Cathead

The Arabia as envisioned by artist Gary Lucy; used with permission of the Arabia Steamboat Museum
 
As a resident of rural Missouri, not far from its eponymous river, I've long been fascinated by the less-well-known steamboats that worked the “Big Muddy” from the river’s mouth at St. Louis all the way to the head of navigation at Fort Benton, Montana, an astounding 2,300 river miles. Most modern impressions of interior American steamboats are of the large, highly-decorated “floating wedding cake” craft of the lower Mississippi River, which represent a small fraction of the full diversity of steamboat design and use. Those craft are, to my eye, too gaudy by far, the equivalent of overbuilt Disney cruise liners; I don’t care for them, and I really don't care for the highly inaccurate and toylike models that most kits claim represent American riverboats. I prefer the smaller, leaner steamboats of the upper rivers, those designed to risk the rocky ledges of the Ohio River (such as the Chaperon) or fight their way up the narrow, shallow, ever-changing treacherous channels of the Missouri River.  By the 1850s, their design had been nearly perfectly adapted to the unique conditions they faced, changing little for decades to come, until railroads finally cut them off at the knees. Two of the most well-known and well-documented steamboat wrecks from this period are the Bertrand (a sternwheeler that sank in 1865 and was rediscovered in 1968) and the Arabia (a sidewheeler that sank in 1856 and was rediscovered in 1988). Both boats now have excellent museums displaying their highly diverse and extraordinarily well-preserved cargo; the Bertrand at a wildlife refuge north of Omaha, Nebraska, and the Arabia at a museum in downtown Kansas City, Missouri.
 
I began researching the Arabia in earnest in spring 2017, writing about and documenting my research and sources for information in a separate thread, but am now ready to begin building the actual model. The text above is copied and rearranged from that thread, but I felt it provided an important introduction to this project and so should be repeated for those who may not go back and read the research thread. Although I am far from a master modeler, this will be my third scratchbuilt Missouri River steamboat. I built a rudimentary version of the Far West when I first became interested in wooden ship modeling, and later tackled a fully-framed and interior-detailed version of the Bertrand. Both of those were built in 1:87, a comfortable scale for me as a former HO model railroader.
 
However, for this project I wanted a new kind of challenge, so decided to build the Arabia in 1:64. The model will be around 32 inches (81 cm) long, allowing for more detail to be added overall. At the same time, though, I've decided not to recreate a fully-framed hull and interior as I did with Bertrand, for several reasons. First, that was a lot of work and material and would be even more expensive at 1:64, and I've already done that style now. Second, creating a framed model of Arabia would be both redundant and speculative; the museum preserves her stern intact for anyone to see, while the rest of the hull wasn't well-documented by the salvage team, so I'd be guessing more than I did with Bertrand (which was meticulously documented by an archeological team). Third, I just like the idea of a complete exterior model this time, trading a bit less interior detail for more focus on the overall appearance and higher detail allowed by the larger scale. Basically, this is just what I feel like doing this time, and doing a project the way you want to is part of what makes it engaging.
 
Although my initial plan was to develop a full set of blueprints for this project, that effort has stalled. It just isn't working for me to spend that much time on a computer, which I already do professionally as a freelance science editor. I'd rather spend my downtime working with wood than with pixels. So I stopped after developing a basic outline of the project and will just dive in, holding the design in my head and in various rough sketches and notes. This is, in fact, an authentic way to proceed, as riverboats in this era weren't built from printed blueprints either (one reason few construction records exist) but were simply laid out and built by artisans on the frontier shores of the Upper Ohio River. So any mistakes or quirks I may build into my Arabia as I proceed from the seat of my pants will be, at worst, a tribute to the real vessel's construction.

Above are my loose outlines of her design. The real Arabia was about 170' long and 30' wide (hull, not including the wheels) and drew about 5'.

