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Thanks Sam !
 
But as you know it your self, sometimes the life is in the way.......
 
But.....a week later then I was saying but here is an update.
Anja finished 3 of the 6 hammock netting....
Still 3 to go and in the mean time I have make the spar/ yards for the front mast.
And place them !
Pictures of that are following.
Tomorrow I go to the spars/yards for the main mast.
Before any questions are coming.....yep, I place them without ropes or parrel beats or other kind of stuff.
 I'am a little sneaky and I know it's not the way but for me it works just fine.
I drill a 1 mm hole in to the mast and spar and glue a brass wire of 1 mm inside.
You don't see a thing of it and I can work on the spars/yards without moving that thing !
Blame me if you want 
 
Sjors
 
 
 

I too am a fanatic for sharpening, I have to be to do chip carving like I do. I also at this point primarily use Shapton glass stones, having experimented with everything under the sun, I find that Shapton stones remove metal faster, stay flatter longer than anything but diamond, and will probably last my lifetime.
 
Anyone who hasn't tried one should, in my opinion they stand head and shoulders above all other hand sharpening stones. Also in my opinion stones above 10k aren't worth it, inexpensive strops of various types work as well or better. And you don't need the godawful expensive Shapton flattening stone, first you won't unflatten it meaningfully doing ship modeling work, and even if you did there are reasonably flat diamond stones out there for 1/10th that cost that will do just as well.
 
But back to your question Bill, see the Veritas Ml.II honing guide I linked to above It's not intended for gouge curve radii but it will do an extremely good job of curved edges at widths from 1/8" with narrow blade attachment to 2 7/8", it's very well made, and it is what I use to sharpen my $200-$300 Veritas bevel up smoothing and jack planes as well as everything else it's appropriate for, in all cases leaves an edge I couldn't conceivably improve on.
 
And as I mentioned above, no one should every sharpen a straight plane iron purely straight, have to feather in a smooth curve to .001 to .003" or so relief at the corners depending on width of iron to prevent those nasty straight lines from the corners of purely-straight plane irons. So I only use the straight roller on the Veritas honing guide to establish the basic bevel, and until that needs to be redone again I will sharpen with the cam roller, spending the most time the first time around to establish the curve I want. You can try to do that by hand, I used to, it doesn't work very well. In short have to pry my honing guide out of cold dead hands.
 
Here is a surface straight off my smoothing plane, three full-width passes right to left. You're going to need an extremely good straightedge to detect any deviation from pure flat, and there is no abrasive that could improve this surface. And this is wenge, extremely hard wood.
 

 
Here are the shavings it's taking doing that.
 

 
And here's the jack plane doing the same thing to a piece of rock maple but that is way easier than wenge. Just about every shaving is almost full width and feathering out on the edge, exactly as desired. 
 

 
And to back once again to the main point , the Veritas guide will do just as good a job on the double-concave iron in Julie's plane.

I have the L-N convex sole block plane

It acts in the same way as the Veritas palm planes but is a bit larger.  I haven't yet found a use for it in model making but I have used it for carving out the hip relief on solid body guitars. 

I too have bought several of the miniature tools and also use them... but in my opinion, cool as they are, the better option for basic small scale planing is their detail palm planes. They are planing an area around the size of their miniature bench plane, have an adjustable-length palm rest that should fit hands big and small, and I find I have more control and can go faster than I can with the straight miniaturized bench and block plane. And they have scrubbing irons for cases of difficult grain.
 
I have the flat and the double-concave, don't see enough of a use for other two.
 



 
 

Okay, I ordered the plane set as well. Damn you guys!

Hi Jan, Don and all,
Sorry, I did not wrote it. Scale of the model is 1/48, length:505mm, height: 480mm, width: 175mm
 
Best regards
Daniel

I was able to really get going today. Thanks to Paul - everything  I did today was due to his last post. The shelves(ladders ) and the port opening system. I had been very tempted to leave all that out - the build is already crowded. But I suppose crowded is part of what the design is trying to display.
 
The build has an outer and inner hull with "frame" pieces making the space in between. After completing both hulls I put a capping plank on top of them to close the gap. Down the road I realized that the port opening system required ropes to be passed thru the outer hull, thru the inner hull and then rigged up. With that cap there was no way I could do this and it did not want to come out. Pauls most obvious idea - put a hole where I need to pass the ropes thru. The destruction is not a problem. There will be another plank that sits on top of the entire hull.
 

 
Access to both hulls using the gap in between them. Off to the races. These ropes are used to close the port doors. The brown rope is a seizing.
 

