Bertrand by Cathead - FINISHED - 1:87 - wooden Missouri River sternwheeler

[Cathead]

The Bertrand, version 2.0, is underway!

 

 

Above, you see a set of mid-hull frames assembled and laid out at the prototype spacing of about 15 scale inches. Astute observers may notice something different from earlier in this log: these frames are built at a 90 degree angle (floor to futtock), not canted outward. The more I compared my purchased plans to the original archeological drawings now in my possession, the more blatant errors I found. I've now pretty much abandoned those first plans and spent some time scanning and resizing the new drawings to 1:87 scale and hitting the reset button on pretty much everything involved with this project. Hence the delay in updating this log, along with a busy few weeks in real life. 

 

According to the actual archeological notes (from here on referred to as the Petsche plans after the leader of the excavation team), Bertrand very definitely had squared-off mid-hull frames, with angles only occurring at stem and stern. In other words, this plan view and the frames I built from it were totally wrong:

 

 

So I designed a new set of frame molds and have been busy mass-producing frames:

 

 

I do these eight at a time, pre-cutting the floors and futtocks on my trusty cutter (upper left), then assembling them around the wooden molds seen at right. These are pinned to a piece of foam board, holding everything in place. I pin a floor in place, dip each futtock in wood glue, then fit it in place along the side of the form, using another pin on each side. Then I use the cutter to create the tiny angle braces, smear some more glue across the joint, and use tweezers to install each angle brace on top. Below is a detail of several of these assemblies:

 

 

When these are dry, I use the cutter to lop a small 45 degree angle off each bilge corner, where a bilge plank will go. These areas were not rounded as on a sea-going vessel, but angular, which made construction much easier for the craftsmen assembling these boats in the American wilderness of the upper Ohio River. Note that the molds have a 45 degree angle cut out at the turn of the bilge. This is so I can glue the bilge together without anything sticking to the mold. The remainder of the frame is sufficient to hold the pieces at a proper 90 degree angle. Anything that sticks to the foam board is popped off with a flat knife blade and sanded smooth.

 

Here's an overhead view of my hull setup:

 

 

A copy of the inner hull plan is attached to the build board with double-sided tape. Several layers of wooden strips line both sides of the hull to provide consistent support for the frames (also attached with tape). The plans then have four thin strips of double-sided tape run on top, to hold the frames in place during assembly. I use wooden spacers to support each frame, keeping it at the proper distance from its neighbors and properly vertical. In these photos, I've removed some spacers temporarily so you can see more detail. I've used tape for everything to allow adjustment is necessary, and it works great. This jig was very much inspired by the Cairo build suggested earlier in this log (thanks, Ken!)

 

As each batch of 8 frames is ready, I add them to the hull jig. It takes 15-20 minutes to build 8 frames, then a few hours for the glue to dry. I basically do a batch any evening I have a short stretch of time to spare, and slowly but surely work my way toward the daunting total quantity needed. This means I don't get overwhelmed trying to do them all at once, or keep count. 

 

Once I reach the beginning of stem and stern curves, I will have to build the frames custom-in-place, but as the standard square frames make up much of the boat's total length, this will be manageable.When all the standard frames are done, I'll start installing the keelson and other stringers to hold the structure firmly together, then proceed on the more complex ends.

 

So that's where the Bertrand stands this weekend. I will do another update when these square frames are completed and I've started in on the interesting challenge of stem & stern. Hopefully the wait won't be as long this time!

 

[Canute]

Great catch on the plan profile. And a nice start on your build.

[Jim Lad]

Absolutely brilliant that you were able to find such a detailed set of plans for your proposed build - if only that sort of information was always available.

 

As for the interior view - have you thought of simply leaving one half of the model entirely in frame?

 

John

[Cathead]

Jim,

 

Indeed I feel fortunate, though as you'll discover later on, the fortune only lasts so far. None of Bertrand's superstructure was present by the time of excavation, so while the hull was thoroughly documented, everything above the main deck is based on conjecture and extrapolation. I'll delve into that when we get there.

 

My original plan was just as you say, to leave one half of the hull unplanked. However, when I realized just how close the frames would be (unlike my first set of plans), I became worried that you wouldn't be able to see in enough, and so started considering other options like holes in the hull or a removable main deck. I have been considering and experimenting with different approaches on the side, and will discuss that more, later as well.

[Cathead]

 

The hull is developing nicely. I had a close shave with my floors, having estimated the required pieces too close for comfort, and not being sure until the very end that I'd have enough. Phew!

