MEDDO

If we empty every 2 months, then it's likely that a member will realise he deleted a topic in that time, unless he only did the day before we empty. 
 
Please remember that that there is a responsibility on members for their own actions too. We have given you the tools and we ask that you use them responsibly and really look at what buttons you're pressing. 

Ben just caught up and am impressed. Esp with the setback and recovery.

Ben just caught up and am impressed. Esp with the setback and recovery.

Part 4 – The Keelson – cont’d


 
I should have mentioned wood selection in the prior post.  Kathryn has a mixture of oak and pine, with the oak being used primarily in structural components.  The HAER documentation does a good job of identifying the type of wood used for each component.  I’m using madrone (very similar to pear) for the components made of oak, and castello for the pine components.  Madrone normally is fairly pink, like pear, but my current stock of madrone is much paler than what I’ve used in the past.


 
The centerboard slot is cut through both the keelson and the keel, so the first task was to add the keel in the area of the centerboard slot.


 
The oak keel is very thin from the bow through the area of the centerboard slot – only 3” thick.  Since the thickness is consistent in this area a single piece could be milled.  The following photo shows this keel piece being glued in place.


 

 

The milling cutter would not mill the entire depth of the slot from the top of the keelson – the keelson would need to be flipped for completion of the slot.  Pilot holes were drilled through the keelson at each end of the slot location – this enabled proper location of the slot when the keelson was flipped.


 
The following photo shows the centerboard slot being milled.


 


The mast step in Kathryn is actually a longitudinal mortise, so this was also milled at this time.  The following photo of the completed keelson shows the centerboard slot and the mortise for the mast step.


 

 

In the interest of full disclosure, I need to admit that I cut the centerboard slot too far forward after misreading one of the various marks I had made on the keelson.  The end of the centerboard slot was in the proper place, so this was easily corrected by inserting a small plug in the forward end of the slot – as seen in the following photo.


 

 

Kathryn’s bow consists of an inner stem, and outer stem, and the cutwater.  All of these components will be made of oak.  The inner stem sits on the keelson, and is supported by a stem knee.


 
The inner stem needed to be shaped so that it inclines at the same angle as the forward edge of the keelson.  I was also concerned about the inner stem being sufficiently secure, so a tenon was formed on the stem and a corresponding mortise was cut in the keelson, as shown in the following photos.


 
 

 

I was also concerned about attaching the outer stem, which will lie against the inner stem, so 2 pilot holes were drilled in the inner stem for aligning the outer stem in a later step.  These holes needed to be fairly horizontal, so the inner stem was held in the milling vise at the approximate angle of installation.  A centering drill was used to assist in drilling at that angle.


 

 

Once the centering drill started the hole, a #60 drill was used to complete the drilling.


 
 

 

The setup for gluing the inner stem to the keelson was a little unusual, since it was necessary to ensure that the inner stem and the forward face of the keelson stayed in the proper alignment.  A parallel bar was set in a vice for this alignment, and the keelson/stem knee combination was aligned with the bar.  A square was also used to ensure that the stem knee stayed vertical on the keelson.  The clamping setup can be seen in the following photo.


 

 

The following photo shows the keelson with the inner stem knee installed.


 

 


 
The next work will include the installation of the stem knee and completion of the keel assembly.


 

Funnily enough, the bad midships area could be made into a cross section model with a little work!
 
Ben

Young America - extreme clipper 1853
Part 199 – Setting up Futtock Shrouds
 
The lower futtock shrouds are lashed to mast eyebolts as shown in the first picture.
 

 
The picture shows the first two secured.  Before lashing the lower ends, eyes and thimbles had to be worked into the shrouds with the lengths set to provide relatively consistent lengths to the lashings.  This was done by hooking each shroud to its deadeye strap and then grasping the rope at the desired length with round tipped pliers as shown in the next picture.
 

