KeithAug

The sub deck. Thank you for the comments on 1st planking - I should probably have said that the sanding was manual - using a cork sanding block. I lightly sanded with 80 grit oxide paper and completed with 120 grit. The next step was to fit the plywood sub deck (2 pieces) and the strips around the deck edge. This wasn't a difficult operation and requires little description here. I aligned and held the deck in place with elastic bands before drilling 0.75mm (.030") holes at strategic points to take alignment pins (e.g. white headed pin in photo). I then removed the sub deck glued and re-fixed it with the alignment pins in place. The alignment pins prevented any movement while gluing. The deck was held in place by elastic bands while the glue dried. Elastic bands can tend to exert most pressure at the deck edge and an off cut of wood was placed along the length of the deck to ensure pressure was also applied to centre of the sub deck. See Photo I sanded the edge of plywood sub deck to mach the hull profile before proceeding to the next stage. Because I was building the 1989 version of Endeavour the deck planking was going to be different to that described in the kit instructions. I will cover deck planking in more detail in a later post. The relevance to this post is that I could use spare 1mm X 4mm hull planking to edge the deck. The deck edge plank needed to bend to follow the edge of the deck quite precisely and I used pins to make sure that it was glued in the correct position (again using elastic bands to hold the edge planking while the glue dried. See photo. The final step was to sand the deck edge planking to match the hull profile. The next post will cover 2nd planking with the 0.5mm (0.020") x 4mm (0.160") mahogany 2nd hull planks. Hopefully the next post will be of more interest than this one.

First Planking. The Amati instructions suggest planking the keel bulb first using the 2mm x 2mm strips - these being double the thickness of the standard planks. The instructions suggest that the bulb planking does not exceed a height of 3cm. The instructions then suggest starting the hull planking at deck level and tapering the ends of the planks towards stem and stern. Towards the middle of the hull the kit provides a double width frame on which to start the planks running fore and aft. I wondered if I could make the first planking simpler and decided to try a different approach. I started at deck level. The balsa backing has a number of advantages when planking - the first being that planks can be held in place by notice board pins while the glue dries. See photo. I proceeded adding planks until I had about 10 rows of planks in place. Because of the balsa backing the hull was already rigid and this allowed me to plank one side, rather that doing both sides simultaneously. Also I didn't need to worry about always starting the planks at the double width frame (I didn't actually fit it) and could stagger alternating layers of planks. This gave a smoother hull shape. Having completed the the first 10 rows I used a piece of card to draw lines on the hull where subsequent rows would fall. This convinced me that I could proceed with further layers without the need to taper the planks to stem and stern. See photo. The next series of photos show progress. As the planking progressed the planks followed closely the lines drawn on the hull. As the planks reached the start of the keel the sharp angle of the bow started to become rounded as it blended into the bulb of the keel. This became the obvious point at which to run 2 of the 2mm x 2mm "bulb planks" along the length of the keel, before proceeding with more of the hull planks. See photo. I found elastic bands very useful for holding the keel strips in place. Also because of the sharp curvature of the keel I did sand off the sides to make them trapezoidal rather than square. Having completed several more hull planks the keel bulb curvature once again indicated that a further 2mm x 2mm strips need to be laid along the keel length. This process continued until the hull planking was almost complete. See photo. The black marking on the previous photograph shows the shape of the final closing plank. This was the only hull plank that I real had to shape. Having completed one side the 2nd side was a repeat of the first. I wanted the final hull to be predominantly varnished mahogany and I knew that the quality of first planking had to be very good. I set myself the challenge of completing the first planking without using any filler. The next photo show the shaded hull (the elastic bands are temporally holding the deck in place). No filler was used and no breakthrough into the balsa backing occurred during sanding. See photo. In the next post I will cover attaching the deck.

Pondering Planking At 1mm x 4mm (.040" x .160") the 1st planking strips are much thinner than those I have used for planking on previous models. I tend to use 1.5mm (.060") planks on large scratch built hulls. Also the spacing of the frames at circa 75mm (3") is greater than I would have desired. Reading previous posts and based on my own experience I was concerned that the planks would tend not to hold a smooth curve between frames and that sanding to achieve a smooth curve would lead to unacceptable thinning and lack of robustness in the finished hull. I didn't want to discard the kit planks so I decided to back the planks with balsa. A pack of 10 sheets of 12mm x 74mm x 450mm cost me £10 and this was sufficient for the whole hull. The next image shows the start of the process. I mentioned in an earlier post that didn't follow the build instructions and that this gave me a problem. The Amati instructions suggest tacking the the thin plywood deck in place to hold the frames in shape while gluing. I didn't do this and ended up with the assembled frames having a lateral bow of 2mm. I think that following the instructions would have prevented this. Additionally the frames had about a 2 degree twist bow to stern. The deck offers little resistance to twisting and I don't think that tacking the deck in place would have helped prevent this. Using a solid building frame would have been the best option. However both problems were easily resolved by solidly bolting the assembled and glued frame on to a 25mm (1") thick piece of square and flat oak plank. Forcing the frame into the correct shape before completing the balsa backing layer. Once the backing layer was complete it formed a very rigid shell which held the frames in the correct alignment. The next 2 images show the oak "strong back" in place. In retrospect I was very please that I had remembered to check the frame alignment while I still had time to do something about it!!!!!! Having completed the backing layer, sanding was a relatively straight forward. I always try to use a sanding block and sand along the lines of the hull as I find this allows me to form a smooth transition of curvature. Feel is important when shaping the hull and I don't recommend the use of power tools for this operation. I try to get the shape generally correct without sanding down as far as the frames in the first instance. See photo. As can be seen in the previous photograph the edges of the frames have been discoloured brown by the laser cutting operation. This forms a useful guide when finish sanding the backing layer, as once the discolouration is removed the hull has achieved its desired shape and its time for sanding to stop. See Images. With the backing complete it was time to start the base planking. I found the oak strong back useful for holding the hull while working on it and I decided to retain it for the planking operation. I'll cover base planking in my next post.

