Roger Pellett

The model is finished. I entered it in the Downeastcon IPMS show in Sanford ME on April 14th, and it placed 1st in its category, and also received "Best Ship" of all ship categories.

I have seen historic and contemporary films on YouTube that show the use of English Wheels and there may be one or two that show the construction of shop-made ones.
 
To be honest I don't really see a need for such a gadget in ship-model building. In the automotive sector they are used to reproduce complex and tightly curved panels with beads or similar features. If you use single copper-plates or even whole strakes in most cases no particular shaping apart from pushing it snug against the wooden hull would be needed. In the worst case you could gently rub on it with a round wooden dowel or something like this on a soft and thick cardboard.
 
In boat-building the vertical iron panels for so-called Francis-patent boats were hammered to shape over wooden formers. The same later in the early years of the car industry, before mass-production.

Once again, Thank You for your kind comments !
 

Again, real life including (business) travels got in the way of progress on this project. In addition, while I was having dinner in a restaurant together with colleagues, suddenly some ‘floaters’ appeared in one eye. I went immediately to the eye-doctor, who checked my eyes thoroughly. Luckily the floaters are harmless, but annoying signs of age. No retina-detachment or something else serious. Apparently, they can spontaneously disappear or the brain sort of ignores them after a while – keep fingers crossed. For the moment they are quite bothering, when working on really small things … so on to the ensign.
 
************************************
 
The Imperial German Navy Ensign

This ensign was first conceived for the navy of the North-German Alliance (Norddeutscher Bund) in 1867, bringing together the colours of the dominant powers, namely Prussia (black-white) and the Hanseatic City States, Hamburg, Bremen und Lübeck (red-white). The design obviously was inspired by the British White Ensign and makes reference to various medieval symbols, such as the cross of the Teutonic Order, and the more recent Iron Cross from the Napoleonic War. After the proclamation of the 2nd Empire on 18 January 1871, this ensign became also the ensign of the Imperial German Navy and remained it until the end of the Empire in 1919. There have been, however, some smaller modifications over the years, thus the eagle was somewhat modified and in 1902 the arms of the cross were made heavier in order to avoid confusion at distance with the White Ensign of the Royal Navy.
Overall, it is rather complex design to reproduce purely manually. First, I had to find a correct image for the ensign, as it looked in about 1878 and was lucky, as the Internet furnished a digital image of sufficient size and resolution. The idea was to print it on both sides of very thin paper (the kind that was used in the old days for carbon copies on type-writer, of which I kept a small supply). Such paper, however, does not feed well through the laser-printer and aligning for double-sided printing is practically impossible. Therefore, I resorted to so-called transfer-sheets. These are a kind of waxed paper that is used to transfer laser-printouts to T-shirts, mugs and such things. Laser-printer toner is basically carbon-black mixed with some plastics powder. It can be remelted with a heat-source, such as an ironing-iron and thus transferred to another substrate. I also experimented with overhead-sheets, but the results were not as good. 

Printing layout for the ensign (as it would appear on the transfer sheet)
 
In a first step, the red stripe in the flag was eliminated from the image in Photoshop, as it would print grey otherwise. The ensign was then scaled to the right size on the basis of some trial-and-error, as the laser-printer prints a few percent undersize. I then added reference marks some distance from the image and duplicated this for mirroring. Several of these left-right-pairs were arranged on an A4-sheet and then printed onto the transfer-sheet using the highest quality print setting.

Preparing the pouch for double-sided toner-transfer to the ensign-blank
 
Using the best matching pair, I made a small pouch (as you would do for the masks, when producing photo-etched parts), aligning the images against each other for a perfect match on an illuminated board (they can be bought for a few €/£/US$ on ebay et al. and are powered through a USB-charger). An oversized strip of the thin paper was slipped in between and everything taped down onto a piece of thick cardboard.
I pressed down an ironing-iron set to the lowest temperature onto the package, which made the toner firmly stick to the paper and no residues left on the transfer-paper. And voilà, a double-sided printed flag with a very detailed eagle etc.

The toner is (almost) completely transferred to the ensign-blank
 
In the next step the missing red stripe was added using red acrylic paint. I also added colour to the legs and beak of the Imperial Eagle, to the Imperial Insignia and the crown using yellow-ochre acrylic paint. If one has a colour laser-printer this step would not be necessary.
The flag was cut out exactly to size, except for the rear, where it was left a tad longer to provide for a hollow ‘seam’ into which a thread with two loops at the end was laid The seam was glued down with some diluted white glue. This area also needed a bit of touch-up afterwards with black acrylic paint.
 
