Red Rackham's Treasure (Shark Submarine)

Markus Antonius
And i thought: " Finally someone who will build that 100th scale oldie... oh damn" 😄

gorby
!!!!! This looks interesting!

Greg Baker
LOL Markus! Sorry to disappoint you. I do have an Academy Me262 that I'm planning to build straight up. Hopefully I'll win your approval on this build eventually. 🙂

Markus Antonius
sure thing 🙂

Julian Herrero aka Yuri
Very clever idea ,,, it's really quite similar ,,,,

Uwe Kaeding
Very cool - looking forward to following this one 🙂

Greg Baker
Thanks Uwe! I finally found a Tintin-themed build that you didn't do first and twice as well! 🙂

John Thomas
Greg, very cool. It does look very much like a Shark and some nice detail work

Julian Herrero aka Yuri
I allways thought that the Me-262 in plan view had the shape of a shark ,,,, may be we should ask herr M esserschmitt or herr Voigt ????

Ben STONE
Nice work Greg and great idea. I did a 262 version of the HYDRA sub from Captain America, the fuselage is perfect for a submarine look.

Martin R.
Splendid idea! Looking forward to the next steps!

Greg Baker
Thanks guys! There's still some body work to be done, but I'm happy how it's turning out so far. I've tried several options for the canopy before settling on one method I think will work... luckily I have a bunch of blister packs saved up for just such an occasion.

Dale Marston
Very Restrained weathering for a Japanese WW2 plane. Looks great.

gorby
???? I think you may have commented on the wrong post Dale (I've done it before now).

Greg Baker
Wait wait... not so fast now. I take all praise... misdirected, blind or otherwise! 🙂

Dale Marston
🙂 LOL

Christian Ristits
Great, looking Forward to it!

gorby
That's greedy Greg, Dale may have intended his comment for my album (damn! He didn't). 😭

Greg Baker
Perhaps. Or perhaps he just meant that the weathering on a scratch built submarine, based on one from a comic book adventure and constructed from the fuselage of an experimental German WWII-era jet fighter IS very restrained for a Japanese WWII plane... we can't be sure. 😄

Greg Baker
In other news I glue the frame to the canopy and while I wait for that to dry well enough for me to bend it to fit the shape, I decided to putty up the seams... and while I wait for ThAT to dry, I started cutting and glueing together the base stand.

gorby
Yes that is possible Greg (if extraordinary unlikely). I'm sure that all right-minded people would agree that it's more likely his comment was meant for a album he hasn't seen (must have been so good it worked it's way into his subconscious).

(P.S. If you don't agree, you are not right-minded and can therefore, be safely ignored.)

Greg Baker
On the other hand... it could just be that Dale has a quirky habit of commenting one build to the left, and that someone else's album received the glowing commentary he meant for mine... somewhere out there someone is scratching his head wondering why Dale is suggesting his OOB soviet battle tank build has "sleek lines" and is "a great display of scratch-building prowess". Poor confused sod.

Dale Marston
All of the above gentlemen. LOL

Greg Baker
In the interest of turning this back on topic...I glued together the base after carefully measuring the arms to make sure the sub will sit properly. One problem I had was the curvature of the wing piece I'm kit bashing means one side is a little higher than the other. To compensate, I just shaved the base slightly to make sure the sub sits plumb and level.

I got ahead of myself on the canopy and tried to do too much too soon and completely botched it. Luckily these are all just trial runs and I have lots of do-overs after I figure out what I should've done. I was also extremely pleased with myself for turning an "electric eraser" (gotta love Asia!) that I picked up at a stationary store for less than $3 and successfully modified it into a sanding dremel. Don't you love it when something works just the way you envisioned it!? Sanding was a breeze!

gorby
'Electric eraser'!?? As I hate sanding I may forgive you for your earlier jabbering ( 😠 ) if you post a photo of your DIY Dremel. 🤔
The subs looking very good.

John Thomas
Greg, that great about the use of the electric eraser as a sander. I have been doing the same off and on for years. I was an Architectural Designer for all most 30 years and when I first started out in the 1980's I was hand drafting and used the electric eraser all most every day but by the 1990's I started to us CADD and all my drafting tools when into storage but I did pull out my electric eraser to use on models. I use it with tooth paste (not the gel) and polished the plastic. I did little real sanding with it. I still use it from time to time but not as much as I did. BTY nice work on the Shark.

Dale Marston
Actually Greg Baker I am starting to like the look of it. It is very different from all the standard kits.

