Silk

My 'Big thing' at the moment is de-stressing and relaxation along with my morning midweek swim Monday to Friday. So with a nautical them in mind, it's a good job that my current relaxation project is a rebuild of a Model Pond Yacht to form the Centre Piece of a Scalextric layout.

I have found out that the Yacht that I am renovating as a Scalextric Centre Piece is a lovely wooden hulled model sailing yacht made by GINER of Spain.

The original model is a double masted beast unlike the single master that I am building. The original model has “Guaranteed to Sail” written on the label, whereas this model ain't sailing anywhere. Indeed when I get around to it the harbour has to be drilled in two places and the Pond Yacht screwed home from underneath the layout. The Model Yacht has a drop down metal keel that I dismantled to make it flat bottomed for the Scalextric layout. The hull is approximately 23½ inches long with a width of approximately 4¾ inches. On the original model the height from the top of the mast to the bottom of the drop down keel is approximately 33 inches, whereas on my re-build, the height of the single mast to the deck level is 32.5cm.

The photograph shows the boat unfinished but after a considerable amount of modelling work undertaken over several weeks. This work has included dismantling the original model yacht, sanding off thick paint, priming, airbrushing several layers onto the hull, lining the hull with white acrylic, and then over-lining the white band with gold acrylic. The deck barrier posts were made from cocktail sticks, with the hull marked and drilled to receive these. The deck post wire is a single strand of unravelled picture frame wire that has been threaded through holes drilled in each cocktail stick. The bolting base for each post was cut out of an old ice cream tub. Well it wouldn't be a new one would it? Because if it was where would all of the ice-cream go? Now if there was enough of that, then that could be swimming heaven....

Stop rushing and top up the 'to do list'

In addition to my airbrushing blog post (You know, the one about things that you can't do and then suddenly it clicks) the following points have now been learnt:

Yellow paint airbrushed onto grey primer = gold and not yellow. It's best to prime with white when using light colours for the top coat.

Thinners isn't paint cleaner and that is now on my 'to do list'. I need to go and buy the correct cleaner for the paints that I use. The problem is I am using so many different kinds of paints. Model car paints, real car paints, and non car paints. Some water based and others not. I have cleaner for my water based paints, and Tamiya thinners works a treat with Tamiya paints; it's the other lot that are causing the problems. Now there's a lot of trial and error going on here, but I am pleased to announce that my current bit of spraying is all done. My mini air compressor is almost silent running, and my large cardboard box spray booth works a treat when resting on top of my donkeys years old workmate.

The spraying job was for 50mm edges for a Scalextric layout that I am building on a 4' by 4' board. The 50mm wide curved edges allow the cars to splay out on the bends. The edges are cut from laminate flooring (which is the same height as the Scalextric track) and smoothed with glass paper. Thereafter each edge was sprayed with Halfords Grey Primer. When dry, I used masking tape to break each piece into 50mm segments from either end and then decided on blue, green, white, yellow, and red colours. The next type of edging that I am modelling is the barriers around the outside curves and inside the tunnels. This barrier will be out of 60mm high strips of hardboard that are sprayed white base coat and then a single colour along each length. Possibly 'change purple' (changes colour with varying light). But that's tomorrow or the next day and today is about today's problems and solutions. The downside for the Scalextric track widening edges, was that the second lot of masking lifted the yellow as if it was plastic. The yellow paint was a water based paint with 'reducer' (like a thinners but also aids drying) added. I decided to re-mask and re-spray the yellow, and this time I used 'low tack' masking tape bought this afternoon. Not that low tack mind you, as it managed to lift bits of the red paint.

Lesson to learn: don't be in a rush and let things dry out properly.

Seeing others do it right

Most of us like to think of ourselves as being good at something. But all too often someone comes along who is far better.

I particularly like making models out of waste material, you know scenery and the like. These can be used for wargaming, scalextric and model trains. As good as I am, I always seem to put off completing the big project. Maybe it's the stress of making such a huge commitment, or maybe it's the uncertainty about how it will all finish up. I've started two, but they're now just abandoned projects. Starting out with certainty, purpose, and energy. But quickly becoming anxiety and depressing and in dire need to be cast off to think of doing something else.

When it comes to building a model railway, I know that it is an awful lot of hard work, and an extremely time consuming process (says the man that has never completed a layout). So it really got to me with this months 'Model Rail' magazine (June 2011 Edition £3.55) to see two layouts built to an astonishingly high standard in two months and seven months respectively. One in 'n' gauge with its realistic setting and superb viaduct, and the other in '00' scale that looks like the real thing. Indeed, at first glance I thought the photo on the front cover was the life version, and only when reading the article inside did it dawn on me that it was not.