From: DMeriman@aol.com
Sent: Friday, August 31, 2007 9:57 AM
To: undisclosed-recipients:
Subject: R/C'ing the Revell 1/72 GATO Class Static Submarine Kit, Part-30
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R/C'ing the Revell 1/72 GATO Class Static Submarine Kit, Part-30
A Report to the Cabal:
Well, it's been some
time since I've banged on the old keyboard and cranked out a Cabal
Report. Getting ready for the SubRegatta, The Cal Tech job, and the usual
production work was a real drain on my 'free time', so something had to
give. But, the SubRegatta is over, I've decompressed from the trip -- and
a big THANK YOU to Fred Freketic who provided transportation, food and lodging
for me, Ellie, Rose, and Kevin -- and it's time to get you guys up to speed on
what I'm doing these days.
Now that I'm plugged
into being the 'submarine guy' for Caswell Inc. -- the main portion of the
D&E Miniatures output is handled by that mail-order company -- I've found
myself having to put in very, very long hours in the shop. But, the rewards to
this change (first time I've worked for a 'boss' in over twenty
years!) have included increased productivity, creativity, and income.
Right now the major effort the Caswell/Merriman team has been engaged in is the
development of an alterations package to convert the 1/72 GATO submarine
kit into a practical, well running r/c submarine. The first public display
of that activity recently performed at this years SubRegatta at Carmel,
Indiana. We had a ball!
Here's an observation
for you: More often than not the SubCommittee and SubPirates technical
forum posts bog down and degenerate into stupid nit-picking and rivet
counting contests. The usual suspect, all members of the "I'm smarter
than you" club. Soon the stink of piss permeates everything as these
arm-chair experts throw reference documents at each other at ever increasing
velocities ... these submarine 'experts' are almost as bad as the SF kit-assembler
geek's who insist that only they can assign the term 'cannon' to certain Star
Trek plans and documents. What a bunch of get-a-life retard's ... all
of 'em!
However, over at the
SubCommittee forum boards there was a pleasant departure from the usual
tripe: a thread started by someone (who has yet to finish a model, what a
surprise) that was useful. That thread dealt with the identification
of Revell's major 1/72 GATO kit failure: the incorrect shape and placement of
that kits set of stern planes. As the thread matured some very good photos of
the planes were revealed as well as documentation to support the arguments
presented; that thread stands out like a diamond in a goats ass today; a thread
contributed to by people with knowledge of the subject and possessing the
discipline to stay on topic. It turned into a damn fine read and stands as a
most useful research tool. Here it is, if you're interested: go to the
Subcommittee forum, click on ' The Fleetboat Dock' page, then click
on the 'Stern Planes Which way is Up?' thread. Good dope there.
That thread presented
several shots (drydocked and museum boats) of actual stern planes. Two things
were revealed in that now dormant discussion: that the planes Revell produces
for their GATO kit are upside-down and that the shape of the planes, in
section, are way, way too thick.
That information --
coupled with the fact that the owner of the GATO I just finished (the same one
I showed off at the recent SubRegatta) had managed to break the kit planes
off -- was most useful as I set about the task of making a set of proper planes
to fix that model as well as becoming the base upon which I'll produce parts to
be added to the 'GATO fittings kit' I sell through Caswell Inc.
The Floating Drydock
drawing of the class stern planes clearly shows a plane form that tapers
sharply from root to tip, and a foil section that is not only unsymmetrical,
but also 'washed out' near the tips (the angle of attack of the tips is
negative in relation to that of the root).
The drawings represent
this through orthographic presentation in plan, profile, and three key
sectional looks along the span of the starboard plane. I assume the changing
angle of attach along the planes span is intended to recover some of
the swirl energy from the propeller in whose wake the plane sits -- not a
unique feature in marine design; many ships employ such angular offsets to
struts, rudders, and planes to straighten the radial component of a traditional
screw type propellers wake.
I've included the
original kit part (the #2 GATO kit I'm assembling, the broken #1 GATO stern
planes, built for Mike Caswell, was not returned with the hull) of the stern
plane to show how I made use of the nub atop its plastic operating shaft to
mount a 1/16" brass wire worked into a bell crank. This works fine ... if
you don't back the fucking submarine into the bottom of your pool! However, the
plastic operating shaft is vulnerable (nice work, Mike!) and should be replaced
with an 1/8" brass shaft -- just one of the fixes incorporated in the
aftermarket set of planes I'm making available.
