Chuck Seiler
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Everything posted by Chuck Seiler
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Micheals only has balsa? I am pretty certain the Mike's here in Santee has basswood as well. Steve-where did you get yours? -
I just measured. 3/8" wide.
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Bill, What is th edifference between the Bluejacket kit and what you are calling "the military version"? I thought they were all military versions? Were some converted after the war?
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Yes, I think th ekeel and frames are the next step. That will help stabilize. I don't know if there is a real need to do anything special with the underside except NOT placing it on a hard scratchy surface. I don't think I finished the underside until I was well done with the whole hull structure...not just planking. I think I gave it another coat of stain, just for gaffaws. However, do as you see fit.
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Bart, Looking back at some old IMs to Steve, I recommended 1/2 planking. I don't recall what he eventually went with, but both he and I have 7+ planks on either side of center. I would say our dimensions are the same. Bottom line, unless you have something to cut with, use what is available.
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I am going to wait until I have more structure in place in order to avoid the curling. AT LEAST keel piece and ribs---probably full exterior planking. Okay....you responded while I was responding..so I have to catch up. I used a satin finish on my Philly 1. I will let you know when I get home....but I would wait until you are done the whole hull.
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Floyd, Never been. Some day. I did see the virtual 3D Philly...which I can repost the link to. Bart, It will not be wood from the kit...the kit does not tell you to plank the underside. Mine are definitely more than 1/4. I am thinking 1/2 because I think I made them a foot wide. If you are using basswood, check with Steve. I think he got some from a hobby store or Micheal's. Definitely use th ewood conditioner. (and be careful of that curling.
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I think it was the balsa wood.
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Bart, let the folks at Model Expo know. They will replace it.
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Steve, Looks good. You can see the difference between the center strip and the rest. The caulking shows up nicely; its there but not too overpowering. How do you like that Golden Pecan? On Philly 1 I used GP for interior planking and regular Pecan for exterior. It provided a little contrast, but I am not sure if it really made a diff. I like playing with colors, so I had both sitting around. I have a can of Fruitwood I am going to experiment with this time...maybe on the wales.
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Good question. I want to say 1/2" x 10 to 12 inches (depending on frame spacing). I will check when I get home. That would equate to 1 foot x 20 to 24 feet. It seems a bit on the long side, but I set my legnth based on the length of the longest hull plank. As far as I know, the underside planks are not documented...at least for this model. I can check with somebody who has the Smithsonian plans. The side planking, however, is historically correct, so if Y x Z is the size of a known plank, that dimension could be used elsewhere. They had plenty of timber.
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Don, What is the scale on this?
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The second thing I want to do that is not in the instruction is to plank the underside of the model. I am surprised that it is NOT planked, per the instruction. Even though virtually nobody will see the underside, I think it is important to make it complete. Invariably SOMEBODY will take a peek. It should be planked. It also makes it very clear that this is NOT a waterline model. That is REALLY the bottom of the boat. Once the floorboard has been assembled (to be covered in future step) I ran a strip up the center representing the keel. In real life the keel was a few scale inches, but putting that in now would make the model tippy when sitting on the flat. I may add it later. I had to be very careful to ensure he strip stayed straight, since all the other planking will guide on it. Prior to this, I had marked the frame locations based on the center keel-piece. I will use these marks to locate my plank joints. Planking in progress using a 5 plank shift. 1-3-5-2-4 Number 2 pencil used for caulking. Planking complete with some light sanding. I am hoping the caulking will be a little more visible once I finish the wood. I will do some more sanding and possibly experiment with 'nails' while I figure out how to mount the model.
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Indeed. Again, my apologies if I came across the wrong way. I have been IMing Steve for awhile, so there may be some things I say that we both understand in a different context that sounds different out of context. For the record....by my rough calculation, that's about 1400 nails. ---ooops. More like 900. Piece o cake.
