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kurtvd19

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Everything posted by kurtvd19

  1. kurtvd19
    Mike: Sounds like you have the problem solved. Roger: That's interesting - but we would probably need a scale cow! I have to sit down and do a page by page read of both of Bates' books. Have used them for reference many times reading the relevant parts but you have convinced me that a thorough read is due. Thanks, Kurt
  2. kurtvd19
    Mike: Test on scrap basswood. The frets that the parts came out of works well - same exact wood so results will be same. Kurt
  3. kurtvd19
    Mike: Looking good. The deck is glued down tight so there is no worry about warping at this point. I airbrush, but this works with brush too. Wet the wood - dampen the wood is more accurate - let it dry and you will see that it has fuzzed up. Sand lightly to knock off the fuzz and dampen it again. Re-sand and then paint. There might still be a bit of fuzz, but much less. A very light final sanding will give a smooth surface. I use a very worn sponge sanding pad (by 3M) for this. Another way to avoid the soaking in of the paint and fuzzing of the basswood is to apply Shellac to the wood - the Shellac seals the wood. A very light sanding and then paint. Kurt
  4. kurtvd19
    Mike: I would go with the oxide red for the decks and the wheel. Anything red would be the same red. Kurt
  5. kurtvd19
    Elijah: Looking good. Very good. Kurt
  6. kurtvd19
    Mike: Put it in a case!! I used to make a lot of $$ cleaning models that were not in cases - gave it up as it was sad to see the same models a few years later that had deteriorated more by the constant exposure. Kurt
  7. kurtvd19
    Dead flat will be most accurate. Kurt
  8. kurtvd19
    Mick: Outstanding work. Thanks for sharing this with us. Every time somebody asks us about the plans I tell them to check out your build. Thanks, Kurt
  9. kurtvd19
    Will: Here are some photos of the jig used by several modelers who built the longboat for the Tri-Club build. It should be self evident how the jig is made and used, but if you have a question just ask. Kurt
  10. kurtvd19
    Mike: No, I didn't forget, just very busy. Will get them to you this coming week for sure. I agree that Oxide Red is a good color for decks and the wheel. It was commonly used and cheap. The Ronnberg colors are not on the NRG website. However, they are in the Shop Notes 2 book we sell from the web site. The printing of the colors was expensive to assure they were accurately duplicated in the SN2 and for the accuracy of the colors to be true showing them on the website is not possible due to many variables in monitors. Kurt
  11. kurtvd19
    Mike: I told you not to dread the hull planking. It looks good. Kurt
  12. kurtvd19
    Sal: The article Roger mentioned is not yet available in the store but I am checking to see if it has been converted to go up onto the site or not. If it has been converted I can arrange to get it o you for the same fee as listed on the web site store. we have a lot more articles than are listed ready to go but we are contemplating a site revision and don't want to make double work for the web masters. Those additional articles will be available once we sort out if we are going to change. Otherwise I can print the pages in question off the CD's we sell, with all of the Journals archived, and can arrange to mail it to you. I will post here when I find out one way or the other about the availability / method. Kurt
  13. kurtvd19
    Elijah: We missed you at the meeting last night - have fun in camp. Kurt
  14. kurtvd19
    I agree 100% with Cathead on the colors. Red was by far the most common deck color though brown was also used. Most hulls were white but black was also used. Check the photos I had posted of the Chaperon to see the white hull, but the photo I posted of the model made by Sam Parent had a black hull and made a very attractive boat. If you are going to model the Chaperon as the Chaperon then I would definitely go with the white hull but if you change the name use black or white. Kurt
  15. kurtvd19
    Yeah, Cathead, I agree - very interesting and I am going to do some checking on the sources Roger has cited. I figured a boat was a boat - but being wider than average sure makes sense for the use. The Chapelle book though is the one I do not have! Kurt
  16. kurtvd19
    Mike: Do not dread planking this hull. It's pretty straightforward. I wet the planks that needed fitting for about 2 minutes, clamped them in place till dry and then glues them in place - no stress on the glue joints. Just be careful with clamping force as the basswood can crush easily when wet. Kurt
