Landlubber Mike
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Comparing Amati Swan Class Victory Models
Landlubber Mike replied to dchrismiller's topic in Wood ship model kits
TFFM 4 is a great resource - I used it extensively for the rigging and sails on my Badger. The authors did lots of research using Steel and other resources which makes it very handy. It was recently expanded to include a chapter on how to make sails. For those that bought earlier editions, Seawatch Books offers a pamphlet covering that chapter.- 12 replies
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- Amati
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Comparing Amati Swan Class Victory Models
Landlubber Mike replied to dchrismiller's topic in Wood ship model kits
I went through the same process when thinking about which to buy. Regarding the ships themselves, they are very similar, both have gorgeous, detailed plans from the NMM that are available for purchase, and since they are essentially the same ship, you can use the TFFM books to tweak your build. In terms of the kits themselves, I liked the fact that the Pegasus had all the upgrades in one box. The Fly upgrade kit was a bit hard to find when I was looking. I think the Fly base kit uses cast metal carriages, which was a turn-off to me, but I'd note that you might want to consider replacing the Pegasus guns anyway given that they are out of scale. As for the ply pieces, SpyGlass is right that they are pretty crumbly and not very good quality in the Pegasus kit (I haven't seen the Fly kit to compare). That didn't bother me as much as I'm replacing much of the visible wood anyway. In the end, I went with the Pegasus as I liked the figurehead and stern and quarter gallery decorations a little better. It's been a really fun project, not just to build, but also to build alongside my Swan class brothers and sisters As for the practicum, I have it and would strongly recommend staying away from it. I wish I had thought to ask for my money back. I bought it while working on my first kit, the Badger, and it did help me in certain places to see how various items fit together. Otherwise, it is terribly written, the work done is rushed and sloppy (half the pages have some acknowledgement of a mistake that was made, like reversing the PE decorations, etc.), and many of the pages show a different model than the Pegasus! Plus, no rigging or other instructions which would have been very helpful.- 12 replies
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You sorta have to guess a bit where the wales end up at the stem - look at the head-on picture in the plans which might help. Using the temporary batten to mark the run of the wales works nicely. I wouldn't use it as a template to run the actual planking against. It didn't really work out all that well for me. Instead, I would think about running tape, etc., then marking the line of the wale. One thing I did was rather than do the full second planking and add a 1mm strip for the wale was to use a 2mm strip for the wale directly on top of the first planking. It made for a cleaner look I think rather than seeing partial planks above and below it. If you don't have 2mm strips, you could always laminate two 1mm strips together.
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From the TFFM series, the wale sorta flattens out at the stem and doesn't continue the upward sweep. On my Pegasus, I found that this naturally happened given the curves at the stem so I didn't need any special bending or shaping. If I remember correctly, this started happening halfway between the first gunport and the stem. It's very slight though. Here is why my log starts with the wale in case you're interested: http://modelshipworld.com/index.php/topic/7267-hms-pegasus-by-landlubber-mike-amativictory-models-scale-164/?p=329358
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Really nice work Frank. I like both colors, but would lean towards the fruit wood too. With the green, the ship might start looking too busy and have a kaleidoscope look.
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I would highly recommend people giving Matt at Inlay Banding a look if you are looking for ebony, holly, or other woods: http://inlaybanding.com Matt was really great to work with, and did a custom order for me to exact specifications. He was even able to get ebony sheets down to as little as 0.7mm. Matt most does work for inlays and veneers, but I think he would make a great resource for ebony and other exotics (along with ebony, he does holly, maple, boxwood, satinwood, maple and others). Now that Jeff is retired, I would highly recommend Matt is you are looking for ebony or other woods.
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After months of searching for a supplier of African Blackwood, I gave up and went with ebony. Thanks to MWB's recommendation, I was able to source ebony sheets and strips to ship model specifications from Matt at Inlay Banding: http://inlaybanding.com Matt was really great to work with, and did a custom order for me to exact specifications. He was even able to get ebony sheets down to as little as 0.7mm. Matt most does work for inlays and veneers, but I think he would make a great resource for ebony and other exotics (along with ebony, he does holly, maple, boxwood, satinwood, maple and others). Now that Jeff is retired, I would highly recommend Matt is you are looking for ebony or other woods.