The Walkowiak drawing
carefully outlined the asymmetric section of the planes as well as the wash-out
from root to tip. Tom's drawing denotes a common central datum plane on
his drawing that bisects the 'upper' portion of foil from the 'lower' portion
of the foil. I captured this reference plane physically by making each
half of the stern planes from two pieces of Renshape Pattern Maker's
medium, sandwich fashion, the face between the two pieces forming the datum
plane. To better see this plane as I cut and sanded the surfaces to shape I
darkened them with marker pen before gluing the halves together
To Revell's credit they
got the plan view of the planes just right -- their failure was to capture the
taper between the root and tip of each plane, and in so doing failing to capture
the washout (negative incidence of the tips compared to the root) of the planes
which acted as stators to the propeller wash, recovering thrust that otherwise
would be lost to the helical swirl, which is an artifact of traditional marine
screw type propellers.
Years ago Kevin Rimrodt
had done a massive amount of research on the GATO/BALAL/TENCH class of boats
and shared his findings with me. One of those papers was a plan
-- available from Tom Walkowiak's Floating Drydock, the
acknowledged expert on all things American WW-2 era submarines -- of the GATO's
stern plane; everything is revealed in that document: orthographic projections
of profile, plan, sections, and establishment of a datum plane about which the
asymmetric shape of the foil at various sections was presented.
From the 1/72nd drawing
I cut a sheet plastic template, which was then used to mark off blanks of
Renshape building medium. These in turn were cut to rough shape, their faces
darkened, and then CA'ed to form a port and starboard plane master.
First cut to these
masters was to establish the maximum thickness at root and maximum thickness at
the tip. From that taper cut I then moved on to capture the shape of the foil
at the three assigned sections.
The port plane
master (on the right) has been cut in taper and still has the initial
set of pencil marks denoting sections, maximum thickness at cord, and pencil
marks near the leading edge denoting the 'under bite' location. And I've
taken the trailing edge, top and bottom, of this plane master to shape as well.
The starboard plane
master has already been cut and shaped to sections. Note that only the pencil
mark denoting maximum thickness at section remains. The dark line near the
leading edge is in fact the interface (datum) plane between the two pieces
of Renshape that were laminated together to form this items blank. The washout
near the tips is progressive and easily achieved by cutting till the shape of
the interface line conforms to that derived from the plan.
God damn! ... I'm good!
In your face,
Mr. Edward Wiswesser!
The original kit part
and the nearly completed master next to it. Production cast resin planes will
be interconnected by a stout 1/8" diameter brass operating shaft. Breakage
issues in this area will be a problem of the past. Note how thick the kit part
is at the tips of the planes!
Note how the new planes
make much more graceful transitions at the tips and rudder clearance edges as
they meet the trailing edge. The Revell Pattern Makers (that term is not
correct, I mean: idiot, drooling, god-damned CNC machine drone), Design
Engineer, or researcher failed to catch the correct sectional shape of
these all important control surfaces.
(Not the end of the
world here. Revell got just about everything about the GATO class right on
their kit. Don't let this rather focused and critical chapter sour you on
getting and building up this fine kit).
Mounting the completed
port and starboard stern plane masters in some backing clay, preparing to make
the first half of a two-piece RTV rubber tool from which I'll produce
production cast resin stern planes. To the left is a sketch I made to help me
figure out the arrangement of the masters, their major sprue channel, and vent
network -- once that had been worked out on paper I cut out a mold board,
rolled some non-sulfur bearing clay on it, and set the masters in place, about
halve-way deep in the clay.
A casting still in the
rubber tool, an unfinished plane set to the left, and a cleaned up and primed
set to the right. Unlike the kit parts, these planes feature a solid 1/8"
brass operating shaft with soldered in place bell crank -- no breakage issue
here, pal! Note that brass 1/8" rod is used as mandrels during the casting
operation to form the 1/8" diameter boars within each plane surface.
Another look at the
'new' planes intended to replace the weakly linked, miss-shaped, and
upside-down kit parts.
The stern plane
operating shaft is a solid rod of 1/8" brass that is drilled in its center
to accept a length of 1/16" brass rod bell crank. The bell crank is first
created by hammering the end of the heated rod to form a padeye, the
point in which a pushrod clevis or Z-bent wire will eventually be connected.
The bend to the bell crank is there to make clearance of the upper end of
the bell crank to internal structures within the stern as the planes are
deflected to the 'dive' position.
The first set of cast
resin D&E Miniatures stern planes test fit into the stern of my #2 Revell
GATO model kit. Perfect!
These thinner sectioned
planes, when compared to the very thick sectioned kit provided parts, will
offer less drag and (as intended by Nautical Architects who designed the GATO
class) will act to recover a small fraction of the helical propeller
flow, translating it to a more linear, thrust producing flow. I expect
the new planes to increase the performance of the model. We'll see, I'll
play with it at Lake Trashmore this weekend and will give you a report.
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