Greg Baker
gorbygould - here's a video comparing the $50 fancy schmancy one with the $3 one I've got. The only difference (other than colour) is that mine has the metal clasps like the fancy one. I originally bought the one just like in the video, but ran across the metal tipped one and bought it because I thought it might be easier to load sandpaper, however with a bit of ingenuity either will work I think. I've seen similar battery-powered dremels (Mr. spin or somethingorother) at the LHS but they've always been too expensive to justify. This worked like a charm and I was giggling like a school girl as I was happily (and precisely) sanding away the seams on my sub. Youtube Video

Greg Baker
I also notice you can get one with the metal tip for $5 on Amazon.com - amazon.com/Ambielly-..ords=Electric+eraser there are slightly cheaper ones ($3 or so) but they have a non adjustable plastic tip.

Greg Baker
John - That's a great idea to use it with toothpaste to polish. I actually used the eraser itself to polish up the canopy for my C.714 build. I was also thinking about cutting the surface material off the "6-step" nail buffing stick I got at the dollar store and glueing it to one of the eraser refills and using that for fine polishing. Haven't tried it yet, but seems like it might work.

Greg Baker
Oh, and I'm very glad that Dale's coming to senses. You should check out some of gourbygould's builds I haven't seen any, but I hear (mostly from him) that he's quite good.😉

Urban Gardini
Looking great mate! But here's some thoughts. I would like to see your canopy quite a bit lower, the height is too much when you compare it to the drawings. It shouldn't be that much problem to take some of the base of the canopy in order to make it look more like the drawing.

Dale Marston
I've started taking my sanity pills (LOL). Gourbygould does a nice job.

Greg Baker
Thanks for the feedback Urban. I haven't really posted a pic of the final canopy yet. The two that I've included so far have been "proof-of-concept" attempts. One was just to get an idea of what glueing some styrene strips to a pill blister pack would look like and the other was if it could handle the cuts required to do an open cockpit. The actual canopy will be quite a bit lower and more in-scale. As you can see in image no. 22, I've painted 0.5mm tubes (2cm long) with Tamiya chrome enamel and once it's cured I've used super glue to attach one end to the side of the blister pack. Once that's set, I'm carefully bending and glueing each strip over the top and down the other side. It works, but yesterday I tried to do too many at once and between all 5 of the little tubes sticking up in the air and my sausage fingers, I couldn't find enough room to attach them in the right place without smearing glue all over the clear parts. So I've decide to do them one at a time... a more tedious process, but one that should pay off in the end. After that I will trim the canopy/cage to fit and then add more styrene around the perimeter of the cockpit to hide any rough edges from the cuts. Hopefully this will work.

gorby
Thanks Greg. If I don't blow my own trumpet, no one else will (that wasn't meant to sound as seedy as it did). Maybe if you ask nicely Dale might send some of his sanity pills, although you may need a stronger dose.😉

What's after the sub Greg? Tintin's electric scooter or his stair-lift? He must be getting on a bit now – he isn't fooling anyone with that hair style.

Dale Marston
gorbygould it sounded very seedy. I only have enough pills for me and they barely work as it is. I think the blimp out of the movie up with the house would be awesome.

Urban Gardini
That's good to hear mate!

Greg Baker
The canopy is giving me a bit more trouble than I thought, but we're still soldering on. I've been able to get one cut to fit, now I just have to attach the frame to it. It's very difficult to glue and bend because the super glue won't hold it secure before it sets, so the bends keep lifting off. I made a putty canopy mold and will try to heat bend the styrene strips to fit before I glue them. More on that later.

In the meantime, I got the top fin in place and scratched up a propeller out of a rocket nose and some carefully cut plapaper.

Urban Gardini
Why not doing the frames with lead foil from a wine bottle?

Julian Herrero aka Yuri
Good progress ... keep on

Greg Baker
Thanks guys. After trying and not really being happy with the results of putting the strips in boiling water, I decided to go another way. I used a bit of 1mm wire and bent it to my will. I'm happy enough with the results... if only I could glue it without getting CA glue all over the clear parts. 🙂

John Thomas
Greg, the wire looks nice

Greg Baker
Thanks John. I'm glad to have it "done", but I do feel like I accomplished something with that canopy. I'm now on to sanding and priming... and then more putty and more sanding. I seem to have trouble getting the transition between plastic/putty to be as invisible as I know others are able to. I wonder if I'm switching sand paper grits too soon/late.