And the sketches from which I'm getting started. There is no definitive information on the shape of her hull, other than the stern-most portion, which I've based on photos and measurements I took at the museum. So for the rest I've adapted a representative hull profile for the era from Alan Bates' The Western River Steamboat Cyclopoedium. The wheel and its supporting cylinder timbers are drawn directly from measurements I took at the museum. Centered within these drawings is the central internal bulkhead/keel I've laid out. These riverboats didn't have external keels the way normal ships did; their bottoms were generally perfectly flat with a stronger internal keelson instead. In this case, I'll be laying out horizontal bulkheads against this longitudinal one, just like a regular plank-on-bulkhead build. Hopefully now that I've laid the keel, so to speak, I can keep progress coming steadily. Thanks for reading, and for offering any ideas, suggestions, and criticisms that come to mind. I'd sure appreciate it if anyone points out concerns or problems that I can either explain or correct as I go along, as again I'm not a master modeler, just an ambitious one.
 
Table of Contents
Below I link to posts starting various portions of the build. This is intended to help folks looking for information on specific aspects of steamboats or their modelling, or just those wanting to catch up on a certain section. I'll try to keep this updated as I go along.
Framing the hull Guards and main deck framing Planking the hull Cylinder timbers & engines Planking the main deck Paddle wheels Boilers Main staircase & chimney breechings Framing the boiler deck & superstructure design Boiler pumps & other main deck details  

Before and after weathering. 

2 guns. I still have to weather the guns and searchlights. 

The Arabia as envisioned by artist Gary Lucy; used with permission of the Arabia Steamboat Museum
 
As a resident of rural Missouri, not far from its eponymous river, I've long been fascinated by the less-well-known steamboats that worked the “Big Muddy” from the river’s mouth at St. Louis all the way to the head of navigation at Fort Benton, Montana, an astounding 2,300 river miles. Most modern impressions of interior American steamboats are of the large, highly-decorated “floating wedding cake” craft of the lower Mississippi River, which represent a small fraction of the full diversity of steamboat design and use. Those craft are, to my eye, too gaudy by far, the equivalent of overbuilt Disney cruise liners; I don’t care for them, and I really don't care for the highly inaccurate and toylike models that most kits claim represent American riverboats. I prefer the smaller, leaner steamboats of the upper rivers, those designed to risk the rocky ledges of the Ohio River (such as the Chaperon) or fight their way up the narrow, shallow, ever-changing treacherous channels of the Missouri River.  By the 1850s, their design had been nearly perfectly adapted to the unique conditions they faced, changing little for decades to come, until railroads finally cut them off at the knees. Two of the most well-known and well-documented steamboat wrecks from this period are the Bertrand (a sternwheeler that sank in 1865 and was rediscovered in 1968) and the Arabia (a sidewheeler that sank in 1856 and was rediscovered in 1988). Both boats now have excellent museums displaying their highly diverse and extraordinarily well-preserved cargo; the Bertrand at a wildlife refuge north of Omaha, Nebraska, and the Arabia at a museum in downtown Kansas City, Missouri.
 
I began researching the Arabia in earnest in spring 2017, writing about and documenting my research and sources for information in a separate thread, but am now ready to begin building the actual model. The text above is copied and rearranged from that thread, but I felt it provided an important introduction to this project and so should be repeated for those who may not go back and read the research thread. Although I am far from a master modeler, this will be my third scratchbuilt Missouri River steamboat. I built a rudimentary version of the Far West when I first became interested in wooden ship modeling, and later tackled a fully-framed and interior-detailed version of the Bertrand. Both of those were built in 1:87, a comfortable scale for me as a former HO model railroader.
 
However, for this project I wanted a new kind of challenge, so decided to build the Arabia in 1:64. The model will be around 32 inches (81 cm) long, allowing for more detail to be added overall. At the same time, though, I've decided not to recreate a fully-framed hull and interior as I did with Bertrand, for several reasons. First, that was a lot of work and material and would be even more expensive at 1:64, and I've already done that style now. Second, creating a framed model of Arabia would be both redundant and speculative; the museum preserves her stern intact for anyone to see, while the rest of the hull wasn't well-documented by the salvage team, so I'd be guessing more than I did with Bertrand (which was meticulously documented by an archeological team). Third, I just like the idea of a complete exterior model this time, trading a bit less interior detail for more focus on the overall appearance and higher detail allowed by the larger scale. Basically, this is just what I feel like doing this time, and doing a project the way you want to is part of what makes it engaging.
 
