My 1st Build (SLR Missile Thunderboat ZippKit)

[Chuck Mason]

Spent most o the day tapping and masking the Cowling along with the 1st layers of yellow to the bottom of the hull. Once the Yellow dries I will be adding a .2mm Navy Blue pinstripe or Met. Gold to add a bit of depth to the Teak decking. I have a good idea as to the lettering and art that will be coming next. Then I will try my hand with the 2X Max clear 368 0061, to seal it all. (after the lettering). I will try out a test piece to make sure nothing bubbles up. So far I am still very pleased for my 1st Boat.



I want the exhaust to look like its coming out of the cowling not just glued to the side so I will mount them inside the cowling. and with air intake and exits in the back It looks like its going to be on the water NLT the 27 or 28th. Only 1 ONE BUG stuck in the wet paint to deal with.

 

[Rich Jones]

Spent most o the day tapping and masking the Cowling along with the 1st layers of yellow to the bottom of the hull. Once the Yellow dries I will be adding a .2mm Navy Blue pinstripe or Met. Gold to add a bit of depth to the Teak decking. I have a good idea as to the lettering and art that will be coming next. Then I will try my hand with the 2X Max clear 368 0061, to seal it all. (after the lettering). I will try out a test piece to make sure nothing bubbles up. So far I am still very pleased for my 1st Boat.
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View attachment 308022 I want the exhaust to look like its coming out of the cowling not just glued to the side so I will mount them inside the cowling. and with air intake and exits in the back It looks like its going to be on the water NLT the 27 or 28th. Only 1 ONE BUG stuck in the wet paint to deal with.

That’s looking great Chuck! I have two areas of caution for you:

1.) Wear a respirator when you spray the Spraymaxx. It’s nasty. You don’t want to breathe it.

2.) On your water cooling, make sure everything is drilled out to 1/8” including your rudder, water nipple on the rudder, water fittings on the motor, water fittings on the manifold, etc… On the water fittings, I put them in a vice grip and drilled from the threaded side out. It’s easier on the threads this way. I thought I was getting sufficient cooling on mine but was wondering why it was so **** hot. When reviewing video, it was only coming out intermittently and I believe what was getting through was partially turning to steam because of the heat. These T Boats need water and I didn’t know there were so many restrictive things going on. Destroyed the top end. It ran like crap on Sunday and wouldn’t idle unless I opened up halfway. I suspected I had melted it down so I opened it up two days ago and indeed I had. I bought a new motor and will try to rebuild this one at some point to use as a back up. But you can bet I’m going to check and double check that there is a geyser coming out of this thing the next time out.

Good luck getting the boat on the water. I want pics and video!!

 

[Chuck Mason]

Thank you Rich, I will be redirecting EXTRA time on the Cooling, I did see where Scott, (M5 Performance) Drills out his rudder and water Feed Fittings on the engine jacket and manifold. I take what you and he say seriously. This will take some doing as I am limited to hand drill and vise grips. But over come improvise and adapt is half the fun. I have the garden hose adapter so I can do a bench run as well.
As always it is grate when in starts looking like a Hydro.
C.

 

[Rich Jones]

Thank you Rich, I will be redirecting EXTRA time on the Cooling, I did see where Scott, (M5 Performance) Drills out his rudder and water Feed Fittings on the engine jacket and manifold. I take what you and he say seriously. This will take some doing as I am limited to hand drill and vise grips. But over come improvise and adapt is half the fun. I have the garden hose adapter so I can do a bench run as well.
As always it is grate when in starts looking like a Hydro.
C.

Yep it is looking awesome. I just used drill and vice grips for everything. Start slowly and increase the speed until you are through. I found a 6” 1/8” drill bit at Harbor Freight for less than 3.00.

 

[Man Le]

Chuck Mason, very nice finish and looking, how did you create a small yellow strips around the wood finished on top of the boat ? tape I guess but using tape in a curve is tough I imagined, at least for me I think.
ALso, what did you use to cut the air vent for the cowl ? the manual came with a template but cutting round edges like the template is not easy from what I can tell, I've seen other people drilled holes instead......

