Young America by EdT - FINISHED - extreme clipper 1853

[Mahuna]

I continue to be amazed at the attention to detail in your work.  Beautiful!

[Erebus and Terror]

What a gorgeous bit of work that is. I am inspired to greater achievement every time I visit your log.

Edited December 15, 2015 by E&T

[rwiederrich]

Big question....does it actually work?

 

Is the slip ratchet mechanism really workable?

 

Rob

Edited December 14, 2015 by rwiederrich

[NenadM]

OMG !!!

[Jack12477]

Ed, I have to echo Nenad's comment ! OMG !!!!

[SawdustDave]

That windless is just insanely good Master Ed.

[mtaylor]

I think Nenad nailed comment of the week... I'm there with him and Jack...      But I will add... I'm not worthy... :im Not Worthy:

[druxey]

Inspirational indeed, Ed!

[michael mott]

Ed you continue to raise the bar... or in this case lower it through the deck. Exquisite work on the whole windlass.

 

My only thought about the method of manufacture is seeing the drill chuck used for milling. 

I know that safety has been mentioned in the past and that you are careful in this regard, if the chuck holding the mill is mechanically locked to the spindle I would have no concern, however if it is held with a taper as many are then milling puts sideways pressure on the chuck and I have seen one come off. Ask me how I know this.

 

Michael

[EdT]

Thank you all for the nice comments and the likes.  

 

Rob, I am sure someone could construct a working 1:72 windlass from my drawings but not me.  As I said in an earlier post, I considering making this a functioning model until I printed off the 1:72 drawing.  It all seemed less daunting when working in real world 1:1 scale on the computer screen, so no, it does not work - at least not very well.

 

Micheal, in this particular case - a 1/32" diam. end mill, cutting to a depth of .025" in wood - I felt quite safe with both the set up and the use of the drill chuck for this very low stress, non-precision work.   Most of the light milling I do on the Sherline mill is done with collets, although I did use an end mill holder for the gear cutting.  Both the collets and the chucks on the Sherline mill use a #1 Morse taper with both secured through the shaft with long bolts.  I have never had a chuck or collet come loose - but thanks for the concern.

 

Ed

[UpstateNY]

Hi Ed,

 

Astonishing work on the windlass....

 

Perhaps a dumb question from someone who has no milling skills, but is there any way to make the gears from wood if you pay attention to the grain direction and so on? 

 

Cheers,

 

Nigel.

[EdT]

Nigel,

 

These could easily be made from wood, either by turning and milling as I did, or by  hand methods.  I would try turning a piece of hard wood like boxwood, castello or pear with the grain direction parallel to the lathe centerline.  If you turn this between centers you will have centermarks at each end.  Use those to mark the depth of the teeth with a compass.  I would then slice off the gear and drill the axle hole using the centermark.  The other end of the turning could be used to make the second gear.  Than divide the circumference into equal parts - I did 36(10 deg) teeth on the ratchets and 18 (20 deg) on the stopper.  You could then use a sharp edged triangular file to cut the teeth down to the scribed inner circle, remembering that the filed out triangular cuts are not equilateral - one leg of the cut is shorter.

 

The grooves that contain the ratchet mechanism could be face turned on both sides after the gear is sliced off before cutting the teeth.

 

Very hard wood is the key.  I would then dye - not paint - the parts, using non-fading, pigmented material like thinned acrylic ink or India ink.

 

Ed

Edited December 16, 2015 by EdT

[UpstateNY]

Hi Ed,

 

Thank you for the very clear explanation...much appreciated!  

 

Cheers,

 

Nigel.

[md1400cs]

Ed,

 

Just discovered your build log. I'll be back (keeping my espresso machine hot) to visit your log from page one. I WON'T key like 100 times+ but will press it "here" As has been said-  beautifully amazing and skillful work.

 

Regards,

 

Michael

[wyz]

Merry Christmas Ed!  There are few here in the MSW build logs who have contributed so much to the advancement of the art of model shipbuilding.  You are the quintessential teacher of the craft and have given to all to the nth degree.  Modelers, from neophyte to advanced scratch builders, appreciate what you do and say.  If it's not your books or your own build logs its your willingness to help others with their projects.  What a beautiful gift that is to the model shipbuilding community.  Thanks a ton!  I wanted to wish you and all you love only the best this holiday season, and that you stay healthy and accomplish all your goals for 2016. 

 

Tom

Edited December 25, 2015 by wyzwyk

[EdT]

Merry Christmas to you as well, Tom - and to all the others who check in on this topic.  I really appreciate your kind words and am very glad you find my posts helpful.  Your comments and others like this make the effort of doing the posts  - and the books for that matter - worthwhile.  I also feel I have learned much from the methods described by others in their posts and would encourage more methods descriptions by all who post.  Their is no "one way" or even a best way to do the various tasks we are all confronted with and all inputs of this type are valuable.  Thanks again.

