ccoyle

Been a couple weeks since my last update. Was away from the ship yard on a little family vacation. Back to work on deck pieces. Built CPT Cook’s skylight and the two hatch “houses” (I guess).  Not sure of their nautical name. 

A minor update. I decided to press on and get the last bits and pieces of the launch out the way. These were the breasthook, windlass and rudder. They are fiddly little pieces that take a lot more time than their size would suggest. I did not have maple of sufficient thickness for the windlass so I ended up sandwiching three thinner pieces together. This was a particularly annoying piece to make. I cut the chamfers on the milling machine but it was one of those pieces where one false move out of the countless moves meant that I would have to chuck it out and start again. This happened on more than one occasion. Fitting it into the hull was also quite challenging but I used some thin-walled brass tube for the housing and brass rod for the axle to ensure that it does indeed turn. I drilled a hole in the side mounting block and then glued the first one in place and the fitted the second one along with the windlass. I had some problems with my geometry but I am not going to worry too much about it as it is pretty much hidden by boat structure. Handles were shaped out of 1.2x1.2mm maple.
 




It took several goes for the breasthook as no matter how I orientated it I was always left with a terminal weakness due to the grain of the wood. I persevered and eventually got one that did not snap in two which sadly was not the shapeliest one.
 

I fashioned the rudder and then tried a new tiller arrangement. I carved this out of a block of walnut. It looks quite clunky but I was a bit fearful of thinning it down even more as it was very fragile and I felt that it was about to snap with every pass of the file. It might be a piece more suited to 3D printing. I have yet to settle on the pintle and gudgeon detail. They are too fragile and I keep knocking them off. I may have to resort to epoxy.
 




Another piece of equipment that I added at this time was the boat hook. I had previously made one on the CAD according to the size of a historical example but this turned out to be far too small to be printed out successfully so I had to exaggerate the dimensions to get something workable. I doubled the size but this looked a tad overscaled when sat next to my trusty sailor. I wanted something more in keeping with the example shown in the famous 17th Century Rembrandt Van Rijn painting. This is over 100 years earlier than my version but I suspect that boat hook technology did not advance much as the hook on the end of a pole concept is hard to improve on. You can buy similar models today although newfangled aluminium telescopic poles are now de rigueur.



I tried to print out a smaller version, which was the devil to work with, but I am happier with the result. I initially printed it out all in one piece with head and handle but then decided it would look better if I printed the head separately and made the pole out of wood. I thinned out a toothpick to around 0.8mm diameter using sandpaper on the lathe. This equates to two-inch diameter in real life which is not outrageous. I made them around 2.4m long or just a shade under 40mm. I printed out 42 of the smaller heads and managed to safely release only 9 from the support raft and lost 3 of those to over-exuberant tweezer action and another two mysteriously vanished leaving me with a paltry four that made it onto their poles.
 



I had noticed that during some of BlueEnsigns build logs he populates his craft with a scale seated sailor figure to check the height of the thwarts and to see if everything is in place. Not wishing to over capitalise on the build, I thought that I could probably find a similar seated figure online for free and then print it out at home. I admit that I did not spend too much time searching but the only free seated figure I could find was a well-heeled Japanese lady. I figured that it would suffice for my purposes so I printed out a few to sit about in the boats and test out the equipment. Please note that this is just an exercise to check the scale of the built elements so I hope there will be no lectures about how it would be highly unlikely that an 18th century ship's boat would be crewed by posh Japanese ladies in high heels.



 
It was a fun but quite useful exercise as it gave a good illustration of the size of the boats and the heft of the equipment that I had produced. I had initially thought that this equipment too delicate but it turns out that I am erring on the beefy side. I am not going to do anything about it as I am at the limit of what I can produce with my shaky hands. I may have to consider the jump to 1:48 scale should I ever get round to finishing this ship and starting another.
 






 

 
 

Greetings:

Having finally decided how I want to deal with the saw, here's what I came up with. A pendulum saw would be appropriate for the type of roller table featured in the saw shed. Here is an example:

With this in mind, it was time to go to the scrap box to see what I could come up with:



The wood plank sits nicely on the rollers with just a bare minimum of clearance of the 2 wooden beams on either side of the saw. The saw machine is double hinged allowing it to be pulled across the table to saw the plank.

The remaining features of the saw shed (upper level, motor, drive shaft and belt) were next completed. These are all very well described in Grant's log so I won't repeat. There was no variation from the instructions. The final steps were construction of the cupola and the rusted metal roof. Here's a photo of some of the roof pieces after etching and some rust chalk applied.
 