 

 
Holes for passing ropes thru the hull.
 

 
The rig to close the ports. A little cheesy, but they match the instructions.

 
Given that I did all this so late in the build there was no way to drill holes up into the beam, so I bit the bullet and drilled from the top. I'll have to go back and fill them.
 

 
Ropes in fitting and threaded thru hull.
 

 
Second part of the opening rig. Just a stropped eyebolt
 

 
Seizing the rope to the port fittings
 

 

 
Right about this time I got to wondering. I'm putting this whole system together based on one picture. It all looks good but how does it actually work? The next pic shows both positions - port open and closed. The brass fitting in the background is closed. The foreground (which I am pulling on) is open. OK, so maybe it will work.
 

 
Second block installed. More holes in the beams to fill
 

 
This shows the hole rig.
 

 

 
The shelves added. Do you see any resemblance to a ladder?
 

 
I did learn a new knot. I had to tie off the end of a rope in an eyebolt and there was virtually no room to reach it. The Davy Knot did the trick. This is a very cool website if you haven't seen it.
 
I'm actually feeling like the end of this build is in sight.

A small item(s) added although it took a little while to figure out. Sacks of something hanging on a hook in the wall. Once again the plans show a cryptic picture that made no sense to me. Something about wrapping a piece of the supplied material around a dowel and then I got lost.
 
The end result looked slightly triangular rather than cylindrical so I found something else to wrap around.
 

 
The material.
 

 
Wrapping the material. Used CA on the edge right by my thumb.
 

 
Then fold over the CA edge
 

 
The back side.
 

 
Remove from bottle top. Trim the wide edge - should end up like the 2nd pic.
 

 

 
Put CA on the lower edge and fold the pointed side over.
 

 

 
These things definitely have a good side and a bad side so be careful where/how you tie the knots.
 

 
Carefully drench them in matte varnish. When it dries it helps to keep their shape. I also glued them together so the good side faces out.
 

 

 
I still may do something to dirty them up a bit. G'nite yall
 

Getting so close I can taste it. I've finished the hammock rail & netting. It was debatable whether to do this or not. I know some have, others didn't. The deciding factor for me was just that the upper deck needed something to balance the clutter below.
 
That netting was not easy to work with. Getting the edge glued around a line really tried my patience. My first attempt at tying the netting off on the rail didn't go well either. What I ended up with is much simplified from the plans. I also found that gluing the netting to the supports first and then tying them off made things a lot easier.
 
I like the look of the netting. I wish I had something like that for my Niagara build. But then again, at 1:64 it might not look right. Still it would be nice to have some to stash away. I could see it being a nice addition for certain applications.
 
I ran out of the kit supplied material for making whatever those bags are. Hammocks? Stuffbag? Still need 3-4 more.
 

 

 

 

 
So all that's left is the railing and the cartridge buckets. The railing is underway.
 
 

A little closer. The railing is finished and installed. To me it seems way too tall. One more thing that is out of scale.
 
In preparation for the completion, I have been going over everything for a final touchup - lots of small spots that need repainting. I also noticed that while the ropes look OK where they are positioned, there are a lot of lose ends that stick out sideways, one was even pointing up. This obviously needs to be remedied. So I clipped alligator clips at the very end to weigh them down and then painted the ropes with watered down white glue. I'm fairly pleased with the result.
 

 

 

 

 
It's down to the cartridge canisters now. I need to dust off the lathe for that. Also figure out how to cut a thin groove in the canisters. I know the lathe is perfect for doing that I just don't know what cutting tool to use for something that thin.

Man I hate it when I start trying to be thorough. Since I just finished hammocks on this build I thought I would take a look back at Niagara since she needs some as well. I Googled a little bit and came across several discussions here along with some pix. And now I'm thinking there's no way I should leave those hammocks piled up in the netting. I didn't even make them the right size.
 
But then there appears to be another inconsistency with the scale. If a real life hammock was 6' that would be about 3" at 1:23 and that gets doubled over, so 3' to 1 1/2". When I make a hammock 3", double it over and put it properly in the netting the stanchions kinda swallow it up. I had to make the hammocks closer to 4" to get the right look. Now I just need about 20 more of them.
 

 
They do look better lined up.
 
 

The hammock redeaux is almost complete. What an improvement! I can't believe the plans and instructions both say to essentially just toss them into the netting. Kinda like this
 

 
I measured out 6' to scale pieces of material then took a cotton pad to give some bulk and rolled that up. When I folded them in half they seemed a little stubby so I increased the size a little. Haven't "rolled my own" in years On this color material, Elmer's ended up being the best glue. For some weird reason CA just didn't want to take to the cotton material.
 

