I have several model ships that I will be putting in a harbor scene on my HO layout and wondered what is the best way to mount them? Do you cement them in place and then pour the water material around them or do you mount them after the water is finished, and if so how do you get the waterline to blend into the water (assuming you have some wave textureing)? I have both resin and styrene model ship kits.
-Bob
PS: The latest MR has some great Harbor modeling articles and they look great.
Life is what happens while you are making other plans!
So far, I've only got one such model, a lobster boat on a very flat and tranquil bay. It's a waterline model, so I just place it down on the water and it looks fine.
That's what I would recommend for flat water - put the water in and place a waterline model on top. If you try to pour water around a model, it will creep up the sides of the hull. That's probably OK if you're going to add waves, though.
Still, I would suggest leaving the model unattached. If you ever need to move it to change the scene, you don't want to destroy the model to take it off the water base.
Thanks for posting this, by the way. I'm planning a car float scene, and that will have a rather large model and I'd like some choppy water around it. The rest of this thread will be very instructive, I'm sure.
It takes an iron man to play with a toy iron horse.
This is the second time I have modeled water. The first was a small lake and I used Envirotex lite. This time I am modeling a harbor so I did it differently.
I painted the surface with midnight blue craft paint. Then I just used gloss medium over that and stippled in the waves. It looks good, but not exceptional. I have received good positive comments about the water.
My 'boats' will be waterline models. I have two barges right now that I use as interchange tracks, so they get changed out during operating sessions. I didn't do anything in particular to them to make them fit in. I am going to add a tugboat later.
Elmer.
The above is my opinion, from an active and experienced Model Railroader in N scale and HO since 1961.
(Modeling Freelance, Eastern US, HO scale, in 1962, with NCE DCC for locomotive control and a stand alone LocoNet for block detection and signals.) http://waynes-trains.com/ at home, and N scale at the Club.
Gandydancer,
Did you scracthbuild your carfloats and floatbridge, or use a kit? If scratchbuilt can you provide some insight about materials and construction? Your Harbor scene looks fantastic!
Bob
This is for the N-scale shelf layout my daughter & I are building, but hopefully it can help.
After painting the bottom a grimy-black / dark green color (and let dry), we poured a layer of Magic Water tinted with Floquil grimy black and BNSF Green (have to use solvent-based paints with MW):
Then we build a simple carfloat out of two sheets of .08 styrene:
While this car float acts as staging, it's perminantly attached to the water with two screws:
The super-cheap screw heads stripped before I could get them all the way down ;(I could have taken my Dremel and cut off the heads but I just covered them with debris instead.After weathering some more with powders they really don't stick out as much.
After the float was installed, we painted Modge Podge Gloss on the Magic Water around the float to simulate moving water:
Got a little on the float, and it does not look like water marks (glossy!), so we'll be touching that up with weather powders later.
But this mounting technique worked for us.Hope it gives you some ideas.
M.C. Fujiwara
My YouTube Channel (How-to's, Layout progress videos)
Silicon Valley Free-moN
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Thanks for the comment. Nothing elaborate was used.The car floats were built by someone else. Basically they are just a 1x4 with a track deck added along with some other details to make it look good.The float bridge is kit-bashed. I didn't want the tall overhead lift mechanisms that most have, so did some research and found that a float type bridge would work, and raise and lower with the tide. The bridge itself is about half a double track girder bridge kit. The pontoon under it is a block of wood, sealed, finished, and painted.The pier is a Walthers kit.
Thank you to both gandydancer and mcfunkymonkey, great information from both of you. Sometimes we don't realize the obvious, and overthink things.
I guess I should have added some more details about my situation: I plan to have a Walthers Tugboat model in the harbor with a wave surface on the water and some wake coming from the stern and some waves coming out from the bow as if it were moving slowly through the water. In order to model the waves flowing from the bow of the ship it needs to be almost coming off the hull and folding into the water. Is there some way to use a release or parting agent on the model so the water material (probably 'Water Effects') won't stick to the models hull? I hope I am making myself clear on what I am looking for? Thanks for all the comments and info you guys have posted. One can never stop learning about the many aspects of this hobby.
How about wrapping the bottom & sides of the boat with saran wrap or a plastic bag, build up the waves around the boat, then when all's dry pull the boat out of the space created?
Worse case the plastic bag sticks to the "water", but hey it's clear and you can use an exacto to trim it down to invisible.
Hi Bob,
When using a waterline hull, like Mr. Beasley said; just have it set on top of the water because you may need to move it from time to time. You state you wanted to have a wake around the tug. The way I made the wake around the lobster boat, which can be moved any where on the water at any time. This is something you might want to try, so this is how I did it.
On my work bench, I put the boat on a piece of clear plastic, (the same stuff you would use as window glazing) and I trace around the hull in the shape I want the wake to look . Then I build up the wake with W S water effects and after its dry I paint it white. Place the boat back on the wake you just made place it any where on the water. The lobster boat you see in this picture can be moved anywhere on the harbor, wake and all. Hope this helps.
Sam
thanks ollevon, that sounds like a good way to start.. It would also allow me to do the water modelling at the work bench.
Hi!
Being prototypical, I prefer anchors. Smaller boats need only one, but the larger ships need 2 or more.
ENJOY !
Mobilman44
Living in southeast Texas, formerly modeling the "postwar" Santa Fe and Illinois Central
ollevon,
What a great idea! Love the look of your scene. Does your wake still work on wavy water or does it require a glass smooth finish? Having lived my life in coastal Southern California, I know firsthand how seldom water is ever glass smooth, especially once anything is moving on/in it.
Hornblower
Along the same lines, I have a number of full hull ships rangine in scale from around 1/75 to 1/96 scale and size from a bit over 12" to over 6' long I'd like to be able to use from time to time on a removeable/ replaceable basis, several of which are R/C. My idea was removeable blocks of water, solid surface to match the regular water, and with other blocks molded around the desired boat hull in a sort of modular fashion. Anybody done anything similar?
hornblower ollevon, What a great idea! Love the look of your scene. Does your wake still work on wavy water or does it require a glass smooth finish? Having lived my life in coastal Southern California, I know firsthand how seldom water is ever glass smooth, especially once anything is moving on/in it.
Yes it will work on wavy water, but not if its to choppy. If you look at the wake some of the white parts are detached from the main wake this way you can place them in between the waves. just make little slivers of it, and as many as you need. That was my first layout and I never did get a chance to make my harbor water wavy. Before I took that layout down I put plenty of waves in the harbor just to check if that system would work on wavy water on my new layout, and it turned out very well. Thanks
Mobilman;
ref: your comment about small/large boats/anchors.
I have several tugs Iwant to put on my layout when it gets to that point; I also have a Seacoast models ferry I converted to a derrick lighter. These craft are all about 65 to 90 feet long. What type of and how many anchors are needed on these watercaft? Also, I am building a drydock with a tug (Lindberg) on the blocks. Got the idea from a book I have about carfloats in the NYC area. I have found little info about floating drydocks, so I did some seat-of-the pants engineering, and designed my own, with tanks under the float platform, and counterweights slung up over the sides. The idea is that when the platform is raised or lowered, the counterweights will be filled or emptied as well. Interestingly, large radial recip type of compressors will be employed to empty the tanks as needed.
I am using a lot of parts from Plastruct and Evergreen Plastics, as well as from Bluejacket Models. If you are familiar with drydock concept desigh, I would like to pick your brain for some feeedback.
Rich