Armed Virginia Sloop by GuntherMT - FINISHED - Model Shipways - scale 1:48

[GuntherMT]

Hi Keith,

 

Am I allowed to say Wow in response too?  Because wow.. that's a post!

 

I remember a Brian from a few months ago plowing through a Carmen build like a bull in a china shop. What a change. 
Your still the ADHD/OCD speed builder of the Carmen era, but you've came miles since her build.

 

 

Actually I started the Carmen on August 15th, and found this site a week or so later via a referral.  So yea, it's been less than two months believe it or not.  Seems longer indeed.

 

I haven't actually taken Chuck's blocks out of the packaging yet to compare them to be honest.  Rigging is still a long ways off, so I put them all into a parts bin with the rigging line until they are needed.  Maybe I'll do a comparison this weekend.  As far as rope walks, I'm considering a serving machine, but I don't think I'm going to go into the rope-walk area, as sourcing the thread and figuring out how much and what types of thread in order to make different sizes of rigging just doesn't sound like fun at all to me.

 

Scratch building isn't in my near, or even reasonably far future.  The early portion of those builds that requires extensive research, as well as laying out all the parts and cutting them is not only something I don't really think I'd have the patience to do, but I also don't have any sort of reasonable workshop or tools to be creating my own bulkheads or frames, etc.  So for a while I'm going to be sticking to kits.  Obviously I'm not above changing the kits to some degree with better materials, I really haven't "scratched" anything (I don't really think shimming stuff counts), or even really needed to make any serious replacement parts.

 

I have decided that an empty pair of gunports on the AVS is entirely unacceptable, so I've orders materials to rectify that little problem so my AVS will have 8 long guns, instead of 6 (hopefully, if they'll fit).

 

On the photography, I'm using an old (as in from the late 90's I think?) Cannon Powershot S3 point and shoot camera that's working pretty well, but it has some serious limitations.  This goofy hobby may make me finally break down and get a DSLR, as I've taken more photo's in the last two months than in the last 10 years.  Every time I look at Dubz photo's I drool a little bit over his picture quality (not to mention his build quality).

Thanks very much for the lengthy note and comments.  My reaction while reading this really was 'Wow'.  I tip my hat to you sir and look forward to the future here on MSW as I continue to pour ridiculous amounts of money into silly little wooden boats. 

 

Also thanks to all the others who have clicked like on various things in this log, they are noticed and appreciated! 

[GuntherMT]

So the stern has been an interesting experience.

 

I continued by planking the transom with basswood, marking each plank where the window openings are so that I could open them up when all the planks were in place.  I did not trace the windows based on the marks, but rather opened a narrow opening in the center of each, and then slowly opened them out until I was happy with the window fitment and alignment in each opening.

 

After joining MSW, I read in one of the threads about stuff that could be used to make window glass, and less than a week later I was in a hobby shop and saw a bottle, so I bought it.  I finally got to use it!

 

Works fantastic.  As I started to try to get the windows placed, I quickly realized that it was going to be a pain in the rear to get the windows in without accidentally pushing them too far in, as the nice window glass that was now in place prevented me from holding onto the inside frames with tweezers.  I cut off small bits of planking basswood and glued them into the top and bottom of the openings as window stops.  Looking back I wish I'd brought them out slightly as I think the windows might look better if they protruded from the transom slightly.  Oh well, next time!

 

I first tried to place the walnut planks in a single piece, and then cutting in the window openings, but after breaking the narrow parts repeatedly, I gave up and glued the windows in, and then placed short planking sections between them.  I am not really happy with some of the gaps I've left though.  Since I used CA to place these (in retrospect, I should not have done that) because of trying to maintain the slight arch, re-doing them would be quite difficult, so I left it and will think about how to address the gaps with some kind of filler later on.

 

Next I added walnut filler pieces on the stern end of the currently placed hull planks, and put the transom side fashion pieces on.

 

I then started working on the counter fashion pieces.  My first attempt didn't make me terribly happy, it just didn't look right to me.  It doesn't look all that bad in the picture now that I'm looking at it, but I tossed it.  The mark on the planking is where the top of the wale should be later.

 

My fashion pieces seemed too short compared to the plans and photo's I've looked at, and I think I figured out what is different about my stern (or at least part of it).  Somehow when I did the walnut planking on the counter, instead of grabbing another piece of .030 walnut, I picked up a full thickness walnut plank (about .048) which made the entire counter thicker than it should be, pushing the trailing edge of the fashion piece back a bit.  I figured I'd just go with it this way, since it really shouldn't affect anything except make my stern shaped slightly different.

