And Now We Are Done!!!

Lets do the victory dance....

Here is the finished product from months worth of work.... Please enjoy..

Don't quit now, we're almost there!!

The end is near...

We left off last with the boat all glued together with the decals on. It is ready for weathering with oils and chalks.

Things I learned this week:

• How to knit!!!
• Lay down a GOOD coat of future before you weather with your oils and turpentine. If incorrectly done it COULD melt your paint job.
• When thinning Testors MM flat coat I thinned 1 part paint to 3 part thinner, when using in a vertical feed jar I increase my psi to 20 lbs when the trigger is pulled. This helps suck up the thicker paint up easier.

So, lets get started!!!!

So, the original part for the bow bumper was injected plastic that "should" look like rope.

Personally I found it to be a joke of an attempt at making a rope bumper.

As well as the side bumpers were injected plastic to "look" like side rope boat bumpers.







So I went on the knitting forums and videos on YouTube.com to try and learn to make a boat bumper.

I even tried to use my puppy dog eyes to get someone who knits make one for me.. That did not work to well..

So I did what I know best, learn how to do it myself.



After about a week of learning how to knit and to do the proper knit technique here is the final product. It took about 7 tries to get this done to my standard.

The blue tape is just to hold the bumper on for scale reasons.








Here is pretty much the layout of all the stuff I need to lay down a coat of oils for weathering.

My tip, make more than you think is needed. I ran out pretty quick and was a real pain to make more the same color.







Here you can see the oil settling onto the pant.












Here is the stern of the boat soaking with the wash on it.

I let this soak for 12 hrs, you want it to soak in but not fully dry.








Here is the wash on the bottom of the life boat and tarp. I installed the tie down lines onto the tarp. As you can see one of them is not fully tight .










After wiping down the boat from the oil wash I laid down a coat of flat clear coat. I used the foam brushes that women use for eye shadow to wipe off the oil wash. Be sure NOT to use your girlfriends or wife's because that will land you in the dog house fast!

Here I have the boat upside down and started to lay down some pastel wash for the bottom of the boat.

Basically I took a pastel block and shaved it with a razer blade to create a very fine dust. With a stiff brush I would dab it into the powder and then brush it on. Once I had the look I wanted I laid down another coat of flat clear to seal the pastels in.

It would have been smarter to paint this part rather than the pastels, it would have stuck better and most likely look better.





Here is the completed life boat after the oil wash.










Now lets get started on the base.. Remember a model needs a nice base to sit on..

I purchased a wood base from Michaels and a wood varnish from Home Depot. I got a varnish that had the polyurethane mixed in it and that worked out great.







I wanted to give it a dry dock look. I purchased a stick of 1/2 inch by 1/2 inch stick from Michaels. Rather than cut the blocks flush I used wire cutters to nip it. This gave a nice worn wood look to the ends.

The wood was originally a white wood color and I used a 'leather' acrylic paint color to give it a darker wood look..






Though painted one looks good, just not there..

The block of wood on the right is the un-weathered wood and the one on the left is weathered.

I used black soot dust that I got from a train store. This stuff works great but man it gets EVERYWHERE...





I began the weathering of the upper deck and hull with the rust pastels.

Because the bulk head door hinges get rusty from opening and closing I added rust dust there.

I also added it in various places that I thought rain would travel.





Here is the stern section (come on class, what is the stern of the boat???) of the boat with rust going over the name.










While dusting my boat with rust I attached my dry dock blocks onto the base and then a 2nd coat of stain/varnish.










Here is the blocks of wood weathered with the black dust to give it an 'oily' look.










Here is the tug sitting on its base. The problem I had was how was I going to make it stay on the base without falling off?

In two of the blocks in the center of the boat I drilled two holes slightly smaller than the plastic rod I had. This allowed me to shove the rod into the wood without gluing it.

I then drilled the same holes in the bottom of the tug, now it wont float.. hehehe.. This way the tug wont fall over but can still be taken off.



Now get your magnify glass out and check out the mast wires attached. Those are actually 'tied' using half hitches. I glued them down with white Elmer's glue so it would dry clear.

The line used is EZ Line and is amazing!! Here is a link if you are interested. This will take you to their Ebay store.













I have mounted my life boat onto the display base. I spent so much time on the tarp and boat I was not going to just throw it away. .










I put down some felt and glued it to the bottom of my base so that it will preserve what ever desk it sits on.


Once the glue was dry, I cut around the edges to make it flush with the base.








So here is my rigging to hold the boat bumper on while everything dries.

I added chain to my bumper by stitching it with thread and glued it into place to simulate a weld.

All the thin ropes are just to hold it in place.