 
The rope was then looped over the jaw to set the position for the eye.  This picture demonstrates the problems caused by a lot of handling of the masts after blackening of the copper ironwork.  All the ironwork on the masts was retreated after all the pre-erection detailing – as will be seen in later pictures.
 
The next picture shows an eye with the thimble inserted with glue applied at the splice joint – as described in the previous post.
 

 
The next two pictures show the six futtock shrouds installed on the lower fore mast.
 

 

 
The ironwork has been mostly re-blackened in these pictures. 
 
The next two pictures show a test I felt compelled to make to satisfy myself that the lower shrouds would clear the futtocks.  I felt some trepidation about this, not knowing what I would do if there were interferences.  Fortunately there were none that miniscule movement of the collar could not cure.
 

 
The next picture shows the positioning of shrouds 3 and 4 that straddle the center futtock.
 

 
The white rope used in the picture is some reject 4-strand linen rope that approximates the size of the served 10 ½" shrouds.  The uneveness reflects the difficulty of making four-strand rope without a central core.
 
The foremast is now ready for installation and work is proceeding on the other two.  In the next to last picture a mast coat may be seen at the deck covering the wedges.  This will be described in the next part.
 
Ed

Preparation of the frames for the KIT.


 
I have to draw the other half of the plans.

Drawing is made by hand, it is easier to draw a circle than a straight line and all the frames are only curves


 
About 2/3 of the blanks are cut, a lot of wood is use and a lot of wood is thrown in the garbage, up to now 1 ½  trash can.


 

Part 2 – Research
 
The HAER documentation contains 8 pages of drawings showing various views of Kathryn, including many details of the interior construction.  Since I plan to build the model as a true plank-on-frame with all (or most) interior fittings, these drawings are an excellent resource.  Besides depicting the construction details these drawings also contain descriptions and measurements of many of the details.  However, I found during the drafting work that these drawings have a few errors – I’ll cover that in a later post.
 
The HAER documentation also includes the detailed description of Kathryn that was submitted for the National Historic Landmark nomination, and this description is a very valuable supplement to the HAER drawings.
 
The HAER drawings are available as TIFF files (much better details than JPG), which were loaded into my CAD program and then scaled to actual dimensions.  Each drawing contained a scale that made this easy to do.  Where the documentation did not contain measurements for a component, it was usually easy to determine the measurements based on the scaled drawings.
 
I collected the measurements in a separate document for easy reference.  That document is attached.
 
            Kathryn Specifications and Dimensions.pdf
 
In addition to the HAER documentation the article by Ben Lankford, found in the Nautical Research Journal published in June 1983, contains many useful descriptions and also a table comparing the sizes of different components from various sized Skipjacks.  Kathryn is a large Skipjack, and in some cases it was possible to estimate the size of a component by comparing it to the size of the same component in the various smaller Skipjacks.  Attached is a PDF of the comparison table.
 
            Skipjack Size Comparisons.pdf
 
Photos of the recent reconstruction efforts are available online, and these were invaluable for determining the configuration of several components.  Photos can be found at SavingWhatMatters.com, and at the Washington University web site at www.washcoll.edu/live/galleries/2508-restoring-skipjack-kathryn
 
There is also an interesting video on YouTube showing the Kathryn dredging for oysters (the video was taken before the recent rebuild).
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6FAkIEcLZtA
 
In addition to the above resources, the following books contributed needed information:
            American Small Sailing Craft, by Howard Chapelle
            Notes on Chesapeake Bay Skipjacks, by Howard Chapelle
            Chesapeake Bay Sailing Craft, by Robert H. Burgess
            Working Skipjacks of Deal Island, by Brice N. Stump
 
I also have a couple of good friends who live in the Chesapeake Bay area, are very knowledgeable about bay craft in general, and who are excellent modelers who focus on the boats of the Bay area.  Through these good friends I have been able to go aboard Kathryn after her recent rebuild and have also been introduced to individuals who were instrumental in the rebuild efforts.
 
 

Part 3 – The Keelson


 
After a lot of time spent researching Kathryn and drawing the plans needed to start the build – it’s finally time to make some wood dust!