 
I still have to figure out how to tuck the ends in so you don't see the edge of the material. But overall I think it is a great improvement.
 

 

 

 
For some reason I seem to be avoiding the cartridge containers. That's the last thing to do...
 
This whole hammock exercise has been helpful. I need to do the hammocks on Niagara. Doing it all first at 1:23 has allowed me to work out a good 'look' for the 1:64 work ahead.

here are a few more pics. Thank you for looking

Hi Ben, glad to hear you're getting back into it. I'm looking forward to seeing your next update(s).
 
Ed, thanks for the kind sentiments. I'm not totally sunk, but just undergoing my own personal recession! Hopefully I'll have some stories to share soon enough.
 
Thanks again to everyone else and all the likes, and especially all the compliments, they are very much appreciated.
 
So a small update on the goings on last weekend.
 
After re-checking my measurements, I've begun to cut out the gun ports on the port side. In some areas it looks like you need to put on a pair of those old blue and red 3-D glasses in order to make sense of all the lines. But it all works out after a fashion. 
 
To help break things up a bit, I decided to intersperse one monotonous task with another equally monotonous task, and began lining the starboard gun ports. I'm using the kit supplied walnut for this task, as the end product will be painted anyway. The instructions say to use the 6mm strip, but I found the job easier by adding widening the strips to 10mm by adding a 4mm strip. It means I'm not fudging around trying to get all the angles right, and in some cases the thickness between my bulwark and outer planking is a bit over 6mm anyway.
 
Not much more to add for the moment.
 
Andy

Hello again everyone, and thanks for all the likes and comments.
 
Time for a small update. I've been busy lately with the gun ports. I was reasonably satisfied with the layout on the starboard side, so I decided to start hacking them out. It's not 100% accurate, but it will be one of those things that separates my build from everyone else's. 
 
As has been identified by other builders, the forward gun ports cut through two of the bulkheads. For my approach, I decided to laminate leftover pieces of first planking in order to build up the thickness and support the bulkhead extensions. For the first layer, I offset the planking by starting with only a half width plank to improve the overlap between layers and make for a stronger structure. So far no observed issues and the bulkhead extensions appear to have retained some strength.
 
I've also made a stab at the lower counter. The instructions say to simply plank the area, but I read in Jason's log where he created a template. I used some 1/32" basswood sheet I had kicking around to create my own version.
 
Moving on, I need to verify all the port side gun ports to ensure things line up as closely as possible before cutting them out. I've had to redraw the forward ones a couple of times already. But I'd rather waste sand paper and a pencil lead and re-do it as many times as needs be!
 
Any day now I should receive my order from Crown Timberyard as well as my first order of replacement bits! Can't wait!
 
Andy

Hi Kevin, no need to ask permission, you're always welcome!
 
I got the batteries charged so here are a few more photos as promised.
 
I used the kit supplied tanganyika for the deck. I expected it to be splintery, but useable. After sanding the edges, I used a pencil to simulate the caulking. I've seen a lot of discussion on whether to plank the deck before, or after installing the false deck. I suggest doing both! OK, now you're confused, but it's really not that complicated. After marking out the centre line and the butt shift, I planked the centre section only, until all the hatch ways and other openings where surrounded. There's still more than enough spring in the false deck to install it as once piece.
 
The other two photos show the first planking at the bow and the stern. Not much more to show for the moment.
 
Andy
 

We now return you to your regularly scheduled build already in progress.....
 
Well, it's been a while since I've posted much of anything. My temporary shore job went temporarily bust just after Christmas (it all came down to a numbers game, there are simply not enough ships running this year to justify the overhead expense blah blah blah (we'll see what happens in audit season!)). Anyway, I'm not out of gainful employment, they've sent back to the fleet (yeah...what fleet?!) at any rate. Long story short, I've had some free time on my hands, so I figured I would start hacking my way through another build.
 
If some of you may recall, I've got two frigate kits sitting around waiting to be built. As the title suggests, I decided to tackle the HMS Diana first. I didn't take any photos of the early part of the build, mostly because at the time my head wasn't in to documenting for posterity, every minute (mis)step I went through.
 
Reviewing some of the other build logs (Ray's and Jason's), they pretty well sum up all the pitfalls to watch out for when building this kit, and there are many! In general I found the CnC cut bulkheads leave a lot to be desired in terms of cut accuracy, in many places I had to sand down or shim up in order to get a smooth run of planking without dips or bumps.
 
