Moonbug

She is filling out nicely!

I really struggled with the decision of either closing in the waist with the Swiss Pear that the deck was planked with, or closing in the waist with the lighter wood. Ultimately, I decided on the lighter as a means - artistically - of bringing the two very distinct colors together. Knowing that the cross beams and the small boats would be lighter, I wanted to tie it all together. I figured that if everything was the darker pear, and the beams and boats were light, it'd just be a bit too much of a contrast. *Sigh* At any rate - I'm not overly confident in my decision, as there is a definite disparity in having the gangways a different color than the rest of the planking. A this point, I'm pretty sure I don't want to tear it all up and re-do it to see how the Pear looks. I do intend to trim the smaller boats with some pear to bring it all together. So I started with the waist by sanding down and adding holes to all the knees. Pretty straightfoward stuff here. My own personal method of the "nails" was to drill out three small holes, then poke them with pencil lead. I took essentially what Augie did with the other deck knees to try and keep some consistency. The knees didn't hold to the bulwarks for crap no matter what glue I tried. Especially with the red paint having already been coated with a satin laquer of some kind. So I posted some brass nails into each knee to get it to hold solidly in place. On to the gangways - the usual method of planking, glued some strips together after lining the edges with pencil lead to simulate the calking. Worth noting here that I had to do the Starboard side twice, because the first time I trimmed it too short. Ugh. What's that old saying - measure twice cut once? (Yeah - and my father was a carpenter for 30 years, so let's not tell him about this mistake, shall we?) Ladders.... oh ladders. I pretty much hate ladders. I blow through quite a bit of wood here because I botch them pretty consistently and end up having to red-do a lot of steps, etc. Then, it's still a struggle for me to get them anywhere close to even. Ladders are truly my achilles heel. The instructions for the skid beams call for card stock to simulate the crutches, but I'm not into that - especially when I have small strips of brass lying around all over the place. So I cut up some brass, bended it to fit, then drilled holes in the bottom to fit a brass nail. I blackened all of it, then mounted all the skid beams.

Got a bit of detail work sorted out over the weekend. I spent almost an entire day finishing up the Starboard side deadeyes and strops, etc. Then I went through and touched up every strop, deadeye and eyebolt that needed to be blackened a bit. I went back through mine and Augie's notes to finish off some of the other details that needed to be attended to, such as Zeus' trident on the Transom and remounting the rudder and chains. Finally, I started to concentrate on the masts. I couldn't actually find the 13mm dowels that were supposed to be used for the fore and main masts, so I had to go track some down from my local hobby store. I had a handful of cleats left over from another project, so it gave me a chance to use my snazzy new airbrush. Worked pretty well, except they all needed to be taped down - after my first attempt at 'airbrushing' blew them all off the counter and had me on my hands and knees picking cleats up off the floor. The color was a combination of Vallejo Airbrush colors light brown and yellow ochre. In order to get the cleats properly spaced, I used a thin strip of masking tape to measure the exact diameter of the dowel (after I did a little smoothing/sanding). I laid that strip onto my ruler, then equally divided it by the number of cleats needed. I then reapplied the tape to the mast, drilled the holes appropriately, and mounted the cleats. Finally, instead of using cardstock to simulate the mast rings as indicated in the plans, I decided to try and use the extra laster cut mast bases. Since there were only two left and I needed four - that meant splitting them in half. A delicate process to be sure! But, I was ultimately successful. They weren't perfectly even, but even enough to sand down and get close. Obviously they stuck out way to far, so I then sanded them down to make them even with the wrapped line. After the usual coats of pre-stain and Natural stain, they turned out pretty well.