 

For my first 'intentional' change to a model, I've decided to 'box' the transom by adding another 'fashion piece' (for lack of knowing what it should actually be called) at the top of the counter.  I had to soak this piece of walnut for about an hour, and then I sort of steamed it by placing it in the microwave for a minute wrapped in a wet washcloth.  It was still pretty hard to get to take the bend, but it didn't splinter at all, so I'll take it.

 

As part of my change to 'box' the transom, I intend to extend the black from the black strake to all the fashion pieces and the taff rail.  I decided to paint these pieces now, prior to adding all the other planking that will butt into them, and I started with primer.  I then started with the black.  I think I need to do some research on prepping wood for paint, because I'm really not happy with how the paint looks, it's very rough compared to most of the painted builds I've seen here.  The first coat of black didn't cover well at all.

 

I ended up with 4 coats of black.  Painting has never been a strength for me in modeling, and it showed as I managed to get paint where it shouldn't go in several places.  After the black had dried, I tried to clean up the areas where I got black on the planking, but I think I screwed up and exposed more primer and fashion piece wood than I cleaned up on the planks. 

 

Oops, hit post too soon, adding pictures.

 

 

I will revisit the stern later and clean up the fashion piece painting, as well as hopefully figure out a way to do something about the gaps around the windows.  I think I'll probably sand the fashion pieces all down smooth and try again.

 

For now though, I'm moving on, as I'm kind of tired of messing with the stern.

Edited October 12, 2014 by GuntherMT

[GuntherMT]

Oh yea, I also did a remarkably stupid thing today.  For no real reason at all, I put all of the receipts I've spent on stuff since I bought the Carmen kit back in August into a spreadsheet to get a total.  Boy that was dumb, that number is really quite a bit larger than I expected. 

 

 

Buying random clamps, pliers, glue, tape, bits of wood, fittings, etc. adds up even when no single purchase is all that much.

Edited October 12, 2014 by GuntherMT

[themadchemist]

I keep all receipts in a binder. ...But refuse to do the math. Wait until you've been at this 2 years.
 
I'm saving that addition for if I ever want to commit suicide by heart attack.  or Admiral flogging......
 
Seriously though, Try to think of it this way. Within a persons typical budget, they skip 2 important things - Savings and Hobby's. I have not paid a cable TV bill in 9 years, I hobby rather then melt my brain with consumer advertised TV. Add that total up, but most think of TV as important as the water or electric bill. I DON'T.

Never underestimate the ability for a human to justify just about anything.
 
Ultimately, if it helps you make it through life with more smiles on your face, and its not taking food out of you or your families mouths, I say do it and don't look back. Nearly every tool is an investment that will last many builds. Which equals hours of smiles, and frustration, which in my opinion is a character builder. Nothing good in life is free.

 

Try this, take your hourly wage and multiply it by the hours you put in Carmen, some say time is money. Now look at that total. No matter how you look at it many of the things we love are expensive, as a disabled homebound person, this hobby saved my life and sanity. To me that's priceless, Tammy agrees. 

Edited October 12, 2014 by themadchemist

[lamarvalley]

I would never add up all the loot that I used, spent, wasted, expended or otherwise watched slip through my fingers in worthy ventures. I see it all as the cost of living. 

 

Love the windows Brian; they give a nice thick appearance kind of similar to old float glass.

[GuntherMT]

 

Love the windows Brian; they give a nice thick appearance kind of similar to old float glass.

 

Lesson I learned after seeing the final photo's in that last post - once the windows are placed, they should be covered with tape or something or they'll get filled with sawdust, which doesn't seem to want to come off since the surface is basically 'glue'.  Chalk it up as another lesson learned, and it isn't a huge tragedy, just something to keep in mind the next time.

[themadchemist]

I think it is very hard to see a curved surface object in a photo with out optical illusions.

I've seen many thing that appear wonky in a photo, but isn't to the natural eye.

I think your symmetry is Fantastic, Brian. Especially when you look at it closely from all the angles.

 

as an aside:

in some thread, I can't remembers who's, they used the shiny black plastic from a CD case a made windows. Since it looks black from the outside it looked natural and was probably easier to keep clean. That's a part of the hobby never discuss, the cleanup after every new addition.

