Littlebob

Update time. I finished the lower hull planking, sanded and filled the gaps, and I gave it a light coat of cherry stain.
 
I still have to do more sanding before I apply the clear coat. All comments welcome.

Update time. I finished the lower hull planking, sanded and filled the gaps, and I gave it a light coat of cherry stain.
 
I still have to do more sanding before I apply the clear coat. All comments welcome.

Update time. I finished the lower hull planking, sanded and filled the gaps, and I gave it a light coat of cherry stain.
 
I still have to do more sanding before I apply the clear coat. All comments welcome.

Way past time for an update. I planked the outer bulwarks and got a good start on the lower planks. the reason it took so long is a few of the planks shifted position and I didn't notice till they were dry so off they came.
As you can see from the pic one of the lower planks has a big difference in color, I think I will either live with the color or paint the lower hull. All comments welcome.

Time for an update, the first pic shows the area around the stern post planked as well as the outside of the transom, I also added the wood name plate backing and painted it black to receive the Virginia brass PE letters.
 
The second pic shows the inside of the transom planked and I added a small piece of wood between the deck boards and the transom base (not sure what you call it) I also added the 2 ribs against the transom and I planked the inside of the bulwarks. All comments welcome.

Time for another update, I got a decent amount done this time, I installed the stem post, stern post, keel, transom and bulworks. Next I will plank the out side of the transom. All comments wecolme.

Time for another update, in the first 2 pics the first layer of hull planks are 100% installed, in the last pic most of the heavy sanding has been done by the dremel contour sander in the back round, love them power tools. All comments welcome.

Time for an update, I installed all the deck planking and added the simulated tree nails, also drilled the mast holes. All comments welcome.

Your work on the bow looks very good.

Not much progress this week. I am waiting on some replacement rope to replace the Revell sheet and tack lines. I liked Evan's (force 9) idea of gun deck stowed sea anchors so I experimented with making the paint more realistic by adding wood grain to the stocks and rust patina to the anchor. I kinda' like how it turned out and will apply this to other parts in the build.
 

 
Hopefully I will get to try dying the rope this week. That will have implications for the rest of the build.

Believe it or not....when I was taking out these 14 - 3/8" pieces from their envelope to put on my sticky tape workholding, the last one slipped out of the tweezer! It took me a half an hour of crawling to find it. It didn't land on the floor, but bounced of my leg into the recesses of one of the shelves under my workbench. All's well that ends well!
 
Now I shall mark exactly where each piece goes on the tape and begin the building process without chasing tiny falling parts.

Some more pics
 
   Last week I´ve got myself entangled with my ship´s windlasses. On AL instructions there are 6 of them and so, I began to cut, sand and drill the small pieces of wood.
 

 
   After lots of it, I realised AL didn´t send all the wood I needed - frustration! Got some time sorting it out till finally decided to use another type of wood from my scrapbox (this one, some brazilian wood - still have to know what type it is):
 

 
   As the first attempt was a fumble, thought some testing would be great and read carefully about what the windlass should look. AL gave me some metal for bars, first I painted them black, to a poor result - after scanning lots of immages I found that metal wasn´t common for that purpose and so, made some bars from toothpicks:
 

 

 
   Following, the barless windlass, and then, the ready one - already varnished (still shining):
 

 

 
   Next entry I´ll bring the boxes and containers I´ll keep on junk´s compartment.
 
(After reading my own post and seeing my pictures, a thought comes to mind - I really do need more light for my workbench)

Update time. I finished the lower hull planking, sanded and filled the gaps, and I gave it a light coat of cherry stain.
 
I still have to do more sanding before I apply the clear coat. All comments welcome.

After painting the britannia cast belay pins with acrylic paint by hand and having it not work out I tryed wooden ones and they lookd horribly out of scale and too short  then I tryd brass ones from my syren kit and they were too long I decided to clean off the paint which was a pain in the butt and spray the 7mm cast belay pins with a flat black primer and im very happy with the result.Should have just spray painted in the 1st place lesson learnt!! 
 

 

 

 

 

 

Progress in my AVS build to date.  I'm using wood, no paint.  Cherry, blood wood, rosewood, yellow heart , walnut, holly, boxwood and African black wood.  Next step is rigging the cannons.
 
Dave

Hola a todos:
 
Finally I decided to place the gunports for the cannons. Initially I had no plan to add the rear (holding) ropes and put only the ones that are in the front, because I had not a clear idea how to do it. The solution was to dip the yarn in diluted white glue and dry it vertically until hardened.
 

 
To put the door in place, and having the hole for the yarn ready, the operation was very simple.
 

 
Saludos

Thanks Russ, will do.
Frank

Augie and I have been swapping tall tales about scrap piles we managed to collect. I decided to look deeply into this hoarder's delight.
 
First, I have a tube on my workbench that holds current or recently used pieces. Second, when I don't think I'll have an immediate need for some of it, it goes into my primary scrap pile in the front of my supply closet. After that, any  good stuff goes into my secondary scrap pile a little deeper in my storage closet, then after that, I have a complete junk pile that I keep just in case all the other scrap piles fail me. I also have all the cut out forms for shaping and bending wood. Last resort is my lumber scrap pile in my garage. I guess I am an addicted hoarder. You never know when one of those scrap piles will yield a trophy!