  17. kurtvd19
    Glenn: The window frames are fantastic. I love the technique you used - and I will copy it when the need arises for windows. The same for the fantastic doors and the milling technique used for the rails & stiles. Definite outside of the box thinking came up with these techniques. Thanks for sharing. Kurt
  18. kurtvd19
    Mike: The photo shows a flat roof - covered with simulated tar paper - and it matches the photos of the real Chaperon I posted earlier. I am confused by your description of the roof. The decorations surrounding the roof are kit supplied. The photo is of the pilot house prior to it being installed onto the model. I tend to keep the installation of small pieces until later in the build when possible, to avoid knocking bits off during construction. Mike, it's only my opinion, but I do not like the King of the Mississippi kit as I think it's unrealistic . However, that's my opinion and if you like it by all means go ahead with it. There is only one person you need to please with the model you build - YOU. You are the Captain of your boat and you can paint it the color you like, add anything you like and make it YOUR model. I am curious as to what the others think about the KotM kit. Take a look at the Train Troll web site for some realistic small towboat / tug kits. I just built the Smokey Duck kit and saw all of their kits (assembled) at the last NRG Conference. I have the Smokey Duck in it's case displayed atop the Chaperon's case. Same scale and it makes a great contrast. But the kit is among the best engineered kits I have built and I will build more. www.traintroll.com Kurt
  19. kurtvd19
    Mike: When you get to the pilothouse I will post some photos of the changes to make to the kit. Here is the altered pilot house. Kurt
  20. kurtvd19
    Roger: W/o taking over Mike's build - I read your comments about the flat bottomed boats with interest - makes perfect sense. And I don't dispute that this might have been the most common type of boat carried. Like I said it makes sense. But I thought that this was something I should have caught doing my research. So I went to my file on the Chaperon to see what the photos I have might tell me about the boats on the Chaperon. I have a whole bunch more of the Chaperon than what I have posted here. And some show only a direct side view of the boats on the Chaperon and from a profile I can't tell if they are flat bottomed or not though some show a low rake angle at the bow which makes me think you are partly correct as related to the Chaperon. However, the photos I have attached of the Chaperon do show that the boats in the photos are not flat bottomed boats with large flares. They do have flat transoms unlike the kit boats though one photo (bottom photo) does show a boat almost identical to the kit boats. These are the photos from my collection with the best views of the boats - most don't even show the boats due to angles and some are too fuzzy to tell. So, at least in the case of the Chaperon the kits boats can be used with some authenticity. But, I am going to look into this further. You don't per chance have any idea of what issues of the Journal might have had the plan(s) you referred to? Maybe we should take this to the other forum on general discussion STEAMBOATS & OTHER RIVERCRAFT - GENERAL DISCUSSION so Mike's build log isn't taken over by this? Although if we keep it to the Chaperon it's a fit here. Take care, Kurt
  21. kurtvd19
    Mike: I will be following. Don't hesitate to ask anything about this build. I did a 6 issue build of it in Ships in Scale magazine and if I don't remember any specific detail I have all my text and photos to fall back on. I probably have a photo of just about anything you might run into building the Chaperon and will be glad to post to help. I mentioned that these riverboats didn't use the small panes of glass for windows in the pilothouse. The drawings below are of the original Chaperon plans and then the drawing (Fig. 99) from Alan Bates' Steamboat Cyclopedium showing the typical arrangement of windows. They agree very closely but the kit provides small window panes for the front "window" area that never actually had any sort of window glass. The front frame pieces were cut down and used to make sliding windows on the sides as shown on the Fig. 99 drawing from the Bates book. Kurt
  22. kurtvd19