 

Just thinking out loud, I really haven't followed AVS threads closely, but is there a trim around the windows. I can see a thin scraped window molding really setting off the stern. The scraped molding I made for the DSotM was a fun experience and really detailed the sides. There's a thread on making razor blade scrapers somewhere, you may have already found it.

[aliluke]

That stern and fashion pieces look fine to me Brian. I didn't glaze the windows until much later in the build - not a consious decision with respect to sawdust - but just because I struggled to find a source for Microglaze.

 

As for counting the costs I never go there!!

[GuntherMT]

Thanks Gents,

 

Keith, there is no window trim in the plans.  I already created some very tiny trim pieces out of Brazilian Cherry and put them on one window with a very small bit of CVA, but I didn't like the look so I removed them, and either I forgot to take a picture, or just didn't bother because I didn't like it.  I do think they could use "something", but I haven't decided what that is yet.

 

I plan to create some sort of a name plaque to go above the windows, but I'm still trying to find a source for decent rub-on type lettering (haven't really looked that hard other than skimming Amazon) to use.  All the one's I've found online so far don't bother to say what size they are, which is really a fairly important bit of information that I would think they would include in the description for an online purchase!

[themadchemist]

Check with Popeye.

He uses a decal kit that if I'm remembering right he prints on his ink jet.

 

That way you choose the font and size.

[GuntherMT]

Today I moved on from the stern.  I'll revisit it later once I decide what I really want to do as far as trim, paint, name, etc.

 

No warship is complete, not even a small sloop, without gunports!  So today I did upper bulkhead outer planking, first layer.  I quite enjoyed this part of the project, and other than the fact that it's apparently completely impossible to eliminate all the fuzz from basswood, I'm pretty happy with the outcome.

I took a ton of pictures, but when I started to edit them to post I realized that they are all really pretty much repeats of each other just on the next section, so I cut it down to just a few.

 

First section, and then with three sections completed:

 

The stern required a bit different approach, as I there is no way to get clamps on the planks, so I used some pins.

 

One of the things I may possibly have spent a fair chunk of that money mentioned earlier on, a little bit at a time, is clamps.  For the first month I was doing this new hobby, I would grab every clamp that looked like it might possibly be useful, and that I didn't already have.  Some people would say I now have far too many clamps, but I say, there is no such thing as too many clamps!

 

Cut to the chase, as it's past my bedtime now, and nobody likes a grouchy ship builder at work on Monday morning.

 

Hrmm.. looking at that last picture, I didn't get the earlier planks on quite even at the bottom.  I'll have to measure and fix that before I begin lower planking.

 

Until the next time, happy modeling everyone, and thanks for the looks, likes, and comments!

 

[aliluke]

Sharp as mate. With this foundation yours is going to be a great AVS! Sleep well and keep it coming.

[themadchemist]

Very Nice.

[GuntherMT]

Thanks for the kind comments gents, and for the likes everyone.

 

It's been a crazy week at work, 13+ hours Tuesday and I was actually supposed to be on vacation today, but worked instead kind of crazy, so not a lot of time spent on the AVS.

 

I did start doing the lower planking, and have now been introduced to the weirdness that is spiling.

I started out by evening up the existing planks at the bow.  I did this by measuring all over the place to determine that the top of the 1/8" blank just above the 1/4" plank was correct along the entire top (at least as far as I could tell), and then using a compass to mark the long lower side based on the measurements from the other side, as measured from the top of that 1/8" plank.  If that makes any sense at all.  After marking it, I just carefully trimmed it with a razor knife.

 

 

Seems to have worked out well enough.  Next I added two spiled planks below this, and that was.. interesting.  One side spiled completely different than the other side between those first two planks, and I think I'll have some odd cleanup to do at the stern, but the 'finished' bottom line of the two sides is oddly even, even though the spiling was completely different.  Strangeness is afoot!

 

 

I also stripped off all the black paint from the stern fashion pieces, sanded everything again, and applied a coat of primer.

 

 

I won't be touching this again until Saturday, as I'm headed to Reno tomorrow morning where I'll be picking up the entire collection of books, magazines, fittings, wood, tools, and even a partially completed Hannah model from a gentlemen that wants to get rid of his entire 30 year accumulation of ship building stuff. 

 

I guess I'll know sometime Friday morning what treasures (or not) I might be loading into the car for the long road trip home!

