kurtvd19

Eric:
The walled off areas alongside the stairs was for coal storage.  I have seen photographs of coal in burlap bags being carried onto boats.  Sometimes on backs or shoulders and also in wheelbarrows.  If building the Chaperon today, and not for a magazine deadline, I would absolutely insulate to top area of the boilers.  Most photos I have of steam engines and their steam pipes don't show insulation on the pipes or the engines.  Back then the fuel was cheap and conserving fuel or steam wasn't much of a concern.
Kurt

Finishing the hatch covers:
 
Today marks the official end of the 2023 Great Lakes Shipping season.  Vessels arriving at the queue for the  SOO locks by midnight will be locked through in either direction.  After that the locks will close until March 25 isolating Lake Superior from the other lakes.  It has been a good season with the twin ports of Duluth, MN and Superior WI shipping 51 Million tons of pelletized iron ore to American and Canadian steel miles. The ports also handled significant quantities of limestone, cement, coal, and grain.
 
The reason for the lakes’ 10 week closure each winter is not ice. Great Lakes vessels can and do navigate in ice.  The 10 week closure is required to perform maintenance that has been deferred during the shipping season.  Superior, Wisconsin is home to one of three active American drydocks on the lakes.  It can dock vessels up to 800ft long.  This winter will be busy.  Eight vessels are scheduled to lay up in the harbor here.
 
The layup each winter means that Great Lakes ships are and in the past have been well maintained.  That, and the fact that they sail in fresh water means that  weathering of the model will be minimal.  A notable exception is the Noble’s hatch covers.  The few photos that I have found of wooden hatch covers of Great Lakes vessels show a checkerboard of different weathered colors that vary from like new wood to black.
 
The first step in finishing the covers was to drill holes in them for the ringbolts. This was done using the sensitive drilling attachment mounted in the Sherline milling column.  Another of my simple wooden jigs assured correct location.  (First Photo).  Adding the two ringbolts to each cover was then just the matter of pushing the tail through the hole, bending it over and securing it with a dab of lacquer based fingernail polish. (Second photo).
 
To finish the covers I mixed up five different grey and black pigments and diluted them with alcohol.  For a couple of shades I added some granulated grey and black dry dye pigment to add a gritty texture. (Third photo). The different colored hatch covers will be arranged in a random pattern when they are added to the model.
 
Finally, (Forth Photo) two stacks of hatch covers to be fastened near the ship’s open coal bunker.
 

Roger
 

Made some nice progress this weekend. It helped that the outdoor temperature got down to -13ºF (-25ºC) last night and never went above -3ºF (-19ºC) during the day today. Good thing we have a nice stock of on-farm firewood on hand.
 
I made a momentous decision regarding the boiler deck. Having built all the framing off-model, I'd intended to also plank it off-model before installation. But I began to realize that installing a fully-planked deck would make it very difficult to do certain other tasks, and decided to go ahead and install the framing now. I had one shot at doing this right, because I had to glue the back of the framing onto the solid engine room structure, and clamp it down tight, while making sure the rest of the deck was as squarely aligned going forward as I could. Since I'd left holes in the deck planking for the support posts, there was little margin for error; I had to get this lined up exactly right. So I did a few test runs without glue, and convinced myself I could get the alignment right before the wood glue started to grab. So I went for it!


Once this was solid, I cut the first three support posts on either side and installed them, along with gluing down the boiler assembly.

Now for some of the details I decided were better done before the decking went down. First, the access to the boiler deck. Way back in this log, we'd had a discussion about where the staircase/ladder would have been between the main and boiler deck, and settled on a location near the engine room, just behind where the boiler deck cabin would be. I'd already framed out an opening for this. My original plan was to scratchbuild some kind of enclosed staircase, but while rummaging around in a scrapbox, I ran across a nice package of HO-scale plastic staircases that I decided would do quite nicely since I hate building stairs. So I cut one segment down to size, painted it white, and weathered it with gray pastel. I figured these should be pretty grimy since they'd be primarily used by the crew.

You'll see this installed in a minute. Next, I moved on to the steam lines connecting the boiler with the engine room (one line for each engine). These would have been suspended from beneath the boiler deck beams, and I'd realized would be very hard to install after the deck was planked. As it was, this was a very fiddly job that had my nerves all jangly by the time it was done. 
 
