The bolt heads on he access door will be painted to simulate the original stainless steel bolts used, so a nice shiny silver paint will suffice. the main panels of the bridge have been given a coat of orange paint, before any more items made and fitted, so not to leave unpainted areas behind anything. well, you can always guarantee to be abl;e to see an unpainted bit, but try getting a paintbrush to it afterwards ! So I always try to pain the "back side" of things before fitting, same goes for the panel behind these items, some colour, even if not correct shade is far better than no paint at all. I say this because I use the Tamiya bright orange X-6 as a "base paint" for these areas, at least you can brush it on, rather than have to spray paint everything. I do have in my stock some "orange touch in" paint, I use afterwards, for the final colour "you can see" on these smaller items after fitting.

I wanted to make these hatches open, no, not just for show, but needed at least 2 of them to have "purpose". Due to the size and weight of the superstructure, its not something you really want to keep lifting on/off to simply switch the power on/off and operate the light switches, so I am going to use 2 of the deck hatches to make this job easier. So once the batteries are in the boat, the upper deck can be fitted and left alone during sailing. You simply lift up a deck hatch and flick a switch to power up the systems. The third hatch will be made with the seperate compartments for stowage of ropes and tools.
Firstly after taking measurements from the RNLI plans, they were transferred to the deck area and the hatches marked out in pencil.To mark the corner radii, I used a coin , much easier than a compass. the corners were drilled out first with suitable diameter drill bit, then its simply "join the dots" with a hand saw, remembering to wear face mask, goggles and gloves to protect you from all glass fibre dust and swarf.
The holes were then finished off with a file and sand papered to the actual line marks.

Now that the hatch apertures are sanded to correct size, its time to add the hatch coaming, to prevent water ingress. I first cut a length of plasticard, approx 10mm deep, then carefully bent to shape to fit "inside" the hatch aperture, making sure to allow enough of the coaming to stick proud on the outside, to form the coaming, but also to leave enough underneath to "fix in". I then cut the coaming strip to correct length, slid in to place and applied some plasticweld on the join and allowwed to dry. I then added some scrap bits of plasticard to the underside of the coaming, to act as "bonding support strips" as the stabilit express is applied all around on the underside of the deck, this then bonds and seals the coaming in to place, without a nasty glue bulge on the outside, where its visible.

A major problem with bonding differet materials together, is how to do such AND without having to leave nasty big blobs of glue or epoxy everywhere. the deck hatch hinges are my next item to fix in place, but again, plastic to glass fibre? So I cut some slots in the deck, just big enough to slide a length of plastic rod through, from which became the hinge post for the deck hatch. Leave enough just high enough to form the hinge post, complete with pivot hole and rounded top cap, but remember to drop sufficient down inside, you can securely affix with either epoxy resin or my favorite, stabilit express. So it leaves you a nice sharp square edge outside, where its visible, and you have a watertight and strong bond underneath.

The hatches are simple 2 piece items, a flat top plate with a thinner side edge bonded on, so when in place, the overlapping edge between the lid and the deck coaming, acts as a water barrier. the hinges on the hatches are again, plastic strip, cut and shaped to suit and a piece of plastic rod, slid through to act as the hinge bar.

As I mentioned earlier, one of the deck hatches will open to reveal a locker space underneath, just as original. This is made easily out of plasticard, with seperator panels to add the compartments. I added some split plastic tube to the top edges of the seperators, to replicate the soft protective foam rubber used, so no nasty sharp edges to catch hands on in rough/choppy weather for the crew.
the box was painted internally first, before bonding to the underside of the deck with stabilit express.
A small led bulb will be added later to the inner side panel of the locker, which will operate when the deck lights are in operation.

Well, have to start somewhere, so why not with adding an outer hull brace strip. This was made from some b & q wood strip [10mm sq], cut to length and then I added some saw cuts in specific areas, to enable me to "bend" the wood to the profile of the hull shape. this was glued in place with stabilit express and left to dry with sufficient clamps around the hull to hold firmly.
Once this had dried fully, the clamps were removed and I mixed up some cascamite glue and brushed this in to all the saw cuts in the wooden strips, to fill up the gaps and also to strenghten the wood back up again .
This strip will form the main deck outer frame and was set "level" with the hull top lip.

The easiest and most accurate way I have found to fit the prop shafts "centrally" in a tunnel, is to first cut a template from either thick card or plasticard. But remember to make the disc the diameter of the tunnel, NOT just the diameter of your propeller, so this gives you a "safety margin" and a safe gap between your chosen prop diameter and the hull. it also means if you need to "upsize" the props, you can still do so safely and without having to remove and refit the propshafts.
Once you are happy with the position of the shaft support hub, close to the stern, then you can mark where the shaft will enter the hull at the forward end of the tunnel, remembering to cover with masking tape before you mark out, then drill out of course.

Now that the holes are drilled for the main shaft, its now possible to mark where the rear shaft support arms will "touch" the hull. Once marked, I cut some slots, just large enough to allow these tags to pass through the hull and be "turned over" inside the hull, purely for added strength, these are kept in the right place, by again using the plastic "prop discs" made earlier to centralise the shafts, so the prop tubes and supports can now be bonded fully in place.

Now the prop shafts have set, its now possible to install the motor mount plates. These are alloy types, with a few small screw holes in the bases. But being as I am going to use glass fibre resin to bond them to the hull floor, I have drilled some larger holes in the bases to allow the fibre resin to seep through the base plates and form a stronger bond, "over and through" the base plates, Making sure not to over fill the plates, so recheck that the motors will still fit in place, or you will need to sand the filler back once set and thats an awfully dusty job!!