thibaultron

Generally the Vallejo paints need a completely oil free surface, being water based paint. So washing well beforehand is needed. You generaly neeed to let them set at least 24 hours, for the primer to fully set. For a metal surface, maybe several days. The Badger Stynalres(sp) is supposed to set much faster, but I don't know about how well it adheres to metal. Did you etch the brass to give it some tooth?

PART 2 Today I had to make a decision about the rigging and painting the boat. The Heller instructions as shown below, have you add the rigging line to parts before you glue them in place, a not unreasonable approach, but not if you want to paint the boat as an assembly, to avoid glue damage. Also the foredeck takes a bit of force to get in place, and doing so would damage the nearby paint. So I decided I’ll have to add the rigging in creative ways later. Another problem is that the mast hole in the foredeck is cast off-center, making the mast lean to one side. The deck also didn’t fit quite right. I sanded one side to bring the hole more toward the center, and allow the deck to fit all the way forward. The best I could do still leaves the mast tilted, but much less so. I’ll trim the locking tab off the bottom of that mast, allowing me to shift it to correct this problem. The slight offset of the mast will be less noticeable than trying to enlarge or redrill the hole. The part that I mentioned disappeared yesterday, turns out to be a support for the thwart (part 16) shown above, as well as a strengthening post for the mast base. I cut a replacement out of wood. The next task was to carve away an ejector pin mark that prevented the thwart from sliding far enough forward to sit properly, not a difficult task. The other ejector marks were below the plank surfaces, so didn’t interfere. I’m not going to try to carve these away, for a better bulwark appearance, I’d just do more damage than good. Here is a shot of the support, foredeck, the thwart, and stern seat installed. The wood support was attached with superglue, due to the dissimilar materials. I now shy away from this type of glue, due to the tendency to shear under a shock load, but no chance of that here. I also cleaned the flash off of the bowsprit, masts and one of the gaffs. The next installment will be a few days away. I’m busy the next few, and then I have to dig out my airbrush equipment. Though the latter might not be needed if I decide to try the Humbrol paints.

Chuck, will "Upgrade" kits be available for those of us on a limited income. Ie. base kit, full planking upgrade, and rigging upgrade?

Well Non violent, except to the fish! :-)

Thank you.

PART 1 It has been a long time since I worked on any of my boats, and it will be a while before I can continue on them, but I needed to do something, so I picked out my Heller Siganot kit for a quick build. This is a model of a ~42’ French two masted gaff rigged fishing schooner in 1/60th scale. Sorry, I forgot to take a picture of the kit contents. It includes the paint, but I don’t know how old the kit is, quite by the box wear, so I may use my Vallejo Paints. I may have to make new decals, also, the ones provided in the kit are black, and will not stand out well on a black hull. The box art also shows a slightly different pain scheme, with the white trim, not a color provided in the kit. First was gluing the hull halves. The fit was quite good. I’m using Faller glue. Next I built the boat’s tender. As a general note, yes I’m getting a bit too much glue on the joints. My hands shake a bit, and sometimes this affects my glue application. I need to get some liquid glue, in addition to the thicker Faller type. Next I assembled the stand. The pedestals had ejector marks on one side, so I put a piece of 400 grit sandpaper flat on the bench, and sanded that side in a circular and back and forth motion. A figure 8 motion is better, but these parts are small and difficult to hold. There is a supplied name plate, but I’m going to wait until the boat is mostly done to attach it, as the keel sits at an angle, so the pedestal openings are not the same height, and I’m not to the point of setting the hull on the stand, to see which “direction” makes the hull level, nor which side of the boat turns out looking better. Now I found a problem. Heller’s instructions, have you set the tender inside the stern, for display. This would prevent sailing the boat, in real life, and is also not really true to life. If the boat was moored the tender would be used to get to shore. If docked, they might pull in in, I’m not sure. In any case, if sailing the tender would be at best towed behind, or perhaps left at the mooring. I'm still debating displaying the sails as set or stowed. Not a real problem, except, they have a untextured mounting boss on the deck, for positioning the boat for display! It would not look good, if I decide to build her with the sails set. Above is a picture of the boss, with it partially whittled away. Using a curved #22 blade, I carefully carved it off, even with the deck surface. I used a large razor saw blade to cut in the planning grooves. I then dragged the saw lengthwise over the area and the surrounding deck to blend it in with the molded in texture. After some cleanup, it blends in well. The hatch has already been attached. Today when I went in, I had a small shock. There is a small hollow cube that attaches to the deck, near the foremast. I think it is the air pipe for the live well. Last night I glued the two halves together and left them clamped in a clothespin, to setup. This morning the clothespin was sitting where I left it on the bench, but there was no part in it! It has apparently gone to that great part heaven in the sky! I looked, but my shop is a horrible mess, from moving stuff, while I renovate it, and it has fallen in some crack, and disappeared! At least it will not be hard to make another one. The last part today was installing the deck and a forward bulkhead. Hopefully that won’t disappear too!

