Making Boat Repairs

Time to fix those deteriorated rubber bands and make a few other repairs on my Skaven steamship:

 

Considering this ship is about 20 years old and has been through five house moves, it's held up surprisingly well. The rubber bands that I used for the drive belts on the paddle wheel have, however, disintegrated. I'm not surprised though– As a toy collector, I am well aware of the perils of rubber components: The rubber O-rings and dumbells that hold vintage G.I. Joe and Masters of the Universe figures together rarely survive the ravages of time and inevitably need to be replaced.

So I should have known better. But let this be a lesson, kids– Don't use rubber bands in your hobby projects if you want them to hold up for the long run.

The first thing I needed to do was remove the crystallized remains of the rubber. After about an hour of meticulous clipping and scraping, I was able to get it all.

 

I touched up the scrapes on the metal and wood with a little paint, and then I cut some new drive belts from a scrap of .75mm thick black styrene. I made them 1/8-inch wide, about the same as the old rubber bands, and stuck them on a piece of double-sided tape for painting. First, I primed them black and sprayed them with Tamiya AS-22 "Dark Earth" spray.

 

 

Then, I drybrushed them with a mix of GW XV-88 brown and GW Screaming Skull, mixing the color progressively lighter to highlight the edges. The final touch was to paint a few lines with the highlight color to represent cracks in the leather.

 

 

With everything cleaned up and painted, it was time to attach the belts.

 

 

And now I remember why I used the rubber bands in the first place... Getting these things glued on was a major pain and took at least two hours. Because they stretched, the rubber bands allowed me to simply loop them around the wheels without needing to trim them to a particular length. The rubber took super glue just fine, and because they were already a suitable beige color, I only needed to wash them with brown ink to make them appear weathered.

These plastic strips didn't want to stick half the time; more than once, I misjudged the length and ended up with a belt that was too short; and I had to trim the width of the strip in a few spots to fit around the framing. As much of a hassle as this all was, I still wish that I had done this in the first place.

 

 

Another thing I wanted to address is the banner pole on the captain's chair, which is made from the seat and driver from the old metal Doom Wheel. The pole is intended for a paper banner, but I never got around to adding one.

 

 

I decided to replace the pole with a plastic banner. After digging through my Skaven parts box, I came up with a few possibilities:

 

 

I settled on the Plague Monk banner. The bells were removed, and I trimmed away the banner pole in the center. On its back, I filled the gap with putty and cut some tears to match the ones on the front.

 

 

Next, I drilled all the way through post and inserted a paper clip so I could pin it between the top and bottom of the metal banner pole.

 

 

 

To keep everything clean while drilling out the base of the pole, I poked it through a paper towel to catch the metal shavings. 

 

 

I primed and painted the new pirate flag and added a Skaven icon of crossed bones.

 

Everything was pinned in place, and I touched up the wood on the pole so it all matched. 

 

 

Aside from that, there were a few spots of chipped paint that needed to be addressed. Now the Skaven steamship is good as new, better in fact.

'Til next time!