 

Until Saturday, happy shipbuilding! 

[aliluke]

Wish that gentleman well! Tell him someone from New Zealand said that and that they have been to Reno (many years ago)..

 

Great work too by the way.

[themadchemist]

Looking very nice Brian. your symmetry at the stem is Really Very Nice.

 

Have a safe trip and may be you'll arrive home with goodies galore.

It's sad that someone is selling everything, I hope its not due to the worst cause.

As a disabled person, Tammy and I have talked as to what to do in case of my demise with all of my "toys". I hope that isn't the case for him, but they are finding a good home and for me that is important. 

[GuntherMT]

Side trip - and update not about the AVS, but my trip through the forsaken wastelands (also known as Nevada).

 

The gentleman who was divesting himself of his years of shipbuilding is doing so for multiple reasons.  Something over 10 years ago he and his wife moved 500'ish miles to a smaller house, so all of the shipbuilding stuff was packed away.  At about the same time, he took up the new hobby of writing books, and discovered that he apparently had both a taste, and talent for this, as he now has 6 books published, mostly historical biographies it appears.  In retrospect, I should have planned for another day, as the length of the journey left me with very little time to visit, and he was an incredibly nice guy.  Honestly I could have spent the better part of a day looking at the 4 models he had left (the rest having been sold when he moved) on display in his house.

 

On display he had a fully rigged semi-scratch (or heavily kit-bashed) Charles W. Morgan, a very detailed large scale model of one of the whaleboats (other than the color scheme, reminded me very much of the recently completed one here in this very forum), and two admiralty style models - the HMS Druid, and the Confederacy - both of which were from the Lumberyard plans and wood.  All four of these models were simply gorgeous, and I'm the dumbest person around for not taking my camera on the trip to get some pictures.  He began modeling in the early 70's, and the Morgan was his final completed model, in the late 90's.  He had started on the Hannah when he moved. 

 

Everything you see is what I collected and packed back to Arizona, and it was all given for free, no strings attached, although on the pay-it-forward principle, I'll do my best to pass everything along if/when I decide I don't need it.  I'll start this next weekend by taking several of the books that are duplicates of ones I've already purchased, to the new Arizona Shipwrights club meeting, and giving them to whoever wants them.

Onward to the stuff.

 

Books are always good, as well as magazines of course, especially older ones that contain so much wonderful knowledge that was used to create models back before this awesome thing called the internet.

 

A fair assortment of miscellaneous tools, most of which will be useful, and some will replace existing tools as they are higher quality.  Also included in all the little plastic containers are the left over fittings and all kinds of random parts from approximately 12 builds including cannon and carriages, eye-bolts, deadeyes, blocks, rigging, chain plates, etcs.

 

And finally, the partially completed Hannah, as well as all of the wood, plans, and instructions to finish her (in theory).  Also included is all of the left-over wood from his other builds, and I have no idea what is what.  There appear to be enough dowels to build masts and yards for about half a fleet.

 

It was certainly an interesting trip, and I'll get some use out of a lot of this stuff.  From a purely financial perspective I'm not sure the trip made a lot of sense (my car went into the shop the day before I left with an engine warning light, so I had to rent a car), although the total value of everything I have pictured here is certainly higher than the cost of the trip, and I enjoyed meeting an older and very experienced ship builder.  I don't regret making the trip, but it did teach me that as I'm getting older, making crazy long 14+ hour days on the road is something I should not do anymore if I can avoid it.

 

I started my day Thursday when I left my house around 7:45am to do a couple stops before picking up the rental car, which promptly started getting engine warning lights and shutting off the cruise control barely 50 miles out of town.  I swapped the car at the airport in Vegas, which cost me about 90 minutes probably, and checked into a hotel outside of Reno just after Midnight.  Trip home was fairly uneventful, but of course took about the same amount of time, after loading the car and visiting for a while, I left Reno around 10:30, and got home about Midnight.  Returned the rental car yesterday morning, ran some errands, and took a long nap. 

 

Now I need to catch up on laundry and stuff, and then I'll see about starting back in on the AVS.

Edited October 19, 2014 by GuntherMT

[jwvolz]

Wow, what an incredible haul Brian. That amount of wood alone should have made the trip worthwhile.

 

Do you think you'll try to complete the Hannah build at some point? It looks to be beautifully started. I'm sure it was great to visit so such a talented modeler.  I would have loved to have seen the Morgan model...

