CharlieZardoz

Hi Doc! Regarding quarter badges for the ship I would say yes she should have them or at least I would add them. Reason is 1 most ships at that time with a quarterdeck had them in the cabin and also the Halifax and similar type ships were all standard merchant schooners which were converted for battle so they all had that apple shape heavy design vs the other type of ship the Bermuda sloop or other sloops and galleys which would have probably lacked such a cabin space.
 
 
Aside from that regarding name there are a few options if you are looking for one. There were two Independence's active at the same time the 1776 Rhode Island sloop of 8 guns and the 1776 Massachusetts brigantine of 10 guns. Neither really fit a Halifax/Sultana style schooner however no measurements are on record so nothing against naming her Independence.
 
Hahn's colonial schooner book mentions a list of armed schooners employed at that time Hope, S Lawrence, Gaspey, Magdalen, Chaleur and St John. I imagine many of these looked like Chaleur or maybe Edward Hawke (the Marblehead schooner). Gaspee is depicted in Millar's book on the Continental Navy looking something similar to the schooner Baltick or Franklin. He also shows a few other schooners in that book of similar lines to your kit. Not exact but these are of course all conjecture. That said ive seen a version of Gaspee using either the kit or Halifax and it looked rather nice. Some pics below

The photo is sufficient for me to understand how the pin/screw is supposed to connect to the carriage. Thank you so much this will give me what I need to complete the carronade

Great article very informative. Not many images of carriage evolution but the British and American carronades look essentially identical at least enough so that the small caldercraft carronade can work. I've already made a laser pattern for the carriage based of the alert plans and will add a screw design based of the plans of corel Ranger.

I was just in Bayside today! Good bagels I'm familiar with Vallejo so will give that a try. The tung, woodcraft and miniwax are all what I used before they seem to be the best (or most preferred) out there. For the lacquer I may try testors and see what I think of those. It may be a case of using certain finishes in certain places on a model and others elsewhere and mix it up. I liked the tung on the cherry more than miniwax, which just made it look dullish.
 
Also I agree about the walnut the color is very nice so hoping cherry will come off similar

Chapelle shows these ships with the -er "quoins" on his plan for the revenue cutters. So does the Mamoli and Krick models, but Corel ranger shows the screw design. Yet the Bluejacket kit has a different design for the truck (with wheels) and the corel doesn't have the "extended muzzle" while Krick and Alert does. Also Chapelle shows Fair Rosamond with a pin/screw design dated 1833 and caldercraft has the pin design for it's hms Pickle and hms Ballahoo of 1802... so the bottom line is I'm quite confused. Not in what you are saying jbshan but in how these kits are all over the map with armament. All I really need to know is when was the pin/screw invented at least then I will know if it was in service by 1818-1825. Guess some research is in order.

Charlie, I just PM'ed you a couple photos of the Corel plans showing the carronade in detail. Hope they're helpful, although I wouldn't trust Corel very far on the accuracy front.

Well yeah I'll definitely make the unique carriage from scratch I can see it just won't do. The barrel itself has some variation but it generally looks acceptable. The main issue is finding a carronade 14-15mm or so in size as the ship used a 12 pounder so at that size options (and detailing) is limited. However look at some of the revenue cutter kits and what do we see? Krick is of course the most detailed but the main concern I have is that only the corel ranger has that pin looking thing in the back. The rest have only the hook. Now adding a hook to the carronade I purchased would be easy, as would drilling in a teeny powder hole up top and whatever that bump in the front is. But removing the pin would mean removing the whole back which sounds like a pain so anyone know if the corel kit with its pin cannon was correct? If not aside from renting a metalwork lathe and making my own are there other options out there for teeny weeny carronades anyone is aware of? I've already checked corwall uk. 

So basically I am preparing for another laser run. This time the parts will be made from cherry and holly woods ie the keel and rudder etc. In the diagram I did some measurements of how big everything should be. The hatch covers will just be strips of wood of the appropriate lengths so they don't need laser work but the cabin is a complicated wedge shaped thing with windows and a door. To help me I downloaded and rescaled the old Italian plans of Alert to give me a basic idea of shape and construction of these parts, the cabin needs to match the camber of the deck. Also to help me is Dirk's "Dubz" very detail picasa construction images of his krick Alert. The holly is for the deck coaming for that I am going to take the scan of the hull from above and just render those into the program that way it fits perfectly to the hull
 
I'm, also in the market for an appropriate scale carronade if anyone has any suggestions?