 

All the vertical frames are assembled and in place, attached with stringers. As the futtocks at bow and stern are angled, I plan to install them one at a time, to fit. Thus I'm now working to bend and attach an interior stringer at the deck line, to which I can measure & attach each futtock. For example, here's the bow:

 

 

I soaked these two long pieces in a cookie tray of boiling water, then bent them around a jury-rigged frame to the correct curve. Once they're dry, I'll glue them in place and have a solid reference point for the rest of the futtocks. Note the gentle sheer leading up to the stem. Here's the stern:

 

 

It's a bit simpler here. The stern is squared off, with a simple curve leading up to the deck. I cut out appropriate molds on my bandsaw, then glued them into an appropriate arrangement for bending the internal stringers. Like the bow, I soaked these in boiling water before bending them into place. As shown, they represent the actual shape of the stern (upside down) quite well. Once these are in place, I'll connect them to the existing stringers in the rest of the hull. Note that the last 8 futtocks are extra-long; this is because the stem also has a rising sheer, beginning there, so I cut those pieces longer to allow for trimming to the exact length once a final stringer is installed.

 

Other notes: while I could have installed all the internal stringers as one long piece, my internal perfectionist got the better of me and I instead cut them into regular, scarf-jointed planks (the actual builders wouldn't have had planks over 100' long!). These joints don't show up in the overexposed photo 1, but they're there. Also, the keelson will need to be built up with several layers of planking, but I won't do that until later.

 

Coming up next, I'll build the stern and connect the deck-level stringer all the way around, and start the tedious job of custom-cutting and -fitting the ~100 futtocks needed to complete the hull framing.

 

This has been great fun so far, and while I'm not particularly looking forward to all the fussy cant frames coming up, I love the geometry of open full framing. A voice in my mind is suggesting that I change course dramatically and build this simply as an open-hull model, with no superstructure at all, perhaps with the deck half-planked at most. What think you all?

 

[Jim Lad]

Good progress so far, Cathead.

 

I think it will loose a lot if you leave it as an open hull model.  Why not get the hull fully framed and then have another think about it?

 

John

[mtaylor]

Cathead,

 

I agree with John.  Don't make that decision yet....

[Cathead]

Oh, don't worry, I'm just speculating. It doesn't affect anything yet, I intend to fully frame and at least half-plank the hull before deciding what to do next. It'll be a while... Thanks for all the likes!

[kurtvd19]

Cathead:

Do you have any documentation on the possible paint color of the boat?  Is it included in the book?

Kurt

[captainbob]

I can remember taking something like this to a club meeting and people saying you build well with matchsticks.  Cathead you are doing well too.

 

Bob

[Cathead]

Kurt,

 

Multiple sources discuss possible paint schemes for Bertrand, though little is known for sure. Most similar boats were painted white, with some trim in other colors. The main deck was often either red or natural wood. The model on display at DeSoto NWR, of which I included a photo in the opening post of this build, seems to match the color scheme most commonly attributed to Bertrand based on my reading. Here's another view of it:

 

[Chuck Seiler]

You can't go wrong with white. That was the common color on the Mississippi and Missouri.

[Cathead]

I've been working to fix a major goof, which came about through ill-advised efforts to fix a minor goof. Apparently I would make a good politician. Unlike most politicians, my final fix has produced a better result than where I started. Perhaps this makes me unelectable.

 

You may recall that I had begun bending the stern stringers, as Bertrand has a rounded but squared-off stern. I had made individual forms for the stringers, assuming they would retain a reasonably similar shape after bending and I could install them one-by-one. Things looked like this, as in the last update:

 

Subsequently, I glued each stringer carefully in place, aligned with its mate along the inner hull. Unfortunately, I did not realize until all were in place, that their curves really didn't line up well. The stern had a clearly odd warp to it, and any attempt to fix it by attaching cross-braces didn't work.

 

So I conceived the brilliant idea of soaking the whole stern assembly, such that I could bend all these stringers back into place and clamp them in a consistent curve. At this point, I had removed the hull from its taped-down security on the build board. So I boiled a pan of water and propped the hull stern-first into it, with the water at a depth just below the first (last?) hull frame. 

 

This did not work. I had even rebuilt my forms to fit exactly on top of each hull stringers, but to no avail. The stringers did not re-bend well; rather they straightened out 90% of their original curve, while kinking badly when I attempted to re-bend them. Clamping did not work and I was in danger of damaging the hull itself. I played Sailor Scrabble with my vocabulary and took a break for a few days to think the problem over.

