funnel cap

tomarack · 02-04-2007

A friend of mine is building a french Belier tug model (remorqueur Bélier)

List of plenty french navy ships with plans you find here

http://www.servicehistorique.sga.def.../listebato.php

here but appear a question..how the construction of a funnel cap is done. We do believe there is a metal net round cap at top of metal covering of the funnel.
We but are not sure, if our view about it is the right one. We need a little help, please. Details available I put as attachments.

**Bunkerbarge** · 02-04-2007

Tomarack, looking at the drawings it would seem to be a pretty normal conical cap arrangement with the added complexity of the funnel not being round.

I have included a couple of period tug pictures and a couple of shots of my model Envoy Class tug for your reference.

I would suggest that you make a cone shape by wrapping either thin metal sheet or plasticard into the appropriate conical shape then joining the material along its edge. Once you have the cone you can then cut the thin slice of the cap out of the cone shape.

If you look closely at the tugs you will see that the cap is open underneath and not joined to the funnel along it's lower edge as you might first expect. This is to allow air to flow up inside the cone and help to carry the exhaust gas clear of the vessel.

As for the spark arrester gauzes, I couldn't find any pictures of that so a bit of digging around the internet may bring up something. The trouble with such items was that they were made up on the spot rather than to a specific drawing and were pretty much open to interpretation of the yard workers at the time. Having said that the advantage is that no-one could say what you create is wrong. You could make a very simple open gauze from something like thin brass rod and solder the rods together to form a lattice. This can then easily be glued onto the inside of the cone.

Looking at your drawing I think the top right hand side detail is a plan of the gauze as fitted, which gives you something to copy with your brass rod and the elevation to me indicates that the gauze is curved in section and fitted to a raised part in the centre of the cone. That's just my interpretation of it.

**Bluewavestudios** · 02-04-2007

Thats a Very Nice Looking Tug of yours there Richard,
Is this one up on a separate thread anywhere..??, would be nice to see more of it as it is a fine looking Model.

Regards.......Mark

tomarack · 03-04-2007

Hi Richard, thanks for your quick reply. We will make the funnel in way you recommended. Your Envoy model tug is very nice, indeed. all the best. Tom

a good news - it happened to find the only photo of remorqueur Belier de Brest naval port

**Bunkerbarge** · 03-04-2007

Quote:

Originally Posted by Bluewavestudios

Thats a Very Nice Looking Tug of yours there Richard,
Is this one up on a separate thread anywhere..??, would be nice to see more of it as it is a fine looking Model.

Regards.......Mark

Mark, I'm afraid I can't take any credit for this one as it was an Ebay purchase. Apart from the motor it didn't have any electrics so I put that in with a smoke maker and I have since put the figures on and done a bit of rerigging. I would like to weather it properly, do some more rigging and add a bit of detail but I really like the look of her and she handles very well on the water.

I'll put a couple of more recent pictures up later.