MEDDO

Superb!   The color contrast really sets each piece apart from the other.

I really like this little cutter. And you're doing such a wonderful job 

This looks great. Thank you for the step-by-step it really gives us a good idea of how you are proceeding. 

Wow... all I can say is Wow!

Deadeyes and plates look great.
 
(Another post to bookmark for future reference)

Excellent progress. Look forward to seeing your next steps. 

Thanks, Mark, for the encouragement.Last day of work before retirement is June 27. I can only imagine what it is like to get up in the morning and look forward to going into the shop every day. But lots to do between now and then!
 
Mark

The evil Jay who sits on my shoulder suggesting funny but wrong things to do had a great idea - the day after I finish these knives, post that I tried them for a few minutes, decided I didn't like them, and am going back to my old knife. If I could then have a webcam capture the expression on Rick's face I think it would be good for at least a solid 30 minutes of laughing.
 
But then I decided he might actually stroke out and then his admiral would be understandably annoyed with me and I'd have to get on a plane for a funeral in Australia for a guy I killed with a funny knife joke, and I decided it was probably not a good idea. I'll just have to keep myself happy giggling imagining that expression
 
So one knife done, other just has a bit more to go that I'll finish tomorrow.
 
As alluded to in the last update, these were going to get my normal brass counterweight, it adds mass that I like and it moves the balance point to more or less the center of the knife, which I also prefer. And yes you need a lathe and basic metal lathe tools and knowledge, but otherwise these are Basic Metal Lathe Work, Chapter 1 level simple. It's not worth setting up the cross slide to do the taper, so I do them with files and sandpaper and the Mk.I Eyeball measuring system. You need a facing tool to face off the ends, otherwise the rest of the operations are all done with the parting tool you see here. Two reveals that I again do by eye, and I don't even measure the width of the shaft that goes into the handle, I eyeball more or less 1/8". This time I was +/- .005" for the two of them.
 
The reveals should have a shiny finish from the parting tool, the rest I finish with 1200 grit sandpaper to give it a considerably duller finish, the contrast is nice. It's not very noticeable when they're brand new but after given a chance to oxidize a bit it looks good, or at least I think so.
 
As these knives are tricky to drill on my small mill, I drilled the required holes by hand with pin vises. Like files, there is no such thing as too many pin vises. Another good example of where my giant pile of tools in many cases is just adding a bit of speed by for example having several pin vises each with a different chuck so I never have to stop and do that switching process again. I put three increasing diameter drills in the pin vises and drilled the normal way by doing say three turns looking at the piece from one orientation, ensuring the bit is aligned with the knife axis, and then rotating the knife handle 90 degrees and doing three turns, etc., you can drill holes very accurately that way. Final size was set by a small mill in my rotary tool, we need close here not a press fit.

Here's what they will look like mounted.


Let's go over the advantages of a CA finish for tool handles again:
It is the most crystal-clear finish I am aware of, perfect for highly figured woods. It provides a better grip than any finish I am aware of, including bare wood. And the shinier it gets the better the grip gets, opposite of what you see with most finishes. It is the hardest finish I am aware of. Rap a knife handle like these on the edge of your bench and it's the edge of your bench that will come out the loser. When you spill super glue all over it you're just refreshing the finish You can start, apply multiple coats, sand, polish, run around in the street naked while pouring mustard over your head and be back inside hiding behind a shower curtain while the admiral pretends to know nothing when the cops show up, and STILL be done in two hours with a knife you could use right then and there. Show me another finish where two hours is not replaced by two days, at LEAST.  Disadvantages:
Difficult to apply on anything much bigger than a tool handle. Easily the worst-leveling finish in existence. You HAVE to sand between coats and do so quickly while the finish isn't fully cured. Any coat you apply needs to be fully sanded before you can do anything else. If you let it fully cure before you level-sand it, you're going to have oodles of fun getting it level.  Comparatively very expensive, making it not worth it from a cost perspective also to use on anything bigger than a tool handle. It's not perfect, but the disadvantages can be managed and I use it for all  tool handles now, I don't see anything else as competitive. And cost can be very much controlled by the process you follow.
 
Here is my sophisticated setup. I'm using nothing but thin CA here, and it's important you do so for the first coat at least, which is more of a soaking. The 8oz of thin CA here was $21 from Amazon, and I will use < 5% for these two handles- I fill the tube/bath, do the soaks/coats, and then pour the remainder into the bottle. I've found no negative effects on the glue in doing so. So I could make another 30 knives minimum from this bottle if needed. If you're concerned about buying that much volume, I've had much success making it last longer by storing it in the refrigerator, just let it reach room temp before use.
 
