Evening Gents.
HMS Verulam was a V Class Destroyer launched 22nd April 1943.
She served in various theatres including the Arctic,Normandy,Malaya,and Burma.
Following her wartime service she was laid up.
Verulam was then converted between 1951/1952 to a Type 15 Anti submarine frigate.
She was decommissioned and sold in 1972 and finally broken up in 1973.
I purchased and built a kit in 1989 and had many years of fun sailing.
Over the years she had a few little incidents (as you do) but she survived well.
Just before lockdown she nearly sank when she threw a propeller and the entire prop shaft when a coupling broke down.
I just managed to get her back to dry land on the other shaft.I was extremely lucky as she was filling with water quickly.
That resultant water did a lot of damage to the entire interior and after remedial cleaning I laid her up.
Now is the time to bring her back to life.
Externally she doesn’t look too bad,but internally I am starting from basically scratch.

What do I hope to achieve.
Replace the 27Mhz with one of my 2.4 sets.
Have as many of the main armament rotating as possible.
I may try to get the torpedo tubes to rotate.
Fit a funnel sized smoke generator.
Try to have the radar working.
Some slight weathering.

Work done today.
Remove all removable superstructures where possible.
Remove main engines.
Test the engines and ensure that bearings were sound and lightly oil.I will need to make a new base plate for the motors in due course.
Remove ESC and rudder servo.
ESC working well.
Rudder Servo was very hesitant and unhappy so I will be replacing with a new one.
I then removed the drive couplings and shafts.
The port shaft was a replacement for the one I lost and had a little corrosion near the propeller so some careful attention was given there.
I also removed the rudder and cleaned the post.There was no wear there so I am happy that it will give good service for many years.

You will see in the pictures that the deck started to separate from the hull after it’s near sinking so a lot of work to do there as well.
Hoping the photographs show my progress.
Take care all.
Regards
Bill.

Evening Gents.
With a couple of hours to spare today I decided to refit the motors,shafts and Rudder assembly.
The reason for doing this prior to repairing the deck and other fittings is so that I have a water tight model to enable me to do trim tests.
As I am going to be adding more servos and extra electrical items from the original build I have taken out some previously fitted ballast otherwise she would be rather overweight.

The motor base had become soft as a result of the water ingress so I made a new base and suitably painted it.This was set aside to dry and set.

The shaft oiler tubes were replaced.
This was done by cutting two 15mm lengths of 3mm diameter copper tubing.
I faced off the ends on the lathe and then push fitted two lengths of flexi tube to the tube.
I then pushed the new tubes over the old pipes and glued in position.

Taking care to ensure that the Port and Starboard shafts went back into the correct tubes I first packed the ends of the tubes with marine waterproof grease.
With the shafts back in place the shaft tubes were filled with light oil via the new oil tubes using a syringe.
I used two small servo screws to seal the ends of the oilers.

I then refitted the motors and most critically ensured that motors,couplings and shafts were in alignment.
That done the new motor base was screwed to the original plate glued to the bottom of the interior hull.
A dry run was conducted to ensure that all was running smoothly.(see video)

Rudder.
I fitted a new servo and centred it.
The rudder post was greased and refitted to the tube and tiller arm fixed in place.
As a precaution against mishaps an extra collet was placed on top of the tiller.
This will stop the rudder dropping out in the event of any problems.
The servo arm was fitted to the servo and connection rod’s suitably attached.
I say rod’s,because you will see that I have also fitted another rod to the underside of the rear turret so that the gun moves with the rudder.
This saves space and the weight of an extra servo.👍
Rudder tested and is satisfactory.(see video)

I will next be working out the logistics of where the electrical components will all be positioned and servo position for guns and torpedo tubes.
Hopefully the photographs give you an idea of todays work.
Regards
Bill.

Evening Gents.
The inclement weather at the weekend gave time for some more progress.
In this update I am covering the refitting of the…ESC and Main armament.

Once again see the attached pictures as they tell a thousand words so do study 👍
The ESC as fitted is a Mtroniks Viper Eco 20.
This little gem is more than adequate for this sized model and copes well with the two motors.
All ESC’s get warm and as such Mtroniks have heat vanes on the back for heat dissipation.
In the centre of the vanes is a circular 4mm section that allowed me to slide in my case a 4mm hollow copper tube thru.
I then fashion two balsa supports one at each end.
Drill a hole in dash support and slide the copper tube thru the holes ensuring that there is gap below the bottom of the ESC.
This allows the heat to dissipate and air to flow under the ESC.
(Hope I’m not teaching Granny here) 🫣.
The ESC on its little base was fitted in place away from the motors and tested.
A satisfactory run was recorded.

We now come to the Main armament refitting along with servos.
The Rear Y turret is connected by a Rod to the rudder servo horn so as the rudder turnes the turret turns.
The X turret has its own servo which works in conjunction with the rudder servo via a 3 Split cable and again turns as with the rudder.
(Please see video).
The servos are fixed in place using balsa handmade support’s and are easily removable in the event of failure.

Front Turrets.
Both the front A and B turrets are again fitted sympathetically in place with balsa casings.Easily removable in case of maintenance. 🤞🤞
The servo’s used are the 360 rotation type.
This gives a little more traverse and control of the speed.
There isn’t a lot more I can say re the turret refits as they are all very much the same in terms of construction.

The next job will be to mechanise the two torpedo tubes so that they rotate.
Thank you for looking and feel free to ask any questions.
Take care all and stay safe.
Regards
Bill.