To hang these, I intended to use very small wire loops run through the deck beams to simulate some sort of bracket. I drilled very small holes in the beams, working very slowly so as not to crack a beam, then ran a longer loop of wire through. Getting these up through the bottom of the holes involved a very small tweezers, a lot of patience, and a diverse vocabulary. I intentionally left fingertips in these photos for scale.



I did two initial sets of these loops, one near the engine room and one near the boiler. Then I took two lengths of brass rod, which I'd already painted black, threaded them through the loops, and pulled the loops taut to hold the rods in place. Here's their "connection" to the engine room, where they presumably pass through the wall and then diverse to their destinations on either side.

Where these met the splitter I'd installed above the boiler, the connection wasn't perfect, so I used blobs of glue to "seal" the joint. Once this is painted black and in the shadow of the deck, it'll look fine. A bit of paint was scraped off the rods during handling, I'll go back through and touch all this up.

Here are wider views of the installed steam lines, ladder, and rear three posts.
 


And an overhead shot:

You might also notice in the previous photos that I gently weathered the whole boiler assembly using rust-colored pastels. Further details to install including a couple more support loops along the steam lines, and some form of railing or enclosure for the stairs. 
 
Sharp and knowledgeable eyes might detect two nit-picks: one detail that's not quite right, and one I intentionally left out, both for convenience and practicality. Can anyone find them?
 
From here I think I want to do more detailing of the main deck first, adding some cargo and so on, anything that would be easier to do while I can see or reach down through the boiler deck framing. There's no reason to suspect that I'm procrastinating on milling a lot more deck planking to careful tolerances. Nope.
 
Thanks for all the interested comments, questions, and likes that provide such useful inspiration to keep plugging away at this project!
 

Eric:
The stacks and the breeching need clearance from the combustible wood and the hot stacks.  If the area where they pass through the decksisn't visible no worry, but if visible you may want to provide a gap.
Kurt
 

Nothing made by ZHL is considered legit.

OK, just a little update.
 
I have been very busy, if not producing stuff, then trying to carry on with my next two smaller developments.
 
Today I finally completed the hull detail for kit number 15, the gun brig Adder of 14 guns (1797 - Acute Class). 12 x 18 Pounder carronades and 2x24 Pounder carriage guns. I think this has taken three weeks in total to get this far, perhaps two weeks for masts and rig.
 
Size wise this fits neatly in between Alert and Speedy. The designs were a lot more involved than I initially anticipated, with the bluff bow and foredeck drooping down as it goes forward, presumably to help negate the recoil of the large 24 Pounders.
 
As with Trial Cutter, it has drop keels, and all hull detail above main wale is pre cut and engraved, meaning very little planking required, which is also painted (or coppered) anyway.
 
This was meant to be a nice cheap and simple kit, but as usual, I went too far, and ended up with a very detailed little kit with many laser cut and engraved sheets.
 
Scale - 1:64th (of course..)
Hull Length - 406mm
Overall Length (Rigged) - 606mm
Height Overall - 464mm
 
This class was a Henslow design, and if you don't like the name, there is quite a choice:
Acute
Adder
Asp
Assault
Biter
Blazer
Bouncer
Boxer
Bruiser
Clinker
Contest
Cracker
Crash (!!)
Sparkler
Spiteful
 
All ordered and built in 1797
 
Adder was actually lengthened in 1798 to 97' along the main deck, so I doubt she was ever coppered in the as built guise. Most seem to have been coppered at a much later date after their launch, hence the white bottom.
 
No idea how well this will sell....

I agree-- Shop local when possible.

The saw I showed earlier came from UMM-USA.  The guy that owns UMM-USA is from the Czech Republic - still has a very strong accent.  He was the original importer.  He has a lot of his unique products made over there by close friends.  He is a great guy and is helping a lot of friends who are still there.  I try to give him my business so he can continue to keep some  of the companies back there to stay in business. 