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Looks good. Just sand down the high spots, and layer on the filler in the low spots, and you'll have a solid foundation for the second planking.
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Take a look at my Pegasus if you'd like to see what a maple deck looks like. I like maple a lot - it's a very hard wood, works and finishes very nicely. Some people prefer holly for decks because it is whiter and without grain, while maple (at least the maple I have - which I think is hard maple) has amber waves through it.
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Really nice work Dave. Your work with the different woods is brilliant. Not too shabby on the metal working too - very nice job!
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Very nice Igor! Are those blocks wood? Just our of curiosity, how will you step the masts into the hull? It doesn't look like you are using a hinge - are you using a string from the bottom of the mast through the bottom of the hull? I'm wondering because I'm doing a similar ship in an upright bottle, but still trying to figure out how to step the masts as I would prefer to avoid using a hinge.
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proxxon ks 230
Landlubber Mike replied to rdestefano01's topic in Modeling tools and Workshop Equipment
Sorry, I should have said that if you see yourself doing multiple models in your lifetime, then the Byrnes saw is a good option. Most of the planking I've worked with is 1mm in thickness, so I can't see spending $130 for a machine that can't rip planks of that thickness. That being said, if you're going to be one model and done with the hobby, then that's a lot to pay for cutting some planking. I don't think you need to only use if for scratch building either. I've used mine extensively, and I'm bashing kits at the moment. -
All great suggestions here. If you are looking for one book to buy to get you started, I would second Frank Mastini's book. It's very basic but gives a really good overview of model ship building. From there, zu Mondfeld and the Lennarth Petersson book (for rigging) can take you through your first build. If you have the money (and the time to read them), buy the other books that were mentioned. Each has good nuggets of info. I would highly recommend looking on Amazon for used books, as well as Abebooks.com and eBay. A lot of these books can be bought for very little money. Some of the more rare and highly sought after books can go in the hundreds, but the vast majority of the books mentioned here are not in that category (the Frolich book is one that is pretty pricey).
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proxxon ks 230
Landlubber Mike replied to rdestefano01's topic in Modeling tools and Workshop Equipment
Buy the Byrnes table saw. I mill stock as thin as 1.0mm without any issues all the time. Anything thinner than 0.7mm will go under the fence, so for sheets that thin, you can simply add a piece of wood to the fence to make it zero clearance. -
Micro Jig Gripper
Landlubber Mike replied to Landlubber Mike's topic in Modeling tools and Workshop Equipment
Sorry for never updating this thread. After two years, I still love it! I use it all the time except when cutting very thin strips less than 1/8" when I use push sticks. I'm a lot more comfortable using my Byrnes saw, but my fingers are well worth the cost of the Grr Ripper. I never got around to building a sled, but haven't felt the need for one with the Grr Ripper. -
Beautiful work Eamonn, and glad to see you're back
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This kit is definitely supposed to be the 1748 version - look at the Chapman plans and the NMM plans of the Lyme. The problem is the narrow waist is not consistent with frigates from that period, but frigates from later in the century. That's probably why people say they are not sure what ship the kit is supposed to represent. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HMS_Unicorn_(1748) Make sure you start a build log here. We'd love to follow your progress. I ended up stopping my Unicorn build, as I liked its sister ship, the Lyme, a little better and will scratch build it in the future since the Corel keel is incorrect when it comes to the stern and quarter galleries.
