mtdoramike

I live in a small town without those type of things. No Kinkos or Staple near me, wish there were. I tried an arcitectural firm a few years ago and they wanted to charge the same fee as drafting house plans at $50.00 per page and with 6 pages of plans, I said no thank you. Most government agencies will not allow their equipment to be used for private business. We do have an Office Depot here in town, I'll give them a try, but odds are they don't have a large enough printer. That is the problem with a lot of businesses around here, they contract out this sort of thing since they can down load the plans onto a CD and send it out to be processed. No, hand delivery to where you live is not an option, but thank you for the offer hahahahahaahaha. I was looking for an on-line source where I can mail the CD to them and have the printed plans mailed to me. I was curious if anyone here might have a on-line source that they use.    

The format on the CD is PDF.

Model Expo used to sell them, but I see they no longer.

to scale at a reasonable price? They are PDF and should be 1/84 scale.

I bought the Billings Danish Training ship Danmark kit off of Ebay for $99.00 a while back. I built the Danmark, which took me about 1200 hours give or take an hour or three. It was a wonderful kit and I would not hesitate to buy it and build it again even at a higher price. The fittings package came with the kit and quite extensive. I can't recall a single issue with the build. The plans are quite good and left little to the imagination. I can't really speak for the directions, because I don't usually use them. The kit came with pre-printed sail material as well.

Here are a few photos of the kit as it arrived to me. 

All in all, it was a pleasure to build, yes, they do use quite a few plastic parts, but if you like to kit bash, that isn't an issue. Now, this kit is an advanced level kit, but with a little help, a novice shouldn't have any real issue with it. 

The finished model is currently sitting in the lobby of a Danish West Indies trading company in Ft. Lauderdale Florida.

Thanks Bob, but that big piece would have been great, but no certificate of authenticity other than what someone wrote on the wood with a sharpie.

I found a piece on Etsy and it should be here within a week or so. It ran me Close to $60.00, but the museum wanted about $300.00 for a small 4" X 2" X1/2" size piece. Hell, I could have bought one of their bowls they advertised on their website and got a lot more than what they were wanting to send me. They said they were protecting their brand and you have to submit a request for the wood and state why you want it and what you intend to do with it and then they decide whether you are worthy of a piece of Victory wood or not. 

Absolutely beautiful job, not a gap at all in any of it. Perfection takes time.

Great looking job. What glue did you use to lay the second layer of planking?

If this is your fist kit, all I can say Is WOW, I'm going to love to see your work after you get a couple more under your belt. Like I said, WOW!

MTDORAMIKE This is my first ever build of a ship, I looked and did my homework regards the kit to cut my teeth on, If money was no object I would have gone Caldercraft all the way but it's a lot of cash for a first time build. Also instructions were the best on the Constructo, that said you do have to read ahead of your actual work to get the idea, they sort of think we're all experienced in this hobby. ( reading your comment you have built many). Manual is all colour as I'm sure your past constructo kits were. I did need to surf the net to find out what Ayous wood was / looked like as it's not marked up, just bundeled with a band around. I actually had to do this with all the timber due to not not knowing what they looked like, Oh the ply hull main section as with most kits was bent, I used the cannon mount timber to clamp it straight, the captains cabin fairing ply was marked up back to front on the paper page supplied. The planking went really well, took a while but went well, Contstructo do supply 0.5 mm x 6 mm veneer strips for those who struggle planking plus they are all the same shade. (I have no idea if this is the norm with there kits). I started using the brass pins in the kit which require a pre-drilling of the plank to prevent splitting. I then used the coloured pins in the pictures previous, they clamp really well and speed up the process by saving pre-drilling. Oh also the grates main spar should run fore to aft but the plans show port to starboard on the lower deck but upper deck the correct way. Mine are as the plan but only the purest will see it, still I may put mine right way soon. Wow I'm going on here but hope I've helped, get this kit and at sub £200 you wont be disappointed

 

 

Thanks for all the info, if I remember on some kits Constructo supplied veneer strips for double planking if needed, but that was later on I think and not in their early kits. I was able to never double plank a Constructo kit and usually finished off the hull with clear varnish. What stunning wood it would turn out to be. I actually found a Constructo Victory kit for $411.00 shipped in the U.S.

I have to agree, with all the Constructo kits that I built, bending the wood was the worst part of it. It's beautiful wood, but tends to be a bit brittle and they usually don't do a double planked hull. I found that wetting the wood thoroughly with hot water and lemon juice seemed to help break down the fiber a bit and helped it bend a little easier. But for those tighter bends, I would use a pair of plank crimping piers with just enough force to help the wood bend a little more and without causing too much damage to the wood. This was done after soaking for a couple of hours. 

WOW, what beautiful work.