 

Happy New Year everyone.

 

Ed

[SawdustDave]

True Ed, about there being more than one way to skin the proverbial cat.... But learning "your way", we can never go wrong.

Happy New Year mate!

Dave

[GLakie]

Happy New Year Ed! 

[Jeronimo]

Hello Ed,

very good work.

Karl

[EdT]

Young America - extreme clipper 1853
Part 131 – Belaying Pins

 

Actual modeling work on Young America has been slow through the holiday period, but I have been putting a lot of effort into research on her rigging and the development of a detailed rigging list with specs for all the lines.  This has been a slow process because rigging was undergoing constant change through the life of the ship – for example moving to the use of iron for many attachments and rigging lines (chain, wire) as well.  Also, sources on sizes, where they exist, vary.  This work will go on for some time.

 

As this “paperwork” has progressed, it has thrown off a variety of diverting questions as to how many (small) parts will be made – for example shackles, iron strapped blocks, gin blocks, etc.  I decided to tackle iron belaying pins as a side project, but one that arises soon in the construction.

 

Model belaying pins often suffer from poor proportionality – generally being too large – especially the wooden variety.  I am determined that the 250 or so of these on the YA model will not suffer from this, so I began work on making these.

 

This started with the use of brass tubing to create a steady rest around a brass rod so these could be turned in the lathe.  This did not work well on the .032” brass rod needed for these.  The next step was to try filing these in the lathe using the simple hardwood guide shown in the first picture.

 

 

The block was stepped and shaped to the pin outline.  A v-shaped groove was cut on the lathe centerline to contain the brass rod.  The next picture shows some filing in progress.

 

 

The results were not too bad – as far as being proportional at least.  The first few made this way are shown below.

 

 

While these are about the right size there is variation in their shapes that needed to be eliminated.  A few of these have been blackened to simulate the iron of the originals.

 

I decided that a much more accurate filing guide was needed and decided to make it to fit in a lathe tailstock chuck – and also to make it robust so it would not bend or break as 250 of these pins were made.  In the first picture a ¼” brass rod is being indicated in the 4-jaw lathe chuck so a deep .032”center hole could be very accurately drilled.

 

 

A small center drill in the tailstock chuck was then used to spot the center.  The .032" hole was then drilled to about .6 inches.  The rod was the transferred to the milling machine for cutting the belaying pin profile.

 

 

To cut the profile, a very accurate CAD drawing of the pin profile was made showing the precise cutting depths and positions so these could be set using the mill's calibration wheels.  In the next picture the guide has been set up in a tailstock chuck and the brass rod passed through the headstock drill chuck and into the guide.

 

 

With the rod contained in the guide the profile could be filed with the lathe running.  In the next picture a round file is being used to shape the concave handle curves.

 

 

The diameter of the lower part of the pin is about 1½” (.021” actual).  This is being filed down with a flat file in the next picture.

 

 

As each of the first few pins were made the guide itself was filed to refine the convex curves of the pin handle that were not easily cut on the mill.  Some of the first few pins are shown in the next picture.

 

 

These look better and should be satisfactory.  They will be mostly hidden by rope coils. Some more polish may help with the blackening and these should get better with practice.  These took less than 5 minutes each.  This will get tedious so I am interspersing it with other work need to complete the deck detailing.

 

 

Ed

[michael mott]

Ed, happy new year to you.

Your method of quickly and easily making a large number of pins in very elegant. Half the battle it seems to me is figuring out how to accomplish these small repetitive tasks. I shall file this one away for the future.

 

Michael

[ianmajor]

Ed, and a Happy New Year from me.

 

Very nice work. I must invest in some decent CAD software to help with the machining!

[EdT]

Thank you, both and thanks for the likes.

 

Ian, the nice thing about using CAD in this case is that the piece can be drafted at full 1:1 "world" scale.  All of the dimensions can be taken digitally from this drawing and converted to 1000ths in model scale for the machining.  This is all much too tiny to be hand drafted to get these dimensions - without a very large board and lots of paper.  When the eyes get too feeble to see this stuff the calibration wheels come in handy.

 

Just be sure the CAD software allows you to work in 1:1 scale - then print to whatever smaller scale you need.

 

Ed

[Capt.Bob]

Hi Ed,

Interesting process.  A couple of questions.  It appears that the 1/32 stock wire is "inserted" into the fixture and is restrained at the handle butt and the end of the pin shank.  Otherwise, the file pressure would risk bending the pin.  Its a little hard to determine from the photos.  True?  At what speed are you turning the stock?  With such close tolerances, alignment seem quite critical.  What cutters did you use to cut the handle profile on the mill?