 
Roofing in progress with cupola installed:
 


Prior to placing the roof supports and roof, I added 3 LED hanging lights. The wires are so small i just glued them to the overhead supports and vertical beams so the wires end up under the floor. These can be seen in some of the photos below of the completed saw shed.




And here are some photos with the lights on (with a worker wiping his brow):
 



Next up is the base which will begin the process of combining Foss landing and the Shipyard at Foss Landing.

jeff

4 the yard and other related builds and starting the planking
 
One of the main reasons for my builds is to help illustrate the story of the local shipyards.   So this build represents the Adams yard some 100 years in existence after family members began both in East Boothbay and North Boothbay.   They were near their end in 1916, but first let’s see what was going on around them.   Several  issues were going on across the Maine industry.
•    In the big picture, the WWI commencement and success of German U-boats caused a dramatic need for large 4 masted schooners starting by 1917.   
•    The British trawling industry had evolved to steel hull and steam driven since the 1890’s.  The American/ Boston market began that swing about 1908 ish.   Rice brothers next door in East Boothbay had recruited a Naval architect from Bath Iron works and won a contract for a steel hull lightship in 1916.  It would be followed by six steel draggers.
•    Despite the war, the movement into Maine summer cottage life fueled the demand for Power and Sailing yachts that had blossomed since about 1895.
•    The offshore fishing industry still had a need for large schooners and there were a few more years to go before the changeover to draggers.
•    More yards in town were expanding into steam driven commercial and some private vessels.  Marine engines of small to medium size were being built at Rice Brothers and installed in several yards.
•    Maine yards were able to build John Alden, Crowninshield and other designed racing yachts more economically than southern New England., and that benefit steadily fed the local market. 
 
So when New York client Mr. William W. Howard went to Thomas McManus for two new fast schooners, Boothbay was not surprisedly recommended.   Adams like Hodgdon and Rice Brothers in East Boothbay and Reed and Townsend Railway in downtown Boothbay harbor were all busy.    A few new lines were sketched onto on an existing 1908 drawing and Frank Adams, fourth generation builder, was off building another schooner.  Though it was late in his carrier, he had a few more builds in him. The Elizabeth Howard and Louise Howard schooners were launched in 1916 and 1917. As fast sailors they would typically collect fish in Nova Scotia and race it south.  Louise, a slightly shorter version, continued until 1925 when she went aground in the Carolinas.
 
Here are two images, one with the steam boat that ended service in 1912. They both are overall photos showing the Adams yard building a 4 masted schooner in 1903. Between then and 1916 the Rice Brothers yard to the far left expanded significantly to become the largest in town. Adams continued to build both schooners and a mix of other vessels, and Hodgdon in the foreground , though since relocated, is today in its 5th generation.
 
Progress
A little delay as summer has arrived. I just took a 3 week trip to see some of western Canada and buffalo at Teddy Roosevelt's National Park in North Dakota...much fun.      We are now in the long planking sequence   
Not unusual for me, I ran into an oops.  My slitting saw blade, purchased from Byrnes several years back, did not really want to slice any more through even 1/8th popular.   I said to myself no worries I’ll just use the normal 36 tooth carbide blade and chop up more wood. …oops wrong?   Perhaps that blade is old too, but what I realized after setting several planks was that they were a bit rough.  They had dings and undercuts….a true sign of my amateur status in milling.   
I went online to find replacement blades and was very sorry to learn that Jim Byrnes had passed away.  I was lucky to have met him once when he came to the NRJ conference, either in Mystic or New Bedford. His great attitude convinced me to try out his saw. It is great!  Many of us are very lucky to have one.
 
I tried again to search blogs thinking I am not the only person who would like to find blades that have a ½ inch hole for the arbor. Even more unusual the little inserts to make other sizes reduce to ½ inch.   Finally, a very recent post said the site as open to sell blades. I immediately got some on order. In the meantime, I continued using “rough planks”.  Fortunately, this model is all about white paint and I chose poplar for that reason. The extra dings and over cuts from that rough blade will eventually get hidden. 
To catch up, here is the set up and first planks:
1   here is the alignment and fixing of the bulkheads to the “ keelson assy”
2. here is the  built up transom
3. here is the roughed in bow block

4,5 .   here the fairing is done, and first planks milled. from the bow view we start to see the uniqueness of the stretched design
6.7      tada the  first plank is on.  

8,9      here the garboard is added. It was at this point that I did a light sanding to get off glue and stuff and realized the roughness of the planks and started looking for new saw blades.
10.   I leave with a picture only another model builder could enjoy. Almost every clamp I own is engaged.
Cheers 
 

Quite possibly the worst rigging diagram I have ever had to work with. Note that one end or the other end, sometimes both ends, of each line is not shown. And this is pretty much the only rigging diagram in the kit.
 