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Foxy, Hey, no...not upset. Sorry if I gave that impression. I am jumping from one swamp to the other, keeping the gators in check. I pop in to MSW from time to time, so if I am a little curt, I apologize. Keep the observations and comments coming. Philadelphia is a strange bird...designed by army guys, built in a hurry with full knowledge that it would not last very long. There are alot of things that don't make sense about it. As mentioned, the instructions do not even call for planking the bottom. I have addressed the reason why I chose to do it with Steve in an IM, and I will re-post that in my build log when I get to that point. Depending on how it is mounted, it will not be widely viewed (if at all)..
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Money is probably negligible, depending on what you use. You could probably get away with pencil dots. Time is the issue. At this point he is probably raring to get started on the model...goofing around with this underside is less than desirous. Of course, one could always use the underside to experiment with nail techniques....if one had a mind to.
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There are a couple things I want to do with this model that are not in the instructions (as far as I can see). First, I want to plank the bottom of the bailing well, second I want to plank to bottom (underside) of the hull. There are other things that I will discuss as I get to them, but these are on the agenda before anything else happens. The bailing well is a depression in the deck where water can be removed-all wooden vessels leak; scoop water from well into a bucket, toss water over the side. An elaborate man-powered bilge pump, as it were. PHILADELPHIA's bailing well is in the aft cockpit (the lower deck area between the aft and middle platforms). The floor of the bailing well is actually the bottom planking. This planking is not represented in the model. It is now. I could have planked the false floor itself, but decided to insert a 'section' of planking. We shall see. A piece of the false floor is cut out. I made the cut before gluing the two sides together. False planking section inserted and sanded (somewhat). More sanding required. We shall visit this area at a later time.
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Rgr, thanks
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Like this?
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I do NOT use wood conditioner, since I am working with hardwoods such as box, maple, holly, etc. I'm not sure if a wood sealer is needed with basswood in order to get a good finish. Check out Chuck Passaro's CONFEDERACY or WINCHELSEA. I believe they were both in basswood. If somebody doesn't provide an answer in a day or so, post the question on my build log, I know you will get an answer there.
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Absolutely, non permanent mounting is definitely an option if you don't plan on moving the case around. If that is the situation, there is no need to screw/nail/bolt/duct tape/super glue the model to the base. I strongly endorse your plan for a case.
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Yeah, it's not like I haven't had time to think about this, eh? I still think it will be an issue of experimenting with things to see how it looks before actually 'going live'. I am going to try a couple things...probably Septemberish. I will let you know what I come up with, but in the meanwhile, I am still working on mounting and planking. Have you decided how to mount it yet?
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Foxy, The rules for 'nailing' planks varied from country to country, depending on date and size of ship, as well. Sometimes 1 nail (normally a wood treenail) between butt ends, sometimes 2 staggered. All that gets thrown out the window with Philadelphia (along with alot of other things. Check out my scratch Philly to see other areas where their building practice went counter to what we normally think as being correct.) They used alot of iron nails to hold these gunboats together. The structural stresses from the 12 pound gun forward and 9 pounders amidships had to be significant.
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Steve, I would not go with nails for the underside at this point. Nails in th ehull and deck are going to be a pain in the @$$ enough. For my scratch Philly I used pencil point (very sharp #6 hard) with some success. Based on some research, I am thinking of using a grayish monofiliment. I will be doing experimentation to figure out which I like best. The problem with the pencil is that sometimes the stain caused it to run (such as on the rudder). Bottom line; subtle is where you want to go....nails that are TOO obvious tend to detract. ....and there are alot of nails. For the hull, there are four nails per main plank (the ones below the wale) per frame. I forget how wide these were, but I think that equates to 1 nail for every 6 inches of width. Since the real Philly had twice as many frames as the model, you would have nails at the existing frames PLUS halfway between them. The above picture gives you an idea where and how many nals there were onthe hull. For the deck, the number of nails were similar, particularly on the forward and middle platforms, due to the guns. The replica uses treenails because it has to worry about corrosion, but the original did not have that problem.
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I am about at that point as well. I will be dribbling that out later this week. I look forward to your post.
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