I tape on dowels to suspend the knife handle in the bath and keep it balanced, don't want it touching the metal as it can trigger local setting.

For the first coat, as mentioned it's a soak. I left these in there for an hour each, the thin CA penetrates as deeply as possible and you turn much of it into a composite material. 
 
For the later coats - you really shouldn't need more than one soak and two coats - you just dip and remove.
 
This is the tricky part, getting rid of the excess glue and then doing everything possible to keep the coat as even as possible and not pooling anywhere while it sets. I put a nice big double piece of foil down, and when I pull it off I shake it straight downward and touch the tail down to the foil a few times in an effort to get the excess off. As SOON as I think I have removed as much as I can/want, I level the handle's long axis with the horizon and then starting turning it constantly along that axis like a mini slow-roaster. And I keep turning it until the surface is fully set.
 
For the soak coat, the turning while waiting to set can take quite a while - 15 minutes or more. For the coats it acts more like thin CA and will set within a minute or two.
 
This is what it will look like after the current coat is set, you can see it's none too level. You definitely don't want to put on multiple coats without sanding fully level between coats. BTW, I am using 400 grit for the level sanding between coats.

Another issue is that while it's relatively easy to sand the overall handle level, glue will build up around the handle/blade joint, and you really really don't want to let that fully cure before you deal with it. Here you can see I'm in the process of trimming that back, using the first knife I made, an xacto replacement. This is what disposable blades are for, cutting through nasty glue
 
You can also see what the surface looks like after sanding, this one has been fully level-sanded before working on the glue buildup.

And this is Ms. Takita, who closely monitors all my activities so she always knows exactly how much she needs to disapprove of them. This is the electrically-warmed bed that sits on one of the tool chests of drawers right next to my workbench, where she has a good view of everything noisy and annoying that she needs to disapprove of. And the bed is close enough to where I sit to demand regular ear scratches to make up for all of the bad things I am doing. 
 
 
Here is the second knife getting ready to go in for his initial soaking. Since the wood is so nice here, the handles are sanded out to 2000 grit before getting their finish.

Once we have our three coats and everything is level sanded with 400 grit, we're ready to finalize the finish. I work my way up through the grits again to 2000 grit. Then it's time for the final polish, I'm using Novus plastic polish #2. There are a couple hundred ways to polish something like this, I use Novus because it works very well on CA, you can get it about anywhere, and it's not super-expensive at least compared to some other options. 
 
You can use a cloth and do it by hand easily enough, and with a rotary tool the most common thing to use is felt points. I am using these floppy polishing disks as it makes me let the polish do the work.

As you see I apply the polish to the handle, not the disk. You can do it the other way around, but if so I recommend full face coverage and not wearing any clothes you like  Also I'm running down at like 5-6k rpm, the only thing accomplished by going faster is creating a mess.

And after only 5-10min of polishing, we have a final finish  Go ahead and look at the full-sized version here, you should be able to see why the wood was sanded out to a polish before adding the finish, I'm not aware of anything that shows off figured wood better than this.


I used a cutoff wheel to cut some notches into the brass tailpiece shaft to give the glue a mechanical hold as well as the adhesive hold.

 
And we have a new knife. His brother will join him tomorrow and we can start working on ships again!

 
 
 
 

Outstanding!

I'm gonna have to say brain, left hand, right hand.

Looks great so far.  I will also follow along as this is a strong contender for a future build.

Absolutely wonderful models there!!!
 
 
 

Welcome!

And then the most important thing of the day: Food! Food! Glorious food!

Then they sat in all the corners possible ...

... and enjoyed themselves quietly ...

... and after a bombastic fennel soup there were still plenty of hearty slices of bread coming ...

... everything freshly prepared on board :-)

So we got the power to get some lessons in working the windlass, now we know how it works ...

... tough job but in the end the anchor was finally up.

And then the most important: the desert :-) 
Some sweet slices of Victory, made and presented by confectioner dafi ...

... everyone was allowed to get a taste of it ...

... and was delighted upon the awarded piece!

That was a dream getting true: Going to sail with my models :-)
How many did have the chance to present their models in such a true surrounding!?!
XXXDAn

Just realised, I never told you how I got the medal on the last picture of the Utrecht
 
...hihihihihihihihihi...
 
Not too long ago I was visiting some friends on a modeling exhibition at Fürstenfeldbruck near Munich.
I suddenly saw some people disappearing with some great models. I told the guards about the supposed theft and they calmed me down: "Going to the competition" they said.
 