I've finished the first planking, and I made an attempt to try something like the method that Chuck espouses for his builds, and ended up with (to paraphrase Douglas Adams) something that almost, but not quite entirely, doesn't resemble it. But it was good practice. I found that the kit was short 4 strips of the first planking material. But rather than order replacements, I found I had enough long scrap pieces lying about that I could reasonably cobble together the missing planks without compromising on the strength of the hull. You may be able to spot one or two of the odd planks in the attached photo.
 
At the moment I am currently marking out the gun ports. As has been observed, the included template is pretty much garbage. It's a lot easier to take the base dimensions given in the instructions and draw out the ports using a ruler and dividers. Around ports 7 and 8, I found the distance between the ports needs to be slightly greater, around 37mm as opposed to 30. This is where the entry ladder and fenders will eventually go.
 
Going forward, I intend to replace much of the kit supplied second planking, and last week I ordered a good supply of castello boxwood from Crown Timberyard. Below the wales will pretty much be kit stock, as it will be largely covered by the coppering. I am going to try to make any of the exposed walnut planking look more tarred than painted.  I have no intention of using the kit supplied copper plates, I find the Amati plates much better looking and far less.... pimply. I also intend to replace all the blocks, rigging fittings, deadeyes etc., and rigging line. I will probably replace all of the guns, as I'm not a fan of the supplied versions. That oversized bowling ball of a cascabel and weird muzzle shape detracts from their appearance, but the two largest size guns that Chuck sells do match closely with the dimensions of the supplied guns (discounting the aforementioned bowling ball). 
 
I would have some more photos, but the battery on my camera ran out of juice (I really should check these things more often). I'll have some more photos soon.
 
Andy
 

Looks great and with all the improvements you have planned I have just booked a permanent front row seat

So it has been some time.... to say the least......
 
I've got some time on my hands again, and things are starting to move once more in the old shipyard. Things have been pretty quiet since the spring...between work and the awesome summer weather (which means spending absolutely as much time as possible up at the lake), it has not been conducive to hiding inside making saw dust. I was busy earlier in the spring purchasing some "upgrades" to the basic Caldercraft Kit. Not finished shopping by a long shot, but at the end of the day, the cost of all this will basically be equal or better than the cost of an entirely new kit ( )... but it will be worth it.
 
So far, I've bought new second planking from Crown Timberyard. Some nice castello boxwood, which I plan to use for the wales and upper works. Below the wales, I will stick to the splintery walnut from the kit. It's actually not all bad once it's cleaned up, but most of it will be hidden by the copper plating anyway, so it's only the top smudge that will be visible.
 
All the blocks will be replaced by those supplied by Syren, far nicer in appearance. Although rigging is a long way off yet, I've already received a good supply to start. There are a few other fittings, such as cleats and gratings that I will also replace, and already have the replacements in hand.
 
The other big thing I'm going to change are the guns. As you can see from the photos below, the Caldercraft cannons are, to my eye, a tad on the chunky side. The muzzle looks wonky and the button on the cascabel is way oversized. The guns Chuck supplies are far nicer and much finer looking. I will also replace the cast white-metal carronades, but that's for another time.
 
Other items on my shopping list:
-Replace kit supplied copper with Amati copper sheeting
-Try to source better looking PE parts for the chain plates (Would like something along the lines as the PE supplied with the USF Confederacy)
-All kit supplied rigging line to be replaced with Syren rigging line
-Stern windows and other PE fittings to be specially examined and dealt with as required (I am considering buying the PE set for the Agamemnon, more so if it comes with PE chain plates and not the formed wire nonsense of the Diana kit).
 
I'm on the fence about the gun carriages. I may yet replace them, but we'll see how things go.....
 
So now for the update part..... in order to break up some of the tedium of cutting and lining gunports, I decided to start some of the second planking on the starboard side (since the ports have been all cut and lined on that side anyway). I'd already planking the lower counter back in the spring, so it was a matter of measuring off where the wale is supposed to be and getting going with the planking. I've started off with the black strake, just above the wales. The instructions call for these thicker strakes to be created by doubling the layers of planking. Fairly common for these types of kits, but given my experience with the Pegasus, it can be tricky to get the second layer to lie properly, and when working with CA, do-overs are not easy. To make things easier for myself, I've laid down the black strake in one 1.5mm layer, rather than a 1mm with a 0.5mm layer on top (as described in the instructions). When the rest of the 1mm thick planking is installed, this will leave a proud edge for the second layer of the wales to butt neatly against. I will attempt to do the second layer of the wales in anchor stock pattern, so having a hard edge will go a long way to keeping things neatly in line.
 
