cueastou mini sub saucer sp 350 - need ref material

[anonymous]

Have you considered possibly fiber

Have you considered possibly fiber glassing the two pressure hull hemispheres only, and only vacuform the free flood superstructure? That would perhaps provide robust strength and water tightness, balanced with production economies. Two hard plastic 'off the shelf' kitchen breakfast cereal bowls from the local Target or other kitchen store for these hull hemispheres? Im serious. Crazy, but serious.

You can say (like Alvin) your sub was built by General Mills too! LOL.

Steve Reichmuth



Edited By Dolphin on 1117783475

[Guest]

With todays small radio equipment,

With todays small radio equipment, I'd make those bowls free flood, and place a small cylinder inside for the radio equipment.

The smaller you can make the seal to the equipment, the better in my opinion.

Also, Vacform doesn't necessarily mean deform.

A good shop should easily be able to pull 3mm (1/8") plastic.

In a spherical shape, that would be near indestructible.

The only arguement in my book for using glass, is either you need very high collision strength, very low volume production, or high surface detail (rivets, plates etc.).

Andy

[boatbuilder1]

thanks for thw comments keep

thanks for thw comments keep them comming
the vacuum form idea is good I had not thought about that.
I will keep that in consideration I would like to do GRP to capture panel lines and rivets and bolts

I will keep you all infomes as progress goes forward

chuck

[Guest]

The panels could be incorporated,

The panels could be incorporated, but you'd need to Vacform into a female mould to reproduce them crisply.

Rivets and such can be reproduced by strategic placing of vent holes, which will also help draw the plastic into the mould, as the vacuum sucks through the holes in the plug.

Besides that, I believe this is a model that will apeal to either static modellers, or more experienced model submariners.

A little bit of extra effort required to detail won't scare them off. A high price will though!

Andy