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jbshan

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Everything posted by jbshan

  1. jbshan
    I read that the French intellectual investigations into ship design didn't actually make it into the ships themselves and remained a mostly theoretical endeavor. The British had the same experience and shortly cancelled the academics.
  2. jbshan
    Also, if you click on the drawing provided above, make sure your axles are at least as high as the drawing, check the height proportionally of the trunnions, side cheeks, basically everything to each other. You may find something you can alter to make up the difference. Once specific guns and carriages were determines, the carpenters would adjust as needed to make the guns fit the port openings; your situation is not unusual, especially with your guns and ship coming from different manufacturers.
  3. jbshan
    Two examples: Vasa was ballasted to the point where the gunports were in danger, but needed a lot more to be stable. Consitution was ballasted conventionally, but most of that was removed before she achieved her best sailing ability. If I recall correctly, both were armed as (roughly) 50 gun 24 pounder ships.
  4. jbshan
    Wayne, judging by the number or failures to achieve the desired height above waterline for the port sills, I would guess your last situation was fairly common, '...conjectural – representing the desired outcome, subject to the actual results when the ship was built.' I don't think the math was yet up to predetermining such things. You could still have waterlines used in the design process, as parallels, Deane in 1670 was beginning to introduce them a bit, but the success or failure of matching desires to results were still in the lap of the gods.
  5. jbshan
    Velvet cushions for the noble aftnesses? Gilded lilies and unicorns? What fun!! Hopeful avoidance of 'CRACK' when removing from formers.
  6. jbshan
    You will find you sometimes need to go back and forth from the text to the plates also, and many of the plates have several things shown. Take your time, make sure you understand everything before moving on. It's invaluable, just for a basic understanding. Be aware also that Lever sometimes shows several solutions to the same problem. That's where you'll want to go back to the plans, which are some of the best, to eliminate alternative setups.
  7. jbshan
    I took my Philadelphia model to the local club meeting when I was doing the outside planking. Using merely some manila file folder stock, I measured, marked and cut out with scissors a pattern for the next plank. Holding it up to the hull, it easily, with no wrinkles, bends, kinks, slipped 'magically' in place. Philadelphia is 1/2" scale, so big enough to do the demonstration for a largish group.
  8. jbshan
    I would call that a stop cleat. It stops the stay eye from sliding farther down the mast. The yard arms should have them as well, to keep the earrings, braces etc. from sliding farther inward along the yard. As stated, it's just a wedge nailed to the spar.
  9. jbshan
    Underhill's too late, as you have discovered, while Lever is right in the time frame. Pay particular attention to Lever's descriptions on raising the masts. If you can make yours to be able to do that, you'll be 90% there.
  10. jbshan
    Mark, Jolley, Fish, I think the epiphany has occurred, yes?
  11. jbshan
    I like the coffee cup still on the table in the bar, third photo.
  12. jbshan
    For the masts, a copy of Darcy Lever, 'The Young Sea Officer's Sheet Anchor' is indispensable. Model Expo usually carries it in a Dover edition, c. $20.
  13. jbshan
    Should have mentioned, the laser cut edge isn't square because the laser takes a few micro seconds to cut all the way through and is 'on' the top surface a bit longer and that side the cut is a bit wider. I use a small machinists' square to scrape the edge back to square, the metal having very true edges.
  14. jbshan
    Thank you, Jaager, that's very clear. And no, you can't filter denatured alcohol through a loaf of bread and drink it. You'll just make the bread poisonous. Lemon extract might be OK, though.
  15. jbshan
    ---Keith wrote: if it's short,what do you grab onto when bending? end of quote--- I always leave a tail or handle that extends past the ultimate end of the plank I'm working on. I first cut or sand or taper, whatever, the top edge and give it a rough bevel. I then trim the end going to mate to the previous plank or into the rabbet, going back to the top edge if needed to get the top and end to a snug fit. I then do the bottom edge to the correct width from previous calculations, at 90 degs. to the outer face. Lastly, I mark and cut the tail end to fall on the frame I want. This 'tail' has been my handle for all the previous processes.
  16. jbshan
    You will encounter the char from laser cutting on the edges of frame pieces which you're going to have to fair up in any event so no big deal. Thinner stock that has had parts laser cut isn't a big deal as you will want to square the edge to get a good edge to be going on with. Also 'in any event', you should get the char off because glue won't work as well on the powdery char. I wouldn't not buy a kit because of that, it's just part of that technology.
  17. jbshan
