ca.shipwright

Greetings everyone,
A further update on the Victory. We traced all the bulkheads, center keel and bracing on 6mm Baltic Birch plywood using the cut out templates. I opted not to glue them down on the wood because I can see the line better than the edge of the paper when I cut. I rough cut out the profiles on a band saw which is way more powerful then my Delta scroll saw. Baltic Birch is very dense. All good so far.
 
One immediate challenge is slots in the center keel, bulkheads and braces. The Mantua plywood is 5 mm. The Baltic Birch is 6mm. This is going to require some adjustment in the slot width- need to widen it 1 mm. What I have done is use the forward line of the slot as a base and widen it towards the rear on the center keel. As for the bulkheads themselves, I put a center line on all of them using the center of the width of the upper and lower center cutouts as the reference. Now I will run up the center line from the bottom and nibble away on each side until a test piece of the plywood fits snugly.
 
Using an extended line from the center keel slot, will allow me to keep the bulkheads vertically perpendicular to the keel. Fore and aft will be done using a 90^ clamped to the bulkhead and center keel. I am going to glue the bulkheads to the center keel, and the bracing with Wellbond glue (dissolves easily with alcohol).
 
I used the homemade shaper to sand the bulkheads to the final profile. Worked like a charm. I think someone in the Endeavour group posted this.Thank you for sharing it.
 
I drew all of the bulkhead modifications on now so I can complete the cutting with one set up of the scroll saw.Next up, is cutting out the center portions and modifications of the bulkheads as per the Bob Hunt's practicum. For those of you not familiar with this practicum; it is designed to kit bash this model by completely finishing the main gun deck and aft cabins, not just the midship portion as per the kit's design.
 
Some photos attached.
 
Regards

It looks like there will be a cascade of problems associated with that 1 mm. Mantua got the money and I got the replace parts for the framing in 4 days. Great service! Assembled all the framing, counters, bow filler blocks, and cut the rabbet. I have misplaced my ebony stern post. Hopefully it will show up or I will make another out of boxwood.
 
When I was cutting the bow filler blocks, the top view as taken from AOS was wider than the first bulkhead. This caused me to scratch my head and what the h***. I then copied the entire forward portion of the main deck and lay it across the ship from the bow to mid ship. Surprisingly, it was at least an inch wider than the Mantua hull framing. It looks like Mantua took some liberties the the kit design. The entire ship's beam is at least 1 inch narrower the the AOS drawings. She is still a monster.
 
Terry- I was following Bob's practicum with my homemade framing parts. This is not an easy build, but, Bob's practicum is so detailed that you almost can't go wrong if you read the section once, and then read it again. If you do purchase the practicum, and I highly recommend it, there are a couple of errata that I can fill in for you. Not having the correct dimensional material and my lack of skills all added to the continuation of the problems. The biggest was that almost all the gun ports had to be cut into the bulkheads. This was not a task I was willing to try. And, it would have seriously degraded the structural integrity of the hull.
 
Photos will follow soon
 
Regards

It looks like there will be a cascade of problems associated with that 1 mm. Mantua got the money and I got the replace parts for the framing in 4 days. Great service! Assembled all the framing, counters, bow filler blocks, and cut the rabbet. I have misplaced my ebony stern post. Hopefully it will show up or I will make another out of boxwood.
 
When I was cutting the bow filler blocks, the top view as taken from AOS was wider than the first bulkhead. This caused me to scratch my head and what the h***. I then copied the entire forward portion of the main deck and lay it across the ship from the bow to mid ship. Surprisingly, it was at least an inch wider than the Mantua hull framing. It looks like Mantua took some liberties the the kit design. The entire ship's beam is at least 1 inch narrower the the AOS drawings. She is still a monster.
 
Terry- I was following Bob's practicum with my homemade framing parts. This is not an easy build, but, Bob's practicum is so detailed that you almost can't go wrong if you read the section once, and then read it again. If you do purchase the practicum, and I highly recommend it, there are a couple of errata that I can fill in for you. Not having the correct dimensional material and my lack of skills all added to the continuation of the problems. The biggest was that almost all the gun ports had to be cut into the bulkheads. This was not a task I was willing to try. And, it would have seriously degraded the structural integrity of the hull.
 
Photos will follow soon
 
Regards

Jesse Lee,
 
I have found that there will be one or more bulkhead extensions that break more than once. After the first break, I soak the extension with extra thin CA glue on both the free and fixed piece while holding them together. This produces a "weld" that is indestructable. The only down side, it takes extra elbow grease to fair this piece as it get extremely hard.
 
