst to ship, and can take some time, if i can get someone a ship that they just have to finish up and make their-own then they will be more likely to stay in the hobby and it will be much faster to get them on the water and let them punch holes with their own boat as opposed to the club boats.[] And as far as mistaking hulls, no problem I do the same thing all the time to, as someone will name their boat and its not the class name from the rules so I go scrambling and make mistakes all the time too, so you see you are not alone, good luck and have fun![]
Bryan that helps a lot, I was not sur ejust what we were getting in to. I live in ohio so it is a ways other wise I would look you up for some help!Still might see about some help with this.
Bryan, Eric Broderick, a former NABS member who sells convoy and merchant raider hulls, battled with a USS Brooklyn for a few years. I think the hull was semi-scale, based only on side and top views. Only one hull was made from his mold. Bob
Ok I think mine is pretty good, it is the norrower "A" version but I think it is ok, looks like ones I have seen wooden hulls of so I think I will be ok, now off to make a nice mold.
Does anyone know if Eric Broderick still sells hulls? I couldn't find any online information about him other than an old email address.
Eric is a member of RCNC and still makes hulls. His handle is Canuck100a. You can email him directly from the Members list. Bob P.
If you're looking for another cruiser project, here are a couple of ideas I'd like to see someone produce, which I think would also be good ships: Soviet Kirov class cruiser German Nurnburg class cruiser USN Portland class cruiser RN Southampton class cruiser
Kirov has the advantage of making a sweet big gun torpedo cruiser as well, so there is multi-format appeal.
The Chapiev was a super Kirov, and the Sverdlov was a super chapiev about the size of the Des-Moines 3.5 units. BDE has plans for both.
Yeah the Chapiev would be nice. Did she carry torpedoes? The sverdlovs are awesome, but given their date of construction I am not sure if they are legal in any format of combat. Did they carry torpedoes? Edit: My spelling is terrible!
They'd be pretty good ships in big gun for sure then I'd guess. Isn't the Sverdlov a little slow for a big gun torpedo cruiser though? IIRC, she was only 33 knots...I'm pretty sure Chapayev and Kirov were in the 36 knot range. Been a while since I looked them up though. I'm not sure if Sverdlov is legal technically in Treaty (I certainly would not object to someone building one), but I know it's not legal in the other fast gun clubs. Chapayev and Kirov are both definitely legal for the other fast gun clubs though. Heck if someone showed up with a modern Ticonderoga, I'd vote to let them battle it, provided they followed the rules for units displacement etc. I don't see much reason at all to tell people "no you cant build that".
