The Ship Model Forum

Hi guys

I am in the process of building a number of 1/600 scale boats from the American Civil war era, however the models i am building lack any ventilators and i am having a nightmare trying to work out how i can make some from scratch anyone got any good ideas?

Rob

Rob - depends on the size.

For a small ventilator, get some solder, bend it, cut to length and then drill out one end.

For larger sizes look for suitbale spur with a curve corner rather than a right angle. Cut off the corner to the size you need then drill out the end.

HTH,

Cheers,

Rob

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For 1:600 I believe some thick wire or solder would just work find.

One of the best ways I saw so far for larger scale ventilators is described here - i will try on my first scratchbuilding project:
viewtopic.php?f=4&t=34771

It is done by Laurent in Online Scratchbuilding Projects for his Zinnia project, page 15.

Yevgeniy

Another method is using sprue. Put a length of sprue or another suitably sized round piece of plastic over a candle and bend the piece of sprue while slightly pushing the two ends together. After the plastic has cooled down use a razor saw to seperate the two cowl vents you are creating. Use a hand held drill or one of the dental burr like pieces which come with a dremel to hollow out the two halves and presto. Two cowl vents. With some practice you can make different diameters by varying the pressure used in pushing the ends together.
One word of warning: use the burrs in a hand held vise when hollowing out the cowls, not the dremel itself as it will melt the plastic!

The system I use has always worked for me. I use h.o. and o. scale model railroad refinery piping to make most of my vents. If I need larger ones, I use the barrels of pens.The other thing you can use is brass tube.You can cut it to langth and then take a shorter section and using the flaring tool make the bells for that type of ventilator,You just make sure that when you solder the two parts together you can file the joint down smooth. You can also bell the plastic pen barrels if your careful. commodore4

Such great post should be posted thrice Very easy reading and understandable - even though I know the subject in question this reading clarified some points to me.

A question which always makes me scratch my head and loose the rest of my hair is how on earth do some achive smooth transition between two soldered parts of brass tubes on a ventilator (one being straight and the other(s) at the angle). I tried that with paper model (with miserable results) and know that you can make an 'approximately' smooth transition between individual sections of a pipe (cylinder) while trying to represent a ventilator. As we can not use putty if we want 'bare-brass' ventilators or unpainted papermodel the question arises.

I knew guys who have done ventilators from metal just casting the metal (in special oven). While definitely a good method it is not for me as I will probably never have an access to such ovens. But how they do it without casting from individual tubes - I do not see any sort of transitions between sections on museum quality ventilators - probably they bend the pipe somehow...

Yevgeniy

Maybe they used the method of electroplating, which was described here some years ago. This guy basically made very thin (to scale) brass or copper fairings and ventilators with metal dissolved in acid, a plug/master and an electrical charge. Quite impressive.

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If all else fails, a complete pig-headed refusal to see facts in the face will see us through. - General Melchett

Quite possible - another method

HI,just recently I ran across this same problem.I took the tubing of the size I needed. I then found some HEAVY electrical wire the same inside diameter as the tubing.I carefully after inserting the wire bent the tubing to a full,with no wrinkles,90 degrees. I then used a torch and melted the copper out!.The result was bell type ventilators that were all one piece.The bell part can be enlarged with a flaring tool ,or the end from the bending tools they use for photo-etch ,the tip makes a good flaring tool. commodore 4

Thats a good tip Commodore!

what type of tube did you use that allowed the copper to melt out and the tube not distort...?

JIM B

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Rob
have a look at Battlefleet models

Harry makes a nice selection of vents

Roy

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This is for JIM BAUMANN :Hi, I am so sorry it took so long for me to get back to you.You had asked what kind of tubing I used where I could melt the copper core out when I finished the bends . I used on the particular job in question , stainless steel tubing that I recieved as part of a box of scrap materials and an older neighbor told me how to do it . It is tricky . You heat the parts till the steel starts getting red and you start from the bottom . It takes less temp to melt copper than steel . He told me this is how they did tubing for an aircraft project in school . Tha instructer surprised them by doing this in class . One thing you have to be careful of is not to get the melting copper on you as you tap it out a little at a time . For one vent it took an hour . I haven,t used this method much as it,s to dangerous for the average modeler to try . I had an engine repair area at the place where I worked and I did it in the welding area . commodore4

Why not do it like they bend copper pipe?
1. All they do is use very dry and pure sand fill the copper or brass pipe , heat and bend very
carefully. When finished remove the sand. Have seen this used but not done myself.
2.Can also use a specialised pipe bender which is shaped like a spring, insert the pipe to be bent
inside the spring and bend to desired shape very gently, but only till a 90 degree bend is formed,
if you go past this you will never get the spring section off. Have used this to install refrigeration
piping.