Regards

E J,
There is always an option of making additional bulkheads using the adjacent as a pattern. You can still  do this by gluing the additional bulkhead(s) to the center keel and the subdeck which I believe is the white sheet perpendicular to the center  keel in the picture. You really don't need a slot for this and may be a easier solution than filler blocks.
 
Regards

E J,
My first look at your SR. Yes is a huge ship. I have the Panart Victory 738. It too is a monster. The price of the case will exceed the cost of the kit. One thing I discovered in working on a kit this size is that the constant turning it around can become exhausting. A Lazy Susan or turntable is almost a must have for energy savings. They are easy to fabricate or cheap to buy.
 
Regards

Ahhhh.
The never ending planking story. I built the Model Shipways Constitution in 1:76 scale. The planks were 1/8th in wide. I thought I would never finish. If I remember correctly there were about 150 planks needed. Thankfully there were some sub-assemblies that I could work on for a diversion.
 
Your SLR is looking good. Drive on!!!!!!!!
 
Regards

EJ,
I'm looking at the third bulkhead from the stern in the next to last picture above. It appears that there is a "break" in the planking run- a sharp bend over the aft edge of this bulkhead. There is really no way to fill and sand to correct this unless you plan to fill all the way to the stern bulkhead A better solution is to remove the planks on this bulkhead and sand the bulkhead fair so that the planks flow out the aft edge smoothly and into the next bulkhead and further on to the last bulkhead at the stern.
 
One of the advantages of using full length planks for the under skin is that you get a very good idea of how the hull fairs out. I think most modelers take the view of getting the under-planking done, in whatever way floats your boat. Keep in mind that when the plank a real ship, they have frames every foot or so. They are able to get a true fair using the shorter planks. The gap between bulkheads is too wide to use scale planking- you cannot truly see the fairing required.
 
Having said all this, I really hope that the picture referenced above is a victim of some type of parallax and you won't have to any of the above.
 
Please, no criticism is intended. Your modeling is fantastic.
 
My Panart Victoy has almost the identical framing as the LSR.
 
Regards
 
 

Jesse Lee,
 
I have found that there will be one or more bulkhead extensions that break more than once. After the first break, I soak the extension with extra thin CA glue on both the free and fixed piece while holding them together. This produces a "weld" that is indestructable. The only down side, it takes extra elbow grease to fair this piece as it get extremely hard.
 
Regards

I built the Bluenose II and wanted a midnight blue color for the upper hull and a rust red for below the waterline. I couldn't find what I wanted in any brand of paint. I went to Lowes and looked at all their paint color chips and found the colors I wanted. I had them make me a trial jar of each color using eggshell acrylic base. I thinned this 20% with distilled water, Brushed on several coats, and finished with a satin Wipe-on-poly. Came out very nice. At $3.95 for an 8 oz. jar, you can't beat this.

Greetings,
Finally got enough done to post an update.

First, you never know how the bulkheads are going to work until you start planking. This is when the defects show up. As you know, I decided to make my own bulkheads and center-keel as well as the rest of the hull formers and sub-decks myself. This became quite a job and there are some discrepancies in the parts. I don't know how or why they didn't work better, but, perseverance and cussing and we prevailed.

I think a big issue was the fact that I used 6mm plywood and the kit used 5mm. A silly little mm, but, it adds up when you consider that the 12 bulkheads means a variance of 1.2 cm over the length of the ship. This made for adjusting all the slots to make them bigger and re-cutting the sub-deck slots around the bulkhead. Not a problem because all of this will be covered by planking.

I consider it a moral victory that I wound up within 1/8 in. of Bob's published numbers.

The big delay was in making and remaking the transom sides. Finally figured it out with Bob's help. Looking at the photo, it looks almost exactly the same as Bob's in the practicum. I consider this a huge win. I hope I'm right.

There are two places where there is a slight bulge in the planking. I may have shimmed the bulkhead to much. This will be corrected. I have to say, I looked and looked at the fairness of the hull over and over and didn't see this until the photos.

I took a break from building and milled all the pieces for the gun port frames out of boxwood. I really like making sawdust. It must be some primal feeling that I get as well as the smell of freshly sawn wood. Much like the satisfaction of freshly mowed grass on the golf course.

Photos to follow in this post and the following.

Greetings,
Finally got enough done to post an update.

First, you never know how the bulkheads are going to work until you start planking. This is when the defects show up. As you know, I decided to make my own bulkheads and center-keel as well as the rest of the hull formers and sub-decks myself. This became quite a job and there are some discrepancies in the parts. I don't know how or why they didn't work better, but, perseverance and cussing and we prevailed.

I think a big issue was the fact that I used 6mm plywood and the kit used 5mm. A silly little mm, but, it adds up when you consider that the 12 bulkheads means a variance of 1.2 cm over the length of the ship. This made for adjusting all the slots to make them bigger and re-cutting the sub-deck slots around the bulkhead. Not a problem because all of this will be covered by planking.

