Hello, everyone! I'm Matt, from the Houston area. I've been into RC airplanes for a while, but I'm new to the world of RC warship combat. @ZARUBA1987 and @Prussian reached out to me a while back from the welcome section to come check out some boats, and after a bit of talking shop, I've decided to build my first ship, the DKM Prinz Eugen. I chose Prinz for multiple reasons. It was recommended to me to start with a 3 or 4 unit ship to have more space to work in for a beginning setup, but not have too much electronics or weight to worry about with too big a ship. Ted recommended to start with a fiberglass hull, and there are fiberglass hulls of Prinz available from Modelshipsahoy, one of which I purchased recently to get started with. The most important reason, though, is that I picked a ship I like. John convinced me to post a build log after we began finding the waterline at his place and after I began cutting windows, so there won't be many pictures of the start of the process. I'll post what I've got so far in the near future.
Here's the follow up to my initial post. My phone camera isn't very good, some pictures may not be very clear. A big package came in with the hull in it. Same day John got his Littorio frame, it was like Boat Christmas. Took it over to John's pond to weigh it and get a waterline. The waterline was marked, the armor belt was taped, and the ribs, hard areas, and 3/8" topdeck area were all taped out. The tape used was 1/4" pinstriping tape from Auto Zone, about $8 for 80 feet of the stuff. John was surprised how well it was sticking, apparently he'd had trouble with this kind of tape staying down. His phone also has a much better camera than mine. Took it home with some lent out cutting blades for Dremels. Never worked with fiberglass before now, treated it like a woodwork project. Drilled corners in each window box, cut roughly inside the box, and filed down to shape. These were the rough first cuts after a bit of filing. After a lot of off and on cutting and filing this past week, the left side of the hull's windows are just about done as of now. The armor belt is still 1/8" too wide, I'll file it all down to proper width after I get the other side's windows cut and shaped. Pretty happy with how it's turned out so far.
Looks good! Note for future reference, I hear those oscillating tools are great for cutting hulls: View: https://www.amazon.com/DEWALT-DCS356B-Variable-Oscillating-Multi-Tool/dp/B07VBB55X5/ref=sr_1_5?crid=L1B3NAMP6HCG&keywords=oscillating+tool&qid=1579923078&sprefix=oscillating%2Caps%2C288&sr=8-5
Looking good so far. You may think that's a big model, but remember she's skinny and only about 15~16lb. Keep the weight low and upper works light and you'll do fine. Didn't realize Prinz was 3.5 units, with twin turrets will be a little weird to set up the guns but you will figure it out.
I tried the oscillating tool but it was really inaccurate. Sorry don't want to hijack your thread. Two questions. 1 Is the hull nice and 2 what did you cut with? Also what do you guys usually cut hulls with?
Harbor Freight has a oscillating tool for about $20. The catch is the blades cost a bit. If you are having accuracy issues try to start the cut at a predrilled hole in the corners of the window. Light touch on the tool is better than digging in hard.
1) This is my first fiberglass hull (and first fiberglass work I've ever done) so I have no others to compare it to from the beginning of the cutting process. I've looked at @ZARUBA1987 's Doria hull and comparing it to that, it seems that the Prinz has thicker fiberglass throughout, around 1/8" thick, so it won't need wood backers to reinforce every rib throughout the hull, might need it behind the armor belt. It's been really uniform throughout and doesn't have any blemishes that I could tell, this hull has been really nice to work with. Ted looked it over and basically gave it the Prussian seal of approval, so I'd say it's a good hull. 2) This is what I'm using. It's a Dremel attachment that John lent me, said it was from Harbor Freight. It's cut every single window so far, but it has a tendency to catch and want to move forward a bit once it hits holes drilled close to the corners of each window. I'm being really careful not to let the blade too close to any of the tape, and I've drilled the holes a bit inside the corners now to give me some leeway if it does decide to slice a bit past. I wouldn't recommend cutting with this Dremel tool, it's dangerous. It's what I did end up working with and thankfully nothing's gone wrong. The oscillating tool seems like it'd work well, and be safer. I'll look into them once I get my own workshop set up. For now, cutting inside and hand filing has been what's working for me. [Edit:] Currently, I've stopped using this. The Dremel cutoff wheels (as the Commodore suggested a few posts down) work just as well and won't severely injure your hands if you end up slipping into yourself.
This 100%. I don't have an oscillating tool to use, but would tell anybody else to go in that direction. I wouldn't recommend this dremel cutting tool unless you know exactly what you are doing, wearing appropriate protective clothing, and being extremely cautious of yourself and others when using it. Safety is top priority! (I've edited the upper post to reflect that) That being said, all the cutting is done, just filing is left. I'm hoping by next weekend to have them all shaped.
Ah, the good old finger remover. Please ditch that thing and just get the fiberglass cutoff wheels, they work fine and won't lop your fingers off. View: https://www.amazon.com/Dremel-456-Reinforced-Rotary-Cut-Off/dp/B0006O8RZA/ref=sr_1_3?crid=1U4GHUG46NY24&keywords=dremel+fiberglass+reinforced+cut-off+wheels&qid=1580063991&sprefix=dremel+fiberglass+%2Caps%2C777&sr=8-3
As per the Commodore's orders, I've picked up some cutoff wheels after work today. I'll use these when more hull cutting needs to be done. No fingers were, nor will be, removed in the making of this ship. Neighbor's boy hopped the fence to see what all the noise I was making was, he was really interested in it once I told him it was going to be an R/C ship that shot BBs at other R/C ships that shoot back. Out of curiosity, is there an age limit or restriction in this hobby?
Wonderful and we generally suggest that a parent gets envolved too. No age limit to note other than most of the older members require a responsible adult to accompany them .
Small update. the windows are done, the armor belt is still 1/8" too thick so that's the next step. Prinz is getting inspected tomorrow. The game plan is to get the water channeling, reinforcing ribs, and deck mounting planned out.