I think you will be happy with the TAIG.  I had one for several years and learned to do a few things with it - I was happy.  A long bed Sherline became available for a very good price so I got it.  Soon learned that I didn't need the long bed unit.  A club member who had just purchased a short bed Sherline was telling everybody how unhappy he was that he spent all that money for the short bed Sherline.  I  overheard him and offered to swap him my long bed unit for his short bed unit and he was at my shop the next day.
So there I was with a Taig and a short bed Sherline.  I soon found myself using the Sherline exclusively and sold it to a fellow club member for a good price for both of us.  Sure enough I found myself missing the Taig as it was a lot easier to use in many cases.  The guy who bought it was in love with it so I stopped considering getting another Taig and learned to love the Sherline. 
I am sure you will enjoy using the Taig it will probably always be able to do more than you need or know how to do.

I think you will be happy with the TAIG.  I had one for several years and learned to do a few things with it - I was happy.  A long bed Sherline became available for a very good price so I got it.  Soon learned that I didn't need the long bed unit.  A club member who had just purchased a short bed Sherline was telling everybody how unhappy he was that he spent all that money for the short bed Sherline.  I  overheard him and offered to swap him my long bed unit for his short bed unit and he was at my shop the next day.
So there I was with a Taig and a short bed Sherline.  I soon found myself using the Sherline exclusively and sold it to a fellow club member for a good price for both of us.  Sure enough I found myself missing the Taig as it was a lot easier to use in many cases.  The guy who bought it was in love with it so I stopped considering getting another Taig and learned to love the Sherline. 
I am sure you will enjoy using the Taig it will probably always be able to do more than you need or know how to do.

I think you will be happy with the TAIG.  I had one for several years and learned to do a few things with it - I was happy.  A long bed Sherline became available for a very good price so I got it.  Soon learned that I didn't need the long bed unit.  A club member who had just purchased a short bed Sherline was telling everybody how unhappy he was that he spent all that money for the short bed Sherline.  I  overheard him and offered to swap him my long bed unit for his short bed unit and he was at my shop the next day.
So there I was with a Taig and a short bed Sherline.  I soon found myself using the Sherline exclusively and sold it to a fellow club member for a good price for both of us.  Sure enough I found myself missing the Taig as it was a lot easier to use in many cases.  The guy who bought it was in love with it so I stopped considering getting another Taig and learned to love the Sherline. 
I am sure you will enjoy using the Taig it will probably always be able to do more than you need or know how to do.

I think you will be happy with the TAIG.  I had one for several years and learned to do a few things with it - I was happy.  A long bed Sherline became available for a very good price so I got it.  Soon learned that I didn't need the long bed unit.  A club member who had just purchased a short bed Sherline was telling everybody how unhappy he was that he spent all that money for the short bed Sherline.  I  overheard him and offered to swap him my long bed unit for his short bed unit and he was at my shop the next day.
So there I was with a Taig and a short bed Sherline.  I soon found myself using the Sherline exclusively and sold it to a fellow club member for a good price for both of us.  Sure enough I found myself missing the Taig as it was a lot easier to use in many cases.  The guy who bought it was in love with it so I stopped considering getting another Taig and learned to love the Sherline. 
I am sure you will enjoy using the Taig it will probably always be able to do more than you need or know how to do.

I think you will be happy with the TAIG.  I had one for several years and learned to do a few things with it - I was happy.  A long bed Sherline became available for a very good price so I got it.  Soon learned that I didn't need the long bed unit.  A club member who had just purchased a short bed Sherline was telling everybody how unhappy he was that he spent all that money for the short bed Sherline.  I  overheard him and offered to swap him my long bed unit for his short bed unit and he was at my shop the next day.
So there I was with a Taig and a short bed Sherline.  I soon found myself using the Sherline exclusively and sold it to a fellow club member for a good price for both of us.  Sure enough I found myself missing the Taig as it was a lot easier to use in many cases.  The guy who bought it was in love with it so I stopped considering getting another Taig and learned to love the Sherline. 
I am sure you will enjoy using the Taig it will probably always be able to do more than you need or know how to do.

Nothing made by ZHL is considered legit.

PRICE IS #1 TO MANY OR IS IT TOO MANY?

Nothing made by ZHL is considered legit.

PRICE IS #1 TO MANY OR IS IT TOO MANY?

As to fixing the larger lathe- You can make small parts on a big lathe, but you can't make large parts on a small lathe.

Nothing made by ZHL is considered legit.