I've trudged through some progress this week, whittling away at the repetitive bits. I'm doubling up on photos from a previous post here (sorry) but I'd worked on prepping all the deadeyes and strops while working on the gunport lids. This ended up being pretty valuable time use, so when it came time to mount the channel plates and subsequently the deadeyes, it was a nice little assembly line. I prepped my eyebolts and nails with 50/50 black-it and water mix. I always have a bit of trouble with eyebolts as the metal is difficult to prep, and the blackening doesn't end up super consistent. Most of the time it ends up requiring some touch up. My plan is to go through and touch up the shiny bits after all the deadeyes are fully mounted. I also realize I didn't quite get the angles correct on the strops when they're mounted to the hull. I had some difficulty with the different lengths of strop parts and getting them arranged properly. The difference in sizes was SO minute that I just couldn't figure out the different lengths to create a proper parallel line on the hull withe the different angles. Ugh. At any rate - the good news here (I guess) is that this won't be particularly noticeable to the average eye since there aren't any ratlines or shrouds actually attached to the deadeyes, so the lines from the masts and crosstrees to the hull won't be inconsistent... cuz there won't be any... yes... I'm rationalizing.

Hey Chuck, I have no idea. :-) Perhaps one of the other, more knowledgeable folks, or the other Chuck may have some insight.

Thanks for the idea B.E., I'll take a look. It's less about whether they're already in place, and more about being able to rig the cannons that are already snuggled under the top deck. Even with it partially open, it's nearly impossible to reach the eyebolts even with my longest, smallest tweezers. And I'm pretty opposed to only having some of the cannons (the more accessible ones) rigged, and not having others that are clearly visible rigged. :-/ Quite a quandary. At any rate, the time is definitely now to make the decision - the gangways and beams are close on the horizon, and once they're in there is no going back to the cannons.

Thanks Pierre, much appreciated. -Bug

I also decided to revisit the idea of gun tackles. I've always felt that the guns looked a little barren. But my problem was, I wanted to be able to tackled any of the guns that I could see - that meant some delicate rigging to say the least. Initially, I started to put together enough blocks and rig to do the side gun tackles of each of the 26 guns that I could see. But then, I soon realized, that trying to attach the side gun tackles to the cannon themselves and then the bulwarks was virtually impossible this far into the build. If the side rigging was going to be done, it needed to be done when the cannons were much more accessible. Drat. So instead, I settled on just rigging the train tackle for each visible gun. While still challenging to get the visible main deck cannons rigged, it wasn't impossible. I still feel it's a little odd to have the train tackle and not the side gun tackles, but at least it gives the cannons a little bit of trimming.

Thanks for the kind words and likes everyone. Much appreciated. I was able to make some more progress on the gun port lids this week. I picked out the top contenders and added the hinges and eyebolts. Then mounted them to the gun ports.

Hey Chuck, thanks a lot for chiming in and clarifying! I was actually going to send you a PM and ask about that. I was seeing some weird, conflicting info there. Also, part of the extra port lid mess was trying to get the ones I needed correctly beveled and sanded nicely. I just glued a full length of four planking strips and cut as many lids as I could to work with.

Hey Popeye, thanks! The PE sheets came with the kit. They're are pretty clean too, and lots of extras all the way around with this kit. Thanks Chuck! I did have some difficulty blackening the parts. Augie left me with a pretty good mixture that worked for him, but ultimately ended up going with a washed paint.

Slow, but diligent progress being made as I move to more outer decorations. I created the gun port lids in a straightforward way, gluing four planks together and using pencil lead to simulate the caulking. I did however, run into a problem painting - which in turn led to my acquisition of an airbrush kit. (Here) After beveling all of the gunport lids, I taped them down them painted them bulwark red. The problem is - all of Augie's bulwark red had basically dried up. I loosened it pretty well with water and a Dremel drill as a "stir stick" of sorts, but the thickness - or shall I say - thinness of it was problematic, eventually seeping around the tape and infiltrating the seams. So I had to go back and scrap then sand all of the leakage off the gunport lids. After staining and sealing, I'll have to see if any need to be re-accomplished. *Sigh* At the same time - while paint dried and was reapplied, and while I scraped off excess red paint - I started assembling the deadeyes and strops.

