Needing a break from structure building, today I decided do
some work on the freighter that will be loading copper ingots at the dock on my
copper smelter module. She is a Sylvan Models resin kit of the RANGELL BOYS.
The RANGELL BOYS was a “lumber
hooker” built in Marine City, Michigan in 1890. Named for their primary use in
transporting huge loads of lumber as seen in the photo of the vessel below. In reality, these vessels were the water-born “semi trucks”
of their day, and were called into service for carrying just about anything
they could cram into their holds and on their decks. As such, it would have been a common sight to see such a
vessel loading copper at one of the smelters in Michigan's Keweenaw Peninsula - the area I am modeling.
While the locations of all hull openings for anchors chains
and lines were cast in place, they required opening-up with a rasp in the Dremel
and needle files. It was also necessary to drill a line of ten scupper drain
holes on half-inch centers along each side of the main deck. I found this
masking tape with inch markings in the paint department at Walmart a few months
ago, and picked up a roll because I knew it was a solution looking for a
problem. That problem reared its head today when I needed to mark the horizontal
locations for these scuppers. To ascertain the vertical orientation, I rested a
small piece of 1/8”styrene on the rub rail and marked the location for each hole
on the appropriate verticals.
I then used a very sharp awl to center punch each scupper location
and then drilled the holes through with an 1/8” bit in my regular drill. Below, you can see the ten holes after they were drilled.
After giving the castings a good scrubbing with a 3M pad and
dish washing detergent, I masked off the lower section of the hull along the
lower rub rail and shot the upper part of the hull and the interior with flat
white Rustoleum. After this dried, I removed the masking and then re-masked the
upper section and interior and shot the lower part of the hull with flat black.
While the hull was drying, I primed the three deck sections with
Rustoleum sand colored camo primer, and then followed-up with a couple of light
coats of a custom mix of cocoa, burnt sienna and pewter gray acrylic craft
paints watered diluted with retarder and water shot with a cheap single-action
airbrush. Thus far, I have had pretty good success applying craft paints I this
manner. However, I find that a thorough cleaning is vital as the stuff hardens in
the nozzle pretty quickly.