    Yes, Ian, you sometimes need wider plank stock than comes with a kit. Even the old timers didn't have easy access to say, 48 inch wide plank. This is one reason to use stealers, to get the distance covered with narrow plank stock. A garboard might have a section at the aft end that notches up wider, to the width of two or more 'normal' planks, to allow you to use regular stock farther up. Spiling, the process of measuring each plank to the one previous, is the way you find out how wide and what the shape is of that next plank.
  18. jbshan
    Checking on Google, Surgical Spirit may work in place of Isopropyl for dissolving white glue, they have many commonalities, but do a test before using it on the good ship HMS Afterguard. I don't know if it is significant to your not being able to find it, but one of the first commercial uses for Isopropyl was as a step in the production of cordite.
  19. jbshan
    Ideally one would at least check each plank for width along its edge. Even those not particularly needing to be cut on a curve still will need a bit of tapering, which is what spiling is, matching the width and shape of each plank to its place on the hull. You can bend a plank in or out, twist it, or bend it up and down (edge set) but not more than two of those at a time. Since you have to bend in or out and twist in most places, that leaves cutting on the curve for the up and down. Stealers and drop planks are used when the difference in width of the hull at that point becomes either impossible or difficult to account for merely by changing the width of the plank, in other words, when spiling will no longer work with the plank stock available, or when the plank would diminish to near nothing. Remember, the plank should set onto the hull with no stress, totally relaxed, as smoothly as a baby's butt. Stealers, drop planks and spiling help you achieve that.
  20. jbshan
    If you get the golf bug, which is a permanent addiction, you have to buy all the equipment, say $1K, drop a c-note each time, maybe, just for greens fees, cart extra, perhaps join a club, a couple of $K more, you've way over spent several years' worth of boat yard expenses. Skiing is in the same category. After each of those is the possibility of either Aprés Ski or the Nineteenth Hole, another addiction we needn't go into. Do you like to shoot, skeet or target? Buy the gun, join a gun club, buy the ammo, again there is the clubhouse afterwards. Tennis ditto. You'll soon develop a need for a new gun, new clubs or skis, a better tennis racket, etc., etc. That saw you bought will last you for years, and will let you get into making your own plank stock, or cutting frames or bulkheads if it's that sort. Pick a pastime, there aren't many as inexpensive over time as building little boats.
  21. jbshan
    Leaving too-rough castings, minimal rigging line and poor blocks out of the equation, many of which you would want to change, augment or replace in any event, merely changing the hull and deck planking from basswood to a nice hardwood can make a large difference in the appearance of a model. It could even allow you to use a wood finish instead of being forced to paint the hull. Until the late 1700s ships were mostly payed, not painted, so having that option is a nice option to have.
  22. jbshan
    I made square blank stock, then marked and cut (plane, sand, whatever) the taper on opposing sides. Turn 90 degs., mark and cut the taper there, so now I have square stock, but with the taper cut in. From that square, it isn't too hard to go to an octagon then to round where required. I didn't try to taper and octagon at the same time. I don't have progress pics, but the results can be seen here: http://modelshipworld.com/index.php/topic/9953-lexington-by-jbshan-dlumberyard-164-from-the-seaways-practicum-by-clay-feldman/?view=findpost&p=295786
  23. jbshan
    Now that's interesting, Tony. I found walnut ink, for artists, water-based, just change the concentration for a lighter result. I put a tiny bit in a shallow dish and pull the line through, once or twice or however many times. For a heavy color, anchor cables for example, I use burnt umber acrylic paint, very similar color to the walnut, probably pretty much the same from manufacturer to manufacturer and medium to medium.
  24. jbshan
    Victory had just come out of refit (1803?) so probably had the more recent innovations.
  25. jbshan
    You wrote: What is the origin of all of the interpretation I am seeing? ---End of Quote--- Thistle, the earliest version (1740?) would have had no connection between quarterdeck and focs'l. As you say, very inconvenient. They introduced a narrow gangway with just a couple of planks to run back and forth. In time, this got a bit wider and gained a rope railing. They then realized it might be handy to get the boats out of the waist and put beams across the opening to hold boats, which got more substantial and with stronger supports. The opening got smaller fore and aft as well, until you get to a 'spar-decked frigate' such as Constitution where the large opening in the waist has been reduced to a large hatch. It's all a progression, over a period of more than 50 years, and the configuration of a particular ship depends where on that scale she falls, as well as the dictates of the designer or particular navy involved.

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