Copying hulls Hi Guys, , a little background info on Me here in Australia. I'm Michael the owner of the Dreadnought shipyards and the Technical Officer for the AUSBG for all of Australia. Brett Farquharson is the owner of the Bowning shipyards and he gave me some moulds a few years ago that were too big for him to build but he wanted them to go to someone who would keep them and the hobby going here and he knew I had the time and inclination to build moulds as I like ships. Almost an unhealyth love of them. I see him at every battle we attend and have a great deal of respect for the effort that he and Bill Kirwan put into the hobby to get it started. He originally gave some moulds to a local Canberra person to build, the big ones to me (800km away in Northern NSW) and some to some people in South Australia. He has had to take the local Canberra moulds back as there was a lot of difficulty in contacting, ordering and getting boats from the Canberra guy once paid for, and the South Australia people/moulds seem to have virtually disappeared. Brett is now doing the middle sized ones again himself so if people email me for the ones I have I send them his way, but if it becomes too much for him we'll see what we do. I have replaced quite a few of his older moulds from scratch and made more of my own from plans sourced from both overseas and drawn up locally, and am willing to step by step anyone who wants a ship through the mould making process. David Ranier is right and it can take up to 150 hours of fiddling and sanding to get a plug for a mould. I have never copied/Ripped off anyone elses mould but have had it happen to me with the WW2 USS North Carolina. Not happy and it has caused problems for the people who bought it. The guy that copied it filled in the bulge area (the NC has a beautiful bulge that seamlessly disappears into the stern, very Sexy!) that I had in it and made the sides slab sided like the Iowa then moulded it. The problem was that he sold a hull from that mould to a guy that then wanted to have the bulge in and was going to add it on to the hull side thus pushing the hull beam out by 30mm more than the copy or my original. I make hulls to sell overseas and the long ones that are too big to post in 1 piece I do a cut and shut on like Bob Pottle's with brass alignment tubes glassed into the hull to help align it and I also provide the matting, instructions on how to rejoin it and "Rails" of polycarbonate to help too. The alignment rods (go in the tubes) and rails are all labelled/numbered as to where they go specifically and the rails are 1/2in high, 9mm thick and usually 25 to 30cm long and go across the rejoin area with countersunk stainless steel screws through the hull into the poly to screw it together. Usually 1 across the rejoin Port and one Stbd and 2 in the hull bottom out of the way of bottles/batteries etc. How can you tell if a hull has been "Ripped off"? 1- An original hull should be flat as possible on the bottom. When you make the plug you belly the plug, say my HMS Hood for example was bellied by 7mm, so from bow to center of keel contact point in the belly there is a gradual fattening of the plug also from side to side and then from there to the last point the keel touches the table it goes back to normal. When you make the mould from this plug and tke the plug out the resin "Shrinks" a little flattening out the bulged belly. When yo umake a hull from this mould the resin "Shrinks more" flattening it out again almost to dead flat. If the hull is ripped the hulls sold from the rip off mould will be "Hogged" Of course if someone makes a plug that is dead flat, then makes a mould on it the mould will be Hogged to start and subsequent hulls severley hogged, this has happened to me with my first hull, a T2 Tanker and some of the Bowning shipyards moulds were replaced for this reason. 2- look for mistakes copied over, my HMS Hood and RMS Titanic also have belt lines and plating that would copy over and be a dead giveaway. cheers
Hi Michael! I'm glad you've come to join us, as many have said good things about your hulls. If someone buys a hull from you and copies it, please post it here so that the individual in question can be properly shamed. We as a community are VERY disapproving of such activities, but I've never heard anyone say that you ripped off a hull from them, so I don't think you need to defend yourself All I've heard about you is that you make good hulls.
Mick also sails one extremely nasty Lion class BB, which has quite an appetite for small, defenceless tugboats.
Have spent some of the most satisfying hours of my life hunting down and siinking small ships. Actually sank one John Oxley twice without a shot under the waterline. first time I got a hit above, dislodged the deck and he sank, then second time I blasted him as he went past, jammed his float and the effect of the shot hitting him pushed his bow under and sank him. Very satisfying! I love the ships you guys in the US make, love the Gel coat and the finish quality is unsurpassed, I dont do gel coats as I've seen the gel coat on canoes and speed boats laminate and crack off from impacts and as thats what we do I'd be worried about that happening. I dont think I'd ever find out if a hull got copied there in the USA. Great website, loads of interesting stuff, I'm slowly getting throough it all learning more as I go, thanks for all the effort you put into it!