Although my initial plan was to develop a full set of blueprints for this project, that effort has stalled. It just isn't working for me to spend that much time on a computer, which I already do professionally as a freelance science editor. I'd rather spend my downtime working with wood than with pixels. So I stopped after developing a basic outline of the project and will just dive in, holding the design in my head and in various rough sketches and notes. This is, in fact, an authentic way to proceed, as riverboats in this era weren't built from printed blueprints either (one reason few construction records exist) but were simply laid out and built by artisans on the frontier shores of the Upper Ohio River. So any mistakes or quirks I may build into my Arabia as I proceed from the seat of my pants will be, at worst, a tribute to the real vessel's construction.

Above are my loose outlines of her design. The real Arabia was about 170' long and 30' wide (hull, not including the wheels) and drew about 5'.

And the sketches from which I'm getting started. There is no definitive information on the shape of her hull, other than the stern-most portion, which I've based on photos and measurements I took at the museum. So for the rest I've adapted a representative hull profile for the era from Alan Bates' The Western River Steamboat Cyclopoedium. The wheel and its supporting cylinder timbers are drawn directly from measurements I took at the museum. Centered within these drawings is the central internal bulkhead/keel I've laid out. These riverboats didn't have external keels the way normal ships did; their bottoms were generally perfectly flat with a stronger internal keelson instead. In this case, I'll be laying out horizontal bulkheads against this longitudinal one, just like a regular plank-on-bulkhead build. Hopefully now that I've laid the keel, so to speak, I can keep progress coming steadily. Thanks for reading, and for offering any ideas, suggestions, and criticisms that come to mind. I'd sure appreciate it if anyone points out concerns or problems that I can either explain or correct as I go along, as again I'm not a master modeler, just an ambitious one.
 
Table of Contents
Below I link to posts starting various portions of the build. This is intended to help folks looking for information on specific aspects of steamboats or their modelling, or just those wanting to catch up on a certain section. I'll try to keep this updated as I go along.
Framing the hull Guards and main deck framing Planking the hull Cylinder timbers & engines Planking the main deck Paddle wheels Boilers Main staircase & chimney breechings Framing the boiler deck & superstructure design Boiler pumps & other main deck details  

Front row ... after your research, I am now prepped to follow the actual work ...

Really looking forward to following this new project of yours Eric. Just love the picture of her at the beginning of the thread.
 
Chris
 

The Arabia as envisioned by artist Gary Lucy; used with permission of the Arabia Steamboat Museum
 
As a resident of rural Missouri, not far from its eponymous river, I've long been fascinated by the less-well-known steamboats that worked the “Big Muddy” from the river’s mouth at St. Louis all the way to the head of navigation at Fort Benton, Montana, an astounding 2,300 river miles. Most modern impressions of interior American steamboats are of the large, highly-decorated “floating wedding cake” craft of the lower Mississippi River, which represent a small fraction of the full diversity of steamboat design and use. Those craft are, to my eye, too gaudy by far, the equivalent of overbuilt Disney cruise liners; I don’t care for them, and I really don't care for the highly inaccurate and toylike models that most kits claim represent American riverboats. I prefer the smaller, leaner steamboats of the upper rivers, those designed to risk the rocky ledges of the Ohio River (such as the Chaperon) or fight their way up the narrow, shallow, ever-changing treacherous channels of the Missouri River.  By the 1850s, their design had been nearly perfectly adapted to the unique conditions they faced, changing little for decades to come, until railroads finally cut them off at the knees. Two of the most well-known and well-documented steamboat wrecks from this period are the Bertrand (a sternwheeler that sank in 1865 and was rediscovered in 1968) and the Arabia (a sidewheeler that sank in 1856 and was rediscovered in 1988). Both boats now have excellent museums displaying their highly diverse and extraordinarily well-preserved cargo; the Bertrand at a wildlife refuge north of Omaha, Nebraska, and the Arabia at a museum in downtown Kansas City, Missouri.
 
