1) wooden hull (have you seen some of Mark's hulls? Quite reasonably priced and well made, easy to build up. The USS Texas even has motor mounts, if you want to use them where they are). 2) care and patience 3) if your local club has club loaner ships wuile you learn or build yours, the cost becomes repairs only for a while. 4) Club build sessions - plenty of advice and helping hands, sometimes parts. 5) good scrounging/repurposing talents Cheers,
Cost can also be spread out over time. No reason to buy a radio until after the ship is mostly built, buy batteries until after the hull is completed, buy cannons until after the ship has had a successful maiden cruise, etc. Also, Hobby King has a good assortment of low cost components such as radios, servos, and motors. A HK programmable radio alone could save well over a $100 than what a Futaba or mainstream radio would cost.
You get what you pay for. I started out trying to build cheap. But my ships sucked due to cheap construction. There are somethings that can be cheap and still just as good. Others thing you need to spend the extra cash. Building a ship is not very expensive when compaired to other hobbies. Even within this hobby the cost of the ship is very low compaired to the cost of travel going to battles. I could build a new ship for less than the cost of my trip to Wade's.
Repurpose things, I used some old 1/4" plywood laying around the house, and was able to build my cruiser hull for almost nothing. Beaver
If build the hull myself from scratch and already had the transmitter, receiver, motors, ESC's, how much would it cost to build a cruiser???
This is from several years ago, some of the prices might be wrong but the list is close. I took out the radio. Adjust as needed. Part Cost Wood For Hull $62.02 Epoxy $44.00 Small Bilge Pump $27.50 Standard Regulator $34.00 3.5 oz CO2 bottle $59.00 2 Solenoids $100.00 Battery Charger $40.00 2 Guns $50.00 2 Drive Motors $10.00 5 Radio box switches $5.00 Wire $5.00 4 Nimh Batteries $150.00 Hoses $5.00 Accumulation Tanks $5.00 ABS for Superstructure $7.00 rudder servo $10.00 2 Radio Box Servos $20.00 U Joints/Dog bone $12.50 Rudder Shaft Gear $4.00 Rudder Servo Gear $3.00 Brass (shafts etc.) $15.00 4 Deans Connectors $15.00 CA Glue $15.00 Dope $11.00 Sheeting Balsa $15.00 Rudder Stuffing Brass $3.00 Caulking $7.00 BBs $7.00 Total $734.02
It still depends - You have several options available including high tech vs low tech. Some items like CO2 bottle and regulator are fixed price items (and it's best that you get something good because they're something you're going to be using/reusing for a log time). Other items like your choice of cannons or actuator valves can be a potential savings area. It also depends on your willingness to do 'work' vs the pre-packaged approach. For example, solenoid valves cost $50+ each. Poppet valves cost much, much less ... but they require you to build a mechanical servo actuation system vs. using off the shelf electronic switches for the solenoids. There's a potential $100 difference there. Likewise, if you can build your own cannons, you can save a bunch. Building cannons is hard, and the prices that BC/Strike charge are more than justified, but ... if you have the ability and are willing to spend a weekend or two learning how, or have someone nearby who can help, you can build them for just the cost of the parts. I would think that in your situation, you could build your cruiser for about $250-350. Again, the lower end of that is more feasible if you have local help or are very comfortable with doing things yourself. If not, you're honestly better off saving and spending a few extra dollars to get you over the initial hurdles. Because saving $50 and never finishing your boat is a much bigger waste of money and time. Good luck, Chris PS - for those who don't know, I bought my first two cannons from Stan. And then ended up modifying them to "Foster" breeches and singleshot before going to my first battle. Where I ended up purchasing (for $25 - shock!) an improved piston interrupter from Carl halfway through the week. It was totally worth it, that stern gun enabled me to get my very first sink the next day. PPS - It appears that Bob is much less of an optimist than I am. Either that, or there's been a lot of inflation since I ... oh, wait. Never mind.
Do I have to buy the manual for building guns from strike models.com or is there some place I can get them for free?
There is much lower cost solenoids on the market. Spartan Scientific makes a nice assortment of 6v and 12v solenoids that are lighter than the Kips and only cost $23 - $25 each. I've been using them for over a year now without any issues.
Hey Richelieu, do you know where to buy the Spartan solenoids online? There was a site mentioned on a different post and I never could find anything through it. Sorry for the off topic post 557
The plans for the guns from Strike are the only plans for Big Gun systems I am aware of, and are not expensive (about the cost of making copies). There are instructions for single-barrel Arizona style guns on the web, and designs for the Model Armory style ones online as well, in at least one caliber. One quick piece of advice, if you already have some radio stuff to start with, that is great. But buy the final radio for your ship LAST. Many try to do that first, and spend $200-$300 of their startup capital on something that, later, they find they could have gotten by with a newer, better, radio for less. for instance, there are now 6 fully proportional channel radios available for $25-60 and a new 16-32 channel radio, the FRSky Taranis is hitting the market (first batch is out, market waiting anxiously for second batch end of this month) at $200 fully loaded with battery, case, RX and all that has incredibly flexible programming (not as necessary in Small/Fast Gun, but a delight in Big Gun). Then they have the Hours coming out later this year - the debate is whether it is their entry, sub $100 radio or a more advanced and expensive successor to the Taranis. FlySky (a different company altogether) has their i10 in final testing and may be out soon. FRSky is also bringing out new SBus servos, and sensors for its improved telemetry (even its older model TX modules feature telemetry). So, for best bang for the buck, buy your radio last. Cheers,