The ensign before adding the colours
 
Draping the flag is best done or least pre-arranged on the flag-staff. The paper was slightly wetted and the flag laid into diagonal folds in alternate directions. Toothpicks ensured that they became folds and not creases, which would be unnatural. Such a large ensign (2.9 m x 4.96 m) would fully unfold only in a moderate breeze and not in the light wind assumed in the scenic setting. So it flaps lazily in the wind, which I tried to reproduce.

The completed ensign
 
To the thus prepared ensign the halliard was attached as a loop. This loop was taken over the top of the flag-staff and a tiny laser-cut paper disc glued on as truck. There was no way to cross-drill the staff for the halliard. The halliard was belayed on the clamp. With this the assembly is ready for installation on the boat. But I will not hoist the ensign before the crew is on board. The recruitment process is still on-going …

Ensign wetted and shaped
 
Sorry, this was a rather lengthy essay on just and ensign, but the idea was to describe in detail, how to arrive on a reasonably realistic looking flag at such as small scale.
 
The ensign attached to the flagstaff
 
To be continued ....

There are two types of commonly used small drills; High Speed Steel (HSS) and  Carbide.  You don"t tell us which kind you are trying to use.  Carbide drills are extremely fragile and are intended to be used in some sort of mechanical drilling device.  Any side force will cause them to shatter.  HSS drills are old fashioned but forgiving.  Good quality ones will drill any of materials that we encounter. 
 
Roger

Really nice work Melissa!  The deck structures can be tricky on these small craft as they often slope.  This means that a conventional three view (orthographic) drawing provides a distorted view of the shapes.  While there are manual drafting techniques and of course CAD that can provide a "true view,"  modeling in cardboard will work too and of course then you wind up with patterns.
 
Roger

Notes on deviation from original design:
 
I set out to build an accurate reconstruction of the model from the book, I think I will succeed and fail in various ways.
 
1. Dimensions and accuracy of shape, form and color:  I believe I will be very accurate in these areas.  I watched the movie clip above of the ship provided by Navyshooter, and I see three thwarts in the model used in the movie, and I fully respect that model, but I do not see three thwarts anywhere in the book, so I will stick with two.  Each interpreter of a model must make their own decisions, and whoever made that model for the movie did an outstanding job in my view. 
2. Materials:
   a. All wooden parts in the book : pine.  All wooden parts in my model: Pine.
   b. Lead ballast in the book:  Tin/Bismuth in my model....a deviation for safety purposes
   c.  "tin" rudder in the book, I will use a piece of aluminum, a deviation for long term corrosion purposes.
   d. "Enamel" paints in the book, I will use same.
3. Tools:  from Chapter 1 in the book , I  see a hatchet and two different knives for carving the model.  I used a table saw and planer to form the pine blank, and I used a bandsaw to cut out blanks for the various pieces as shown in my photos.....maybe I should have used a hand jigsaw which would have been doable.  I did only use knives and chisels for carving, no dremels. 
4. Construction:  It is not clear from the book how the model was exactly constructed, but the impression I get from the early pages is that the boy carved it out of a single piece of pine.  I made my hull from a piece of pine and am making the thwarts, packs, and man, from separate pieces which I am gluing to the model.  This may be inaccurate, but! I submit the illustration from the 2nd page of chapter 26 to support my decision to make the man from a separate piece of wood with the grain vertical along the upright plane of the man.  For copyright purposes I will not post the illustrations here.  The illustration supports that the boy built the model with the man made from a separate piece of wood with vertical grain perpendicular to the grain of the hull.  I will use wooden pegs to attach the perpendicular-grained pieces of the man and the canoe. 

In the meantime, i continued with the fore castle basis.
 
This time I checked in time whether any problems will arise with the schrouds.

So yes, my cardboard structure was much too wide at the top. Error corrected just in time.

The base starts at an angle of 45° following the (few) remains of the fore castle. And then with a curve upwards. As always too high or too long, shortening later is easier than lengthening.

Applying the second was a little more challenging.

Additional temporary supports were then installed. And i continued with finishing the waist. 

Gluing done on starboard side, now on to port side. Sanding is for later.