I began researching the Arabia in earnest in spring 2017, writing about and documenting my research and sources for information in a separate thread, but am now ready to begin building the actual model. The text above is copied and rearranged from that thread, but I felt it provided an important introduction to this project and so should be repeated for those who may not go back and read the research thread. Although I am far from a master modeler, this will be my third scratchbuilt Missouri River steamboat. I built a rudimentary version of the Far West when I first became interested in wooden ship modeling, and later tackled a fully-framed and interior-detailed version of the Bertrand. Both of those were built in 1:87, a comfortable scale for me as a former HO model railroader.
 
However, for this project I wanted a new kind of challenge, so decided to build the Arabia in 1:64. The model will be around 32 inches (81 cm) long, allowing for more detail to be added overall. At the same time, though, I've decided not to recreate a fully-framed hull and interior as I did with Bertrand, for several reasons. First, that was a lot of work and material and would be even more expensive at 1:64, and I've already done that style now. Second, creating a framed model of Arabia would be both redundant and speculative; the museum preserves her stern intact for anyone to see, while the rest of the hull wasn't well-documented by the salvage team, so I'd be guessing more than I did with Bertrand (which was meticulously documented by an archeological team). Third, I just like the idea of a complete exterior model this time, trading a bit less interior detail for more focus on the overall appearance and higher detail allowed by the larger scale. Basically, this is just what I feel like doing this time, and doing a project the way you want to is part of what makes it engaging.
 
Although my initial plan was to develop a full set of blueprints for this project, that effort has stalled. It just isn't working for me to spend that much time on a computer, which I already do professionally as a freelance science editor. I'd rather spend my downtime working with wood than with pixels. So I stopped after developing a basic outline of the project and will just dive in, holding the design in my head and in various rough sketches and notes. This is, in fact, an authentic way to proceed, as riverboats in this era weren't built from printed blueprints either (one reason few construction records exist) but were simply laid out and built by artisans on the frontier shores of the Upper Ohio River. So any mistakes or quirks I may build into my Arabia as I proceed from the seat of my pants will be, at worst, a tribute to the real vessel's construction.

Above are my loose outlines of her design. The real Arabia was about 170' long and 30' wide (hull, not including the wheels) and drew about 5'.

And the sketches from which I'm getting started. There is no definitive information on the shape of her hull, other than the stern-most portion, which I've based on photos and measurements I took at the museum. So for the rest I've adapted a representative hull profile for the era from Alan Bates' The Western River Steamboat Cyclopoedium. The wheel and its supporting cylinder timbers are drawn directly from measurements I took at the museum. Centered within these drawings is the central internal bulkhead/keel I've laid out. These riverboats didn't have external keels the way normal ships did; their bottoms were generally perfectly flat with a stronger internal keelson instead. In this case, I'll be laying out horizontal bulkheads against this longitudinal one, just like a regular plank-on-bulkhead build. Hopefully now that I've laid the keel, so to speak, I can keep progress coming steadily. Thanks for reading, and for offering any ideas, suggestions, and criticisms that come to mind. I'd sure appreciate it if anyone points out concerns or problems that I can either explain or correct as I go along, as again I'm not a master modeler, just an ambitious one.
 
Table of Contents
Below I link to posts starting various portions of the build. This is intended to help folks looking for information on specific aspects of steamboats or their modelling, or just those wanting to catch up on a certain section. I'll try to keep this updated as I go along.
Framing the hull Guards and main deck framing Planking the hull Cylinder timbers & engines Planking the main deck Paddle wheels Boilers Main staircase & chimney breechings Framing the boiler deck & superstructure design Boiler pumps & other main deck details  

Regarding the inflatable, I wonder if adding some seams would help with the realism, especially internally? It would break up the long run of smooth plastic and give some more visual interest. Looks nice, nonetheless

I am aware of the other brand, cannot remember the name either, but I am sure I will bump into it eventually somewhere on the sight. No hurry, one of those jobs I can do tidying up at the end.
 
 
I have been busy in the garden since my last update, so have not made as much progress as I would have liked (same with the garden).
 