Drop Keel A short post this time. The Amati keel is 2mm (.080") thick 3 ply plywood with the outer layers being of mahogany. My keel had a 0.5mm ( 0.020") bow across the width. I decided to replace the supplied keel with one made of brass. I had a piece of brass plate to hand which was 3mm (.125") thick and I milled this down to the desired thickness. I then cut and filed it to shape using the supplied drop keel as a template. To achieve a mirror finish I hand finished with successively finer grades of wet and dry paper, finishing with 600 grit. The final polishing was done with Brasso (polishing compound). I drilled and reamed a .250" hole in the keel and turned a pivot pin to a diameter of .2495" from brass rod. I machined a corresponding hole in the keel piece before glueing it in place. The following photographs illustrate the process.

Thoughts on frames!!!! Firstly thank you to those who have viewed / replied already. The frames were laser cut and popped out of the plywood sheet quite easily. The edges were sharp with a good finish. The notches which join the frames to the longitudinal beams were too tight to assemble and nearly all of them had to be eased with a file. Once eased the skeleton slotted together well and created a stable structure even without glue. An interesting / unusual (at least to me) feature of the kit is that the keel isn't continuous. This and the fact that I didn't follow the build instructions gave me a problem which I needed to correct later in the build (more detail in later post). I glued the skeleton together at this stage but decided I wasn't happy with Amati's solution for bridging the 6 frames (5 spaces) where the keel wasn't continuous. I particularly disliked Amati's solution for mounting the drop keel as it seemed very fragile. The following photograph shows two of the Amati keel pieces held in place with masking tape. I replaced the Amati inserts with something a little more substantial as illustrated in this picture. The 2 mahogany plywood bridging pieces in the next photograph (middle of the 5) are supposed to take the 1mm (.040 inch) pin which acts as the pivot for the plywood drop keel. In my kit all 3 pieces were warped and no amount of soaking in hot water and applying corrective pressure seemed to cure this. This for me is a weak area of the kit and not really satisfactory. I suspect kits built with the Amati drop keel solution will quickly loose this feature. The next image shows the more substantial section which takes the keel pivot (prior to installation). I have access to a milling machine with a slotting saw so making slots of this type is for me relatively easy. For those without this facility fabricating the piece out of 3 laminations is a good alternative. The drop keel and pivot assembly to my mind had to be substantially improved and I will cover this in the next post.

Having spent a number of years scratch building HMS Cornwall (Type 22 Frigate) at 1:96 scale I felt I wanted to tackle something a bit quicker and easier. I also wanted a model that provided the opportunity for enhancing the kit to create something a bit different from the norm. After a week or two trawling through the range of kits on offer I decided to build Amati's Endeavour at 1.35 scale. Although the kit features Endeavour in her 1934 guise I decided to model her as restored in 1989. To do this I have relied heavily on the web based photographic resources. The kit was a Christmas present from my kids and when finished my Daughter has claimed the model for her bay window. The building of Endeavour has been covered in detail in a number of build logs and I don't intend going over the ground they have covered so well. What I intend doing is covering some of the things I have done differently and what I learned in the process. I will start where I am now - in the middle of the build and then go back to the start, working through a series of updates over the next couple of months. Hopefully with summer out of the way I will get back to building in September and complete in time to add another kit to my wish list for next Christmas. Here are a few photographs to start the process.

like a number of you I have been considering options for installing featherboards on my saw. In particular I wanted something to provide horizontal pressure to hold the timber against the fence. I also wanted something which had a degree of self adjustment (to avoid resetting every cut). The attached photos show my solution. The arm is spring loaded (elastic bands) and this allows me to rip over a range of 1/2 inch without resetting. To reset I move the arm to the next hole, this takes about 30 seconds. The mechanical advantage on the arm means that the force holding the timber agains the fence is about 50% greater than the force applied by the elastic band. While the elastic band may appear to be a bit crude it actually works very well and of course has the advantage that the force can be varied by simply adding or removing elastic bands.

Thank you for the advice - contact successfully established through the PM route. Keith.

Hi Guys - I need some help! I have been attempting to buy a Byrnes table saw using the Byrnes web site and have also tried to contact Model Machines using their web site email page. When I try to use the web site check out I get "Safari can't verify the identity of the website "host2interwebinc.com" and if I try to proceed further I get a 404 error web site not found. Also I have sent 2 emails via the web page but have had no reply. I know Jim uses the NRG site and that lots of you have had contacts with Jim in the past. Can anyone suggest an alternative method of contacting Jim or Model Machines. Regards Keith