 
Kathryn’s keelson is a massive timber, consisting of two parts secured by a scarf joint.  The individual frames are mortised into the keelson, and a slot for the centerboard runs down the middle of the keelson.  The keelson is 16” wide and the height varies, decreasing towards the aft of the boat.  The bottom of the keelson below the level of the bottom of the frames is only 8” wide.  Following are a few cross-sectional views from the HAER drawings to illustrate the keelson:


 



 
The first step was to make the two main parts of the keelson.  After gluing the drawings of the two parts to the appropriate stock, these parts were cut out and sanded to the lines using the disk sander and the elliptical sander (for any inside curves).


 

 

These pieces were joined at the scarf and glued, using the clamping arrangement shown.  A piece of plate glass was used to ensure that the keelson was straight.
 

 

The next step was to form the narrow bottom of the keelson.  This would be best done on the milling machine, but an approach for cutting along the curve of the keelson was needed.  I fabricated a ‘table’ for the milling machine with a peg located in the table.  (I saw this in use on another build log – a great idea)




 
By keeping the keelson stock pressed against the peg, it was possible to follow the curve of the keelson with the milling cutter.  Light cuts were progressively made on each side of the keelson until the proper depth was reached.



 

The following photo shows the milled bottom of the keelson.
 

 

The next task was to cut all of the mortises for the frames in the keelson.  Since the keelson sits on an angle, a jig was developed to ensure that the frame mortises were perpendicular from the waterline.  This jig simply consisted of a piece of wood with the top cut at the appropriate angle.
 



 

This jig was positioned against two machine screws in the tooling plate to ensure that it was horizontal, and the keelson was clamped against this jig.  A laser center-finder was used to check that the mortises would be vertical.
 



 

The mortises were then cut on both sides of the keelson (the drawing of the keelson was mirrored and pasted to the port side after initial shaping of the keelson).  All of the mortises are 2” deep.


 

The ends of the mortises were rounded because of the shape of the milling cutter.  These were then squared off using a knife and a small chisel.



 

When reviewing the photos from the recent rebuild, I was able to see that the forward end of the keelson was rounded to the depth of the narrow keelson bottom.


 

 

A rotary tool with a medium stump cutter was used to form this end of the keelson.

 

 

The bearding line is very pronounced at the front of the keelson (shown as the dark line bordering the mortises in the above photo).  The keelson was shaped to this line, again using the stump cutter.


 

 

Finally, the forward 12” of the keelson tapers from its 16” width down to 10” – this was done on the disk sander.


 

 
 

 

So the keelson is now fully formed.  Next up is to cut the centerboard slot, begin installation of the keel, inner stem, and stem knee.


 
Thanks everyone!

Just an FYI, This tutorial was about making simple one piece molds for flat-ish small decorations on ship models.   Like gun port wreaths etc.   There are also more complex two and three part molds for making fully round parts like cannon or a figurehead.   When time permits I will make a similar tutorial based on my experiences.  I will also continue to try new material and brands.  For example,  as soon as my gold dust gets here I will try and make a gilded example of the monogram used in this experiment.  I am just waiting for it to arrive in the mail.
 
But everyone should add there experiences here for simple one piece molds so we can start compiling more content and info for everyone.
 
We will try to bring everyone more tutorials like this for other things.....maybe soldering,   or blackening,  or very soon I will be sculpting additional decorations for the barge kit prototype from Sculpey and will create a similar topic about that.
 
Chuck

Thank you to all for very very nice comments. It is great pleasure for me to present my work on this forum.
Next part - the swivel gun mounts.

Last part of the small details - euphroes, parrel ribbs, cleats, rack blockas, cathead blocks.

Thank you Rob .
Some other small part are ready - yard tie blocks, jeer blocks, sheet quarter blocks, single shoulder blocks, long tackle blocks, hearts.

Because Anja has an update yesterday I will also update mine......
 