First, I have started the ships boat which is an inflatable, the shell of which is made by CAP Maquettes and purchased from Cornwall Model boats. Picture curtesy of CMB.

I have dressed this up a bit with some black paint, paper and some 2mm o/d rings made from 0.33mm brass rod. It looks a bit better. My wife said (scornfully) that it looks like a lump of plastic. That’s what an inflatable is, so maybe it’s better than I thought. The side ropes do not hang very well, I will give them a coat of diluted PVA and see if I can get them to look better.

I still need to do the outboard motor, fuel tank, paddles and the fittings for it to be lifted on the davits.
 
I finished the foresail boom. I was hoping the gooseneck would be fully working, but a bit of solder got into it, so it only goes to port and starboard.

I need to cut the chain to length and fit a double block to the end. It goes 2-3 times round the end of the boom and then I need about another inch.
 
To get this far, I realised I needed some idea of how the foresail would be attached, so I also started the process of making the sails. I cut up the piece of cloth I had obtained into sail sized chunks and then tried to iron out the creases. Lesson. I should have washed/soaked it first then dried it, then ironed it and finally cut it into sail sized chunks. I then experimented with making one of the triangular sails, the inner jib, as I thought they would be the easiest.
 
It did not go as well as I had hoped. I folded over the shortest edge and used diluted PVA to glue it in place. It was too narrow to tack. However I did not pay enough attention and did not realise it stretched as I did this. Once I realised what had happened I decided a new inner jib would be required, but I would continue with this one for practice. I then repeated this process on the longest edge, taking more care. I found that I could glue this in place without any stretching. That is as far as I have got. Below is a picture of my trial sail along with the Billings one. I would describe the billings material as deck chair canvas.

I have drawn the shapes of all the sails onto the chunks I cut, using the billings sails as patterns.
 
I then made the foresail gaff. I used the supplied tapered dowel, but made the jaws from scratch and added other details from the Musées de la Marine plans and photographs. The jaws supplied in the kit was a piece of plastic, which I used as a template to make the new one from some 1.5mm ply I had spare.
 
Once made I realised the shape of the foresail needed adjusting slightly as the length of the head was too long for it to be correctly mounted on the gaff.

Here are the two together. The piece of cloth they are on is the foresail.

I will now continue with my attempts to make sails. May try various methods on scrap material first. Will also do the mainsail boom and gaff as they are very similar to those for the foresail, just a bit larger and finish of the ships boat.
 
Thanks to everyone for looking in,
 
Glenn
 

Hey Hof! Yes I thought about LEDs. I have this battery powered string of LEDs. But i have my hands full with this model and dont think I can pull it off🙁  Maybe with my next model ( the Missouri)🙂  

 
I'm now trying to assemble 4 20mm guns. This is where me being a rookie really shows! I dont have the skills to cut off the plastic barrels and replace with brass barrels. I already cut one barrel off so I atleast have to use one brass barrel and it will be a mess. 

The searchlights are done for now. I like to let the paint dry for 24 hours before I start weathering. So I will continue tomorrow. 

she wants to help but has shakey hands 😟

Daria,
Mrs. Cathead (who is a scientist) thinks it's fantastic that you're interested and engaged in such things, as do I! I've been sharing all your updates and photos with her. There isn't much in the nautical way out here in the central US, so I quite envy you the chance to work on such a Viking ship (especially as someone of Norwegian descent).

and painted 🙂
 

Daria,
Mrs. Cathead (who is a scientist) thinks it's fantastic that you're interested and engaged in such things, as do I! I've been sharing all your updates and photos with her. There isn't much in the nautical way out here in the central US, so I quite envy you the chance to work on such a Viking ship (especially as someone of Norwegian descent).

Michiel, not only lights but I even thought of RC controls. But since I know nothing about RC boats I moved on.
 
Vaddoc, the primer is Krylon Gray Primer out of a spray can, nothing exotic and sands nice and seals the wood. Also works well with the Glazing Putty in filling any gaps.
 
Thank you all for stopping by and words of encouragement.
 

