Shazmira

What a wonderful memorial to your dad's life and memory, made me tear up. Now I have to go find the movie and dvds of this show you are talking about and learn even more about your dad's extraordinary life. Your father looks to be quite the happy man in the photos you shared, I am betting if asked he would reply that he had a good life!

Beautiful work Popeye! How in the world can you take just a few minutes to do something before you run out the door for work? No way I can do that, if I sit down to the work bench, my butt seems to think I have to stay there for hours, don't think the college would appreciate me calling in sick all the time lol

Very sorry to hear of the loss of your father Buck. It must be hard, I would assume you are also now trying to take care of everything on his end as well as your own. I do hope your house in Kansas sells soon and you find the perfect place in Colorado, so you and your wife can be together again. Besto of luck my friend!

Finally a small bit of progress. I did what I said and graded all day yesterday so i could build today. Got my mast turned around in the right direction, then fashioned the bowsprit and its ironwork Made the boom, and the iron work and block am currently working on the gaff, talk about a b******, had no problem with the first side, but took me 4 tries to get the other half, tiny little piece kept breaking on me. It needs considerable work yet, but I want the glue to harden before I start sanding and filing it into shape

They look quite good Sam! Excellent, clean work. Yes that nasty 4 letter word does have a way of getting in the way of what we want to do with our time

I am glad you did not take what I said as an insult....probably should have found a better way to word that. But your build is much like mine, seems each step we get a bit more confident, and it is obvious we learn from previous mistakes and make improvements! Ah the poor Syren...still calling softly from her box. I have been too busy grading papers this week, and working out an issue at school with a special student that I have had no building time at all. My hope is to finish my grading on Saturday, and have Sunday to work. Still trying to finish, the other two builds first. Longboat is getting close, and thanks to Keith (themadchemist) I now have the missing blocks for the SFII, so I can finally finish the last of her running rigging and put her under glass!

She looks quite impressive Sjors, I am really seeing some vast improvement in your skills!!

Sherry, oops...guess I need to to proof my posts a bit better . Pretty sure you know I meant dArk side, although in all fairness, dork side is maybe not an incorrect moniker either. I am pretty sure my students call me something pretty similar to that when they hear about my hobby . For pride and aesthetic reasons...good enough for me, and your work is top notch, so you pull it off well! Kudos, for sticking to your own sense of ethics!

Plenty to think about popeye. I get the concept of absolute zero. I think for the SF, part of the issue is that I dipped all my rope in poly, then I stretched it to dry. After I coiled it up and placed in glasine bags until I was ready to use it. problem is, with all the setbacks and time delay the rope wants to hold the coil, so it required being stretched very taut in order to have the straight lines on the ship when installed.

Wow Sherry, excellent grates. But I have to ask; why do the labor intensive fashioning of your own? Wouldn't it be easier to buy the grates from someplace like Model Expo? Is it a pride thing, so all of this ship is scratch? Or a scale issue? Just curious, thinking ahead to my future dive into the dork side

So Popeye, I understand the knees...seems like an easy enough addition. Do you pin the knees to the pin rail, or just glue them. and do you pin the knees to the bulwark, or just use glue? On my build I had added pins to the rail itself into the bulwark, but the strain placed on them once the lines were belayed pulled them up and broke the seal of the CA. Maybe my pins weren't long enough to add the needed strength to hold the rail in place.... I was actually considering building my pin rails into the "walls" where they will placed. I figure on the SF, once all the planking and everything was completed there is at minimum 1/4 of thickness of the hull and the bulwarks where the pin rails were attached. So, I was thinking that with enough foresight, I could actually cut holes (like gun ports are done), make my pin rails deeper so the extra depth would be inserted into the slots I cut, then plank as normal. In this way my pinrails would actually be built into the structure of the ship rather than just attached to the surface, and thereby offer the extra stability needed. I hope I explained what I picture in my mind accurately enough. One of those things my mind sees as possible, as long as the location is spot on when initially doing the structure portion of the hull and deck. Since I have not yet begun a new kit, don't know if it will work in reality.

I want to know how you do your pin racks so they don't break off when belaying lines. I have been considering what I can do differently than pinning them on my next build so I don't have the problems on it like the SF

Clean and crisp Bob, and the iron work looks great! hmmm guess I should have looked at your pics before I put my mast on

Popeye, I am so happy to see that an experienced and seasoned builder as yourself, makes blonde mistakes like me . Makes me feel good to know I am in great company! Well fixed too btw!

am I backwards???? I swear sometimes I was blonde in all my previous lives...either that or I am brain dead!! Wow, now I really feel like an idiot. Thank you so much for catching that Bob. At this point it will be easy to fix, thank you again for speaking up!