The flanking rudders move to aid maneuvering.  Water flowing over a rudder from the props is very effective in turning the boat (high velocity) while water flowing over the rudder in baking up and not from the props is very ineffective in steering (low velocity).  Thus the flanking rudders being ahead of the props work very well in controlling turning while in reverse.   The boat can move sideways when the flanking rudders are turned one way with the steering rudders (behind the props) are turned in the opposite direction with one prop in reverse and the other going ahead.  I can't remember the combination of port or starboard props in forward and port or starboard in reverse with the direction of the flanking rudders being to port or starboard and steering rudders to being to port or starboard, but both props and rudders must be set in opposite directions to move the boat sideways.
 
Pilots can do this in their sleep before they are entrusted to operate a towboat with barges.  I have spent a lot of time on towboats on the IL River when I was associated with the owner of the business and while I did a lot of steering on mostly straight parts of the river or gentle sweeping turns I would never have thought of asking if I could attempt a sharp turn where operating both sets of rudders and using reverse on one prop to aid turning knowing the pilot would absolutely not allow it.  Back then I was into R/C boats and had a twin screw towboat with steering and flanking rudders with individual motor control.  The towboat company had a real nice shallow pond adjacent to their office building and our Radio Control Model Boat club was able to enjoy operating our boats there.  I used to truly enjoy calling out to a Captain or Pilot and ask them if the wanted to operate my tow.  They all said yes without hesitation - the first time.  After a quick explanation of which control lever on the radio was the steering rudders with the other by default the flanking rudder, the port and starboard motor controls were very obvious which controlled the props.  On a 1:1 towboat the steering controls are horizontal levers that operate on a concentric pair of control rods to the rudders.  The engine controls are side by side levers with duplicate sets of motor controls on each side of the steering levers.
 
Like I said earlier all Pilots and Captains can make their boats move in any direction by combining steering and motor controls as describer earlier.  They don't have to think about forward/reverse/port/starboard.  But the simple fact that there  is a different R/C control layout than in any towboat caused them to screw up the simplest maneuver.  Most would hand me the radio and walk away after just a few minutes.  But most of them came back later because "no toy boat is smarter than me!"  We did have a lot of fun operating at the shipyard.
 

Since I'm starting the fore castle earlier than planned, I haven't looked at this properly yet.
According to what I have read briefly, it should look like it is drawn on the cover of the MR book.
2 light cannons and all the are rest swivels, or hail shot pieces 

Hello again everyone, it has been way too long since my last update. I have been busy, I have just been dealing with computer problems. My old laptop decided to give up the ghost so I had to purchase a new one. Well after being a Windows guy for 30 years, I finally converted to the dark side and got a Mac. I knew there would be a learning curve to get used to a new style of computering, but it took me little longer than I had planned to get things moved over from my old laptop and figure out how to use the new style of apps. But I persevered and finally got it all moved over and I am ready to go. So pull up a chair, grab a drink and get ready for a major photo dump of progress.
 
So on my last update I was having difficulty trying to solder my railings and had decided to go with the styrene method. While I pondered how to do the small railing on top of the pilothouse, I worked on the lower sections of railing. Here is the railing that surrounds the pilothouse going together.
I couldn't get the small jig that I had previously made up to get a consistent results, and I was having a hard time getting the stanchions to stand straight up. So I made up a different jig that had slots cut in at the correct spacing and clamped the two halves together. This held the vertical stanchions perfectly upright and steady while I glued the top rail in place. Once this section was complete I removed the section of railing, placed it on my mat then used a small piece of scrap wood cut to the correct spacing to add the lower rail. I forgot to take pictures of this part, but in the next picture you can see a couple of the pieces of scrap wood on the railing show how it was spaced.

More of the lower deck railings.

 
Then it was on to the smaller railing. I took @KeithAug advice of making a jig with my Xtool to frame up the ladder as a test piece. 
So far so good. Then I cut the brass rod pieces and placed them into the jig.

 
I decided to give the solder paste a try, and it didn't let me down. This was so much easier than trying to flux and solder the pieces together in the jig.


After a little filing and cleanup I am very pleased with the outcome.

 
Since the ladder was a success, I decided to use the solder paste on the pilothouse railing. For this one, I made up another jig that gave me the proper spacing for the height of the rail and soldered each stanchion one by one.

Again, I am completely satisfied with the results. Now I'll just need to tie the ladder in with the railing, but that will have to come once I get the decks secured in place.

