Part II
by Laurent Gontier-Versailles

The propellers

It might seem strange that I write now, so early in the construction, about the propellers .

Yes , I know but as they are already made I couldn't wait to share the following explanations with you all…

The propellers are an important feature on a model and badly built ones can destroy the appearance of a model .

Lucy , in her short life has had two different sets of propellers , the first one being a set of three bladed props , with the blades bolted to the hub , which remained till the 1909 refit , when they were changed for a set of cast in one piece four bladed props, after a earlier successful propeller swap on Mauretania , her sister-ship .

As I decided to represent Lucy in her maiden voyage configuration , being the easiest way as I used the John Brown shipyard's construction plans , without later alterations , like the post Titanic sinking commendations ( more boats , etc…) , I had to choose for the three bladed propellers configuration This was also easier for the fact that there are a lot of pic's of the first prop's & almost no pic's of the second set , while one of these four bladed prop is now on display on a wharf at Southampton , UK .

This 1909 alteration to four bladed props lessened the earlier heavy vibrations , as Lucy & Maury were known to be "shakers" in the after part of the ship…

As you can see on pic's of lucy on her building stocks , the props have a very distinctive "Mickey Mouse ears" shape , different than on other ships.

This shape and the relatively little diameter used ( about 5.0 meters ) were due to the use of high revolving steam turbines connected straight to the shafts without reduction , turning at 185 RPM's at full speed .

No propeller from a model shop actually meets this shape, so they also had to be scratch built.

I have for about two years been in regular contact with a modeller , Mike Newman , from Christchurch (N.Z.) , who has produced a wonderful model of TEV Rangatira at the 1/64 scale , which I saw while surfing on his modelling club site . www.csmee.org.nz/
"Canterbury Society of Model and Experimental Engineers"

We became what we can call "internet friends" , sharing a lot of impressions about our passions of scratch built ship models , of course , and vintage American cars .

As I told Mike my problems about the propellers and my lack of knowledge about soldering , he proposed to make them for me , I just had to send him the plans .
We agreed about some swaps , and after receiving some pic's by Email on my PC , I got the four brass props in my mail box after a few months.

About the plans of these propellers , they do not exist anymore , the only data we could get were the ones held in some books , but the sources gave different data , so I contacted some TRMA trustees & other readers through the message board .

I don't remember who has given me the right data , but translated to 1/100 , it came to an outside diameter of 50 mm's and the pitch was about 55 mm's

Here underneath is the plan of the propeller I sent to Mike :

Another surprising feature on both sisters is the direction of rotation of these propellers , the inner revolving outward , the outer inward .

I was astonished by the quality of Mike's work , the swap we did would never be equal to the money I would have paid to a well known British prop's builder

Here underneath are two pic's of Mike outstanding work :

The other parts you can see on the picture above are the four outer bearings , turned on the lathe , out of manganese bronze , to be put in the copper tubes ( 8 inner & 10 outer diameters in mm's ) I used to make the stern tubes.
These bearings have to be glued in position , to avoid their rotation while the shafts are used .

I decided to use bronze bearings instead of ball bearings , as the revolutions will be kept low , this is not a race boat…

The stern tubes of a R/C sailing ship have to be greased , not to lubricate the shafts , but to avoid the introduction of water in your model. Some modelers use oil , but that oil has to be filled at each navigation .
I prefer to use grease instead , as I grease my shafts once & for a whole season , for about six months of navigation on the Sundays . I know this from experience with my previous models .

Here under is a pic of the two inner stern tubes with their greasers

So , here it stops for now…

In part 3 , I will tell you how to build the main decks that have to be put on the hull before we may commence with the representation of the plating , which shall begin in part 4…

See you,

Laurent.