Get to building that model, don't worry about it, you got's plenty of help around here so nap to it:) I have built a couple of mamoli  kits and like them. The plans are great, instructions are quite good depending on which level ship model kit you get, if it's for beginners or intermediate level the instruction will reflect this just as if you were building an advanced level kit. Use this as your guide which kit better suits your ability. But there are people all the time building advanced level kits with little to no experience.

Mamoli's wood is quite good depending on the price of the kits, I have found with kit manufactures, the cheaper the cost of the kit the cheaper the materials. I too built the Mamoli Constitution and ditched the metal galley stufdf and built my own from wood. 

WOW, they must think they have gold. I don't mind paying $50.00-$60.00 US for a small piece the size of 3 or 4  inches long by 2 inches or so wide and about 1/4" to 1/2 inch thick. I would just like to make a few mast heads or anchor collars out of it. I could probably get away with half that size really.

I have gotten quite a few pieces of the Constitution in the past from their gift shop and got good chunks for like $15.00 + a few bucks for shipping. But that has been close to 10 years ago, they may have also changed since then.

I'm looking for a Piece of wood from the real HMS Victory ship. I have tried getting some from the Victory Museum and gift shop, This is the response I got from them with no further word:

"The National Museum of the Royal Navy is now the sole supplier of authenticated wood and copper that has been removed from HMS Victory, and indeed is now the owner of the ship itself.

We do indeed sell arisings to enable them to be turned into a variety of products, examining each request to ensure that it falls in line with our objectives.

If you could let me have some rough details of what you are after, and for what purpose you require it, I will get back to you."

So if someone in the neck of the woods or has a piece of Victory wood that they are willing to, part with and willing to help a brother out, it would be appreciated. I'm willing to pay for a small piece, I would just like to incorporate the wood into the Victory model that I'm building.

Thanks,

Mike

The planking job looks very good on the Deck(s)

I love the planking process when I'm not cursing up a blue streak hahahahahaha.

Wow, what a beautiful planking job. That wood coloration is gorgeous. May I ask, what is your opinion so far on this victory kit? I love Constructo kits for their materials and have built several over the years.

I have found most all kits from Manufactures like Latina, Occre, Mamoli, Constructo, Mantua are usually questionable about accuracy and some have decent materials while others have great materials. To me, out of all the manufactures kits that I have built/kit bashed Two stand out as of the highest quality as far as most of the materials and believe it or not, Constructo and Model Shipways top my list. But out of those two kit manufactures, accuracy goes to Model Shipways hands down. When I buy a kit, the first thing I do is ditch the instructions, then I look through the wood and see if there is anything decent and in most cases I use most of the wood from all of the kit manufactures. Now the metal pieces are questionable, if they look good and seem to be some what historically accurate, I will use them, but chances are I will fashion my own quite often out of wood rather than metal.

To me, I prefer a bit more accuracy than quality of the kit, but I'm not going to beat up a kit manufacture if they aren't spot on. I'm building a model from a kit whether bashed or strictly kit built. It will not be museum worthy no matter how much time I put into it. Now, if I'm going to scratch build something that to me should be museum worthy then quality and accuracy would be paramount. People spend way to much time worrying about the small stuff when they could be modelling something nice to donate, give to their children or sell.  

I only posted it here in case someone seeing your build likes the model and would like to build it. It's not my auction, I would be building it instead of selling it if it were mine. I don't know if the seller in a vendor or just some guy who thought the model looked cool in the hobby shop and paid the retail price only to realize it was more than he could handle and is now just trying to unload it and recoop some of his money back. This kit retails for like $900.00-$1000.00 in a hobby shop, but there's no way they would get any where near that selling it on ebay or after market.

But sorry to hijack your thread. Back to building

They have the Royal Louis kit on Ebay right now for $490.00 + $25.00 shipping. I'm sooooo tempted. But I have built a few Mamoli kits in the past and their quality seemed a bit lacking.

http://www.ebay.com/itm/271478783703?_trksid=p2055119.m1438.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT

What a gorgeous model. How many hours did you spend on the SOS every day. That is a ton of work to get done in that short amount of time. I know guys building the SOS and they are looking at a 10 year project:)

What a wonderful job you are doing on the Constructo version of the Constitution. I'm itching to build one of these myself. I have built the Mamoli version as well as the Model Shipways version of the Connie.

What a beautiful model. You did a splendid job on her and did her justice.

The model builder is always their own worst critic hahahahahahahaha, from a little distance away, any imperfections won't be noticed. I always look at model building like this, if the keel is straight, the mast are straight and in alignment the rest will work itself out. Although we strive for perfection, most ships were rough and not as smooth and beautiful as you may think. I always prefer a little weathered look.