I took a long break from the longboat while I went back to the rigging of my SFII, now that build is in dry dock awaiting parts so I am back to the longboat. Worked on the mast this week, got it cut and tapered, and the sheaves drilled in it Then went to work on the "iron" bands. This was only my 2nd attempt at soldering, I originally bade the bands and tried using CA, but I worried, from previous experience, that the glue would not hold up to the pressure of the lines so I decided to remake them and solder them together. "raw" soldered bands I then drilled the holes needed in the bands, cut them to size and tried my hand at blackening them...I think they turned out pretty darn good for me Next was painting the mast I also spent time this week, getting the longboat mounted on the pedestals and making sure it was level The mast step I fashioned...probably cant tell from the photo but I did NOT want the mast just glued to the top of the step, and I feared a tenon would still not be structurally sound enough, so my step is a bit thicker than 1/16 and I drilled a hole through the center so my mast sits down inside the step. I feel this will give it better stability when I start pulling rope through it it and placing pressure on it. how she sits now

Where she sits right now

Welcome Wes, OMG you read the entire log now that took some fortitude!!! But thank you for your visit and kind words! I am looking forward to actually finishing her, yet at the same time it was nice to work on the longboat this last week. The change of pace did my mind wonders! Steve, you tell Angela her advice is of course spot on...that desire for perfectionism is one of my many flaws, but yet this hobby has indeed taught me that sometimes you just have to say it is good enough!! Scott, very nice to see you again, I seem to have missed you most of the summer, obviously you have been busy with all your other projects! I do know what you mean, I have several different hobbies, quilting, and cross stitch being among the top, and have unfinished projects on each of those as well. My fear on ship building was that if I quit I would upset the hubby who bought me the kit last Christmas, after I convinced his disbelieving mind that I could do this!!! I did not want to let him down! Keith, good to hear from you again! Glad to see things are still okay for you and you are moving forward. I really do want to see your SF...pm if you start a build log! Thank you for your generosity, I will send you a pm Andy, you sure nailed that on the head! Reality Bites!!!

Randy, I can't tell from your pics, and I can't figure out how to make them bigger...just in case, I discovered when doing the running rigging that many of the rail caps on this ship also double as pin rails. If you look at the large color photos on the sheet that came with the kit, you will see them. Hoping you noticed this sooner than I did, as it is proving to be an issue getting the holes drilled now.

Popeye, nope never took anything you said in a negative light, trust me I know you have never been anything but supportive. Jay, Syren blocks are all too small, I did think about using them lol. If they had been on the large side I would have used them anyway, but no luck...and too small for the rope I have anyway. Steve,I am not giving her up forever, just dry docked until life works out some other details (money), then I will finish her up. Yes, if I did not have the other builds to fall back on I would probably try to fashion my own blocks, but you kind of said it exactly as I am feeling it,I am just kind of "over it" I am pretty disgusted with the lack of foresight, in the plans and instructions, as well as my own, and need to walk away right and focus elsewhere.

I looked at Dafi's dowel idea. That is genius, I have dowels, and I have spare bits, so I can get Craig to CA them into the end of the dowel for me, or take it outside in a stiff breeze and do it myself. That will definitely solve the cap rail issue . You hit the nail on the head though about looking ahead....that is the problem. Although I read, and read, and read again to be sure this problem would not occur, the fact that I was brand new to building, have no working knowledge of ships, and the biggest issue of trusting the manufacturer to have complete instructions, is why I am in the boat I am in. I am so glad my other two builds are Chucks...at least in his instructions there are no missing details, he tells you in advance to do this now, because you will need it later. However, now I know what to expect from other kit manufacturers. Next time I am reading through instructions I will have the working knowledge to know what they are talking about, so I can look at the plans and see the discrepancies between the plans and instructions. So, all in all, the SFII has done exactly as I intended, she has served as a great learning tool. Not that she has taught me everything by any means, but I do feel much more confident going forward now.

Wow, you seem to just be flying through this build!!! She looks exceptionally good!

Sorry everyone, I still have no internet service at the house, and have been much too swamped at work to spend much time here, there are just not enough hours in the day right now!!! Okay, bad news. The SFII is now officially relegated to the dry dock. As I was progressing through the running rigging, I ran into more cap rails that require being used as pin rails. Unfortunately there is no way to drill the holes in them without damaging the shrouds, the lines, or the rails themselves with the tools I currently posses. Not the end of the world, I did come up with an alternative and was prepared to continue; then I discovered I am short several double blocks for which I cannot complete the rigging without. I do not have the patience, to try to fashion my own, and at the moment my budget is stretched so tight I do not have the $20 necessary to purchase and have shipped a package of replacements. So, I have placed her in dry dock for awhile until I can procure the blocks I need and can finally finish her off. I will post pics this weekend when my internet is finally up and running again. In the meantime I have now resumed work on the18th century longboat. I spent yesterday shaping the mast, the mast step, and the truck, complete with sheaves (what a b****). The best thing about the SFII and all the little things that made her a challenge to a first time builder is that I now feel confident in my skill to move forward on the next model. Although my "skill" is nowhere as as great as many of the builders on this site, I do feel I picked up enough knowledge from all my own mistakes, as well as those created by crappy plans to proceed. I know on my longboat, the planking is of much better quality than my first attempt here, so I do now feel ready to tackle the simple rigging on the longboat now! Yes, Sjors, this also means the Syren call is much stronger!!! I have pulled the box out of storage....I think in a week or two, I will be able to officially start her!

WOW, quite a bit of progress there Sjors, I am amazed at how tall those masts are, I never imagined they would be that high....now it is bringing about nightmares of all the string that will be needed to cover them up