 

[Rich Jones]

Chuck Mason, very nice finish and looking, how did you create a small yellow strips around the wood finished on top of the boat ? tape I guess but using tape in a curve is tough I imagined, at least for me I think.
ALso, what did you use to cut the air vent for the cowl ? the manual came with a template but cutting round edges like the template is not easy from what I can tell, I've seen other people drilled holes instead......

I know you are asking Chuck and I’m sure he will reply but I thought I’d weigh in for a second. I used 3M 1/8 and 1/4 inch vinyl masking tape to do the fine masking. It let’s you form curves, the bleed through is next to nothing, and it pulls up easily without pulling the paint. I use paper for larger areas not involving fine lines and or regular paper masking tape. I’m sure Chuck did something similar. Regarding the holes in the cowls, I use a Dremel tool. Either the sanding drums or cutting disks work great. Also for fiberglass, an 1/8 drill bit in the Dremel will side cut through like butter.

 

[Man Le]

I know you are asking Chuck and I’m sure he will reply but I thought I’d weigh in for a second. I used 3M 1/8 and 1/4 inch vinyl masking tape to do the fine masking. It let’s you form curves, the bleed through is next to nothing, and it pulls up easily without pulling the paint. I use paper for larger areas not involving fine lines and or regular paper masking tape. I’m sure Chuck did something similar. Regarding the holes in the cowls, I use a Dremel tool. Either the sanding drums or cutting disks work great. Also for fiberglass, an 1/8 drill bit in the Dremel will side cut through like butter.

Rich, thank you for the detail suggestions as always, I love all suggestions and more ideas is always better.
I found 3M 1/8 and 1/4 inch vinyl masking tape from Amazon and will use those, what is best use for 1/8 or 1/4 inch ? I guess depends on how thick the line I want ?
Dremel tool for the holes in the cowl, cutting disk for straight lines and sanding drums for the curves I think.

 

[Rich Jones]

Rich, thank you for the detail suggestions as always, I love all suggestions and more ideas is always better.
I found 3M 1/8 and 1/4 inch vinyl masking tape from Amazon and will use those, what is best use for 1/8 or 1/4 inch ? I guess depends on how thick the line I want ?
Dremel tool for the holes in the cowl, cutting disk for straight lines and sanding drums for the curves I think.

To do what Chuck did, I would use 1/8 to create the separation between the paint and the deck. It does the curves a little better. Once it’s down rub it on firmly. I then like to add the 1/4” behind it slightly overlapping the wood side of the 1/8 tape. That creates a little more room for you to tape when you are masking off the larger area that doesn’t get paint.

 

[Chuck Mason]

create a small yellow strips around the wood finished

3M 1/8 and 1/4 inch vinyl masking tape to do the fine masking

Yes 100% I agreed and followed Rich tapping job very close. This is my first tape job or shooting such a kewl boat so I read and read and went through every thread I could that showed how to.... I am very lucky to have found Intlwaters to follow. IMO if you take your time and follow what others have done, you will be happy with your Killer Kit. also Make sure to open up the cooling system as Rich has suggested.
NEXT is the Drk Red, and Navy Blue to finish off the Cowling.

 

[Man Le]

Chuck, I completed the bottom build and flipped over, found out the "forward non strip" did not sit flush to the "outer chines", I went through your build pictures and found you had the same, see I highlighted below, did you have to trim the forward non strip so it flush to the outer chines ?

 

[Chuck Mason]

forward non strip

I ended up Filling the area with 2pt epoxy and cilia beads to make it thick and putty like to fill and shape the area.. It is well to build a solid ridged nose so splitting dose not occur in this area so the added epoxy was not a big deal to me also remember this was my 1st build 1st boat so I made a few Opps. even had to reorder a few pieces....
I believe I fit and refitted the two Forward sponson pieces multiple times to get the tapered Angles.
Did you sand them at the required Angles as suggested in the build sheets?
Good luck

 

[Man Le]

I ended up Filling the area with 2pt epoxy and cilia beads to make it thick and putty like to fill and shape the area.. It is well to build a solid ridged nose so splitting dose not occur in this area so the added epoxy was not a big deal to me also remember this was my 1st build 1st boat so I made a few Opps. even had to reorder a few pieces....
I believe I fit and refitted the two Forward sponson pieces multiple times to get the tapered Angles.
Did you sand them at the required Angles as suggested in the build sheets?
Good luck

I did sand them at the required angles, took me a while with lots of sanding to get it right, I'd say that's the toughest part of the build so far.
You are correct it's weak in the nose area and I also added more epoxy after the 1st round of putting them together.
I decided to sand the forward non strip and made it sit flushed to the outer chines, a good of ~ 4mm needed to sand, it's thin so not that bad, took me a good 20 mins sanding for 1 side using 60 grit sandpaper.
The 1st pic is the left side, already sanded down, the 2nd pic is the right side, haven't sanded....

