hello everyone i am new to the rc sailing scene and am loking to build my own yacht after having a shot on a friends. im not too concerned with the design as i have one for a sliver IOM. i am hoping to build it out of balsa wood but apart from that dont know what im dooing. any help will be very appreciated with the whole build or any ideas with anything

Nothing wrong with balsa or obechi as a building material, apart from it needs plenty of care waterproofing inside and out, and a knock-resistant finish to the outside of the hull. IOM rules have a generous minimum weight for the hull, so you shouldn't have a problem making it strong enough.
Welcome to the real fun part of model boating.

i wasent planing on racing it under the IOM rules so weight isnt an issue as long as it dosent sink. what glue do you use to attach the planking to each other and the ribs? and would you waterproof it before or after its assembled?
thanks for the help

Hi, follow the following link and it will take you to the American Model Yachting Association


http://www.modelyacht.org/

As soon as you get into the site, on your left you will see a menu, click on 'Boats', then on 'Class Page', scroll down and click on US 1 Metre. When you get to the US One Metre page click on 'construction tips, file and plans. You will see a (4) four part section on how to build a model from balsa. even though the section is to build a US One Metre it is like the bible that most modelers follow to build any boat. As you may know is that the US One Metre is very similar to the IOM.

GOOD LUCK

If you have any other questions feel free to ask me, I have been building these models for about 15 years.

Steve

thanks for the link, it covers everything i need but if theres anything else when i start building hopefully you will know what to do

reading through the construction guide im not too sure on what to do with the keel support.
do i put 2 layers of balsa there and have this chunk of wood sticking out the bottem of the boat or dose the support go in after its out of the mold.
any help is appreciated.

No Balsa...

There are a couple of areas that need to be VERY STRONG as well as FREE from flex, and
I would like to suggest the following;

Imagine that you are looking at the boat from the rear towards the front at the location of the mast and keel, and for simplicity reasons here illustrated as a Triangle pointing down:
1/ The Keel attached in the bottom.
2/ The upper two corners is where the standing rigging that is supporting the mast is
... attached.
3/ The mast is standing on the center of the upper side (deck)

This area must be designed strong enough to be able to balance the involved forces, compression from the mast pushing down - the upward force on the standing rigging, the forces of the keel that actually work in all directions...

(A very simplified drawing is attached)

So back to your question;
One quite common design for the keel area is to build a box of a strong material that is attached to the hull...

I hope this simplified explanation makes sense to you, if not - just email me for further explanation.

Good luck

This is the area that almost all of the horsepower (and there can be A LOT) is transmitted. Further to Strykers advice, mounting the mast in a tube/box/receptacle which is a structural part of the fin box is good. All the forces transmitted down the mast are transferred directly to the fin, and the hull becomes less stressed and more a device for directing the water past the works.
Any structural bracing belongs oh the inside - you dont want anything that is going to disrupt the water flow on the outside. You do not intend racing, but looking at what practices the racing lads go in for is a good idea, as they want a boat that will perform well in a wide range of conditions, and this is probably what you want as well.

thanks for that guy's. just so i got this straight i reinforce the whole keel, mast and shroud area. what would you do to make it free from flex? pack it with more wood?
thanks for all the help