Great article very informative. Not many images of carriage evolution but the British and American carronades look essentially identical at least enough so that the small caldercraft carronade can work. I've already made a laser pattern for the carriage based of the alert plans and will add a screw design based of the plans of corel Ranger.

I was just in Bayside today! Good bagels I'm familiar with Vallejo so will give that a try. The tung, woodcraft and miniwax are all what I used before they seem to be the best (or most preferred) out there. For the lacquer I may try testors and see what I think of those. It may be a case of using certain finishes in certain places on a model and others elsewhere and mix it up. I liked the tung on the cherry more than miniwax, which just made it look dullish.
 
Also I agree about the walnut the color is very nice so hoping cherry will come off similar

I planked the inboard surface of the transom with red heart.  I'll trim it to final size tomorrow.  I also drew up the design and cut out the boxwood fascia that will decorate the transom.  This is similar to what was installed on my Patrick Henry AVS. Lastly, I installed all the bulwark frames.  These are 3mm X 2mm boxwood pieces.

Have not tried it but reviewed info available from internet. Tung oil is a seed oil. It has been used in coatings for centuries in China. The dark form is a mixture of tung oil and gilsonite which I believe is an asphalt of some kind. . The supplier sells a version with 3 dipentene solvent to cut viscosity. I recommend you review the SDS (safety data sheet) for product before using especially safe handling and protective gear. Terpene solvents are also quite flammable. You can find more info on the constituents by googling the list CAS numbers. Pure tung oil dries through oxidation like linseed oil darkens with age but at a slower rate than linseed oil. asphalt also oxidizes but I could not find any info on its impact on that property either positive or negative. My educated guess is that it is substantially less oxidatively stable than pure tung
Jaxboat

Here is the transom glued in place.  I used epoxy.  I made some molding out of boxwood using my Artesania Latina scrapers.  There will be two horizontal strips across the entire transom.  One below the windows and one above.  I haven't worked out what else I may include back there yet.

Thanks, guys.
 
Charlie:! I haven't thought about a name yet, only it won't be Independence". I'm open to ideas and suggestions. If I choose a real historic vessel name, I may have to deal with the nitpickers who'll point out inaccuracies in my build compared to the actual historic ship!

I'm curious Doc, are you planning on naming this model Independence? There were a couple of schooners in service at this time as the model is a variation of Halifax you have a few options at your disposal, Gaspee for example. Just intrigued

I grew up in Bayside
 
I'm probably not the best person to ask about varnishes and lacquers.  I've never tried lacquer.  For varnish, I bought a small bottle of Vallejo varnish.  They make paints and finishes for wargaming miniature figurines and models, and are very high quality.  The paints and the varnish go on very thin and easily.  I'm avoiding paints on my larger scale models, but I've been using them on ship-in-bottle models that I work on here and there.
 
If you're looking at stains, I've really liked working with General Finishes products which you can find at Woodcraft.  They go on very evenly, no smell, easy clean up.  I recently used their blue stain on boxwood to good effect (at least I like it) on my Pegasus build.  I also used GF Antique Oak on pear to get a nice deep brown look (interestingly though, if you use that stain on a light wood like maple, it turns the wood a grayish color).
 
For finishes generally, I really liked using Tung Oil - they sell at "Tung Oil Finish" which is only partially made up with tung oil, but I use 100% tung oil.  Minwax wipe-on-poly is another one I like.  I did some tests with my Badger, and thought the tung oil barely edged out the wipe-on-poly.  A year or two later, I looked at the same test piece, and really couldn't tell the difference between the two.  The oiled finish really brings wood to life in my opinion, especially on woods like walnut (I'm sure cherry is another that becomes very rich).  It's too bad that walnut doesn't have the finer properties of woods like pear and boxwood, because oiled walnut is absolutely gorgeous in my opinion.

Haha it's a nice place to live!  I may try varnish and lacquer as well and add that to the list. Any brands you recommend? The holly was extremely grey almost green so a bit of yellow was actually a good thing. The poly gave the holly a basswoodlike color though tung and natural stain was too much for the wood.  With cherry the oils look nice, boxwood and pear it was 50/50. But it all gave me an idea of what approach I plan on using I mean mixing stains with paint is another option, so there is more experimenting to be had.