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Thanks Don. I've had a similar experience when people outside the hobby look at my work. I almost want to tell them about all the extra details that are added, but I don't think they would fully get it. I'm sure the response would be, "you agonized over that tiny detail??" It's that darn Blue Ensign guy and his Swan crew and their exquisite builds that push me to put in all these extra details
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I bought the Dutch ships book along with some other books from Seawatch that were on sale, and I have to say that it's a fantastic book. Lots of pictures of models and artists rendering, and the plans (for which there are a number of them!) are really great. These Dutch ships have a lot of character, and are a nice change from the typical warship you see built over and over. The ships are also smaller, so using a similar scale, you can scratch build the ships in the plans and have models that are about 2' or less in length. Anyway, just thought i'd say that I'm really happy with the purchase and would recommend the book/plans if you like Dutch ships
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Work and family has been limiting my time in the shipyard, but I made some progress over the last few weeks. I started the bulwark planking, and managed to get the waist area completed. Need a little sanding here and there particularly to help define spirketting from the quickstuff, and to touch up the gun ports and sweep ports. I did the spirketting as a single piece at about 1.25mm thickness, and the quickwork as three rows of planks at about 0.8mm in thickness. It's a little simplified from the bulwark planking in TFFM, which includes a scarpf joint somewhere in there, along with top and butt planks I believe. Given how much of this area is going to be covered up with the cannons, etc., it didn't seem all that worth it to torture myself - I feel like I went though enough on the outer hull planking The wood I'm using is redheart. It can be crumbly at times, but for planking, it works really nicely. Over time it will mellow a bit to a more orange-brown, which I think will be a nice effect along with the other colors in the build. You can see a bit of this color change in the bulkhead uprights which I replaced a year or two with redheart. The only thing to watch out for is that the end grain turns almost black if you use an oil finish - i found that using varnish preserves the color much better. I'll also be using redheart for the gun carriages, bitts, and likely the capstan, as well as a part of the stern decorative area. I already used it for the upper stripe on the outer upper hull. In some ways this "painting with wood" idea has been a pain, but I'm really happy with how things are coming together. Thanks for looking in!
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There actually was a Unicorn - it and its sister ship the Lyme were members of the Lyme class, and are considered to be the first true frigates. The ship's plans were in Chapman's "Architectura" book, which you can see here (scroll down to plate LV), or you can go to the National Maritime Museum's website and see the plans for the Lyme, which are also on my log. http://www.finemodelships.com/ship-plans/Chapman_Architectura_eng.htm http://www.sjohistoriska.se/ImageVaultFiles/id_2241/cf_1115/55.JPG (direct link to plans) Take a look at Ian's log and my log of the Lyme (based on the Corel Unicorn). Lots of inaccuracies in the kit which can generally be overcome though with a little forethought and preparation. Probably the biggest I would say is the closed waist and wrong slope to the deck levels, particularly at the stern. Those can be fixed early in the build. Other issues which are trickier to deal with are the inaccurate placement of the figurehead and how the stern comes together. Essentially, the stern galleries are incorrectly placed, there should be a stern post, and the angle of where the stern post should be is wrong. There are some other slight inaccuracies from the actual ship in terms of the deck items, location of the masts, location of the first bulkhead, and the gammoning. All that being said, the ship does make for a very nice model, regardless of whether you tackle these inaccuracies.
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Hmm, not sure if I would say it's heresy or not, but no names will be mentioned I'm not sure how old the kit is. The Keith Julier handbook where he builds the model is dated 1995, so it's been around since then. I don't blame Euromodel though - it seems like the kit is spot on as to very detailed and accurate plans. It's just that the name and origin of the ship has been passed down through history due to what might have been a mistake of Admiral Paris in transferring the name of the incorrect ship to the plans 150 years ago. Given the extensive plans (there are 18 sheets for the Le Renommee!) and Euromodel's reputation, I don't think that they took any short cuts with this kit. It's been interesting using Google translate to translate some of the Russian forums where this ship is discussed. They correctly noted that the stern of the ship is represented in zu Mondfeld's "Historic Ship Models" on page 108, where it is labeled as the stern of the Swedish privateer frigate from 1760 named the Jupiter. I can't find any info on a Swedish ship of that name though, I'll have to reach out to perhaps European sources. Sorry for the diversion. Now back to your Unicorn
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