Daria,
Mrs. Cathead (who is a scientist) thinks it's fantastic that you're interested and engaged in such things, as do I! I've been sharing all your updates and photos with her. There isn't much in the nautical way out here in the central US, so I quite envy you the chance to work on such a Viking ship (especially as someone of Norwegian descent).

Making 7 searchlights. And ready for paint. 

Well I'm off to airbrush

Thanks, she is happy to read it!
Today we took part in another build (or a maintenance of an already built "model"). It is Helga Holm, the Viking ship replica, built in 1983, 22m long, weighs 4 tons.
It is in a decent shape, but definitely requires some repair. For now the goal was to raise a tarp cover to protect it from elements in the winter.
Daria participated a lot, and she looks forward to sail it in the summer!



 

 

 

 
Ready to be covered:

 

I did line off the Stern too. The bow planks will narrow to about 2/3 of there original width. Not too bad I guess. After I removed the plank I installed today I put it up for the day. I think I was just to tired to concentrate. It's not fun when it's like that.

As long as you line off the hull you should be fine. About the first 4-5 bulkheads the taper starts at the bow. There is also some tapering needed at the stern. Again- Bob F illustrates a good tutorial. Hope this helps. 
Steve

The build was finally resumed, we had a number of modelling sessions during the last few weeks. Horray!
This time the job is simple - glue pre-cut veneer pieces to their places, fine fit and making sure they are properly clamped.
Daria likes it a lot! And whines that with this tempo it will take too long to finish the model - we need to glue more than one part per day!
 
Learning how to work with a scalpel with various angles. I know the holding is not correct here, but that will be corrected later:

 
Using masking tape to "clamp" the veneer where regular clamps could not be used. Works like a charm on this scale:

 
Transom all clamped: 
 
Result is ok, including the ebony parts:

 
Then onto the bulwarks. They are double-layered for whatever reason, but alignment is easy and done by a small pins that fit into tiny holes cut in all layers. Such a simple and elegant idea!

 
Found out the hard way that these clamps are not good enough - they clamp only in the middle, while veneer warps due to moisture.
So we experimented with other ways of clamping:

 
And ended up with this monster, but it seems to work:

 
She really enjoys it now - the difficulty level is just perfect, and learning some new techniques every time. I am touching the model less and less, she is doing more fine fitting herself (and said fitting is always required, a millimeter here and there).
 
 
 

The presentation went extremely well and some are now more informed about the various aspects of modelling.
In working on the hatches I first make the sidewalls fitting snugly on the coaming using Midwest #8006 Basswood strips. Then I glue a slightly over-sized 1/32" hatch cover to the sidewall frame while in place and set a small steel block weight on top until the glue sets. This assures a flat cover index to the coaming; the glue while drying can distort the the cover if not weighted down. Each cover is marked on the inside with B(bow) and S(stern) and location P (port) and hatch number from bow. There is enough slight variation in size to make each cover unique.
 
 
 
I bounce back and forth between making hatch covers and the accommodation tower. The tower is being built with individual decks so down the road details can be added much easier than if the tower were one piece. Things like door hatches, ladder ways and rails.
Here is deck "A" which will index on the main deck; the small locator rectangle will have glue added to the center while indexed into the deck and the glue will stick to the main deck and release the deck when the glue is dry providing a tight fitting locator. This will be the foundation for the tower.
 

 
I used a wood strip spacer against the bay wall and masking tape for centering and gluing Deck "A" locator to the main deck.
 

 
Here is a view of the in progress build up of the tower so far. The challenge is adding the indexing locators of each deck to each other with a tight fit. The tower decks will separate from each other to add details later on. Here is a front view.
 
 
 
Here is a rear view showing various ladder way openings. The individual height of each deck is .375" 
 

 
Here is an overall view of where I am at so far. Many more hatches to go.
 

 
Now back to making hatches and decks.   Bring a whole new meaning to "Down the hatch!" 

Steve, Thanks for looking in and keeping me on the right path. I will run tick marks on the frames and up the stem. The proportional divider sure makes it easy. It's a great tool.

Al,
Steve is right, you certainly need to start the tapering of the planks.
But overall it's looking good.