Landlubber Mike

Man that looks like real wood. Really well done!

A few thoughts after reading through the thread: 1. The framing looks really impressive on the Amati. It looks well designed to not only provide structural support, but also aid in the design of the hull when it comes to correctly placing gunports, etc. Using MDF is also a great advantage for the kit. I greatly preferred the MDF used in the Amati Pegasus hull over the plywood and other wood used in other kits. MDF is incredibly strong, flat, with no flex. It's harder to work and you have to be careful with the dust and fumes from machining it, but all that is outweighed by the structural benefits in my opinion. With a model of this size and weight (no dummy barrels, etc.), a solid skeleton is going to be critical. 2. My guess is that the increase in size over the 1/64 Caldercraft won't necessarily be the primary driver of cost differences. It will probably be on the fittings. If the Amati doesn't use dummy barrels, my guess is that the price differential will be fairly significant. 3. I know that they have been talking about the Amati Victory for years now. I think it's good that they are taking their time to get things right with this kit. Remember the Model Shipways Essex? That seemed to have been rolled out too quickly and from what I was reading on here, appeared to be a disaster with fit and other issues. When it finally comes out, this is going to a pretty spectacular kit if it follows the top quality design, components, plans, seen in their other kits like the Pegasus - just with a much grander subject.

Thank you, that's really helpful. I'm sure others also had similar questions. Now we know. Greatly appreciate it!

Fantastic build, congratulations! I like your display as well. Nice to see all your fine work. Is that train model “The General”? If so, I remember my dad building it when I was little.

So the difference from Caldercraft is the larger size and the interior details, which only will be seen if the hull side is open? With the Caldercraft one in the stash, just wondering what the main differences are.

That's some of the nicest looking brickwork made out of painted wood that i've seen on here. Excellent job!

Awesome subject and great start. Hope you don't mind me following along.

In case this build goes south, sounds like setting it on fire might be consistent with reality then

Awesome work! Looking forward to the final glamor shots

Fantastic job - love the diorama setting! 👍

Nice job Ragove! Came out awesome. Can I ask - for larger decals, how do you transfer the decal from the water dish to the model? I've used toothpicks and the like for smaller decals, but larger are tricky. In sliding them off the paper, I haven't quite figure out how to properly do it to get it immediately in the right position (Plasmo on Youtube makes it look way easier than I've found it). I would worry with larger decals that the decal would curl if you pulled it from the water by an edge or corner, but maybe a wide wet brush would work?

For what it's worth, I upgraded my table to the wider table and am incredibly happy with it. If you are using Jim's sliding table to make cross cuts, the wider table top allows you to avoid having to remove the fence - you can just slide it all the way to the end of the table. A nice time saver, and for me at least, reduces the risk of me losing the screws

Agree with Lou and Keith - amazing how using card you can create such detailed and interesting models. Nice job!

Maybe I need to add some Dutch guys and a basket of eggs

Thank you for the kind words Kevin. Personally I think it's a really nice kit of a beautiful ship, regardless of the questions as to its name and origin. PiratePete's build notes also are incredibly helpful. Great materials, tons of well-drawn detailed plans, and lots of options to make the ship as detailed as you want. Along with this kit, I have Euromodel's Prince William zu Pferde in the stash, which is a really fantastic kit. If you're looking to go big, the Euromodel Royal William to me seems to be at the pinnacle of kits on the market.

Nice job! For all that trouble at the end, she sure came out nicely. Congratulations, and nice job sticking with it.

I had to use two different couplers, one inserted into the other, and include one in the tool and one in the shop vac (Fein in my case, which was in metric).

Looks fantastic, really nice job!

Most of the wooden ship kits built on here will take you months or years. Even if you spent 40 hours a week building, I doubt you could do most of these ships in less than a month. Midwest has some very simple kits that are more weekend-type kits that might fit your timing requirements. I'm working on this Annapolis Wherry kit that could probably be done in a week or so: https://www.clcboats.com/shop/boats/scale-model-kits/annapolis-wherry-scale-model.html You could also do a plastic model of a wooden ship? Those would be less expensive and much quicker to build.

Here is Jim Bynes' site: https://www.byrnesmodelmachines.com/ I wholeheartedly without reservation recommend his tools.

What kind of sanding operation are you looking at? I use the Byrnes disc sander for most operations, and also have his thickness sander to sand down strips and sheets. To sand down the first planking on my builds, I use a palm sander, followed by hand sanding. I've used an oscillating spindle sander for inside curves on things like bulkheads. I've sanded taper into masts and spars using a lathe. I've also used sanding drums in my Dremel and micromoter. None of these are cordless though. Of course, there are people here who just use their hands and sanding blocks and have better outcomes than I can with these tools

I don't believe so. Then again, if I remember correctly, on my prior builds, after applying the decals I added a coat of Future to seal them in, then added washes, then sprayed the flat coat. For these engines, I painted, applied two tiny decals to the centers, applied the wash directly (no intermediate Future coat), and then sprayed with the semi-gloss. So in both cases, the decals were covered with something prior to the clear coat and the decals look perfectly fine. What I don't know is whether applying something enamel or oil based to a decal is likely to cause problems.

Really nice work Josh! Can't believe I missed your other logs. I wish I had more time in the day to work on SIB builds, but have other stuff on the bench. However, now that I think about it, I guess I can say that I'm diligently working on the bottle part of the build - last night I finished a 1.75 liter tequila bottle that will make a nice home for one. 😁 Good luck on the completion of the project!

Over the last few days, I've been slowly adding details to the fuselages and painting some of the smaller details. Also decanted some Tamiya Camel Yellow to start the yellow wings. I also finished the engines. I have to say, Accurate Miniatures did a really nice job on these. The details are very crisp, and they also included PE for the ignition wires. The white plastic rod is the mount for the propeller, and it's designed to allow the propeller to turn. A lot of thought went into how Accurate Miniatures produced the sprues, as thus far I have had no sink marks to fix or seam lines to remove. A lot different of a story from their F4B-4 and P-6E models, which were reboxings of Monogram kits. Nice to not have to spend a lot of time filling and sanding. These were painted using Vallejo paints and washes. The metal is from Vallejo's Metal Color line (I believe I used White Aluminum for the engines, and Burnt Iron for the F3F-2 engine exhausts. Then I used Vallejo washes. I believe I used black wash for the engine pistons, and dark grey for the black and grey areas. I like adding a dark grey wash to the flat black as it breaks up the color and makes things look more realistic. After, I sprayed a light coat of Mr. Super semi-gloss clear to seal everything. I really like the Mr. Super clear sprays. I used the flat for my F4B-4 and P-6E builds, which went on really thin and without any of the issues you tend to get with the Tamiya paint rattle cans. The semi-gloss worked just as nicely. I'll have to try the Liquitex High Gloss Varnish that Egilman recommends as well. The Vallejo Metal Color paints go on so nicely, I want to have some nice shiny birds.

Amazing work, wow! And you move along so quickly too!