Eric:
The stacks and the breeching need clearance from the combustible wood and the hot stacks.  If the area where they pass through the decksisn't visible no worry, but if visible you may want to provide a gap.
Kurt
 

As to fixing the larger lathe- You can make small parts on a big lathe, but you can't make large parts on a small lathe.

Eric, the boiler turned out great!

Here's some more progress on the boiler. I took a few of these overexposed to help the dark black be visible. Here I've added the steam vent into the breeching and a representative safety valve, a t-shaped pipe from which two steam lines will run to the engines, and a rough version of a "doctor" pump used to draw river water for the boiler. If you follow the piping you can see that the water runs from the pump around to the mud drum beneath the boiler, where the Missouri River's abundant sediment would settle out before getting into the boiler proper.

 
This is a more simplistic version of the same setup I built for Arabia (see last post), but that was (a) at a larger scale, (b) intended to be a more open model with internal visibility, and (c) I just plain held myself to a higher standard for that one. This will work fine for Peerless.
 
And here it is set in place on the main deck, with a brick-lined ash pan under the firebox doors (for hopefully obvious reasons). First photo without boiler deck, second photo with boiler deck loosely resting on top (but not bent to proper curve).
 


There is no other superstructure to build; unlike all the other vessels I've built (and also unlike Chaperon, one of the few accurate kits out there), Peerless has absolutely no support for the entire boiler deck forward of the engine room, other than two rows of supports posts. I'm repeating myself here, but that's why I chose to have the breechings directly support the boiler deck even though it's not quite accurate. Otherwise it's a long, delicate run of mostly empty space. Also I chose to build the deck framing separately. I've said all this before, but I thought these photos really made the point.

Hello again,
 
Time has a way of getting away from us, and I didn't realize that it has been over a month since my last update. With the holidays, I needed two of me to keep up with everything that I was doing. I have made some progress on the the Caroline though, and I figure it about time to get something posted.
 
So before the holiday's hit I managed to work on the Kort Nozzles. For these I found that 1 1/2" plastic conduit was the perfect diameter for these, and saved me a ton of time having to shape these out of styrene. Ok, I admit the size wasn't exactly perfect, they were .75mm larger than the correct scale, but I figured that was close enough, and by the time I finished shaping them I would be close enough. Besides these will be on the bottom and not fully seen.

 
Placement on the hull in there approximate location.

 
I put the nozzles on my drum sander and used that as an arbor to sand them into shape with a sanding block and files. I forgot to take photos of the process, my phone was in my hobby room and I was too lazy to go get it. But anyway, this was the first nozzle roughly shaped, compared to the original pipe.

 
Both nozzles with their general shape. I still need to get them smoothed out a little more and add a few details for them, but I like what I have so far.

 
Then the Christmas holiday hit and Santa was very good to me. The Admiral and I decided that we needed a new toy to support our craft and shipbuilding hobby and we decided to invest in a laser engraver. After extensive research we decided that an XTool S1 would be worth the investment, so we bit the bullet and purchased one.

 
So I spent a few days tinkering around with the engraver and it's software, making small, little simple projects just to get the feel for it, then it was time to see what it could really do. So why not try it out on the Caroline. Here I am working on the walls for the first two decks. Pretty easy since they are somewhat square.

 
Then it was time to see what this baby would do.

 
Couldn't ask for better results. So I played around with the windows a bit, using different thicknesses of wood to give them more dimension and depth and engraving the window frames, as well as some of the door features. 

So to help with some of the wall structure I drew up little brackets to help support the wall braces and cut them out as well as the braces.


 
Then it was time to give it all a test fit. I'm thinking I am going to really like this tool.



 
I do realize that this is somewhat turning a scratch build into a kit build, and hopefully no one thinks that this is cheating. But hey, aren't most kits started from a scratch built model? 
 
I've got more to come, but I just found out the hard way that CA has a shelf life, and after first opening my current bottle two years ago, it's adhesion is just not what it used to be. So for now I'll work on some of the other deck walls and get them designed while I am waiting on a new bottle of CA to arrive.
 
That will do it for this update. Thank you all for stopping by and the kind comments.
 
-Brian
 
 

As to fixing the larger lathe- You can make small parts on a big lathe, but you can't make large parts on a small lathe.