 
After competing the railing, it was time to work on the hull features. I wanted to get everything on the underside of the hull done so I could get it mounted to a temporary base and work on everything upright. So I started with the Korts and wheels. On my previous post I had already cut and shaped the Korts and temp mounted them in place. Now it was time to install the fairings where they tie to the hull. Nothing out of the ordinary here, just cut a few pieces of wood sheets to match the contour of the Korts and hull.

Then I made a couple of plugs with centering holes so that I knew where to align the wheel shafts.

The centering plugs also helped me mark where the wheel shafts will penetrate the hull.

Once the penetration points were marked, it was time to do a little drilling.

Wheel shafts temp installed to test their alignment.

Then the wheel shafts were cut and mock wheels made to make sure that I had the centering and clearances correct.

 
Once the holes were drilled and the shafts cut, it was time to work on the shaft supports. I cut out several pieces to layer up the supports and carve them down.

Three layers was just about right, now its time to carve them down.

Roughly shaped, and testing the fit.

This is the look that I am going for.

 
On to the wheels. I used the mock patterns that I had previously made to align each blade. I made the hub in the same manner that I made the supports. I cut out several layers  and sanded them to shape. I didn't take pictures of this process as well, but you can see end results of the hubs in this photo. I then cut out another pattern of the wheels and separated the blades from the hub and proceeded to glue them at the proper angle on the shaped hubs.

One of the completed wheels.

And temp installed in the Kort. Just a little sanding, shaping and paint and they should be good.

 
Next it was time to work on the rudders. I started with the main rudders. These were cut from pieces of wood sheeting. I didn't have any materials thick enough for the completed rudder so I layered these as well. Here is the initial shape. 

The two layers glued together.

Shaping to get the correct contour. 

 
Rudders temp installed to test their alignment. I also threw in another little detail with the addition of a galvanic anodes. These were place in various places along the hull, rudder and Korts to help with corrosion prevention.
 
Time for the flanking rudders. Same process, these were also cut out of wood sheets, but there is not any contour to these. They are fairly flat and need to have a narrow profile since they are rarely used when the boat is going forward. This low profile reduces drag and prevents the disruption of water flow through the Korts. There is some cross bracing to help stabilize any flex from the water flowing across it. Here is the initial pattern.

Cross bracing installed.

More bracing. This is used to streamline the water flow around the rudder shaft.

More galvanic anodes installed on these rudders as well. 

All four rudders completed.

While perusing the internet for more study material I ran across an another little detail that was built into the boats. I'm not sure what it's called and my searches were coming up empty, but that is not saying much because its sometimes hard to look something up if you don't know what to call it. Anyway, I noticed from some of the videos of towboats in dry dock that there was this fairing attached to aft section of the hull. My best guess is that its purpose is to help keep the turbulent water from coming over the aft deck. So I glued on a thin strip of wood and installed these very tiny gussets cut from .020 ABS sheets.
 
Here are the gussets.

Gussets going in.

The finished fairing
 
 
Time to get it all premiered up and ready for some paint.

And more galvanic anodes going in.


Next up was the installation of the coil coolers. These were radiators of sorts installed on the hull sides that uses river water to cool copper fins that circulate engine and clutch oil through. The coolers are mounted recessed in the hull and a protective grill installed on the outside to protect the fins from river debris.
 
Here are the cooling fins that I cut out on the laser cutter.

Recesses cut into the hull for the cooling fins.

Fins installed in the hull


Here is the protective grill alongside the hull and coolers. These will get attached after the hull is painted and the cooler fins coated with a touch of copper paint.

Painting of the hull, wheels and rudders.


 
Flanking rudders installed.

Main rudders temp installed to test for clearance.

Port rudders aligned

All rudders installed and anodes painted up.

Up close shots showing details.


 
Time to flip it over and install the coil cooler guards. It wasn't until I posted this photo that I noticed the gap in the wood planks on the hull. I'll need to go back and fix that.

 
Here she is in her correct, upright position with all decks sitting in place.

 
One final feature that was almost completed that I wanted to add to this update was the construction of the stacks.
 
I started with a basic framework of a base and top with a center support to maintain the correct height of the stacks.

Then it was time to cover the frame with strips of wood. Here is the first strip going in.

More progress. Starting to take shape.

Completely covered with a light sanding to smooth out the edges of the planks.

Here is the cap and fairing that will sit on top of the stack

The two pieces assembled.