Hey Charlie, looking fantastic.  Lots of interesting planning and techniques, thanks for sharing!  
 
I've also been doing a lot of experimentation with various woods, stains and finishes on my various logs.  I haven't tried holly yet, but I've read that holly does tend to take a yellowish tone with certain finishes.  I think a quick search of logs on here and you can find out what finishes people tried.  I would think that most oils and wipe-on-poly would yellow the holly.  I wonder if a varnish would have the same result?  One thing I've found is that certain woods turn almost black when the end grain is oiled (e.g., redheart).  However, when I applied varnish to the end grain of redheart, the color of the redheart was preserved nicely. It and other finishes like lacquer are certainly worth a look.
 
Queens is my home town too by the way!

yeah, been a while since last post, have done a lot since then, including redoing entire port side that was 1/8 inch to high, don't ask me how it happened, but I somehow got it on the bases crooked.  I am drilling holes in the pin rails now, I will finish the deck furniture deck framing around the masts.  The head rails were a real bitch to fit properly, not the horizontal ones, the vertical timbers.

Carronades came in during the Late Unpleasantness between the American Colonies as then were and Britain.  By the 1780s they were becoming numerous on RN ships.  The earliest ones were on trucked carriages, with trunnions on the middle of the barrel and quions at the rear for elevation.  The latest ones had a lug on the bottom for a pin to hold the barrel to a sliding mount and the elevating screw at the rear.  Additionally, the later ones had an extended muzzle to take the blast farther from the rigging when firing through the bulwarks between the shrouds.
That may help you date any barrel/mount setup you encounter.  Lavery, 'Arming and Fitting' covers these details.

Gluing a breech hook to the carronade is no problem imo and I can add a teeny gunsight in the front using a metal wire. That's the plan anyways this carronade is eensie weensie 13.5 mm I'm going to assume that unless someone tells me otherwise that having a pin screw is a wholly acceptable for this model

Well yeah I'll definitely make the unique carriage from scratch I can see it just won't do. The barrel itself has some variation but it generally looks acceptable. The main issue is finding a carronade 14-15mm or so in size as the ship used a 12 pounder so at that size options (and detailing) is limited. However look at some of the revenue cutter kits and what do we see? Krick is of course the most detailed but the main concern I have is that only the corel ranger has that pin looking thing in the back. The rest have only the hook. Now adding a hook to the carronade I purchased would be easy, as would drilling in a teeny powder hole up top and whatever that bump in the front is. But removing the pin would mean removing the whole back which sounds like a pain so anyone know if the corel kit with its pin cannon was correct? If not aside from renting a metalwork lathe and making my own are there other options out there for teeny weeny carronades anyone is aware of? I've already checked corwall uk. 

Well yeah I'll definitely make the unique carriage from scratch I can see it just won't do. The barrel itself has some variation but it generally looks acceptable. The main issue is finding a carronade 14-15mm or so in size as the ship used a 12 pounder so at that size options (and detailing) is limited. However look at some of the revenue cutter kits and what do we see? Krick is of course the most detailed but the main concern I have is that only the corel ranger has that pin looking thing in the back. The rest have only the hook. Now adding a hook to the carronade I purchased would be easy, as would drilling in a teeny powder hole up top and whatever that bump in the front is. But removing the pin would mean removing the whole back which sounds like a pain so anyone know if the corel kit with its pin cannon was correct? If not aside from renting a metalwork lathe and making my own are there other options out there for teeny weeny carronades anyone is aware of? I've already checked corwall uk. 

So the keel needed a few modifications. I decided to separate the little sprit piece in the front as I noticed in diagrams of the ship Louisiana (from the color scheme a bit back). This allows me two things. One I can vary the color from the keel which is black and have that piece natural wood to make it fancy. And more functionally I realized the masts are raised about 4 degrees and while the keels take that into account when the model comes together it might not work out and if that happens I can just redo the front piece rather than have to do the whole keel.
 
 

Your "bump" looks like a gunsight, which some guns had and some didn't. Notice, on the Krick image, that the sight on the muzzle lines up with another reference point toward the breech (rear). The "hook" is where the breeching rope passes through; this is the heavy line that controls the recoil. The Corel casting doesn't have this, which is annoying. I just wrapped my rope around the breech itself, as was done on some long guns.