 
In photos, most of the bracing wires appear to be doubled. In some instances it looks like the pairs were wrapped in some kind of material. The upshot is that the cables look thicker. I will duplicate this effect by using wire for the rigging instead of EZ-Line. That means the technique will be a little different.
 
Here's the forest of struts mounted to the lower wing.
 

I got the cabane struts and their bracing done, so of course I had to give the top wing a trial fit.
 

Wing progress.
 

 

 
 

Yes, actually!
 
BTW, you probably already know this, but Tom Grigat built that very kit in one of his Modeling in Motion videos.

Some of the assemblies are quite small.

Yes, actually!
 
BTW, you probably already know this, but Tom Grigat built that very kit in one of his Modeling in Motion videos.

Quite possibly the worst rigging diagram I have ever had to work with. Note that one end or the other end, sometimes both ends, of each line is not shown. And this is pretty much the only rigging diagram in the kit.
 

 
In photos, most of the bracing wires appear to be doubled. In some instances it looks like the pairs were wrapped in some kind of material. The upshot is that the cables look thicker. I will duplicate this effect by using wire for the rigging instead of EZ-Line. That means the technique will be a little different.
 
Here's the forest of struts mounted to the lower wing.
 

Continuing on with my WW1 theme, I’m starting on the Lanchester armoured car offered by Copper State Models.  The number of frets with this kit are not huge but what sets the kit apart are the quality of the detailing and a most beautifully  detailed and colourized instruction manual on thick stock paper.  Lanchesters were the second most numerous armoured car in service during WW1 and was designed by the Admiralty Air Dept for the Royal Naval Air Service to support air bases and retrieve downed pilots.  Scott 
 

Painting started with careful moves not to delete the dark shades

After 1rst coat

After 2nd

After 3d

After the last one

Finished putting the boards down for the first layer.  A few gaps that need some filler, and a few bumps that will need to be smoothed out, but I'm happy with the result.  I decided to not plank some of the deadwood area on the first layer as it will need to be sanded down to 0mm per the instructions anyway, I have seen a few others go this route on various models and decided to try this method. 


 
While the PVA glue was drying for the final planks, I decided to start wet forming the pear laser cut patterns for the out hull.  While these won't be used for a few more steps, I wanted to give them ample time to dry in position over the next day.

 
Question for the experts.  I have been thumbing through the instructions and it doesn't look like these slots in the stern frames are utilized, is this assumption correct?  I just want to make sure I haven't missed anything as it looks like the stern fascia pieces will cover them.

 

Quite possibly the worst rigging diagram I have ever had to work with. Note that one end or the other end, sometimes both ends, of each line is not shown. And this is pretty much the only rigging diagram in the kit.
 

 
In photos, most of the bracing wires appear to be doubled. In some instances it looks like the pairs were wrapped in some kind of material. The upshot is that the cables look thicker. I will duplicate this effect by using wire for the rigging instead of EZ-Line. That means the technique will be a little different.
 
Here's the forest of struts mounted to the lower wing.
 

Yes, actually!
 
BTW, you probably already know this, but Tom Grigat built that very kit in one of his Modeling in Motion videos.

Quite possibly the worst rigging diagram I have ever had to work with. Note that one end or the other end, sometimes both ends, of each line is not shown. And this is pretty much the only rigging diagram in the kit.
 

 
In photos, most of the bracing wires appear to be doubled. In some instances it looks like the pairs were wrapped in some kind of material. The upshot is that the cables look thicker. I will duplicate this effect by using wire for the rigging instead of EZ-Line. That means the technique will be a little different.
 
Here's the forest of struts mounted to the lower wing.
 

Update
 
this sequence is dedicated to the build of the wheelhouse, nav- and controlroom. Also the planked deck for the "monkey platform" is ready for mounting. The nav. light containments will be integrated in to the wheelhouse railing panels
 
Nils

brass windowframes ( square-tube) are fitted in, tight fit

the wheelhouse walls are from 0,8mm ply mounted to the framework

section is painted and the monkey plattform deck has dryfit

The "glassing" of 18 windows

silicone glassing bits pressed in, tight fit into the window frames

the "monkey plattform" deck will be permanently glued on, when the wheelhouse section is screwed down to the boats deck

 
 

Thanks for your words Uwe,
all the coming items are being built from pictures as good as I can
I found a solution for finding the "lost" anchor cable in the closed hull, and to secure it. I`m currently trying my luck with the wheel- and nav house from 0,8 mm ply, I´ll try to do the square windowframes like already done once for the "Ergenstrasse", which has the same scale. Its a bit more tricky and fragile here in order to bring 8 windows over the limited wheelhouse breadth
 
