mowens63

Ok, its time to post this weekend's progress. (admiral wants to go to a concert so there will not be much progress today.) I mentioned before the bulwarks are made of 4 pieces of thin plywood and are likely to delaminate if soaked in water. Also I could just see the issues of having to line up 2 different pieces at midships. So I created 1 full length piece out of 1/32" Balsa. Now I know that the next step should have been to begin the 2nd layer of planking. But as I started to line off the bulkheads. I became very concerned with how fragile those Bulwarks were. So I decided to reverse things a bit and plank the bulwarks.
 
The plans call for planking the bluwarks inside and out with the same strips as the 2nd layer of the hull. This is when I ran into a major problem. There was not enough wood! I counted out the strips and there was only enough to plank the hull below the deckline and no extra! God bless my Jim Saw. I found a piece of Walnut that was close to the same color etc. and I made myself enough planks to plank the bulwarks. I used the micrometer attachment to get the strips down to .75 mm. It worked beautifully. This was the first time I had used my slitting blade.
 
I also had long ago decided this model would not have any paint. it was going to have all of its color from the wood used to build it. So I decided to plank the inside of the Bulwarks with a lighter wood and a different color from the deck. I used some leftover deck planking from another kit.
 
You will also see that I took the opportunity to install the knees for the Transom. I am planking that now.
 
The last time I worked on this model many years ago. I wanted to try my hand at tapering the masts using the electric drill lathe. So my final picture shows her on the stand with the masts and bow sprit in place. This will also give the admiral an idea how much space she needs to find in the house.