Landlubber Mike
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Everything posted by Landlubber Mike
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Like Andy, I had no problem with the swelling either. I agree with him that I don't think there is enough moisture in the planks to transfer to the MDF and cause a problem. -
Rick, I built the Caldercraft Badger, which used plywood for the keel and bulkheads. I am now building the Corel Unicorn (plywood) Amati Pegasus (MDF). Here are my thoughts. I think plywood is great, but only if it is perfectly straight. The Badger kit came with perfect plywood parts. The Corel Unicorn did not. When I went to source plywood elsewhere, the package of plywood I got from Micromark was all warped (to their credit, they refunded me the purchase price), and the next source had one piece out of five in the package that was not warped. I see people using various methods to un-warp their keel, but I have always wondered long term how successful that is if you don't also add in lots of filler blocks or other pieces to keep the keel straight - which, is a complete pain I would think. MDF, at least what is used in the Pegasus, is perfectly flat and the keel, bulkheads and lower deck all fit together like a glove. I don't know if you can get that kind of precision with plywood, and maybe Amati sources very high quality MDF. But, it was a joy to work with. I had to go through so much trouble with replacing the Corel Unicorn keel that it was a real relief to switch over to the Pegasus kit. MDF is interesting too in that it is a hard material to sand, but it's quite easy to chisel as the layers flake off if you chisel them the right way. If you chisel, you aren't creating much fine dust. Toxicity is, and should always be, a concern. I guess my take on it is that there is not much work that goes on in ship modeling with the keel and bulkheads, so your exposure is limited (I'm so slow at modeling that I'm only exposing myself every 5 or more years to the keel). That being said, like any other time I'm sanding wood or composites, I try to be good about taking the necessary precautions of wearing a dust mask, vacuuming up the dust quickly, sanding outside if a big job, etc. Plus, there are so many other toxic materials that are used in the hobby like woods, adhesives like CA, soldering stuff, blackening agents, etc. So, I just try to be smart about the nature and extent of my contact with those materials. Anyway, I'm still a relative beginner to this hobby, but these are just my thoughts.
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Great pictures Ian - looks like a really fun trip. Welcome back!
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Fantastic Igor, very nice work. It looks fantastic in the new bottle. Are you planning to add sea to the bottle?
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Very nice work Peter, this ship has very nice lines. Clean crisp planking, great job!
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Hey Carl, very nice job! Looks like you managed to get it inserted without a hitch, congratulations! So are you going to do any other SIBs? I think I'm hooked, but I'm going to go the scratch route for my next builds.
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Hey Nathan, it's looking great. Are you planning to add sea to the bottle? If so, consider filing down the bottom of the ship. That will help you to need less "sea" material, and make it easier to fit the ship through the neck of the bottle.
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Coming along very nicely Glenn. Wow, that Victory is huge!
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Looks good Nathan. I finished my Hannah SIB a couple of weeks ago. It's a nice kit that really tempts you to get addicted to SIB modeling
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Nice work Carl, good luck with the next step! Would be cool if you joined the rest of us in continuing on with SIBs. I did it as a check the box for my bucket list, but now I'm pretty addicted to it.
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Thanks Igor. I have the website bookmarked. I might try buying a bag of old used watch parts as well to see if they would work as well.
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I planked my Badger (both plankings) on my lap, and the first planking of my Pegasus in my lap. I might just do the Pegasus second planking in my lap, but I've been thinking of using my Amati keel clamp for the upper second planking, and my Panavise for the lower second planking (when I flip the ship upside down).
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Igor, very nice work. Maybe you posted this once before, but for the photo-etched ship wheels, where did you source them from? I haven't seen any at such small scale before. I was thinking of going with old watch parts, but your photo-etchings look much nicer.
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In case people coming across my log are interested in what goes into SIB models, Igor set up a nice topic here: http://modelshipworld.com/index.php/topic/10011-sib-what-is-necessary-to-start-building-the-ship-in-a-bottle/#entry297548
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I thought so too Carl. Glad you were able to get it off - isn't it essentially a sticker that you adhere on both sides ? At least mine was. I was also worried that I wouldn't get the ends to line up correctly.
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Your best sail cloth and technique
Landlubber Mike replied to steven sturgis's topic in Masting, rigging and sails
For what it's worth I got a big roll of model span last year from CornwallModelBoats. Steven, if you're interested in furled sails, I shared my techniques that I used on my Badger in a separate thread: http://modelshipworld.com/index.php/topic/3944-landlubber-mikes-technique-for-furled-sails/ -
Your best sail cloth and technique
Landlubber Mike replied to steven sturgis's topic in Masting, rigging and sails
Is there a difference between silk span and model span? I have a roll of model span, but haven't tried using it yet. -
Thanks Daniel and Igor, that's good to know. Igor, I'd love for there to be a discussion on bottles. Did you want to start one? I'll have to be on the lookout for bottles - or at least start drinking better liquor. I'll stay away from perfume though... Thanks Kester! The kit comes with various ensigns, but I decided not to go with them as the material was a bit bright, and I thought not conducive to adding some folds. Next time I promise
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Hey Joe, I didn't mean to scare you off. Frankly, the only two things that stressed me out on the build were getting the sea into the bottle and having snapped the bowsprit. I'm sure you're much more careful than I am Other than that, it was a lot of fun.
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Thanks for the kind words Hamilton. I'm looking forward to your Hannah as you already have a knack at working at small scales. As for the 1-page build log, that probably because I didn't want to embarrass myself by posting a progress log during the build, only to fail in the end. Once the ship is in the bottle, it's not coming out. I was really worried that I would break the bowsprit off again, and when the main mast got bent, there was a lot more finger crossing and colorful language Those would have been repairs that would have been impossible to make.
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Hey Daniel, thanks so much for the kind words. This was a lot of fun. You're right about the photo-etched parts - in some ways they make things easier, but in others, they make things more difficult, particularly if you end up breaking them like I did If I had to do it again, I would use wood (or possibly brass rod, though brass is a bit heavy), and leave the use of photo-etched parts for small detail pieces. I can see this being addicting - I thought I would do the kit to check the "build a ship in a bottle" item off my bucket list, but I've found myself thinking about future SIBs. Looking at the links on your blog didn't help! Relative to larger sized models, the SIBs are relatively inexpensive and not as time consuming for sure. And no rigging of cannons with 2mm blocks! Just out of curiosity, where do you source your bottles? Antique bottles would be interesting, but I would think that the glass can be cloudy or otherwise discolored. I have some tequila that was gifted to me and is in interesting bottles, so at least I could have fun "sourcing" the bottles that way.
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After seeing your models, I think I'm inspired to try them out again. Take care my friend, I'll keep a look out for your updates.
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Yes, you are certainly dealing with a small amount of volume! If you can pull off the sea, I think it would be a really nice touch to the model. For my Hannah, I tried building up the sea around the pedestal base the best I could. I wanted to make it look like the ship was sitting in the sea. It's very tricky to do that though. If there is a next model, I'm thinking of maybe using a plug to ensure the outline of the sea around the ship. I'm not sure how I would do that using the Vallejo water though. I think if I pushed the plug in, and then tried to pull it out, the material would stick to the plug and pull into the space. I probably also couldn't bake the material, as then I would never be able to remove the plug. But the Vallejo water looks beautiful once it has hardened. Something to think about if I do another ship in bottle.
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