    Mike: This is just my opinion of the kit - offered as another viewpoint not argument. I built the Chaperon when it was first released. I thought it was one of the best engineered kits produced and except for rigging materials I didn't find that the materials provided were not of good quality - with the exception of the very small square strip wood meant to represent the battens on the board and batten cabin siding. I replaced this with cherry strips I cut. I know that woods can vary from time to time so your might not be as good as mine were. As to the plans, I thought they were exceptionally well done - the isometric views can help the builder see the model in 3D unlike the standard 2D 3 views of most plans. The plans provided adequate full size drawings for the parts that needed to be sized to the plans. There are inaccuracies - the hog posts do not extend down into the hull. The pilothouse windows need to be reworked - small panes of glass were not used in the front windows of riverboats. But, the faults do not take away from this kit being by far one of the best riverboat kits on the market. I had a lot of research materials for this boat as well as a prototype of the original kit that Model Shipway's never actually produced - 1/8" scale, solid hull. I knew the inaccuracies of the original plans and shared details with the kit designer - not all were corrected as the kit was pretty far along in development but it turned out to be a great kit in my opinion. The photos attached are of my model - the bow on view - and the other is of the model built by Sam Parent that was entered in the 2016 contest at the WI Maritime Museum. Sam's model corrected the hog posts and added the monkey rudders behind the stern wheel - this was a feature found on many riverboats but not on the original Chaperon - he named the model Barbara Ann after his wife. Sam added a lot more details than I had included - it is a great model - and earned a gold medal. Anyway, I know you will enjoy building the Chaperon. I will be happy to share details of the pilot house windows and the hog chains and their turnbuckles. I could not believe that the kit included photo etched turnbuckles! Flat brass at this scale just doesn't cut it. Take care, Kurt
  23. kurtvd19
    Thanks for the compilation. The Chaperon did not operate on the Mississippi River. It was used mostly on the Yazoo River and Ohio River. It very well could have been used on the Mississippi as there were many similar boats on the Mississippi. Kurt
  24. kurtvd19
    Cathead: One point that was covered is that there must be a good market to make the mfg take the risk. There are not enough of us building riverboats to be considered a viable market. The Chaperon kit is the sole kit with good scale fidelity and good engineering and I think the sales of it have been good but I don't think that Marc's going to do another riverboat kit soon - if ever - as there just aren't enough of us to matter. Here are some photos of what I think is the best engineered riverboat kit I have ever seen - and built. It's a 1/48 scale waterline kit by Train Troll - I got it at the NRG Conference in Mystic last year. Kit name is the Smokey Duck. Train Troll will be a vendor at the 2016 NRG Conference in San Diego in October. Laser cut parts that are by far the best of any kit I have worked with or examined. His market is mainly RR modelers - a much bigger segment of the modeling world than we are. I think when more boat builder see this guy's stuff he's going to become better know to us. Check out the web site. Every one of his models is great and the detail stuff he has is outstanding. Kurt
  25. kurtvd19
    Cathead: Yes, IPMS accepts wood models. As each chapter is pretty much just loosely associated with the IPMS-USA they all get their charter from the IPMS-USA and must follow their rules that include all models. There are some that are less accepting than others but I think it's more an area interest in that there are IPMS car clubs where all the members model only cars/trucks and there are aircraft centered clubs too. But nobody is turned away (at least to my knowledge - and I am sure the national group would not take kindly to hearing of such a practice). The model shown on the current cover of the Journal was an IPMS winner - Best Nautical - at the 2015 Nationals and it took 2nd place in the Recent Master's Competition at the WI Maritime Museum's show. 20 years ago the thought of a plastic model on the cover of the Journal would have had some old timers having heart attacks. The same sort of thing happened within IPMS when they opened their competitions to all media. They had to with the use of photo etch, etc. You can check the IPMS web site where they list all the shows scheduled. You just missed a show in Branson, MO. The IPMS-Gateway (St Louis) group has their show on September 10. ipms-gateway.com/invite2016html I don't remember where you are in relation to St. Louis but this might be something to put on your go to list. Kurt

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