You can see I made side bumpers as well.




Here you can see the rigging has been removed and weathered. So far everything is holding strong.

I weathered the bow bumper and even cut some of the string to give it that "smashed" worn look.

That is about it.. Next is to post the completed pictures on a beautiful granite counter top.

Thanks for reading..

Ok, you might need more than one drink.....

It's amazing how a model building group
can motivate you to get some work done..

We left off with the salt lightly misted on the model drying. This was ready for the light coat of white to help random the paint fading.

Things I learned this week:

• Accept that some things are just out of scale and can't be helped.
• Don't use to much solvent for your decals.
• I need to get the hood with the magnifier on it.

Here is the wheel house of the tug boat with a light coat of diluted flat white. I used distilled water as my thinning medium because if I used a thinner as a medium I was worried it would hurt the underlying paint.







Here is the smoke stack to the tug, this will help with the weathering process.











Here is the hull of the boat drying with its light coat of white paint.












Here is the main deck quarters drying with the salt trick.










Here I used a wet brush to scrub off the salt, because I used a water as a medium I was able to take off some of the white.












A shot of the main deck quarters.











The wheel house did not fade as well as I would have liked. Oh well next time.











Here is hull of the boat after the light coat of white. This turned out the best as far as altering the nice black paint.










Stern of the boat nicely weathered and faded.












Now, I sprayed down a good layer of Future so that I can put on the decals. If you put on decals without a glossy finish first then what it can do is tarnish or alter the edge color of the decal film.

Not to mention this coat of Future seals in my weathering.






So here is the equipment needed to lay down your decals. There are two major solutions needed for the decals; micro-sol and micro-set. One solution is stronger than the other. There is a GREAT article on the ARC (see resource links) that walks you through putting decals on.







Here is a completed decal on the stern of the boat.. Meet Lucky XI...











Here is the port (left) bow with the decals on them. See the white'ish hue to them around the edges, that is ok. That is part of the solvent 'softening' up the decal (far as I can tell), when it all dries it will clear up.










Here is the starboard bow (right). I had to guess where the depth measurements would go. I think they are to large for this scale, see lesson learned above.









So, the main deck railing (where you see the Lucky) separated from the deck. No clamp would hold it down due to the curve of the boat and no where to pinch it. I had to be smarter than the boat. Used a stick to run across the top and a large clamp to provide the positive pressure down.








So, I had to weather the decals to make them look as though the paint is chipping. I used a 350 grit sand paper and 'lightly' scuffed up the decal. This also takes off the white so it is not so bright and new.








Here is the bow decals worn down.













So break out the magnifier glass and a piece of hair because we have some fine detailing to do.

Now of course I am way to anal to just let the port holes stay painted red. So each port hole is painted brass with the bolts as well. Trust me there so many port holes I think I might be permanently cross eyed.





Here is the smoke stack, I painted the port holes with brass and painted the ladder white. I did this because I will weather it and make the steps look old and worn.










And you thought I could not get any more crazy. Yes that is the name of the boat on the life ring, Lucky XI.











Yup, did it to the stern of the boat too.. There you can see a ax as well. The two little white dots at the top of the picture are overhead lights getting ready to be painted yellow.









Here is my life boat that I have built. There is a problem though, this boat when installed on the tug is way to big. In some of the images you will white davits (or little cranes) on the upper level. When the life boat is placed where it should go there is no way it would be able to get past the two davits.

I have removed the davits and will find a way to incorporate the life boat into the display.




The finished tarp.












Here I have attached the wheel house to the main deck quarters. You can see the two white davits there, and the empty space where the life boat would go. The life boat would not be able to swing between the two davits.

I have added the life ring boat in place of the life boat. It is not often a tug (harbor tug) has a full size life boat on board.




Here I have attached the main deck quarters/wheel house to the main hull. Davits have not been removed yet. If you look closely I installed windows on all port holes and the wheel house. The only place I did not install windows was on the smoke stack port holes, way to small.







Here I have removed the white davits on the upper deck and put the orange life ring raft down in place of the life boat. Much more to scale this way.

I have also installed the ladder on the bow (front).








Now it is time to lay down some serious coats of Future. My next steps will be to weather the boat with oils. Due to the turpentine and oils you need a got coat of Future (or gloss coat) to protect the paint below.

I have elevated the boat so I can spray all 360 degrees around and under the boat in one shot.






Here is the stern of the boat letting the Future dry. A 48 hr dry time is best to let the clear coat cure.



















Finally here are the oils I will be using to weather the tug.

There is still a problem that needs to be addressed; the boat bumpers. I have been working on those at the same time for the past week. I will post my progress on that another day due to the length of this post.