Ulf Petersen
Wow, a Tintin project! I'm in.
Great ideas you show here, Greg.👍

Bart Goesaert
nice thing, but I think I'd loose the round bars around the dome, for fine strips you can also work with fine strips of paper, made harder with thin CA. I also think it is a bit too high with regards to proportion. That said, it still is a marvel to follow

Jay Dubya
Great work so far Greg. I have to ask, did this inspire you too?
dailymail.co.uk/trav..veiled-Brussels.html

Bart Goesaert
oh man... Once found these decals... happy as a kid, unfortunately these were never sent, and it was impossible to get into contact with the seller ever after...

Greg Baker
Hmmm...wonder if Dale's got any of those pills left... seems Bart might need a couple too.😉

Still, he has a point about the canopy frame... and it just so happens my wife walked in the door with metallic tape - basically metal foil with adhesive already on it. Told good not to try, and now I'm not quite sure which way to go. The wire was hard fought, but the tape might actually make for a better, more in-scale frame. Sigh... I dipped it in Future to make sure the foil's not going to fall off, so we'll see. Added a new pic of the test fit.

gorby
I could be wrong (it has been known to happen) but I assumed that Bart was referring to decals like J W's link for the dailyfail.

Bart Goesaert
you're completely correct Gorbygould... it was about the decals of the A320.

Greg Baker
I stand corrected. Perhaps Dale could share with me.😉 In my défense though, it did seem impossible that decals that cool would actually exist.

Dale Marston
Pills Sent. Many cool decals in the world. Look at those from the Hudson Hornet.

Greg Baker
Thanks for hooking me up Dale! They kicked in jus in time for me to figure out I'd almost forgotten to add a mouth to the front of the shark sub. Whew!

Greg Baker
Whelp. I finished my Tintin Shark Sub. Thanks for all the support... you can find the completed image gallery here - scalemates.com/profi..bums&album=32412

John Thomas
Greg, outstanding work. Is your Shark stand homemade? It's also really nice

Greg Baker
Thanks John! Yes, the stand is also homemade. I used the underside of the wing/supports from an Academy 1/72 Spad XIII (trimmed into a rectangle) for the main bit. Then I used a bit of Everygreen siding to make a little planter box for it to sit in. Then I used a tiny bit of "pleather" fabric, sliced off the backing with a razor, and then made little wraps for each of the support posts. There's also one small bit of trickery. Because I used a wing, the surface wasn't flat or symetrical. So, to offset the slight curve from the leading edge of the wing, I trimmed the backside of the box to allow it to sit plumb and level (ish). 🙂

John Thomas
OK, very good

Greg Baker
Ok. So, since the Great Shelf Disaster of 2023, I've been quietly repairing, reworking, and just plain redoing, many of my Tintin models. After the relative success of replacing my earlier scratchbuilt efforts with 3D modeled/printed updates, including my Armoured Car (The Blue Lotus (Wolseley Armoured Car) | Album by strobez (1:72)) from the Blue Lotus, and the Udet Flamingo (Tintin in the Congo (Udet U-12 "Flamingo") | Album by strobez (1:72)) from Tintin in the Congo, I've decided to go after the very first Tintin model I ever did... the Shark Submarine from Red Rackham's Treasure!

Although I didn't design the actual model itself, I had to do extensive reworking to enable it to be printed at 1:72 scale. So far so good, the biggest challenge has been to try and make sure the two part fuselage doesn't warp during the final curing stage. Rubber bands were too tight, so I tried to warp it in bits of wire to keep the edges at least SOMEWHAT close together. After the resin is fully cured, there's not much bend in it, so I think this is a crucial stage in the project. We shall see!

Matthew A
Genius having the wavy join, hope it doesn't cause to much trouble.

Ben M
Looks like fun making another sub. This was my favorite one as a child.

Jan Peters
Great job replicating this one.
In Holland someone made one in 1:1 scale, which doesn't look as good, nor is capable of diving.
Youtube Video

Greg Baker
Thanks guys. I seem to have forgotten to take a pic after installing the motor. It was tricky to get a dc motor connected to a bit of wire to spin the propeller down a shaft. You need to put enough resistance on the circuit to slow the motor down, but not so much that the friction inside the shaft tube will cause it to stall. I also need to redesign the propellor, but live and learn. The join along the wavy joint didn't quite work. I still need to do a bit of putty/sanding, but at least the imperfections SHOULD be hidden by the transition zone between the white and the black.

