LargeScale88

Hello,

I've decided to start in with boats, and airplanes. I look at dumas boats and they are all small. Iwant somethin GIANT!!

Somethin scale, a very nice kit, more than 60" long. I like big boats. Any info would help.

Or plans, any people who have plans for big boats, tell me please!!!

Thanks.

Deathwish

My Feedback: (6)

how about this:
http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_64..._1/key_/tm.htm
i have 2

dallas2254

Not sure if you can use the word "Kit" and Giant Scale, as in bigger than 60 inches, in the same request. That is pretty much scratch built territory. 'Been there' and still in the process of 'Doing that'. Just find the plans that you like of a smaller kit built model and take it to Kinko Copy Center and blow it up to any scale you want. That is what I did. Kinko can only go 48 inches wide on their printer so you might have to tape together some pages if you want to be able to sit in it after you build it and launch it.

Oh one other thing. The price of every component is also large scale and the availability of parts, to scale, diminishes exponentially. At some point your hobby store becomes the West Marine Store (Theft Marine) and then your price of accessories grows exponentially. If you have every owned a big boat (>25 feet) you know what I mean.

My [link=http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_3993444/mpage_12/key_/tm.htm]72 inch Harbor Tug[/link] is already past $3500 and my[link=http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_9713018/mpage_2/key_/tm.htm] 76 inch Shelly Foss [/link]is half way there without the electronics installed yet. Neither one of them I can ride in but my cat could. The look on my neighbors faces when they see that harbor tug pass in front of their docks is absolutely priceless. Great way to be neighborly and transport a half rack down to a party on someone's dock. That was my vision for building them in the first place.

As for making ballast that is another story. You have no idea how much weight you will have to carry around to put one of these large scales down to the water line. I am already up to three deep cell blue top optima batteries at 44 lbs a piece and still not down to waterline at $155 a piece. Can't put the wieght in the boat before you launch it or you will have a bad back in no time so you need to have and efficient way to put weight in it at the waters edge...hence forth the batteries come with good handles and they give you about 190 hours of play time between recharges. Might as well install an inverter and use real 200,000 candle power spot lights and a compressor to run your fog horn. Everything is way out of scale when you are talking large scale.

All I can say is I am having so much fun building these tugs and even more fun running the 85 foot tug on the water already. I am wanting to build the 14:1 scale version of the crowley invader class tug. The problem is that it would be 9 feet long to be the same scale as my other two tugs. Given that it is suppose to be faster than the Shelly Foss, I will have to put pretty good size power plants in it. Well it is not much of a problem except that it will be darn near impossible to take it anywhere. The good thing is that most of the parts are available at West Marine.

Opps I got out of scale on that reply

mfr02

People who make kits do so in order to sell them.  They therefore consider how many people are likely to buy them.  The best selling sizes are those that fit in the back of a car.  "Giant" boats are therefore for scratch builders, so, like dallas says, find some plans at whatever scale the plans are, and then either build from them scaling up as you go or get them enlarged to the size you want.

Hydro Junkie

Something else to consider is that depending on how large you go, you could be required to license your project. There was an article in RCBM a few years back about a guy that built a 12 foot coastal freighter. Because it was big enough to ride in/on, he had to license it to be able to put it on the water. Just something else to consider

Umi_Ryuzuki

That's a little boat Deathwish...
Most of the 1/72nd cruisers are 8 feet long... and the
Bismarck at that scale is 11'-6"...

But I think what LargeScale wants is bigger yet...

http://www.rcuniverse.com/forum/m_46..._1/key_/tm.htm

[8D]

Deathwish

My Feedback: (6)

Man if i only had the space. I would make me one that big. I love the 8 foot aircraft carrier on that forum.

dallas2254

I resemble that comment you make mfr02.

It is not that a 6 foot + tug is heavy (34lbs), it is that it takes 3 full size deep cell 45 pound boat batteries to weight it down to the water line and that is alot of going back and forth between the water and what ever large vehicle you have to transport it in. There are a few redeeming factors of having a big model boat. You can do many things with it like:

1) Throw some jumper cables on it and jump start any boat on the lake even after a week of running the tug boat with not recharge.
2) If the boat you are trying to start won't, then you can tow it in even if it is a 1:1 scale boat.
3) You can install more accessories than most models and not have to worry about weight or electrical power drain.
4) You can install an inverter, go AC, and ..... turn your boat into a tazer if you swamp it.
5) You can ruin your back transporting it
6) You can go further away from the dock and still see where you are going (optional video relay)
7) You don't need a magnification glasses to see what you are working on.
8) You can multiply or devide by a smaller number to calculate scale
9) You can waste alot more time trying to find anything that will fit on it since few large scale accesssories are made for them.
10) You get more questions. The first question you usually get asked when someone sees it for the first time is "Why....."
11) And, the answer usually starts with "I have no idea anymore.....it just happened one day at Kinko I got this hair brained idea...."
12) After you build large scale, you never go back which presents a problem for storage and potentially your marriage.
13) If building large scale doesn't ruin your marriage it just makes it stronger.....I suggest naming the boat after your wife if she asked what you are going to name it. I now have two boats named after my wife. The fact that the boat is large made her notice it and the lack of 'honey do' jobs getting done around the house keeps her interested in when I am going to finish it. I just show her another plan for tug that would do her name justice on it.
14) You can transport cargo across the lake or pond with out worring about sinking the boat. (half rack of beverages to the neighbors on the lake, instant life of the part attraction). It helps to live on a lake for this to happen.
15) You can find parts in a marine store and are not limited to hobby store.
16) You can spend alot more money on it than you ever anticipated this hobby should have cost you, had you known better before you went to Kinko copiers with that big idea to blow up some boat plans. ( see all previous points)

I am sure there are many off the wall ideas that others have run into with these large scale boats....

D

the goon

Hi all,

I'd like to throw my two cents worth in on large models. My largest model is a 1/12 scale american harbor tug from the 1890's. length is 80", beam is 15", depth of hull is 11'. Power is a surplus wheelchair motor. Weight in the water is 165 lbs (40 lb model, 125 lbs batteries/ballast). The hull was made by a friend of mine in 1993, and I scratch built the rest last year. I love larger models, but I get older (52) i don't take this one out to the pond as often.

Mark

the goon

Kmot

My Feedback: (24)

That tug is awesome Mark.

dauntlessfan

I have tried scratch building a "giant scale" boat a few times, but never made it to completion [].

The first time, I scaled down some plans for a real boat to about 6' in length and built a hull out of plywood. Then for some reason I lost interest so my brother took that hull and converted it to a piece of furniture. Today it holds folded bath towels in his nautical theme bathroom .

Pumper1

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Hi

i have a larege tug that is 72" long about 51" top to bottom. It was powered by a gas engine that looks like it was water cooled. Twin props, bow thruster working winch, rotating radar and ver good detail. The hull is fibreglass. It has a transmission that has forward, neutral and reverse.

I was wondering if anyone has any thoughts as to the scale etc.

I would like to find a home for it that someone could enjoy it

mfr02

Quote:

I was wondering if anyone has any thoughts as to the scale etc.