[GuntherMT]

Joe,

 

I'm undecided on the Hannah, as I feel like it will be some time before I'm comfortable tackling that build.  Where there is a lot of really nice wood here, until I can figure out what is not part of the Hannah kit, most of it will not be touched, at least for now, as I want to make sure the Hannah is completable, either by myself, or someone else in the future.

 

On the other hand, there is a fair amount of wood that is clearly not part of the Hannah parts list (which I have), and I can use for whatever.  There are various sizes of boxwood, cherry, poplar, walnut (both light and dark), ebony, and also lots of unmarked stuff that I don't know what is, but is not on the Hannah list.

 

In any case, I've got plenty of time to figure it out, as the AVS is obviously not going to be completed in the super-fast time that the Carmen was, and I've taken advantage of the huge Model Expo sale and now have 'other projects' waiting for when the AVS is completed.  The Hannah has been mothballed for at least 10 years, so it probably isn't going to suffer any by waiting some more at this point.

 

Edit: Also, I'm really kicking myself for the camera thing.  I'm going to have to email him and ask if he has any photo's I can share.

Edited October 19, 2014 by GuntherMT

[GuntherMT]

So as I get farther into the planking, it's becoming obvious that I needed to spend more time on the hull fairing, or rather, I need a better understanding of the plank flow when I'm placing test planks for the fairing, or something.

 

I'm getting quite a dip in the planks on both sides just aft of the bow, and the planks at the stern are nowhere near symmetrical side to side - I'll need a stealer on one side to even them out at some point.

 

Here you can see the dips on both sides where the fairing was done incorrectly.  Luckily this is a double planked project so I'll be able to fill these, but it's a bit of a disappointment to me, as I was hoping that this first planking would have been good enough to be a final planking, as a personal goal.

 

The planking if you only look at the stem area is still pretty nice though!

 

I'm still doing a fair amount of edge-bending to get the planks to come in at the stem, even spiling them to 1/2 a plank width on every plank so far, although it is getting less pronounced on this 3rd one.  The stern would require severe edge bending to get them to stay at full width, so they are getting spiled which is why I'll need a stealer at some point on at least one side, possibly both, on this upper section.

[aliluke]

Like your haul from Reno - amazing. And nice to see a pass it forward from that.

 

Your planking looks just fine to me. Nothing to die in a ditch about at all. Remember there are sanders and fillers to come followed by another layer. A good line with that first planking is to use it as practice for the second layer but not lose any real sleep over it. I swear it is already much better laid than mine was at the same stage. Carry on, stay calm and enjoy.

[GuntherMT]

Thanks Alistair and Lawrence,

 

Also thanks to the other folks for the likes.

 

Today I made some progress with the planking, and I also have been repainting the stern fashion pieces.  I sanded them down since I was unhappy with how rough the black paint looked, and then I re-primed with thinned primer, sanded with 320 grit, primed again, sanded with 320 grit, then added a coat of thinned black and sanded once more.  After that I added about 6 or 7 coats of very thin (think - more of a wash than paint) black.  I did this over the last few days of course, and I actually did the first two primer coats before leaving on my trip.  Much happier with the smoothness of the black painted area now, although I still need to fill the gaps around the windows at some point.

 

 

The planking is progressing reasonably well, even if I'm not 100% happy with everything about it, it is after all going to be covered up later.  I really need to get better at trimming the pieces to size, as whichever end I finish with isn't getting trimmed to the right size very well.

 

 

I've got the garboard plank on the other side, but none of the other lower planking there.  Last day of my short little vacation is tomorrow, so maybe I'll finish up the first planking layer.

[themadchemist]

Nice work Brian,

I've found using a planking fan to mark the bulkheads before starting helps greatly in the narrowing of the planks consistently.

 

BobF has a wonderful demo in his build log starting here:

http://modelshipworld.com/index.php/topic/1465-18th-century-longboat-by-bobf-ms-148-tri-club/page-2

[GuntherMT]

Oh, BTW, now do you see the difference between Chucks blocks and the MS ones. Night and day, just like the rope. If your talking rope walk, its over... you've committed to this hobby, but then that really become obvious as I read on.....

 

 

I completely forgot to reply to this as discussed a couple weeks ago.  Yea, there is quite a difference between the blocks.  These are 5/32 doubles:

 

No regrets, although it will be a while before I actually need to use any of these.