Afternoon Gents.
Another rainy day here in Devon,so,time to do a little more on the refit as it’s not fun cutting the grass under an umbrella.
Today it was time to motorise the twin torpedo tubes.
With only room for one servo the challenge was to build a link mechanism and couple the two together.
PLEASE see the photographs for a better understanding than my ramblings.
Firstly I removed the tubes from the decking taking care to drill pilot holes thru the tube bases first.This ensures that the tubes go back in the correct location.
The servo had to be connected to the forward tubes as that was the best space area I had.
Refitting the deck in place I positioned the servo in it’s rough location and carefully removed the deck and marked around the servo.
I then made a simple balsa box for it and fitted the servo and glued in place permanently.
I then turned a short length of 6mm aluminium tube which slides directly onto the servo motor head by friction fit.
I then drilled a larger hole in a servo horn and slid down the tube.This being for the linkage to the other set of tubes.
Using another servo fitting I glued it to the torpedo tubes base.
Once the deck is in place then both torpedo tubes friction fit on top of the 6mm tubes so I have engine room access.
Servo fitted and a dry run undertaken with forward tube in situe was successfully completed 👍.

Moving onto the aft tubes the process was largely replicated other than I made a pivot system with 6mm tube which sits in a bearing base.
This set up sits nicely between the engine couplings.
Making up the linkages took a little time to ensure that the rotation would be equal.
Once made all was fitted and after a few trial runs the system works well.
So we have life in the torpedo tubes now.
Finally I removed the deck railings in the area of the tubes(no picture I’m afraid)

I am happy with today’s efforts.
Next I shall fit the smoke generator within the funnel.
Enjoy,and stay safe one and all.
Regards
Bill.

Good evening all.
With some time to spare yesterday(Friday) I decided to do two more jobs.
So progress continues apace and having completed the majority of the internal workings as can be seen in the previous blogs the time has come to “Make Smoke” and repair the deck.

SMOKE GENERATOR.
Smoke is generated by the use of a Seuth Number 5 placed within the funnel.
The Number 5 runs off a max of 6volts.This power supply is attached nicely on top of the main power pack forward.
Firstly I removed the funnel from the deck and drilled holes in the base and matching holes in the deck.
This is to allow the wires to pass thru and to ensure that there is sufficient up draught to help the smoke flow.
I then made a suitable support to attach the smoker.This is made from Balsa and is a vertical support with a flat base.The smoker is attached with a clip.
Having painted it black and allowing to dry I glued to to the internal base of the funnel and tested 👍. All good it works(see first test video)
During this job I damaged the funnel top wire cage so made a replacement from thin brass wire and fitted…Simples!👍
The next task was to do all the wiring which was simple and the smoker is activated by an on/off switch situated internally under the bridge.
I must apologise here that for some reason some of the photographs I took of the wiring failed to load so aren’t shown.
Once completed the funnel was repositioned on the deck.
Another test showed the result in the videos.

DECK REPAIR.
I previously mentioned that the upper deck had started to separate from the hull following the incident years ago when she nearly sank (as previously described).

The photographs show how bad this was.
I separated as best I could the deck and cleaned up the framework,then with superglue I replaced the deck.
I needed to add two cross member supports for strength.
Some cracks were filled and all left to dry.The whole deck will be repainted in due course.

So now what is left to do on this refit.
Two of the lifeboats are damaged along with the Davits.
Anchors to replace.
There are various small items that need to be repaired including the main masts.
Then a little weathering on certain areas.

Tomorrow I will first do a trim test to see how she sits in the water.
Take care all and stay safe.
Regards
Bill.

Evening Gents.
A few small items done over the last couple of days in between other home domestic jobs.
The mast and its base were quite badly bent and distorted during my saving the model from sinking.
All of the above had to be removed carefully and the base section repaired along with the mast.A relatively simple but time consuming job.
The Anchors were also removed and quite simply replaced with two new ones 👍

I then placed the model in the bath for a full trim test.
I had at the start of the refit removed a reasonable amount of lead ballast to allow me to add the extra servos and battery for the smoker as previously described.
She sat quite well in the water,but with a slight list to Port.
This was rectified by adding 80grms of lead fixed to a small board and placed starboard side aft next to the rudder post.
Mission accomplished as the trim was spot on.

For information I use small lead weights obtained from my local garage.
These weights are used for tyre balancing and are perfect for this type of job.
They have self adhesive backs so no mess involved.👍👍.

I also did a little weathering which I will show in the next report along with the remaining few small items that need completing.

Although on the mend I look forward to becoming well enough again soon to sail Verulam and HMS Belfast but still not fit enough to get to the pond 😤☹️.

Please see attached photographs.
Take care and stay safe one and all.
Regards
Bill.

Evening All.
I trust you are all well.
This has been a relatively short but quite full on refit.
The reason being that I have time on my hands for personal reasons and am unable to get to the pond as yet.I hope to remedy that soon🤞🤞🤞.

I have now finished the small items such as new flagstaffs and some rigging along with the little jobs you want to keep putting off.

I have done some moderate weathering of which I am happy with on this model.
The white ensign has been raised once more and she will be tested on the pond as soon as I can get there. I will post a video when I get there 👍
Thank you for looking and all your kind comments.

Please see the pictures and video clips.

So what’s next,I ask my self.
I have a model of HMS Cossack circa 1941 which I bought from a well known on line site some 10 years ago that has never seen water and has languished on a shelf as it is only a static model.It is quite a well built model and worth retro fitting.

I have started to tinker with her so possibly will do a blog on her in due course.
Take care all and stay safe.
Regards
Bill.