Torsten
What an inspiration, I'm flashed 😎

Greg Baker
I already snapped off one of the fins (not saying which one!) while sanding the putty... so then I got to add MORE putty and sand the break down too! Yay!

Es-haq Khosravi
Beautifully done! Waiting for the end result!

Matthew A
Well done on only snapping one.

Ben M
Every project involving 3d printing has a step where you coat everything in putty and sand it off several times.

Łukasz Gliński
Never thought a project could take longer than my trawler 😄 Following, cool topic indeed 👍

Greg Baker
You're right on that, Ben. After plenty of sanding and putty, I finally felt like I could get a coat of paint on it... only to drop it and have 3/4 of the tail section break off. Luckily it was a relatively clean break... just more putty and sanding required.

Ricardo Reis
Very cool! Following!

Nicolas
following

Tom ...
in

Nils Steyaert
awesome project, im gonna be following this one 🙂

Matthew A
Looks great

bughunter
Hello sharky! Very nice.

Greg Baker
Thanks Matthew! I was pretty careful on the masking, so I think it worked well - just a couple of touch ups required! I'm also pleased that my "canopy plug" seems to have done the trick for a "heat and smash" molding of the clear canopy part. It only took me 3 tries (and one singed finger) to get one I was happy with.

Spanjaard
looking fantastic Greg!

Ben M
Looks great!

David Taylor
As above.

Greg Baker
Thanks guys! Getting the clear canopy to fit was a bit of a challenge, and there's still a tiny gap, but I think it's about as good as it's going to get. I also had a tiny bit of light overspray with the white paint as I was touching up the underside. I've still got the masking tape, so I might try to re-touch up the touch up with black. It's a slippery slope. I also might have to actually clean up the workbench. I can't find the propellors I put "in a safe spot for when I need them". 😉

Nikola
Why you do this? 😄

Greg Baker
That is a very good question…

Spanjaard
for the fun of it 😉

Lochsa River
more OTTB modeling it seems...you are nuts, u no?

Lode Schildermans
Greg, one fo my favorite albums. Amazing to how you manage each time to transform regular kits into something that doesn't exist, only on paper

Greg Baker
Sigh... Thanks Lode. Your well-timed comment gave me a bit of a boost. When I was going to solder the final bits of wire to the USB plug last night, the soldering iron cord caught one of the fins as I was trying to plug it in... and the whole thing went flying off the work bench and all of the fins broke off - some into multiple pieces. After a good cry, I decided to salvage what I could and try again. Stay tuned~!

Matthew A
All the best

Jay Dubya
@Nikola - I believe the similarly afflicted know why Greg does this to himself.
@GB - love the implementation of your imagination

Greg Baker
Finally put the finishing touches on this one. I thought the propellor would be the end of me, but I can prove it works!

Youtube Video

Lode Schildermans
It was already awesome, but that detail really completes this beautiful build.

Greg Baker
Thanks Lode! I'll let you in on a secret... the one problem with this one is that... Tintin is too big! But I didn't have the bravery required to pop open the canopy again.

Łukasz Gliński
Nice, have you considered white wash for the shark's eyes?

Jv
Very cool
I also was a big fan of tin tin as a kid

Spanjaard
fantastic!!

Matthew A
"Superlative!" (in a Blackburn accent)

Greg Baker
Damn! I forgot the eyes! That was actually my plan, Łukasz, but after redoing the paint job 3-4 times... I forgot! Hmmm... stay tuned. 🙂

Greg Baker
Łukasz - Thanks for pointing out my mistake... We now have eyes!

And, just because I couldn't take Lode's disapproving look, I decided that I couldn't live with an oversized Tintin in the pilot's chair. So, I popped open the canopy very carefully and replaced him with a normal-sized boy. 🙂

Łukasz Gliński
Not sure the sharks use their eyes much, but for sure it looks great 👍

Lode Schildermans
Me, an disapproving look? I never thought you would notice it 😉 lol. You're a perfectionist which is the reason to adapt the build. Tricky to do, but the result is there. Congrats

Greg Baker
I'm hardly a prefectionist... but my collector instincts would drive me crazy every time I saw an oversized Tinitin on my shelf. I've actually spent quite a bit of time trying to determine the perfect 1/72 scale size of Tintin and his friends. It took a bit of trial and error, but I've more or less settled on it now. The trick to making sure all the figures are more or less the same is done by comparing the relative size of his egg-shaped head~