My wife and myself have returned from a rushed, but rewarding, week in the North West of Tasmania, Aust.

Our son insisted I accompany him and have a look at the Devonport Maritime Museum. Well worth it, with models of a lot of historical vessels, from clinker rowing boats through to windjammers, naval vessels and the evolution of ferries to the mainland.

Models include Slocum's 'Spray', SS Southern Cross, the oldest clinker dinghy in Australia, build using Huon Pine, and thought to be approx. 140 years old, and the Cutty Sark, which plied wool from Sydney to the UK.

Well worth the trip.

The Odessa is fitted with a action camera to record her journeys. This video was produced as a trial. The Odessa has recently been resprayed in metallic red and the little dingy was removed.
She now also has a crew of three.
1:20 scale - Lindberg kit built.

Part 1. ideal conditions; nearly 30°C, cool Bier at hand😜
Sea Scout built by Dad in the early sixties with a Taycol Target and 6V lead acid wet cells (very wet😡). Renovated and dragged into the 21st century over the last several months 😉
See Build Blog 'Sea Scout 'Jessica'' for details!
Motor: Propdrive 2830, 1000kV, 30mm 3 blade Raboesch prop. Quicrun 16BL30 (30A) ESC with BEC.
Tested with 3 battery types, all started with 99% measured capacity-
1. NiMh 4.2Ah 7.2V, nom. 408gm.
Result: Speed sedate (OK 😉scale river cruising!) No planing.
Max current: 3.6A
End status V / capacity left: At end of short run ca 3 mins. 7.78V 99%.
2. 2S LiPo 4.0Ah 7.4V nom. 257gm.
Result: Speed still sedate but due to lower batt weight at least the forefoot came out of the wet stuff! Max current: 4.1A
End status V / capacity left: At end of short run ca 3 mins. 8.25V 93%.
3. 3S LiPo 4.0Ah 11.1V nom. 315gm.
Result: Now we're getting somewhere!!😁
Good speed, manoeuvrability and planing 😊 Max current: 7.5A
End status: 11.95V 74% after several long runs, ca 20 mins total.
Estimated (extrapolated) endurance on a 4Ah LiPo around one hour - mostly 'full bore' - 'Pedal to the metal man' 😊

See also:

The competition!

Final run. (Beer was getting warm😁)

Cap'ns log entry:
Boat dead-weight w/o battery: 1.8kg.
Spray rails to be added!😲
Slight list to port to be trimmed.
Rudder servo to be reversed!!😲
Keel protection to be added: some scratches and flaking from stony sloping shore 🤔
Summary: much as expected👍 Forget anything less than 3S.
Anyone want to buy a batch (4) of new 2S 4Ah 45C Lipos? 'One careful owner'!
Happy boating people, Cheers Doug 😎
PS Many thanks to Camera girl Gisela 👍
Recorded in 1080p HD.

Trying air injection to break up the water flow. The air pumps I ordered finally arrived a week late but are too small to be of much use. I need a much bigger and faster volume of air to achieve what I want, which is for the water to almost be sprayed out in a mist. Might need to mod the water outlet by fitting fine tubes or stoppers around the inner smoke tube to build up a bit of back pressure, which might be another alternative
Unfortunately, as I've said before, you can't scale water, due partly to surface tension etc (why it either drips or runs out of a small pipe), so to make it fine you have to pressurize/vaporise it at the point of exit (ie garden sprayer) which is the hard part on a small scale. Lots of fun trying to perfect it though, and it keeps me out of trouble, and keeps the brain working - (although it's just asked for a pay rise due to all the work it's been doing lately!😂)

Tip,- if you run both videos at once you can see the difference between this and the last vid. It also breaks the smoke up.
JB

refitted Robbe Sirius IRC 88 (by stock maritime) completely new electronics and fittings, resprayed in 2k polyurethane topcoat

here is my Robbe Sirius, the Stock maritime tuned version.
I traded an iphone 5c for this model.
it was in a used state without any working electronics.
Completely removed all electronics, stickers and rigg and started with sanding.
resprayed the hull in oyster 'pearl metalic' and started building up with new fittings , electronics etc
Sails like a beauty !

This is a restoration of a launch I was given that was found in a rubbish bin on a farm here in Auckland it is an old RCM ? plan built 'Fairacre' and was pretty rotten when I received it as it is made in balsa and had been wet for quite a while. I stripped it down, re 'planked' large portions of the hull and fiber glassed it, re- built the cabin, re- marked the deck planks, fitted lights, curtains (ex Graupner Commodore bits from the 70s I had kept), stern ladder, cleats etc. it is fitted with a 540 brushed motor (originally had an old Graupner monoperm) and 70s Graupner ESC and Using 2.4 Radio gear. I still have a few things I'd like to do such as a re-wire, fitting chine spray rails, better motor and maybe some safety rails, but for now it does the job.

Model is 49” long and with ballast keel added weighs 17 lbs. hull is covered with 2 layers of 2 oz. cloth fiberglass cloth and painted with Krylon spray can paint. Hitec sail winch servo for main sail and standard servo for jib. Model has auxiliary 6 volt electric power to compincate for my sailing ability’s and wind conditions.
Sails are Mylar.

First sea trial of "Mi Nuh Biznizz" (meaning "I don't care" in Jamaican slang). All plastic built using an altered Krick Lisa-M hull. Work in progress. Pretty wet run. Needs some spray rails, that's for sure 🤔

Scratch Built 1:32 scale Dover Harbour Board Tug, DHB Doughty.
The main hull is a standard Damen hull purchased from Mobile Marine Models, see their website for Portgarth.
the hull is fitted with 2 x T12 Motors for the main propulsion,2 x 60 degree kort nozzles for steering, with 2 x purpose made brass props.
Also fitted is a 12v Graupner water pump for the working fire monitor and Fwd spray bar, 2 x Mtronks 15 amp ESC's, Futaba steering servo and Futaba 40 MHz Receiver.
Approx Dimensions including fendering Loa 41" Beam 14"

Cheap buy as it had been in the loft for years.
Most of the glue had failed and many parts lost. Totally resprayed or hand painted from deck up. Powered by to monoperm motors. Now finished it is up for sale. Now been sold.

This is a Chris Brown fibreglass hull for Cariad, it was a reject so Chris let me have it cheep. I like to be different so I built it as Spray of Newport. Sailed well on internal ballast only just adjust the rig to suit the conditions. Two sail arm servo one on main other on fore sails. Rudder controlled from under the deck by servo 3. The westerman ( who sails the boat for the pilot) holds the tiller which moves his arm. A forth servo pulls a string passing up his leg through his arm which is a spring. When the spring is compressed the arm waves in a random way. ( the idea came from the toy animal on a stand when the bottom of the stand is pushed in the animal falls down.)