Anyway, it will all make sense later on..... maybe....
 
 
Hrm.... now that I look at it, I may slap some black paint on the stem before I get further along with the second planking....
 
Andy
 
 

Update time! Hooray!
 
Planking continues slowly and steadily on the starboard side. The second layer of the wale has been added, my first attempt at top and butt (anchor stock). You can just see the shape of the planks through the black paint. I used castello boxwood for the second layer, which was a pleasure to work with. Having the black strake 0.5mm proud of the surrounding planking gave a nice line for the first strake to butt up against.
 
Below the wales, I've carried on using the kit supplied walnut planking. It is incredibly splintery, Caldercraft must supply some other variety of walnut from that supplied by Amati (go figure). It works after a fashion, and doesn't look too bad. Most of it will be coppered anyway, and I find the the colour contrast to the castello appealing. Also, because the kit supplied planks are also about 1m long, cutting them down to more manageable lengths has made things a lot easier when it comes to bending and tapering, it also makes it easier to get a nice fit and finish where the planks meet the stem and stern counter.
 
Anyway, that's about it for now
 
Andy

Thanks for the comments, the "likes" and just looking in...  
 
At last, a real update as life (the Admiral's health) got in the way.  The frame extensions have been removed and she's starting to look more like a frigate.   I still need to sand them down to the sheer strake but I'll be doing that when I need a break from the gundeck work.
 
Here's the pictures...  as always, a click on them will open them to full size (or what constitutes full size on MSW).  The last two are more of a reference shot for examining things on my part but I thought I'd toss them in anyway.  Sorry about the sawdust and mess.....
 

Hola Michael:
 
I am sending you the drawings of the BB Wasa, I am not sure if they are correct or not (as many other parts in the instructions), but anyway is better something than nothing.
 

 
 
 
Saludos, Karl

Hi Mates,
 
Need your kind advice, if you don’t mind.
 
As work continues on putting together the upper masts for all three masts, I realize that I did not think about (nor understand) what method should be correctly used for hailing the mid and upper yards.
 
I went to Anderson, but it still left me a bit confused.
 
Putting ropes over the cap does not appear in any Vasa model that I have seen including the 1/10th (but I have NO good pics of that area) And I assume that grooves would be needed in the caps?
 
PS: All lower yards for all three masts have pulleys cut into each mast – so that is easy enough (pulley may be the wrong term). That part I understand.
 
  
 
Then I thought that I would add a second ring under the caps, but then it seems that those are actually used for hoisting topmasts. Makes great sense, but then why need the fid??
 

 
That leaves two other options;
 
Drill another hole in the upper masts adding a pulley within – I think that I’m too far gone for that option
 
Or add two more blocks under each of the platforms to use to hail the yards. 
 
Last pic is obviously a complex and prob. 18th century vintage
 
The two extra blocks under each platform could be the easiest to do.
Any thoughts will be appreciated indeed.
 

 

Capt. Steve, thanks for that tip - will use it when I get to the main caps. Thanks for your nice thought as well.
 
Karl, I also need to thank you a second time. You were so kind to send me jpg's, in sections, from your master Billings rigging sheet. These have been SO HELPFUL - so appreciated. Thanks again.
 
PS: When I get to the sails I will have to spend a lot of time looking through your's and Frank's build log again (:-)
 

Hi Mates,
Working on the mid-foremast installation - how I fashion the mast cap release pins;
====================
1) Using a small brass nail squeeze its head with standard size pliers.
 
2) Using a rotary tool smoothen (a bit) the now flattened head – top and bottom only
 
3) Drill a hole through the flattened head first measuring the drill bit so as to have it conform to the other nail that will serve as the vertical locking pin.
 
PS: the attrition rate tends to be high with this step –it’s hard to align the drill bit so that it remains centered and drills the hole where you want it to be on the flattened nail head (doing it without a drill press)
 
3) Then with a rotary tool flatten the sides to square off its look.
 
4) Now flatten the head of the other smaller nails
 
4) Blacken all the parts with Black Brass Metal Finish.
            Over time I do not think that black hobby paint will
            Stay adhered and may flake off (IMO) only.
 
5) I found that the tiny vertical lock pins tend to slide too low.
            So I use a super small smudge of CA as I insert the pins
            Holding the pin where I want it to remain.
 
6) Cut off the too long vertical pin ends
 
PS: Thanks mates for the help with the mast fid bits. I’m happy to have learned this detail. J
I think that it was Peter Jensen – I need to go back through to check your kind advice…