I consider it a moral victory that I wound up within 1/8 in. of Bob's published numbers.

The big delay was in making and remaking the transom sides. Finally figured it out with Bob's help. Looking at the photo, it looks almost exactly the same as Bob's in the practicum. I consider this a huge win. I hope I'm right.

There are two places where there is a slight bulge in the planking. I may have shimmed the bulkhead to much. This will be corrected. I have to say, I looked and looked at the fairness of the hull over and over and didn't see this until the photos.

I took a break from building and milled all the pieces for the gun port frames out of boxwood. I really like making sawdust. It must be some primal feeling that I get as well as the smell of freshly sawn wood. Much like the satisfaction of freshly mowed grass on the golf course.

Photos to follow

Dave,
Just keeps getting better and better. How do you get your fingers in as crowded as the deck is? I must have a case of "fat fingers."
 
Regards,

I built the Bluenose II and wanted a midnight blue color for the upper hull and a rust red for below the waterline. I couldn't find what I wanted in any brand of paint. I went to Lowes and looked at all their paint color chips and found the colors I wanted. I had them make me a trial jar of each color using eggshell acrylic base. I thinned this 20% with distilled water, Brushed on several coats, and finished with a satin Wipe-on-poly. Came out very nice. At $3.95 for an 8 oz. jar, you can't beat this.

Jesse Lee,
 
I have found that there will be one or more bulkhead extensions that break more than once. After the first break, I soak the extension with extra thin CA glue on both the free and fixed piece while holding them together. This produces a "weld" that is indestructable. The only down side, it takes extra elbow grease to fair this piece as it get extremely hard.
 
Regards

I built the Bluenose II and wanted a midnight blue color for the upper hull and a rust red for below the waterline. I couldn't find what I wanted in any brand of paint. I went to Lowes and looked at all their paint color chips and found the colors I wanted. I had them make me a trial jar of each color using eggshell acrylic base. I thinned this 20% with distilled water, Brushed on several coats, and finished with a satin Wipe-on-poly. Came out very nice. At $3.95 for an 8 oz. jar, you can't beat this.

Jesse Lee,
 
I have found that there will be one or more bulkhead extensions that break more than once. After the first break, I soak the extension with extra thin CA glue on both the free and fixed piece while holding them together. This produces a "weld" that is indestructable. The only down side, it takes extra elbow grease to fair this piece as it get extremely hard.
 
Regards

I built the Bluenose II and wanted a midnight blue color for the upper hull and a rust red for below the waterline. I couldn't find what I wanted in any brand of paint. I went to Lowes and looked at all their paint color chips and found the colors I wanted. I had them make me a trial jar of each color using eggshell acrylic base. I thinned this 20% with distilled water, Brushed on several coats, and finished with a satin Wipe-on-poly. Came out very nice. At $3.95 for an 8 oz. jar, you can't beat this.

Jesse Lee,
 
I have found that there will be one or more bulkhead extensions that break more than once. After the first break, I soak the extension with extra thin CA glue on both the free and fixed piece while holding them together. This produces a "weld" that is indestructable. The only down side, it takes extra elbow grease to fair this piece as it get extremely hard.
 
Regards

Jesse Lee,
 
I have found that there will be one or more bulkhead extensions that break more than once. After the first break, I soak the extension with extra thin CA glue on both the free and fixed piece while holding them together. This produces a "weld" that is indestructable. The only down side, it takes extra elbow grease to fair this piece as it get extremely hard.
 
Regards

E J
A great looking gun carriage
 
Regards

Jesse Lee,
 
I have found that there will be one or more bulkhead extensions that break more than once. After the first break, I soak the extension with extra thin CA glue on both the free and fixed piece while holding them together. This produces a "weld" that is indestructable. The only down side, it takes extra elbow grease to fair this piece as it get extremely hard.
 
Regards

E J
A great looking gun carriage
 
Regards

Beautifully done E J. Your photos are super- keep them coming.
 
Regards
 
Sold my La C.- can't work in 1:100 anymore. But I am continuing to follow your log. It is very inspirational as is the LSR.
 
Regards

Outstanding. I am totally in awe of your metal work, especially the studding sail brackets. I wish I could do this type of thing. But somehow, the soldiering iron and I just don't seem to get along. Any advice on the how to would be greatly appreciated.
 
Regards

Outstanding. I am totally in awe of your metal work, especially the studding sail brackets. I wish I could do this type of thing. But somehow, the soldiering iron and I just don't seem to get along. Any advice on the how to would be greatly appreciated.
 
Regards