'Garden scale' railway figures fit this boat well - they come quite cheap if you paint them yourself.
The roof fits firmly on the superstructure , and I used two magnets each side to keep it in position. Here is the rear roof being made up and fitted, just like the front.
I changed to using a can brushed motor because of ths space requirements, and the easier reversing. The motor mount is made of bent tinplate, and the dimensions are here..
Note the servo lead ends. Make those extensions rather than long servo leads! So if a servo fails it will be easy to replace....
The motor box is quite full! You can see the receiver on the right of the motor (above it in the picture), and the ESC below it. There is a six-pack of 2/3 NiMH batteries fitting snugly in the box, and all the connectors and cables have to be small and short.
Here we start fitting the figures in position. They are screwed to tke seats or the floor. This is why we don't put the bottom skin on until the last stage.
I cut the side skin a bit short on my prototype, but filler easily corrected it. The picture shows how the structure fits, however...
The standing figures really make the boat realistic. Attach them to the floor with a single self-tapper screw, drilling a thin hole up through the sole of the shoes.
A view of the bottom of the sub-deck. Note the arrows indicating screw hole positions, the 1/16" stringer run along the keel to support the bottom skin, and the cables running to the (few) compartments where equipment can be hidden...
Here are the forward roof halves being joined. Note that some 1/8"x3/16" balsa strip is glued down the sides, to aid location and to carry a couple of magnets for fixing.
I made the roof units removable on my prototype, because I wanted figures on the deck and they would be inaccesible if the roof were fixed. However, a fixed roof, at least at the front, is fine.
A quick view of what the boat will look like with figures...
But when the lids are on (magnets again) it looks quite clean. The motor box becomes a seat (like the prototype) and a raised table (which the prototype does not have)...
