Tsekoa II - 1/32 Scale
The Real Boat...
Built in 1985 by Allied Shipbuilders of Vancouver for Public Works of Canada, the Tsekoa II was used in the construction, maintenance, and repair of buoys, docks and other marine structures along the British Columbia Pacific coastline. In the early 1990s the vessel was sold to the Canadian Coast Guard. After its service with the Canadian Coast Guard, it was laid up and eventually sold. She now sails as the Oceanic Surveyor.
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The Kit Build...
Well this project has been about 12 years in the making.... And then some!
I got this kit back in 2004 or so for Christmas from the parents. It seemed easy enough and in my skill set at the time to get it finished within a year or 2. I built up a lot of the smaller items - crane, lifeboat, davit, mast, etc. and when it came time to get the electronics in, things stalled. And to top it off the motor couplings needed to be tapped and drilled which I had no means to do at the time. So there she sat for a long period of time.... smaller parts finished, rudder servo installed, rudders hooked up, shafts installed. It sat for a few years in the box, gathering layers of dust before I brought it to New Hampshire thinking I could get some work done, but nothing... then when I moved from my old place in Mass, to where I am now, and it came along again. FINALLY I said screw this and got around to working on it - I was tired of it being the neglected build, it actually was giving me a guilt trip every time I looked at it. Upon re-opening the box, I noticed a rudder shaft broken, which has been the bane of my existence since restarting. The original motors had 6:1 reduction gears on them, but I since removed it after testing in the lake on a choppy day. This was done to give the 550 motors a bit more kick in pushing through heavy seas and high winds - which I use the boat often in. I also noticed the crane was a mess, so a new one was in order (you will notice a painted one on the build pictures - the new one is unpainted). I have it set for counter rotating props, which makes her stable and maneuver nicely even without the bow thruster... The model also has working navigation lights installed, as well as some scratch built items like the pallets that the buoy 55 gallon drums are on. Speaking of these, they are both 3d printed items that I created in Sketch Up and printed on a Makerbot Replicator 5. The paint scheme is not 100% accurate as I was not fond of the lower part of the deck house being gray. |
There are three sections of images below - Construction, Painting and Completed Model