Having little to no talent for metal work - this is all very impressive to me! Nicely done Grant.

Outstanding work. Your weathering techniques are very, very cool. I'm quite envious!

Thanks so much for the comments and likes everyone. It's my daughter's eighteenth birthday this weekend, so no t much progress... but I'll be back in the shipyard soon. Hopefully not the kind of stall I had for three months!

Got some progress done today. Tedious, and nothing elegant - ladders, fenders and chesstrees. Then took the opportunity to neutral stain and layer most of the recent work with matte lacquer.

Finished off the bow this weekend by adding the boomkins, associated rigging and blocks, and then the railing.

Coming together nicely Adam!

After a rough second half of 2016, I was finally able to get back into the shipyard. Not anything major, but it felt REALLY good to get any kind of work done on the Confed. I finished off the details and etching on the Starboard side of the bow, filled out the bow itself, added the seats of ease and secured the Bowsprit. After a couple of failed attempts at constructing the seats of ease using small pieces of the 1/32", I decided to cut off a solid square block from on of the thicker sheets and just drill it out. This turned out to be WAY easier to sand and fit. The bowsprit went in pretty easily. I've still got a little work to do tightening up the knightheads against the deck of the bow.

Nicely done. Very clean work. -Bug

Hey all. I didn't fall of the face of the planet. Not to turn this into a Facebook page (Chuck's pet peeve ), but we've had some significant teenage daughter "challenges" which have forced me to take a break from the Confederacy. In the meantime, I'm messing around with a vintage Pocher model kit of a 1932 Rolls to keep my mind occupied. http://modelshipworld.com/index.php/topic/14227-pocher-car-kits/ I'll be back to the Confederacy soon, I promise. - Bug

Thanks guys! @Grant - Tedious indeed - with a few "redos", but always worth it in the end. @Popeye - believe me, I'm keeping my finger's crossed too! Otherwise - it'll be pretty easy to decide which side faces the viewer when it's displayed. @rdestefano - Thanks for the kind words - but much of the credit goes to Augie of course, he gave me a great platform to pick up from. And good luck on your first build, I'm sure you'll have lots of support here at MSW. Don't forget the build log! - Bug

Great work Grant. Admittedly I'd have liked to see the before. But I know with myself, when I botch something then have to repair it, the last thing on my mind is taking photos... -Bug

So, the last couple weekends have been a tough part of the build for me. Going from the support beams to the middle rail was a tough bit. Although the guidance warns against permanently putting the mid rail into position until everything is fitted - that didn't work for me. I had to glue the mid rail in before I could measure anything out. I started with the cathead knee, carving out a spot for it along the side of the ship and making an adjustment where the bottom meets hull. However, I ultimately changed my methodology, and use the middle portion that links to the mid rail to the cathead knee as my focal point. I shaped and shaped and shaped some more to fit it along the hull, then notched out a spot against the hull where it would hopefully meet the cathead knee with as little deviation as possible. Here's a good comparison of how the parts started, and the degree to which they needed to be shaped. Once everything was aligned, it became a sanding fest with a very small amount at a time until everything could get smoothed out. I also added a bit of glue to the cracks of the moulding so that as I sanded, the sawdust would get caught in the cracks and fill in the gaps as much as possible. It was also important to sanded the moulding along the shape of the hull so the final product is the same width consistently throughout the bow. In the end, it was a bit of funky tweaking, and each of the pieces has a very slightly different shade to it based on the grains and the sanding. But overall, it smoothed out pretty well I think. Finally, I added the pre-stain and the stain, then touched up the decorative trim. Although the instructions only show the decoration to the base of the middle rail, I thought it more prudent to continue it the length of the middle rail. I still have to add the half beam at the base of the bow, but I am pretty pleased with the end result. Now to spend the next couple of weeks doing the port side... Ugh. - Bug

Nicely done Sjors! But I still think you SotS people are masochists. - Bug