Today , Was a day of many Hats, I started by masking the deck and then spaying 3 coats of Flat white ( I did not want the glare from the gloss ) I then trimmed the cockpit Coamings, sanded them, and Stained them Cherry . Then I Started making the Pintles and Gudgeons , This is the first time that I have made metal parts ( I learned how to make them here on M.S.W. ) The Coamings have not been glued in. Here are the results

Thanks for checking in on me and helping me out Russ. It helps me out a lot.
 
Cheers!

@ Charley. Thanks for taking the time to look at my build. There are a lot of Syrens on MSW, so help is easy to find.
@ Karl. Welcome back old friend! Thanks for tagging along!
 
I have begun to carve the bearding line. I have to admit I had no idea what it meant to produce a bearding line before. But thanks to the detailed instructions it is well explained why it is needed, coupled with the rabbet strip.
 
So to begin it was a matter of curving the rabbet strip around the bow of the bulkhead former. After soaking the strip in water for about 20 minutes, it became like rubber! Basswood is so easy to work with when it comes to curved areas of the build.
I then added the rabbet strip on the base of the bulkhead former. Allowed this dry over night, before removing the rubber bands, clamps etc.
 


 
Next step was to start carving the beading line. I think I have created the correct shape, but other builders will be able to tell me otherwise. According to the instructions as long there is a distinct gap between the keel plates and the rabbet strip then it should make planking easier.
 



 
I then added the stem knee and keel. Once the stem knee was removed from the plywood frame, I cleaned up most of the laser burn marks. However as it will be covered in copper plates/painted later I didn't make too much of a fuss on removing the burn marks. Next was to carve the top section of the stem knee too allow the figure head to be placed neatly later on. I don't have a photo of this step, but I did make sure the figure head fits nice and snug.
 



 
I'm now working on the bulkheads. Firstly removing them from the plywood frames. I did find some were quite brittle and broke at the section where the bulwarks will be placed. Care must be taken when performing the final stages of fairing the hull.
 
Once they were removed I dry fitted them to the bulk head former. This was a long process as they were all a very tight fit. I did have to remove a lot of the burn marks on each of the bulk heads, and the bulkhead former, in order to make them fit better.
 


 
Then I had to make sure the printed lines on each bulk head lined up with the corresponding ones on the bulk head former. Some to create a bit of bulk hanging over at the deck level. But I can remove this at a later stage. It's only about 0.5mm hangover, so it shouldn't create any big issue.
 
 
 
Now I have a question for Chuck, or any other Syren builder. The instructions state to make sure all the bulk heads located at the Bow end of the ship face towards the Bow. They are labelled with "letters". All the bulk heads at the Stern end are "numbered", so need to face towards the bowel. 
 
However. There is one bulk head that has a strange symbol on it. It sits about mid way up the ship:
 

 
The instructions doesn't state which way this bulk head should face. Does anyone know which way it should be installed? Whether it be with the symbol facing towards the stern? or the bow?
 
Any help would be appreciated
 
Thanks for watching
 
Adam
 
 
 
 
 
 

The stanchions that came with the Mamoli kit I feel are too thick and clumsy. They just don’t seem to be to scale. I would be a lot of work to file them down and I’m not sure the results would be worth the effort. If I am to drill the stanchion openings now, I need to know what I putting in there to determine the size and shape. So, I’m going to take a stab at making them with 3/64” “music wire” for stiffness of the posts and connected to copper plate (to be determined) bent to cradle the railing; more on that effort later. At this point I haven’t determined the size of the futtock plates.
 

Time for another update, I got a decent amount done this time, I installed the stem post, stern post, keel, transom and bulworks. Next I will plank the out side of the transom. All comments wecolme.

Woehoew starboard side of lower gun deck cannons finished I dare say it worked out pretty OK regarding this is my first time doing somethin like this. It required super glue, toothpicks, a little weight and a lot of patiencie will clean up later! I like it!
 
What do you guys think? Enjoy the pictures
 
 

Another minor update.
This time I decided to experiment a bit with my “woodcarving talents” ..
Note .. I have practically non-experience with woodcarving .. 
 
After having darkened the ornaments on the supplied metal plate it shows that they are not very detailed.
 

 
So again a bit creativity is needed to produce something more detailed.
The easiest part seem to be the lower part of it, so I started out with these.
 
The choice of wood I used:
It needed to be a light color and without much grain, the obvious choice would be boxwood ..
But finding boxwood for a reasonable price doesn’t seem to be that easy so, I decided to give it a try with abachi.
 
The tools I used:
- a very sharp scalpel (blade 11)
- a printout of the ornament on a sheet of transparent paper 
- electrical iron for transferring the printout on to the wood   
- a magnifier glass with light 
 
I started out with drilling holes for the openings and carved roughly the edges
 

 
Followed by carving the complete outline of the ornament 
 

 
After this I gently removed wood from the top and bottom to simulate the up/under “snake like pattern” I had pictured in my mind.
 

 
And "finally" starting to round all roughly cut edges into smoothly curved lines
 

 
It turns out for me that starting carving with abachi wood was not a bad idea after all.
It is a soft but firm wood and the grains are not that visible, but most important I find it very easy to shape with a scalpel  
 
..I must admit that I’m pleased with my first results..