 

Here's the drastic but effective solution, which at first glance looks quite like the last one:

Yet in this case, I rebuilt the forms AGAIN to exactly match the pattern of the stringers, and recut the curve on my bandsaw with the whole thing assembled, to ensure the curve was consistent. In the meantime, I delicately cut out all the stern-most stringers back to where they'd been before, to allow grafting the new assembly on. This was painstaking work so as not to damage the lower frames. I made sure, after initial inattention, to stagger the scarf joints so the hull wouldn't have any weak points (I had done the whole hull this way, anyway, and somehow momentarily forgot this obvious point when cutting out the old stringers).

 

I soaked new stringers and bent them onto the frame with copious clamping, as seen above. When dry, I removed clamps from the curve (but not either end), and glued a series of frames along the stringers to ensure the assembly retained its proper geometry when removed from the forms. This was key to my success this time. When I did finally pop the whole thing off, it held its shape beautifully. I then, very carefully, cut all the stringers to match the scarf joints on the hull, and glued the whole thing in place, propping it up with scrap wood to ensure I got the curve and elevation I wanted:

Next I installed the rest of the upper longitudinal stringer (already in place from midships to bow), the first stage in shaping and holding the stern in place. Other supports will come soon. But now I have a proper stern with proper curvature. The price of all this was a few less than perfect joints between the stern and other stringers, as they inevitably didn't dry in exactly the right orientation. I don't think it'll be terribly visible in the finished model, and the overall result is much better.

 

Since the last update, I had also mostly finished framing up the bow. I did this by installing the upper stringer, clamped to the midships futtocks and bent to the proper curve, and glued to a brace on the stempost. Then it was a basic matter of cutting each individual futtock to fit and gluing it from frame to stringer. As far as I know, such boats eschewed curved frames for simplicity of construction:

 

Here's an overhead view of the mostly-completed hull framing, set next to the plans:

 

Next on the to-do list:

 

- Finish installing stringers along bottom and sides of hull.

- Finish installing futtocks at bow & stern.

- Cut & install lots of little angle braces along the turn of the bilge, everywhere I couldn't prefabricate a frame.

- Trim the futtocks to final length.

 

At that point the hull will be strong and easily handled, and I can begin interal framing and/or planking. I'm very relieved to have fixed and improved the stern assembly, and looking forward to handling a completed hull. If only real crises could be solved with knives, profanity, and glue (actually, maybe we've tried the first two enough already).

 

[captainbob]

Nice fix on the stern. It looks good.

 

Bob

[kurtvd19]

Very interesting and a great fix.  Fixing problem areas can be a real challenge sometimes.  You nailed it.

Kurt

[dgbot]

Nice fix on a tough problem.

David B

[Cathead]

Thanks, all! It may be a few weeks before another update, as I have some work-related travel coming up and other time commitments that will push Bertrand aside temporarily. Feels good to have the stern fixed, though, so I can come back with interest rather than trepidation.

[Cathead]

I have made it through some very tedious work on the Bertrand, getting the hull framing virtually done. Here is how she looks now, though you will have to look closely to see changes from the last photos:

 

 

What has happened since:

• Finished framing bow & stern, including inserting lots of little futtock braces into all the bilge corners. A very fiddly task I am glad to be done with.
• Finished interior bracing with various stringers along sides and bottom of hull. This includes the reinforced keelson, built from multiple layers of wood.
• Sanded and shaped frames, including the tight turn of the bilge. Will likely need to do a bit more touch-up before planking, once I start testing the lie of planks.

Doesn't sound like much, but it was a lot of detail work without major visual progress. All projects have this sort of task. But the hull is now solid and sound. What's really neat is, it's just as flexible and strong as the real thing. You can take it in your hands and flex, bend, and twist it like a snake's skeleton, which is just how the prototype boats needed to be to navigate the sandbars and shoals of the shallow Western rivers. I may have to take a short video of this to share; it's a very different architecture from the rigid hulls of ocean-going vessels.

 

Here are closeups of the bow and stern:

 

 

I haven't yet trimmed the upper ends of the futtocks, so they look very ragged. I won't do so until all the decking beams are in place and I'm sure of the final geometry.

 

 

I closed in the final part of the sterm with a piece of scrap wood on each side, to provide a better surface for planking. This area won't be seen in any angle, so I decided to make it easier on myself.

 

I'm not a master craftsman, and it shows in certain areas. For example, here are two less-than-ideal results along the hull:

 

 

At top, you see the upper internal stringers. The deck beams are supposed to rest on this. But I didn't get it installed perfectly level on both sides, it wavers up and down a wee bit in places. So I filed notches into it where necessary to get the deck beams to sit evenly across the hull. It won't be noticeable in the final product, unless a real craftsman is looking really closely, but I was annoyed to discover my error.