Wanted to see what this means I went there and I saw hundreds of tanks, bi- and triplanes, strip-downs and full-dressed and loads with evil crosses. And then I dicovered one single ship among all those competitors: a wonderfully build RJN Hiryu.
 
Then I saw the medals for the categories, heard the price to take part: 2 (zwei, two, deux, due) Euro and only 1 competitor for the ship´s category?
First cheap enough and the second to little competition for my taste ;-)
 
So I ran to the car, got my slice of Victory out - By the deep 17 if one remembers - ran back and 2 (zwei, two, deux, due) minutes before the  submission deadline I threw my model onto the table like James Bond his hat in direction Miss Moneypenny.
 
Then some times later the big medal awards ceremony, can you guess what?
 
I made a wonderful second (2, two, deux, due, zwei) Place!!!
 
The other competitor in the category "Ship" only made it to before last. And the only one ahead of me was becoming "Best of Show"!
What do we learn from that?
- First, dafi never took his medal off again, everybody who saw me evermsince can confirm that!
- Those 2 (zwei, two, deux, due, two) Euro were economically well invested
- dafi is stupid, for another 2 (zwei, two, deux, due, two) Euro he would have gotten also the bronze medal as he had another slice of Victory still in the car.

This is Frank who got a bronze medal with his biplane-strip-down against a competitor field of a felt 723 other planes. So I was better than he was as my beloved medal is SILVER.

XXXDAn

Wonderful build Chuck.  Thanks for all the instructions, demos, tips, photos and ideas.  

Great job!  I really like the case and presentation there.

Excellent subject.  You have some nice equipment there.  The keel looks good.

I guess I would have to see it in person. I don't think it looks too bad in the pictures. 

My wild guess is that the rubber being some type of petroleum product is not really inert and somehow it is either reacting with the wood or releasing some type of oil/residue onto the surface it's clamped onto.   I've seen this type of thing happen with a couple other items I have that were clamped or sitting on rubber bases on a table or something. 

Hey guys. Vivian lives in Brazil. Her language is Portuguese
 
 

Thanks Dave! It would be great to see another LSS Halifax being built.  I still have a LSS Fair America and eventually plan on getting to that one.  However I'm going to go back to a few regular kits for to hone some skills.  After getting my hands on some of the Syren rope I don't believe that I'll be using any kit supplied anymore. 

A couple days ago I cut up some black paper and taped it to the wales  to see how it looked. I kind of liked it however I am a little bit concerned about painting it black as the wood has already seen some wipe on poly.  After seeing Bob's Halifax post  where he painted it i've decided I really like it.  I will test out there small piece of the leftover wood this weekend. Will use the wipe on poly let it dry and then I will lightly sand it and then paint it to see how it comes out. 
 
 Here are a few pictures with and without. 
 

 
p.s. I'm going to have to give up my super awesome model stand blocks that I've been using for the last few years and figure something more permanent for the final mounting.

Rain, rain, and then more rain. That was the weather in sunny Florida for a week. Bad for golf, but good for modeling.
 
With all that indoor time, I was able to get by a couple of tedious tasks. First, was cutting the hull loose from the framing jig. This proved more time consuming and difficult than I had imagined it would be. I first tried to do it with keyhole saw blades in an X-acto handle, but this seemed like it would be an endless job, and I have no patience for those. I rummaged through my tool box and found a Stanley handle with a hacksaw like blade and this ended up doing the trick, although still slowly and carefully. It is pictured below.
 
After freeing the hull, I then turned to the task of fairing the interior. This turned out to be quite a chore, because the frames needed to be thinned considerably to reach their proper final proportions. Beginning with a Dremel with a sanding drum, and then using various grades of sandpaper with different sticks and blocks, and some freehand sanding as well, I worked my way through it. This took me days of tedious work. It's likely that I may still need some more work at the bow and stern as I proceed with interior work.
 
My next job was to add the keelson. Although this is a laser cut part , it still required considerable fiddling and adjustment to get it to fit tightly and properly. Lastly, I added the first strakes of interior planking along the keelson in the hold area, just to get a feel for that process. I'm now deciding just what interior work to do and how to go about it. I would like to show as much of it as I can, but we'll have to see how that works out.
 
Bob
 
 

Thank you to all for comments and likes.
To sailor 123456789: I have the same problem to understand this function. The chain pums and main jeer bitts are so close each other and there is no space for manipulation. Above that I made one small mistake, the main jeer bitts are positioned behind the deck beams  (in plans are the main bitts under deck beam). Fortunately on the main jeer bitts end only two ropes.
To John Allen: It is secret. But whoever seeks, he finds it.
The last item on the main deck - brake pumps. They are installed temporarily now. Final fixation will be after deck planking.