Landrotten Highlander

Hello,
thank you for the nice comments and the likes.
Here's my new video for the construction of the longboat:
 
LINK
I hope you enjoy it.

Thank you Patrick, Mobbsie, Cees, Jan, JesseLee and Anthony for your kind comments and best wishes for the holidays.  And of course to all those who clicked the like button, thank you.
 
Well, yes, the more I pick at it and keep touching things up and redoing a few things here and there, she's bound to improve a little at a time 
 
Not everything goes easy, some things test my patience like the quarter deck door.  I finally had the hinges remade and cemented on when I found that the top hinge pin was also cemented to the "gudgeon" part.  Hmmm, yeah okay, a little careless, domkop me   However, I managed to free it up by using a small pick I made two lifetimes agi from welding rod.  Painted the "iron works" flat black.   The only thing left is putting a coat of poly on it.
 
Next came cementing the two eye bolts into the frames at the starboard side so I can hook the rope to it that'll keep the capstan poles secure.  I made the small hooks and "spliced" the rope to them and hooked them on.  Painted the poles a dark oak to match the wales and stowed them away.
 
Now I have a question for Jan or perhaps another Dutch ship expert.  Because my ship is rather large for that era I have been loo0king at the "Prins Willem" in Herman Ketting's book as well as some of the other drawings I have obtained by Ab Hoving.  In Ketting's book on pages 50 and 51 are three belaying items indicated.  I think I can disregard the "boordknechten" (sorry, don't know the English word for it) because they were primarily used on smaller ships.  On page 51 I see they bolted "kruishouten" to the bulwarks on the "verdek" between the main mast and mizzen mast.  In my case this area is now below the quarter deck.  Would I need to install such belaying items on my model and to the quarter deck bulwarks?  
 
​On the same page is illustrated "hornklampen" on the lower part of the masts.  These are used to belay the "parten" coming from above.  
 
If I need to add these belaying items to my ship now is the time to it.  It's getting crowded now at the quarter deck bulwarks with the capstan pole storage and the galley chimney.  Could I add another pair of "knechten" to the quarter deck behind the main mast instead?  The Prins Willem does show a few behind the main mast.
 
Nothing like starting with building a ship without any data where now, years later, one has obtained enough drawings.  Much is now after the fact, which makes it rather difficult and challenging.  
 
Okay, all water over over the dam and we're going to plug along as best as we can.
 
Here is the pic with the quarter deck door installed and the capstan poles stowed away.
 

 
Cheers, 

Thank you all for the great comments and for the likes.
 
 
 
 
 
Greg, Mark,
For me this really seems small progress considering I am entering the tenth year of building for this project. But I'm getting closer and closer - I can see the light at the end of the tunnel. I even ordered the display stand - it would be ready by mid January next year - see first two pictures.
 
I also made some more progress -  I won't say small or big this time. Here are the pictures.
 
Regards,
Alexandru

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                you soon rekon54

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following photo
 
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hi advances work on the Fleuron                                 following photo   rekon54  

You might try this. As a retired Master goldsmith and Gem cutter I often needed to glue semi-precious gem material into a precious metal mounting. What was needed was a glue that matched toe color of the stone. ie   onyx = black glue. Lapis= blue glue.  I used a semi fast set two part epoxy and added a small amount of powdered paint such as Tempera paints found at art stores.  Mix well and use a Very small point to 'pick up' a dab of colored glue and apply it where you want the rivit/bolt head. The epoxy will maintain a raised bump through curing. You will have to experiment a bit to get the droplet size right. Note to all, you can color epoxy glues this way and unlimited color palet by mixing colors. Good luck.

Thanks for the "likes" and comments.
 
That magic milestone...  All planked, sanded, and one coat wipe-on poly.  I do have one small area that needs some work as it has a stain.  I don't think it's blood...
 
Lessons learned at this point.. many.    
 
1) I should go a bit wider than the 1/8" width even if it's out of scale.  Just for the eye appeal and the ease of working with the wood.
 
2) Use a "harder" wood, like boxwood.  Pear deforms and dings easily.
 
3) Definitely not pear for gap-filling.   Some areas went black, other areas look good.  Strange stuff.  I played with some scrap and it did the same thing.  Either that or not use the poly and sawdust in the gap filling and live with the glue and sawdust.
 
4) A bit more care in the framing and fairing. I found some areas just weren't proper and had to fiddle with the frames before continuing.
 
Now to attend to the stern... which should be fun area and not as tedious.
 

 

Hello,
thanks for the nice comments and the likes.

Here are a few recent pictures to further internal development of the pinnace.

 

 

 

Hello friends,
new Pictures.
Regards Karl
 
 
 
T e i l  7

Continuation.
 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 

 
 
 
The beginning of the relation is available at this address:
 
 
http://5500.forumact...ndre-1-24#66516
 
 
 
Regards, Paul

I said I wouldn't but it was such a nightmare to do this last little bit I had to post it
 
It is not completed yet but the worst is over
(thanks to my Irish/Scottish/French/Portuguese stubbornness)
 
I present the (uncompleted as yet) "stern"!
 

Ironwork from steamboat wrecks was routinely salvaged, and indeed boilers, engines, and more were re-used on multiple boats. Bertrand's own machinery wasn't original, but was salvaged from another wreck and installed on the newly-built Bertrand.
 
I went back and re-read the academic papers by Dr Crisman dealing with Heroine's excavation, and they did not directly explain the 4-boiler count, other than citing an earlier reference to general practice of the time. However, there's an interesting comparison to be made with reference to my earlier guess about boiler numbers being related to the support structures. Nowhere in the Heroine papers could I find a direct reference to the WIDTH of the boiler supports, though they are described in general. The area of Heroine's hull where the boilers sat was the most damaged, and didn't have any decking remaining to preserve more evidence.
 
