HMS Indomitable Build (pg4)

Slide an  oilite bushing until it is half-way inside the brass tube. Careully run a THIN bead of CA glue around the part of the bushing still poking out the end of the tube, and then quickly press it the rest of the way flush into the brass tube.

Repeat for the second stuffing tube

You can then slide each stuffing tube back through the hull, with oillite bearing on the inside, until the tubing just slightly pokes into the gear box area itself.

On the outside of the hull, if the stuffing tubes are too long (as mine were) you will need to cut them down to the right length with a rotary cut-off wheel. 

-- you can see the two hulls behind the stuffing tubes where the rudders  will mount under the hull. To know where to cut  the stuffing tubes, you can hold a rudder up to each hole (lining-up the shaft hole in the rudder) and see how far foward the rudder will come.  Mark that on the brass tube with a marker.

-- you also need to allow space for the prop (don't want the rudder and props to overlap each other) so hold a prop up to the mark you just made and make a second mark further back up the stuffing tube that will account for the thickness of the prop.  This second mark is where you will want to cut the stuffing tube sort with a rotary cutoff wheel.

Once stuffing tubes are each cut down to length, insert an oillite bearing (with a little CA glue around their outside end) and quickly push flush into the stuffing tube.

You can then use E6000 to seal the stuffing tubes into the hull and into the gear boxes inside

RUDDERS

The rudders come with the 1/8" hole for the rudder shaft however it is best to still chase this hole by running a 1/8" drill bit through it by hand. I also used the dremmel to clean out that indention on the bottom for where the brass rod will be bent over into after it i spushed through the rudder.

I intend to glue these rudder shafts in with E6000. As I like to give the adhesive more place to "grab" I have always carved notches into the shaft where it will be inside the rudder (just used a Dremmel cur-off wheel, but don't cut all the way through!)

Smear some E6000 adhesive over these notches, and then squeeze just a little down into the 1/8" shaft hole in the top of the rudder.

Push the rudder shaft down through the rudder until it pokes through the bottom.

Leave some excess shaft at the end to poke through the other side of the rudder (you can see these rudders have an indention to hold the bent shaft. Probably not necessary (I have never done this on the rudders I 3D printed myself and they never slipped when just glued to the notches on the shaft, but since these rudders came with the indention  already modeled-in why not give them the extra strength)

You can just see that I also used the Dremmel to cut 1/2-way through the shaft where it comes out the bottom of the rudder. I did this to make it easier to fold over (see below)

Fold the brass rod over into the indention on the bottom of the rudder. You can also coat this bit on the bottom with a bit of E6000 as well.

MOTORS

At this point you can mount your drive motors onto the motor plates, and then screw each plate into the heat-set brass insets on the motor mounts with 4-40 screws.

[for this build I intend to go with 2s LiPo (7.2v) so I used a pair of PropDrive 35-42 1000kV motors - really overkill since ONE of these will push a larger SMS Baden at speed, but since I used them in other ships "consistency of spares" is nice]

Once you slip and tighten the driven gear onto the drive shaft, you can rotate the motors down until the gears mesh* and tighten the mount screws on the motor to hold them in place (and repeat for the other drive motor).

*a common trick for setting the "sash" (the gap/space between the gears) is to place a single layer of paper tower between the gears as you rotate the motor down, such that the piece of paper towel is tightly squished between the teeth of the gears. You can then tighten the the motor screws to lock it in position, and rotate the gears in one direction until the piece of paper towel is split out the side.

When done you should have a set-up similar to this.

REINFORCED STRINGER

Cut a piece of the stainless steel 1/8" rod the exact length of the mid-section stringer (under the wing turrets).  Coat the stringer in E6000 adhesive and then clamp the rod into the groove until the glue sets. Repeat again on the other side.

note: the purpose of the 1/8" rod is to protect the ABS-plastic stringer underneath from being blown out by luck bb hits during combat