Nils

a hole was drilled into the forecastle bulkhead, the "lost" achorcable of the hall anchor fished through this hole and secured with a wooden stopper. This lays between bulkhead and its cover item.
Paint touchups pending later on

the arrangement for the waistdeck fastenings of the mooring cable
 


made a little framework for the wheelhouse sides. A wooden spacebar provides for the right height afterwards

there are panama fairleads to prevent dammage to the railing

the framework is fastend to the boats deck with screws so that it follows the decks sheer

a card template for making the front window front, the other sidewalls will be done likewise

the windowframes will be made from brass square tube, the glassing done later with square extruded semitransparent silicone bar
 

I was away from my shipyard for a while because I had other things to do. I'm happy to be back again. I completed the assembly of the commodores cabin walls and doors that I started before.

Log #9: Starting the Second layer planking
 
The second layer planking has started.
The outer prow pieces have also been fitted.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Work has been continuing on the aft deadwood, the inner stern post and the sternpost.
 
I firstly cut out the rabbet on the sternpost using the mill. They are 3" deep. I also milled some very slight rebates on the aft side of the sternpost where the gudgeons will eventually sit. There are also two 'notches' on the inner sternpost where the ends of the fashion pieces sit but because the fashion pieces aren't the same height on both sides one notch needs to be slightly longer than the other.  Here are all three pieces just sitting roughly in place on the keel.

I then moved on to tidying up the steps on the aft deadwood. I realised that one step was slightly undersize on one side compared to its opposite number and so I added a small sliver of wood to build that up a little. I also made the steps nice and crisp and marked out the curve for the area under the bearding line on the base and rear sides of the aft deadwood to give me a guide when sanding this area.

The initial sanding was done with a dremel sanding band initially and then I moved on to a variety of curved sanding shapes using 240# grit paper.

I didn't sand all the way down to the final shape at this time as I thought it would be easier to achieve the desired curve once the inner sternpost was attached to the deadwood. I started some initial sanding on the inner sternpost before gluing and pinning both pieces together. 

Further sanding then helped to blend the curve across the two pieces. It was at this point that I realised that during the sanding process I had somehow managed to break off parts of the foremost step on each side of the deadwood. As mentioned previously these are very small and delicate pieces and I should have no doubt taken more care with them! I decided that a repair could be effected by cutting out a small section of the base of the deadwood on both sides and gluing two thin pieces of wood there extending out to each side. These were then cut to size to represent those two foremost steps. I think if I was to make the deadwood again I would refrain from milling in these foremost steps until the rest of the shaping of the piece had been completed, thereby avoiding the danger of damaging them. 
 
I was also slightly over zealous in sanding one side of the inner sternpost - it ended up a bit thinner on one side when compared to the depth of the rabbet on the sternpost. I don't believe this will be an issue later on as further sanding will be required when fairing the frames, but I have not yet attached the sternpost to the inner sternpost just in case I decide to change it. Finally at this stage I cut out a piece of 15" wide wood for the rising wood. This was made in two pieces with a scarph joint and the positions of the main station lines were marked on it.

 

Hull Construction – 2nd Planking
 
Shout out to those who are following along or popping in for a peek!
 
The Vine’s gunwale was 9” wide x 5” thick (~ 23 cm x 13 cm), which works out to be ~ 4 mm x 2 mm at scale.  I elected to go with 6 mm x 1 mm because the 6 mm dimension contrasted better with the 4 mm planking and 1 mm looked better than 2 mm.
 
Both the port and starboard gunwales are installed and taper into the stem and stern rebates.  6 mm wide garboards are also fitted both port and starboard.
 
As mentioned in earlier, I’m using a 4 butt shift 5:3:1:4:2 pattern and 7 strakes are installed both port and starboard.
 

 
Cheers,
Jay

Yeah I did, a beautiful job as well...
 
The WnW instruction for this are the best... (glad that Mike got to it before I did)
 
All I can offer is the link to the WnW page for the kit, yes it is still up and functioning, there is even more info on this airplane there... (2 versions)
 
http://www.wingnutwings.com/ww/product?productid=3085 French version
 
http://www.wingnutwings.com/ww/product?productid=3106 (USAS version, take a look at the rigging update page for the US version)
 
She is looking very nice brother...

Quite possibly the worst rigging diagram I have ever had to work with. Note that one end or the other end, sometimes both ends, of each line is not shown. And this is pretty much the only rigging diagram in the kit.
 

 
In photos, most of the bracing wires appear to be doubled. In some instances it looks like the pairs were wrapped in some kind of material. The upshot is that the cables look thicker. I will duplicate this effect by using wire for the rigging instead of EZ-Line. That means the technique will be a little different.
 
Here's the forest of struts mounted to the lower wing.