 

The 0.021" shank of brass is obviously very thin and fragile.  Any problem with the pins bending?  I'm not familiar with iron pins.  Your prototypes seem to have a very long shank compared with the handle.  Is that typical of iron pins?   Will these be trimmed to a different length?

 

Always looking forward to your posts,  Bob

 

P.S. My YA is progressing,  I've been making frames, and frames, and frames, etc.

[EdT]

Hello, Bob,

 

Glad to hear your model is progressing.

 

I will try to answer your questions.  First, whether the pins are wood or iron I would make them of brass because wood will not be strong enough on a rigged model at this small size.  I believe they are strong enough for the service using the hard brass.  The pins are on the long side.  I intend to trim them to a uniform length before final finishing rather than clip them accurately when separating them in the lathe.  They will be trimmed then pickled and blackened in one or two batches when all are made.

 

It is true that the wire is inserted into the guide by sliding the tailstock forward over the chucked wire, but it is not restrained at the tail end.  It is held down because the guide surfaces do not extend to the centerline of the part.  File pressure is light and there has been no problem with the wire staying in place.  Even the thin section at the lower end has not shown any deflection during filing.  I am using a medium file (#2 Grobet) on that section and on the handle end initially then a fine round and flat to finish.  They are then polished using crocus pushed down with a pencil eraser.

 

I am not sure of the speed, probably fairly low surface speed due to the small diameter.  Three cutters were used to make the guide  3/8" and 1/8" square end mills and a 1/8" ball end mill.

 

This is a new method for me and could perhaps benefit from some improvements.  One might be to leave the headstock end of the guide at full 1/4" rod diameter to more firmly hold the pin, although this has not been a problem.   Doing this at the handle end would make the end difficult to round and size. However, I do not see enough potential benefit to make a new guide.

 

Having made a few dozen of these, I am well satisfied with the final result and the efficiency.  I do worry a bit about the few hundred on-off cycles on the ancient Unimat motor however.  (I do have a spare.)

 

Ed

[druxey]

I agree that properly proportioned belaying pins on models are the exception rather than the rule! My own workaround was to make the pin in two parts: the straight shank and the contoured handle. The handles have short pins for insertion into the rack. Of course Remco's and your own solution to turning small diameter parts is far more elegant!

[Capt.Bob]

Hi Ed,

Thanks for the explanation.  I don't have CNC on my milling machine, so making the fixture manually will be a significant challenge.  I have been toying with some ideas about mass producing the hundreds of knees that will be required.  The idea would be to make a generic form similar to molding strips that are cut to size and individually sanded angles to fit each application.  The redundancy of frame fabrication has got me looking ahead.

 

HI druxey,

Nice alternative solution. Thanks, Bob 

[EdT]

Hello Bob.

 

I hope I did not leave the impression that CNC was used to make the guide.  The milling cuts were made by hand turning the calibration wheels on the mill from reference surfaces on the piece.  Pretty standard milling practice. I'd be glad to explain further.  I would like to hear more n your idea for mass producing knees.  It sounds not unlike the solution presented in the book and in the Naiad books.  Any new twist that you have would be of interest.

 

Ed

[EdT]

Young America - extreme clipper 1853
Part 132 – Forward Lockers

 

There were two forward lockers that abutted the forecastle breast beam and the bulwarks at the side.  The enclosure on the port side was evidently (also?) used as a toilet.  These were undoubtedly used to stow gear that needed more protection than that afforded under the open forecastle.

 

With the windlass permanently installed, these enclosures could be constructed and the ladder ways between them and the windlass also installed.  In the first picture a panel of siding has been edge glued and is being fitted between the rails of the port bulwark.

 

 

 

After fitting, the panel would be cut off square to size.  These would most likely have been made using tongued-and-grooved planks maybe 2½” thick.  To accentuate the plank joints, the edges were rounded before edge gluing – as was done for all the other deck structures.

 

The next picture shows some pieces in assembly.

 

 

 

Although the workshop is in the basement, I get very bright sunlight through the windows this time of year – hence some overexposure in some of the pics.  In the next picture the end walls have been fitted and the fore-and-aft wall with the door is being test fit.

 

 

In the next picture the wall has been installed, the roof has been planked and is being smoothed out.

 

 

The flat faced curved riffler is being used for this.  Note that door hardware was installed prior to setting the wall.  In the next picture the edges of the roof planks are being pared flush with the chisel.

 

 

The next picture shows both enclosures installed.

 

 

The ladder way on the starboard side is also installed and the glue on some decking for the port ladder is drying.  In the last picture the second ladder way has been installed and roof planking on both enclosures painted.

 

 

 

 

Ed

[druxey]

Lovely work as ever, Ed. The enclosures look quite low; what height were they?