Cathead

I will need to dredge up more superlatives for this one. You've done such an amazing job of taking a really unique, interesting prototype and making it into something even more unique and interesting. I feel like I can review these photos over and over again, still finding new details to enjoy. This log has added a lot of joy to my life and I thank you for all of it.

Less mineshaft, more tunnel.

I've made broader progress that I'm not quite ready to write up yet, but here's a narrower update on a minor upgrade. The shape of the tunnel has been bugging me; it seems too squat. It wasn't really obvious to me until I'd finished the bluff, but now I can't un-see it. I think you can see what I mean in the paired photo below. The real one is significantly rectangular; mine is nearly square. Bugs me. So I decided to renovate it. This meant raising the ceiling and narrowing the sides. Starting point: I used a woodworking tool I had in a drawer, a rotary rasp that chucks into a power drill. It's meant for rough shaping of wood, but boy is it perfect for boring out a tunnel. Then I filled in the sides with some new plaster. Gave it a fresh base coat of paint: And weathered it down: That's much better. The beauty of this is that I'm modeling the period not long after this tunnel was freshly blasted. So it's actually perfect to have the area right around the portal look a little disrupted and different from the rest of the rock. I didn't weather it quite as much, leaving the color a little fresher. I'm pretty pleased with how this came out. Just shows it's worth going back and reassessing your work now and then. I've also been working on the longer bluff line on the other end of town, along the river, but am not quite ready to share that progress yet. Thanks for the fun discussions above, and for all your interest!

I'm enjoying the thought and creativity you're putting into this build. Making a build your own is what makes it not "yet another Endurance"!

This model is simply a cat-alogue of excellent work. Littered with interesting features, and the hull has lovely fe-lines. One might even say purr-fect.

That's looking really nice.

That wide rail seems like a necessary piece of infrastructure enabling the stable placement of adult beverages as needed.

Not something I'm very experienced in, but as no one else has answered...I've seen a couple different approaches used. Some folks shape their masts from square stock, which lets them produce both rounded and other forms on the same piece (much like the real process). You could certainly build it up as well.

I managed to overlook this update somehow, but a belated congratulations on finishing. You've done a nice job bringing this kit to life and it's a lovely gift for your friend.

As you can tell from my username and photo, I heartily approve of this addition to the crew.

Kurt, do you agree with my assessment above? You're the true expert here, you and Roger, and I'm happy to be corrected if I misstated something.

I've learned plenty from your work, believe me.

Thanks for sharing those great photos! You've done a nice job on your scenery. Do keep in mind that I'm modeling late fall / early winter, so a lot of the standard foliage products won't work for me. I also prefer to minimize the use of artificial stuff, though I'll certainly be using some. One of the reasons I'm focusing on this season is that it lets me use a much higher percentage of natural materials. But, for example, I intend to use some purchased static grass to help simulate the winter grasses so distinctive in this part of the world. There will be plenty of fallen limbs/timber, especially along and in the creek. But on the other hand, keep in mind that this was the era when trees were at a minimum, so to speak, given the local demands for timber and firewood. Check out the historical photos posted earlier in the thread; the landscape was a lot more open than the lush regrowth people take for granted today. One of my interesting challenges will be balancing a historically accurate level of vegetation with an easily believed/accepted look, because modeling this truly accurately would make many modern viewers think it was farther west in, say, Montana, because they associate modern Missouri with lush (almost overwhelming) vegetation rather than the sparser "frontier" look it had around 1900.

Keith, most of those appear to be steel-hull vessels. For one thing, the super-long hulls and short stacks imply they're late-era vessels that are more likely to overlap with early metal hulls. #1 is, as you suggest, a harbor vessel and not representative. #2 is the Monongehela, a steel-hull built in 1927 (https://www.waterwaysjournal.net/2021/01/24/the-towboat-monongahela/) #3 I can't identify but looks like a lake steamer design, and a post-1900 one at that given the more modern davits and lifeboats as well as the thin metal paddlewheel, so very well may be a steel hull. Even if not, if she's a lake steamer, she can have a heavier, more rigid hull than a riverboat so may have more muted support structures above deck. Or if she does have a full set of hog chains, they may well be hidden within the superstructure and since we can't see a bow view we can't tell for sure. #4 is the George Verity, another 1927 steel-hull vessel (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/George_M._Verity_(towboat)). And though your view is from astern, the photo from Wikipedia is forward and shows the same long hull, short stack design of that era. #5 is the Orco, built in 1936 according to the UW LaCross library (https://search.library.wisc.edu/digital/ACNQC2XXRJ4USX8G), so again very likely a steel-hull vessel. #6 is definitely a steel hull, and the 1935 date of the photo helps confirm this. These are all fun photos to look at, and thank you for sharing, but I'll maintain that any wooden-hulled riverboat had to have hog chains for structural integrity, until the development of steel hulls or unless it was designed to operate in deeper water (e.g. the Hudson) where shallow draft and/or light weight wasn't a consideration. If I recall correctly, the original Lula was up in Montana, so absolutely fit those constraints. Your version is meant to be a Hudson River / port boat, right? So you can get away with fudging it a bit.

Can you show an example? To the best of my knowledge, and as wefalck implies, this was an integral part of steamboat structure (stern or side wheel) and not easily dispensed with. They're sometimes not easy to see, but until the development of metals hulls were pretty essential. They keep the lightweight hull structure from essentially folding up like an origami construction and so have to run most of the length of the hull. I've never seen a traditional stern or sidewheeler that didn't have longitudinal hog chains and often latitudinal ones as well. Now, to be more specific, that's true of RIVERboats, because they needed shallow, lightweight hulls to navigate shallow river conditions, and so couldn't afford the hull bracing typical of marine vessels. Your original Lula was indeed a riverboat with hog chain bracing, but your modeled Lula is a harbor vessel with less concern about draft, so you could also assume that it has a stronger hull than the typical riverboat.