 

[Rich Jones]

I did sand them at the required angles, took me a while with lots of sanding to get it right, I'd say that's the toughest part of the build so far.
You are correct it's weak in the nose area and I also added more epoxy after the 1st round of putting them together.
I decided to sand the forward non strip and made it sit flushed to the outer chines, a good of ~ 4mm needed to sand, it's thin so not that bad, took me a good 20 mins sanding for 1 side using 60 grit sandpaper.
The 1st pic is the left side, already sanded down, the 2nd pic is the right side, haven't sanded....

Are you you simply referring to the fact that
the non trip was too large and had overhang? It is typical for a kit manufacturer to make parts like decking, etc… oversized so that regardless of any minor building variances from kit to kit, the size of the part is sufficient to cover the area you are covering. Yes, sometimes you have to trim off 1/4 in plus or minus but what you wind up with after you sand is a perfect fit. You will further block sand the top of the frame so that the decking sits correctly when you are ready to put decks on.

 

[Wasted wages]

Looking good Chuck!

 

[Hydro Junkie]

Are you you simply referring to the fact that
the non trip was too large and had overhang? It is typical for a kit manufacturer to make parts like decking, etc… oversized so that regardless of any minor building variances from kit to kit, the size of the part is sufficient to cover the area you are covering. Yes, sometimes you have to trim off 1/4 in plus or minus but what you wind up with after you sand is a perfect fit. You will further block sand the top of the frame so that the decking sits correctly when you are ready to put decks on.

The same applies when you build from plans, you ALWAYS make the parts oversized and sand to fit. I build from plans drawn by Roger Newton and have found that his plans always had errors, especially in the sponsons of the boats with two different sponson widths. The only ways I found to correct the errors was to either:

1. redraw the parts to fit
2. cut the parts oversized, install them and then sand to fit

In my latest builds, I've had to do both since the plans were incorrect when compared to the full-sized boats in several areas. It takes time to do so but, in the end, I'll have a more accurate boat with parts that fit as they should

 

[Man Le]

The same applies when you build from plans, you ALWAYS make the parts oversized and sand to fit. I build from plans drawn by Roger Newton and have found that his plans always had errors, especially in the sponsons of the boats with two different sponson widths. The only ways I found to correct the errors was to either:

1. redraw the parts to fit
2. cut the parts oversized, install them and then sand to fit

In my latest builds, I've had to do both since the plans were incorrect when compared to the full-sized boats in several areas. It takes time to do so but, in the end, I'll have a more accurate boat with parts that fit as they should

Rich, Hydro Junkie,

Agreed and thank you for the advises, my 1st build and that's what I've learned so far, can't expect everything fit perfect, I'm working on the decks and those pieces need to be trimmed, I've just picked up a scroll saw from the market place yesterday, my 1st build and so far loved it, figured I'm going to build more in the future so scroll saw will help for the build.

 

[Hydro Junkie]

You guys might like the video I found on You Tube a bit ago. I posted a picture of "my boat", now we have a video of it running:

 

[Rich Jones]

You guys might like the video I found on You Tube a bit ago. I posted a picture of "my boat", now we have a video of it running:

Love that!

 

[Chuck Mason]

Spent some time in the Boat Room as I received a few more details I wanted to do prior to the Clear Coat.
I drilled out the rudder and finished the fittings as well. Now its time to assemble one more time so I have all the little details handled, like the holes on the boat for the exhaust, the steering rod and water outlets. Almost done.

 

[Rich Jones]

Spent some time in the Boat Room as I received a few more details I wanted to do prior to the Clear Coat.
I drilled out the rudder and finished the fittings as well. Now its time to assemble one more time so I have all the little details handled, like the holes on the boat for the exhaust, the steering rod and water outlets. Almost done.
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Beautiful boat Chuck! You did a nice job. One layer away from the water!