[BareHook]

Brian,

Those blocks bring to mind another fix for the AVS kit, the blocks specified for the cannon rigging are too large and should be downsized to 1/8 to be in scale. This is something that came up in many build logs from MSW1.0 so I figure is worth repeating here.

 

Ken

[GuntherMT]

Already taken care of Ken, I laid in some single and double blocks of every size all the way down to the tiny 2mm ones (which are just silly small), and had already planned to downsize the cannon rigging blocks based on notes from build logs here.

 

Thanks for bringing it up though, certainly good to know if I hadn't noticed that!

[GuntherMT]

Slow progress continues on the first planking.  I managed to completely mess up my planking plan where the bottom and top planking come together, and didn't figure it out until too late to be able to close it up without using any drop planks or stealers, and ended up having to use both.  Not a terrible tragedy, but was completely due to my own lack of proper planning.  Another lesson learned.

 

I used a single drop plank at the bow because the planks just weren't working out there and the edge bends were getting too severe as they transitioned to the bow.  I did this when the first plank kinked while trying to edge bend it.  Rather than just toss the entire plank, I cut it off and added the drop plank to allow me to use a single spiled plank forward from that point for two planks headed aft.

 

It turned out ok in the end, but was a little bit bummed that I had to use it.  After that, I ended up using both drop planks and a stealer towards the stern because of how narrow my gap got before it widened out in the stern area.

 

The starboard side first layer is now complete as can be seen above, and while I'm happy with the flow and believe that this will make a great foundation for the second layer, as a 'practice' run it was a bit of a failure, but taught me some lessons about basswood planking.  I was being very careful to try to make no gaps, but as can be seen there are numerous noticeable gaps.  I believe that I was placing the planks while they were still too wet, and the gaps were formed (mostly) by shrinkage after the planks dried out.  There are also a couple planks that have some ugly gaps where I over-trimmed while spiling.

 

If this was the final layer of planking, I would need to fill & sand, meaning I would have to paint the hull.  Luckily it's not the final layer, so I can just clean up the edges around the rabbet so that the 2nd layer will tuck into the rabbet properly, and call it good.  After I finish the other side of course.

 

The port side is down to the final 3 (or 4) planks remaining (pictured in my last update), we'll see if I can figure out a way to do it without as much patchwork in the form of drop planks and stealers.  I think the port side has a better chance of working out, as it's a much more consistent spaced gap left to fill.

 

[aliluke]

You're hard on yourself Brian. Looks really good to me. I took the painted hull route as I liked it better (and still do) so I guess I had more scope for planking gaffes. I did have stealers at the stern but think I got through to the bow without joggling. Any way a few layers of paint sorted everything out!!! If you are going for a natural finish it is a bit more of challenge but you seem to perfectly positioned to be up for it.

[GuntherMT]

You're hard on yourself Brian.

 

Somebody has to keep my head from expanding to fill the room Alistair! 

 

After dinner I couldn't wait until tomorrow, so I moved on to the port side.  I did a much better job of keeping the planks aligned on this side, and used no stealers or drop planks at all!  I probably should have used a single stealer at the stern, but even there, the only reason I needed one is the gap left because I accidentally trimmed the 2nd to last plank off  too narrow - I got too aggressive shaving it and broke the full width off at the stern, and didn't feel like starting over on that plank.  I thought I might be able to completely close the gap by using a section of 1/4" plank at the stern to finish, but it came up just short so there is a small triangular gap there, but I don't think it's enough to affect the second planking.

 

Here is the hull with only a single plank gap left, and the 1/4" plank section placed at the stern.  The gap that's left is exactly the same width for the entire length (pats self on back).  Well, the digital calipers could find variations, but a marked strip was on the same pencil mark for the entire length, so close enough to exact for me!

 

And a bunch of different shots showing the completed first planking, ready to move on to..  whatever is next!

 

Actually, what's next it the Wales, and inner bulkwark planking, black strake, etc., before moving on to the second planking.

 

I'll decide after the second planking whether it gets painted or not, but my plan is to leave it natural below the black strake if I can do a good enough job at the planking.

[themadchemist]

Nice work Brian,
Your WAY ahead of your ability level on the Carmen, or maybe just learning to slow down.
 
You stated "it was a bit of a failure, but taught me some lessons about basswood planking"....
Nothing is a failure when you learn, PERIOD!

I'm with Alistair, don't be overly hard on yourself, I think she looks Great!