Small World Models 1/96th Blueback Kit Restoration

[thor]

I have re-attached the lower-forward section of the bow permanently to the lower hull. Z cuts can be very finicky to fit up properly and they do weaken the hull requiring additional support at the cut. To make thing easier for the modeler the lower hull half will be presented as a single piece.

[sam reichart]

Hadn’t heard from you in a while. Was hoping all was OK your way. Those masters do look pretty good for how old they are. Always thought that this kit was an interesting boat. I know it was a popular model back in the day. Hope it will be again.

[thor]

Here are the Blueback Hull Masters laid out on a parting board for inspection. Overall, for 30 year old masters, they are in good shape! I have some filling to do and lots of scribe line clean-up. I will detail all of that here in the forum. This will take only a fraction of the time of what I was planning to do which was to create all new hull masters by pulling a very heavily laid up glass hull out of the very work out molds. Now, I can go straight to molding this kit up after repair and clean-up of the masters.

[thor]

After a short break in the action for work I am back on the Blueback for the rest of the year. I hope to have the first kits available shortly after the New Year 2024. After MUCH looking and digging into boxes of stuff Don & Bob were able to locate the hull masters for Blueback, Oyashio, Sierra, & Kilo! I am still missing Trenchant, but I can re-create a new hull master from the very worn-out old molds if we are not able to locate the hull masters for the kit. Many thanks to Don & Bob for turning their shops upside down looking for these! This new situation will make bringing these olds kits back to life much quicker and with greater fidelity to Dave Manley's original work.

[thor]

It sounds like you have a very good combination there. I like the E-Sun ABS-Like Hard, Tough Resin. It works well. It has even worked well so far as a good candidate for propellers. There are several new semi-flexible ultra strong resins that will be entering the market in the next year. Phrozen has two new super tough, semi-flex resins that are due out in the spring.

[salmon]

I haven't tried extra high strength resins....the combination that I am using right now is Siraya Tech ABS-Like Grey and Tenacious in a 80/20 mix. It make the print jobs not as brittle and better resistance to breakage when dropped. Still is strong and I can tap threads into it. What extra high strength resin do you like?

[thor]

Thanks, Tom. Have you tried the extra strength resins? There are a couple that I've been extremely impressed with. Their strength rivals or is superior to the standard urethane we've been using for a long time and they are more stable at elevated temperatures. The dowside is they are pricey! But the time and labor savings more than offsets the cost.

[salmon]

Matt, I get it. I find 3D printing to be a great way to create and try new ideas. I began mixing different resins to create something that I find works better for me. Anyways, I look forward to what you create.

[thor]

Hi Tom! Yes, Sir. I have it. I am getting away from the old rubber mold & urethane method of production in all areas where it can be avoided. So, I won't be using it. When I can cut the time to produce a kit by 50% or more and provide a better product by adapting to more advanced production methods its really hard to justify using the "old school" methods. All of my kits are going to be converted to this type of production. Only the hull will be hand made from epoxy glass.

[salmon]

David remastered the sail.
Did those get to you?

[sam reichart]

That sail looks awesome in the shadowed 3D pic. Great stuff Matt!

[thor]

A little more progress from yesterday. Trying to get all of these surfaces sealed together as a solid volume can be a real pain in the backside. But we are in the home stretch now. Now, on to the sail side surface detail then add the scope mounting plate internal to the sail cavity, then lastly the mounting base and mounting screw holes for affixing the sail to the hull. There will be two versions of the sail available for this kit; the Blueback in her late configurations and then the early Barbel, as launched, sail with no sail planes and different details.






After the final detailing is complete a full sail will be printed out to look for any issues that need to be fixed before moving onto the stern appendages.

[thor]

Here is an image of the updated sail tops as of this morning.

[thor]

Thats the idea, Bill. Thank you for the encouragement! The availability of the new resin 3D technology makes things so much easier to produce. I will only be fabricating the hulls by hand. The rest will be done through printing. The effort of pouring all of those parts with urethane resin was always the choke point for me. It is very labor intensive and its very messy. The molds take up a ton of space in my small shop, as well. The 3D printing takes care of all of that and produces far superior parts to the old hand poured resin parts. I only have to do the CAD once, which takes a TON of time but its only done once. Load up the print program and hit GO. Thats it.

These boats will hit the water soon. Bob is kicking me in the backside to get them out of the shop so he can get them in your hands.!

[wlambing]

Correction: USS Narwhal is NOT a 637 Class submarine! I have seen this erroneous listing as a Sturgeon several times. She is a one-off, all by herself, Rickover experiment that was actually quite successful in her career. S5G reactor plant, 33' pressure hull cylinder diameter, 314' 8 5/8" OAL, 6 MBTs, 3 on each end, 'cos she had no AMR 2 wasp waist tankage, it was all Engine Room! Topside fittings were mostly mirror-image to the 637 locations. I spent slightly more than 5 years in her Auxiliary Division (MAR 73- MAY 78).

The options Matt is presenting are wayyyy cool! While having a sailful of appendages extended while you're driving your boat around in the pond may help with making it easier to keep track of, in the real world, most of the time those chunks of pipe are faired into the sail for efficient transit through the ocean environment. For example; 1 periscope up and the BRA-34 antenna, at slow speed on a 637 at PD. You would also have the BRA-24 Floating wire extended, but nobody's come up with a good way to model that, so it doesn't happen. On my boats, I'll compromise by having 2 'scopes up and another antenna/snorkel raised to help these aging eyeballs.

Matt- Keep up the good ideas, but make her producible, so's we can get the thing, build it and run it!