I finished the running rigging.
Still one drawing to go .
Then the anchors and lights and of course the netting .
But it goes fast enough....
The ship is to big to get it in one shot so a few.....
 
Sjors
 

CLEWLINES AND SHEETS
While I have been working on prototypes of my scratch-build ship’s boats, I noted that we now have a new format to the site.  Looks great.  Thanks to the ADMINS. I can’t imagine the time it takes to keep all of this up to date.
Since I hit a snag on what to do with the clewlines and sheets for a ship rigged without sails, I broke down and secured a copy of Peterssons book “Rigging Period Ship Models” and found an answer in the diagram on page 49. Using that as a guide, I rigged my topsail clews and sheets. An adequate solution.

SPANKER THROAT HALLIARD AND TOPPING LIFT COLLAR, COURSE LIFTS, TOPSAIL LIFTS, BACK STAYS
 
More work on the main mast. And I hit a snag with the Spanker Throat Halliard Collar.  I installed the collar around the top of the spanker mast ok. I actually cut a grove in the spanker mast to allow the collar to sit in before I installed it. Good planning. But I forgot to seize the double block to the Spanker Gaff. With the Spanker Gaff already pinned in place, and having already fully rigged it, I was reluctant to UNDO everything just to seize a block.
 
Therefore, I was forced to seize that block on the ship.  The seizing rope wraps around the base of the gaff and passes through two holes in the jaws (I did put the holes in before installing). That is now a very busy place. I used a very long strand of .012 black rope so that I could pull it far away from the gaff, and was able to tie a whipping knot that wrapped around the double block, and pulled it tight to the gaff.
 
I rigged the Topping Lift Collar with .018 rope for the Spanker Boom
.
I rigged the Topsail Lifts and belayed them to the pin rail.
 
I rigged the Course Yard with .018 and belayed them to pre-installed tackles at the base of the main mast.
 
I also belayed a number of the loose running rigging ropes, including the t’gallant clew line and sheets.  Those pass through the fairlead on the shrouds and belayed to the pin rail.
 
​I belayed the Course Truss lines.
 
​I also tied off all of the back stays with the small kit supplied deadeyes.
 
I am getting pretty close to finishing off the rigging I chose to do. I have not included any large scale photos lately, so here you go.

CATHARPINS PRACTICUM
 
I thought I would share with you my method of installing the catharpin on the lower shrouds of my main mast. I have seen other modelers use this method. The Niagara plans call for thimbles for attaching the lanyard.  I elected to use the kit supplied brass rings that I blackened.
 
Since this has to be tied on to the model, it is a bit tricky. Using elongated pieces of .018 black rope (as per the plans), you can pull the ends far enough away from the shrouds to tie the knots.
 
The pictures show the process that I chose. I don’t know if this is the correct way, but it worked from me and at this scale looks good.
 
As an aside, I have come to a better understanding how and why a sailing ship’s rigging is engineered the way it is. Together with the futtock shrouds and the ratlines, the catharpin, when added to the main shrouds, really tightens up the entire system.  It is rather incredible how everything works so well together.

Paint touch up and refinishing some parts before stropping blocks, seizing line, and creating rope coils. In the meantime, I have been planning the layout of all parts inside and out of the boat. I took my first reference photo. All parts are not included yet.  
Steve

Truly an inspiration. Upon my return to the forums was sad to hear of Augie's passing. Very glad you had the opportunity to honor him by completing this build.

Truly an inspiration. Upon my return to the forums was sad to hear of Augie's passing. Very glad you had the opportunity to honor him by completing this build.

Love the Skipjacks.  Can't wait to follow your progress.

Truly an inspiration. Upon my return to the forums was sad to hear of Augie's passing. Very glad you had the opportunity to honor him by completing this build.

Love the Skipjacks.  Can't wait to follow your progress.

Very nice birthday present.

Truly an inspiration. Upon my return to the forums was sad to hear of Augie's passing. Very glad you had the opportunity to honor him by completing this build.