I rescued my PT Boat from EBAY in August 2005. it was owned by a young boy in Birmingham whose Dad had built if for him. it is an original Aerokits kit Fast Patrol Boat. When I bought the boat it had a sound hull with a few damaged fittings, which I removed. Since then I have made new guns, extended the front cabin to carry the life raft to make it look like a late World War II Elco PT Boat and added other new fittings.

I have made 6 working exhausts in brass tubing, have fitted a new open prop shaft running an Octura race prop and a Merco 61 glow engine. it still needs torpedos, guard rails around the machine gun turrets and a few other fittings. The number 349 is from an original Pacific Theatre 80' Elco PT Boat whose name in Bee Bee, which I hope to add at a later date.

I have also painted it in an original Pacific Theatre camouflage from a PT Boat book which I bought for reference and to make it look like a standoff scale model. This boat was also photographed by the local Burton Upon Trent newspaper at the Fireboat day in September 2006. I ran this boat at the Burton Model Boat Club's Fireboat day in September 2006 briefly until I broke the exhaust manifold and had to retire it early.

These pictures are of a scale model of Captain Joshua Slocum's "Spray". it was sailed around the world, singlehanded between 1895-1898. Slocum re-built a Delaware oysterman hull in Fairhaven, MA and had been a gift to him.

After reading of his exploits in an original copy of his book, 'Sailing Alone Around The World' 1899 The Century Co., John copied the drawings that were in the book, established a scale for each and then converted those scales to just one - 1"=14.6" and proceeded to make a model of the famous boat. At that time [2003-2004] there was a commercial kit available but after much research John concluded that he had enough information from the book to build his own version. Actually the available kit contained some mis-information about the boat and that settled the matter.

The model was built plank-on-frame and then covered with epoxy/glass since it was intended for RC. He sailed her during the summer of 2004 and was quite pleased with her performance. An opportunity to sell the model came to him and he did so in January 2005.

This was originally built circa 1960 by my Uncle, with no radio control, you set the rudder, and let it go! it was then powered by an IC engine. All the fittings, engine and electrics where removed in 1965(ish) for conversion to electric, but the project was scrapped and everything was lost.

After a number of years carrying Action-Man around the living room, it was condemned to 30 years in the loft. Restoration started 3 years ago, completed after 1 year and given back to my Father as a Xmas present.

Sadly, he never got to use it much and it's now back in my possession. After 6 months or so (see posts!) sorting a better motor/esc/battery combo, it's ready for another restoration to bring it back to former glory.

Look closely on the 3rd picture, in the background you can see Fort Perch Rock Lighthouse, a listed building which stands at the entrance to the Mersey, and the famous Liverpool Waterfront further down river. New Brighton lake is in a fabulous setting for boat enthusiasts.

This is a model of a sidewall hovercraft fire and rescue boat (Hovermarine HM218) built by James Ramsey.

This started its life as a broken hand vacuum cleaner. Opened up there are two squirrel cage fans. He obtained pictures, sale data, amd small GA drawings from a Hovercraft Museum and was able to scratch build.

It has twin motors operated through mixer and two ESCs, steerable fire monitors plus nav lights, deck lights, flasher, fire pump, siren, rear mast lights and serch lights operated from the transmitter via a Digiserv unit.