On the other hand, the Bertrand wreck did have the boiler-area deck intact, with special cross-timbers and decking in place to support the boilers, so we know for sure how wide that area was: about 10'. That's pretty narrow for a hull that was about 34' wide, not including the guards. As far as I know most steamboat boilers were around 3' in diameter (the papers state that Heroine's were 34"); that means Bertrand couldn't have had more than three boilers, and 2 seems more likely to accommodate the rest of the boiler structure. In comparison, Heroine is a much narrower boat, with a hull width of only around 20' (judging from the published diagrams), so four 34" boilers would have taken up 12'-14' of the total 20' hull width (though she also had guards). I believe Arabia's hull was about 30' wide, and we know she had 3 boilers. Finally, for whatever it's worth, Heroine is especially thin compared to later boats; her hull appears to be about 140' long though only 20' wide, compared to Bertrand's 161'x34'. 
 
This does NOT mean we should jump to conclusions about Heroine's boilers; there's no rule (to my knowledge) saying the boilers on a steamboat should be X% of the total hull width, and Heroine was built very early in the creative process of developing western riverboats, while Bertrand was built over 30 years later in a relatively more standardized age. But it is interesting to consider if/why Heroine had such a large boiler capacity for a small, one-engine boat compared to larger craft like Bertrand or Arabia, and I wonder if she turned out to be at all top-heavy given all that heavy power plant on such a narrow hull. 
 
I don't want to derail Glenn's build log into a longer discussion of other boats, so in general we should direct discussion of the Bertrand to my log instead. But in this case I think the comparison is interesting; I'm really interested in Glenn's thoughts or corrections on my guesswork here.

I completed the binnacle of the main bell

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I continue to make progress on the model, but there isn't really much to say. I completed construction of the rail, adding the pieces that make up the underside. With these in place, it's a much stronger structure.
 
To fit the pieces into place, I had to soak the cedar pieces a little bit to impart a slight bend or twist here and there. I took the shortcut of wrapping the pieces with a wet paper towel and put them in the microwave for about 30 seconds. This was just enough to do the trick.
 

 
 
Along the underside of the rail on the upper hull planks there is a laser-scribed line to help position the underside pieces of the rail.
 

 
 
The pieces glued and clamped into place
 

 
 

 
 
After the rail was completed, I went ahead and added the stem and other hull details include a thick strake located on the upper hull planking, just underneath the recently completed rail. 
 

 
You may notice that the stem is lighter than the rest of the hull. Like the stern beam, the stem is make of Hinoki or Japanese Cypress instead of Sugi, Japanese Cedar. 

Thanks everyone for visiting and your likes.  Kees and Pete thank you for very kind comments.
 
I completed the capstan backlash pawl assembly.  Mixed some Testors "rust" with black to get some sort of an iron look and painted the pawls with it.  It so happened that when I was browsing through a few books, looking for the galley chimney, I came across the drawings of the "William Rex."  According to these drawings and also photos of the interior of that model, the anchor capstan is exactly the same as what I have done.  I guess luck is not only with the irish but also with this dumb Dutchman 
 
I proceded to prep the starboard side for the repaint job.  I managed to slice two rather thin roles from that wide rol of Frog tape.  It clogged up my bandsaw though and had to spend half an hour cleaning all the gum of it 
 
For this particular masking job I could have used the regular blue tape.  I may just do that for the port side. The sticky stuff on the Frog tape makes it slide, it's difficult to tack it and then pull on it.  Oh well, everything that I wanted to protect from paint is now masked off and I started applying the red at the forward part of the ship - - railing stanchions only.  One more coat and that should be it, hopefully.  I can then remove the masking tape and hopefully the fresh paint on the railing caps didn't suffer.
 
When I started laying one coat of the green on the waist railing it dried up much darker then I wantd.  Sooooohh, I added a little white to it and a touch of red because it was not gray enough.  I think I now have the correct color match from the chart.  We'll see tomorrow.
 
On the pics below you can also see that I have painted all the railing caps.  Gwen thinks it looks very spiffy and I'm happy with it as well.  I would have rather used the cherry wood but alas I didn't think the light colored wood would be this distracting. 
 
Okay, here are the pics as she sits today.
 

 

 

 
Cheers,

In the next step I made the mast clamps for the thwarts.
 

 

 

 
On the following pictures are all built-in parts for the Pinnace

Setting the yard and sail.  As Clare mentioned in his blog, the setting of the sail "billow" is a challenge. 
 
        Bob R.

Finally the Mars support arm is inserted into the gear sandwich and fixed in place with a grub screw. The finishing touch is to add the moons Phobos and Diemos and Mars itself.
 
All the brass parts are really starting to add up and the Orrery is starting to get pretty weighty!

Time to splice the main brace, methinks.   Or maybe just a happy dance...
 
Major milestone today... external hull planking (except for the transom is finished.   Still needs a serious sanding and some gap filling which I'll start on after a bit of cleanup in shop.
 



 
Next job (after the sanding is fitting the stern post, fashion pieces and doing the transom..  planking, windows, carvings, and the molding strips.
 
Time to splice the main brace, methinks.    Or maybe just a happy dance...

Hello,
 
thanks for the nice comments.
Here is a little update:

Sail rigged and ready for install.
 
      Bob R.

Hello,
 
the taffrail is ready! That was't so easy as it looks, but now fresh under paint, all the hardships are forgotten.
 

 

 

 

 
Regards,
Siggi
 
 

suggestion:  why not use a brass rod of a diameter similar to the length of the diagonal of the bolt.  Drill a hole where the bolt is supposed to go.  insert the rod and fix (solder or glue).  Then carefully file the rod to the height and squareness you look for.