ccoyle

Nice execution of a beautiful and unusual subject!

Welcome! Many of us ship modelers are also closet aircraft fans (see signature below). Cheers!

Hello, Spooky. Welcome aboard! Your project is looking good so far. It's true that Polaris would have been easier, but not greatly so. Albatros (if I'm thinking of the right kit) is a topsail schooner, so the rigs will be similar, except that Albatros will have one or two square-rigged sails -- not too much to worry about. Rigging can be daunting, but no more so than double-planking a hull for the first time. Make sure to read through all the instructions and diagrams, and think of the task as a series of concrete steps. OcCre's photo instructions and diagrams are usually pretty good and should be a big help during the process. As for your gun ports, they're not half bad; perhaps a little work with a square or flat file will square them to your liking. As for a third model, any model of Golden Hinde will be pure conjecture on the designer's part. Reliable source material from that time period is notoriously sparse. If that's the sort of vessel that appeals to you, I'm sure it will be within your abilities once you have completed your first two projects. Good luck!

Hello, Tomek! I for one kind of find it reassuring that someone who designs such elegant models describes his work as "average" -- it gives hope that truly average modelers may make something presentable upon completing one of your kits. Kind regards!

Beautiful result -- congratulations!

Absolutely. People do it all the time.

While waiting for paint to arrive (no ETA yet), I took care of a few miscellaneous bits. First, I trimmed the thwart to fit. Then I wiped out the remaining resin dust with a damp rag, followed by a start on taping up the rails. No pics of the last item -- just tape, dontcha know.

Outstanding!

I have to agree with your assessment, Dave. I bought the Dremel stand years ago and quickly gave up on it. Nevertheless, I've been dragging it around on all my moves, cross-country and all. Don't ask me why.

Annoying production schedule hiccup: The paint I ordered was damaged in transit and discarded thanks to UPS. I haven't heard yet from the shipper when (or even if) they will reship the order. I'm a little miffed, because I felt like I was on a roll and was anxious to start painting. Now it's just more waiting ...

They're a provider of affordable cremation services. Oh, wait -- that's Neptune Society, not Neptunia. Never mind! 😜

As popeye has pointed out, Dan passed away last year, but he was indeed a master of the card medium. As a card modeler myself, and having had mixed results with Halinski (all down to my abilities, not to any faults with the kits) I cannot stress enough: DO NOT start card modeling with a Halinski kit! Halinski are the 'gold standard' of card modeling, and their kits have a well-deserved reputation for detail and realism. But that detail and realism comes at a price -- Halinski kits are probably the most challenging kits on the market to assemble. When your Mk V kit arrives (which I also own a copy of), you will be dumbstruck when you see the number of parts in the kit, especially small parts. I would advise anyone starting out in card modeling to start simple -- there is a multitude of new skills to be learned, e.g. scoring, cutting, folding, rolling, etc. You don't even need to necessarily start with aircraft; the same skills are used for ships, architecture, etc. Spend some time looking around and you can even find plenty of free models (from reputable sources, of course) to build, allowing you to booger as many attempts as needed to get your skills down pat (we have a tutorial based on one such kit in our card modeling section). Then, you can try one or two models from publishers whose offerings are still nice but less complicated, e.g. Kartonowa Kolekcja. Have some fun looking around at vendor websites to get an idea of what's available in card. A few of my favorites are: Paper Shipwright WAK Orlik GPM Have fun!

Oh, dear -- I learned today that the kit's designer, Darius Lapinski, has made available a 3D-printed hull for this kit. Heart (and wallet) be still!

I'm pretty sure that's the same wheel that was included in my ancient Corel Flying Fish kit. It wouldn't surprise me at all to learn that somebody -- maybe Corel or Amati -- is churning these out in bulk for use by other companies in the region.

Welcome, Ken. I had a look at your drawing -- very nice! Artistic skills will come in handy during your ship modeling adventure. Cheers!

Best way to do that is to post pics of the kit box & its contents here, along with brand name and scale.

I don't know diddly about marine paints and varnishes, so I went with Interlux Brightside, the one-part polyurethane topcoat recommended by CLC, Interlux Pre-Kote build-up primer, and Interlux Schooner varnish. I shopped around and found a place in Florida that sells these for a bit less than CLC and ordered today. I had my daughter look at the color options, and she happened to pick the exact two colors I was thinking about, so that was nice. I then trawled the Internet looking for boats wearing that brand and those colors, and decided I liked the blue better, thus the canoe will wear Sapphire Blue on the outside, contrasted with Seattle Gray, a nice light gray, on the inside. Here's a pic of a boat being done in Sapphire Blue. And here's one that shows kinda the look I'm going for, albeit in a different brand of paint. Now for more anxious waiting ...

Very striking model -- congratulations!

Amati's Elizabethan galleon makes a beautiful model.

Yikes! I can't believe it has been over a month since I updated this thread! Of course, COVID and its aftermath ate up three of those weeks, so there's that. Anyways, I have an announcement: I ... I think I'm ready to paint. 😲 Yes, I finally got all the sanding done, inside and out. Now, it would be sweet if I actually had the paint on hand, but I don't, so the next step is to order paint, primer, and varnish. Not being too pleased with my interior finish work, I'm pretty well set on painting the interior. My plan is to go with either a dark green or dark blue exterior and a light gray interior (I intend to fish from my canoe, so I think gray will cut down on the glare); the rails and decks will get varnished. And that's it for now.

I feel the same. Seam stitches and bolt rope lacing are essentially impossible to duplicate to scale on a model and are not visible on full-size ships in any case. Whenever I have made sails, I have only used glue for panels and bolt ropes.

I have no opinion on the scale (1/70). The finished model is 754 mm (roughly 30"), so it's a fairly large model. As I described in the review, the wood elements are very good, but I would say that the fittings are average. Were I to build it, I would definitely want to upgrade some fittings. But, as the prototype demonstrates, a straightforward out-of-box build can produce a striking model.

Don't look for it anytime soon!

Review has been added!

If you have completed the second planking, then you have already made it past the point where many beginners give up on such a large project, so stick with it!