Came late to this build, but like what you are doing on it. I have several of these kits, and will continue to follow yours. Good job!

Chuck, what method do you use to remove the char from the edges? Sanding, scraping, etc.?

Wye River Models sells one, but I don't know what the kit consists of. I have a Horizon Models one, but you have to do major carving on it to get it even close to the proper hull thickness. Wye River seems to sell a lot of their kits that strongly resemble the old Horizon ones, so their's maybe the same.

What does the engine look like?

Nice book, downloaded it. It will be interesting to look at, can't read Dutch, but the drawings are great!

The kits are now listed on Ebay

I'm offering three kits for sale to the forum members, before I put them on Ebay tomorrow night (Sun 6/10) The first is a Model Expo solid hull Phantom 1800s (1/96) (the newer kit) still sealed. I'm asking $30 plus actual shipping. The shipping box weights 2 1/2 pounds and is 17"X10"X4" The second is the Billings Boats Viking ship Roar Ege about 900AD (1/25) opened for inspection. I'm asking $50 plus shipping. The shipping box weights 4 pounds and is 27"X12"X4" The third is the Model Expo/Model Airways (1/16) Sopwith Camel kit purchased new and only opened for inspection. I'm asking $100 plus shipping. The box weights 5 pounds and is 27"X12"X4". Note that most of the fuselage on this plane is wood, hence most of the laser cut parts are the wing ribs.

Frank. Would a DXF or DWG file of the trailboard, help you? I Used the Kathyrn trailboard as one of the options for my Carrie Price model, that I will someday soon (hopefully) continue. Here is a picture of port side one, minus the name, which I could add. The drawing is smoother and can be scaled, the convertion to a JPG roughens it.

Frank. They say "The Devil is in the details!". Keep up with Your level of details! Fantastic work and a great build thread!

Great work on the propeller! All your machining is top notch!

Great work Frank!

Snow, nice model!

There were two types of early "anti-fouling" type coatings used below the water line: White Stuff and Black Stuff. The White Stuff was used in colder waters, the Black Stuff in tropical climes. The Black Stuff was a dark brown to black color the White Stuff was an off white. Vallejo Ivory 70918 in the Model Color line is suposted to be a good match for White Stuff.

Generally all ship's boats were lowered and towed behind during battle, so them hanging in front of the guns would not affect battlewothyness. Servicing the guns and port for normal cleaning may have been a pain though.

One thing to note. Most of the modern Diorama/Figure painting books assume you start with a model with heavy woodgrain patterns cast into the surface, not a smooth plastic one. Buy some of those cheap plastic "For Sale" signs at the hardware store and practice on the white backside, of the sign. Pratcicing on cardboard or paper will give different results, as they absorb the paint differently. These are great for practicing airbrushing also, as well as testing your paint color/mixes for final dried look. I tried several techniques using a Revell DR-1 1/32nd model. While the model is a newer one, they cast it with distinct wing ribs rather than the gentle sagging fabric skin between the ribs. The distinct ribs allowed me to segragate the various tries, and then record the results, for future use.

Doll house curtains (1/12th scale), might be a source, as well as 1/16th figures or 1/12th. In either scale maybe a child's figure, were the scale difference may not be noticible. On a side note I once owned a 17' sailboat and found an old ad for it. The boat looked much bigger in the add, with more people in the cockpit than it could ever hold in real life. It wasn't until you looked closely that you noticed that the occupents were all children, about 6 or 7 years old!

Wonderful!

Interesting and unusual build! I'm in. One question, in the "movies" they always show the windmill turning, with no cloth on the "sails". Don't they need the sail/vain frames covered to actually run?

Nice work so far!