 

At bottom, you see an example of futtocks that didn't come out straight. Trying to clamp all of these perfectly onto the stringers was difficult, and in places I didn't succeed. More annoying sloppiness, but only noticeable close up. Once the model moves back from the eyes, it all blends into the whole. Still, were I to do a hull like this again, I would be more careful somehow. At least, I'd like to think so.

 

What comes next? Before any planking begins, I'd like to install the interior framing and the deck beams. This will strengthen the hull more for planking, and the planking also depends to an extent on where the deck beams are. This is because Bertrand has guards, extensions of the deck that reach beyond the hull, so the guard support beams need to penetrate the planking. I've decided it will be easier to install the deck beams first and plank around them, than plank first and cut a bunch of holes/slots for the guard supports.

 

The decks beams themselves will be a bit fiddly, as the deck has a slight camber that I'd like to recreate. This will mean some very careful installation of internal framing to get the camber right, and produce a deck surface that doesn't look like a wavy fun-house floor or skateboarding rink.

 

Working on this will likely take me a few more weeks before any update comes; this continues to be a very busy time of year in the real world. It's been strawberry season here on the farm, and all that picking does a number on my back, making the idea of bending over a model workbench for fun just a bit less attractive.

 

In other news, the weather lately has been good for wrecking steamboats. Tons of rain in the Missouri River basin, the river rising rapidly, carrying lots of fresh woody debris into the channel. Were this 150 years ago, it'd be a deadly time for boats like the Bertrand. Not to mention, almost impossible to work their way upriver into the flood currents.

[captainbob]

Considering you are trying to align all those hundreds of matchsticks, I think you've done a masterful job.

 

Bob

Edited June 17, 2015 by Cap'n'Bob

[Jim Lad]

A masterful job on that hull framing.

 

John

[gjdale]

Nice job on the framing.

[Cathead]

Thanks, folks. You all have a higher opinion of the framing than I do, but I reckon that's better than the other way around.

 

In the meantime, while you wait for the decking to take shape, here's a nice period tune. Waiting for the Federals, also known as Shelby's Mule, in honor of Confederate Jo Shelby's raid through Missouri about a year before Bertrand began operations on the river.

 

https://youtu.be/Ij4iN79Vm88

[Cathead]

Quick update:

 

 

The boatyard is hosting a special visit from the owner's wife and other important ladies. Pretty hard to climb around all that framing in corsets and hoop skirts.

 

Progress made, all the guards (extensions of the deck beyond the hull) are in place. Really starting to show the boat's final shape now.

 

 

Next up, installing bulkheads along the centerline (on top the keelson), slightly higher than the guards to support the deck's camber. Then deck stringers to complete the hull framing.

[captainbob]

She's really starting to take shape and looking good.

 

Bob

[Omega1234]

Hi Carhead

 

Fantastic job so far. I especially like the framework. It'd almost be a shame to cover it, but cover it, you must, I'm sure,

 

I'm looking forward to your next update.

 

Cheers

 

Patrick

[mtaylor]

Hi Carhead

 

Fantastic job so far. I especially like the framework. It'd almost be a shame to cover it, but cover it, you must, I'm sure,

 

I'm looking forward to your next update.

 

Cheers

 

Patrick

 

Interesting concept... an Admiralty style riverboat.....

[Canute]

Cathead, nice looking hull. Really shows off the curves around the bow.

[Jim Lad]

She's looking good with the guards fitted.

 

John

[Cathead]

I especially like the framework. It'd almost be a shame to cover it, but cover it, you must, I'm sure

 

 

Interesting concept... an Admiralty style riverboat.....

 

 

 

I've mooted that idea before in this build, and am still rolling it around in my head. If I had ever intended to cover all of it, I would have just built bulkheads and been MUCH further along by now. The initial concept was, and still is, to leave one side unplanked including hull and superstructure. I had wanted to be able to pose it from one angle and have it look complete and realistic, while from another angle you could see inside.

 

But I keep reconsidering. As this takes shape, the idea keeps flitting around to do something drastic like not plank at all and just build the whole thing as an open framework including all the cabins and such. In that case I would do just enough decking to support necessary machinery. Of course that decisions puts me on the hook to build some really detailed machinery and that scares me a bit.

 

I've also joked to Mrs Cathead about displaying the hull as a under-construction diorama, but I really want to build the superstructure, too, one way or another.

 

Thanks to all of you. This is a really, really fun build and I'm glad there's some interest in it. While you wait for the next addition, here's another good river song, Big Scioty: 

 

 

[Omega1234]

Hi Cathead

 

I understand the predicament you're in about the planking/no planking. I have my personal preference, of course, but the decision is up to you. I'm sure whichever way you go, your ship's gonna be a beauty!

 

Can't wait for the next update, so, keep 'em coming.

 

Cheers

 

Patrick