And the cap installed on the stack and a final sanding.

Both stacks completed and temp installed.

Another view. I will take these and cover them with some body filler to fill in the gaps and give the top pairing its final shape. Hopefully that will be done by my next update .

 
Well that is it for this update, I hope to be a little more timely with my next one. Thank you all for sticking with me on this and stopping by. As always I appreciate all the kind words and input.
 
-Brian
 

No. As far as I can see a Three Roll Bender is a pipe bender. An English Wheel is a sheet metalwork tool typically used to make panels, often automotive. It is used, by very skilled craftsmen (I can't emphasise how skilled) by eye and hand to stretch flat metal in different directions to make complex curves.
 
English Wheel

Thank you Andy and John.
 
I spent a few hours today completing the rudder (excluding finishes).
 
The shaft is 0.16" diameter while the plate is .04" thick. I therefore needed to machine slots in the the cladding 0.08" radius by  0.06" deep. See blue arrows on next photo. I also cut the plate along the line of the shaft removing a .016" wide strip.
 

The brass pieces were then assembled on the cladding and glued in place using CA glue.


The other side of the gladding was then glued in place forming a brass sandwich.


The rudder is fitted with anodes. All the anodes on Cangarda are of the same flat plate type.  I drilled the holes for later anode attachment.

To get the taper sanding of the cladding symmetrical I employed a flat sheet of aluminium oxide paper and a bulldog clip.

The bulldog clip is holding the front of the rudder clear of the sandpaper and at a constant angle while the taper is sanded. The bulldog clip spring is hard enough to resist the abrasion of the oxide paper. The taper on the front edge of the rudder was formed in a similar manner.



My plan is to get on to the planking next. I expect it to be a long job so if you want to skip it I suggest you rejoin in about 2 months.
 

Hi Everyone!
 
Got around to some sanding, carving the packs at the bow and stern, and made/installed the thwarts.  Continues to be a very fun project.
 




 

There are two types of commonly used small drills; High Speed Steel (HSS) and  Carbide.  You don"t tell us which kind you are trying to use.  Carbide drills are extremely fragile and are intended to be used in some sort of mechanical drilling device.  Any side force will cause them to shatter.  HSS drills are old fashioned but forgiving.  Good quality ones will drill any of materials that we encounter. 
 
Roger

Unlike steam railroad locomotives, marine engineering practice required use of condensing engines for two reasons.  First, high pressure boilers did not tolerate salt water.  Scaling from salt deposits impeded heat transfer causing failure of  the boiler tubes.  Second, the development of the triple expansion engine, increasing thermal efficiency, required steam in the low pressure to be exhausted well below atmospheric pressure.
 
New York City harbor craft, however appear to be an exception to this rule.  In his excellent book, Tug Boats of New York City, (Photo caption page 85) author George Matteson writes:
"The white vapor emanating from the tug is exhaust steam, which indicates that it is equipped with a noncondensing engine.......  Most small harbor tugs were equipped with noncondensing engines to save expense and because clean fresh water was always available from city hydrants."
 
Railroad locomotives are subject to height restrictions from tunnels, bridges, etc.   These harbor craft were not.  the easiest way to increase boiler draft was to increase the height of the smoke stack with steam vented separately.  As with railroad locomotives, as steam technology matured, marine engineers worked to utilize every last BTU from fuel bought and paid for.  For sophisticated steam ship designs this lead to all sorts of waste heat recovery devices often located in the smoke stacks.  These harbor craft traveling very short distances did not require these complicated steam plants.

Unlike steam railroad locomotives, marine engineering practice required use of condensing engines for two reasons.  First, high pressure boilers did not tolerate salt water.  Scaling from salt deposits impeded heat transfer causing failure of  the boiler tubes.  Second, the development of the triple expansion engine, increasing thermal efficiency, required steam in the low pressure to be exhausted well below atmospheric pressure.
 
New York City harbor craft, however appear to be an exception to this rule.  In his excellent book, Tug Boats of New York City, (Photo caption page 85) author George Matteson writes:
"The white vapor emanating from the tug is exhaust steam, which indicates that it is equipped with a noncondensing engine.......  Most small harbor tugs were equipped with noncondensing engines to save expense and because clean fresh water was always available from city hydrants."
 
Railroad locomotives are subject to height restrictions from tunnels, bridges, etc.   These harbor craft were not.  the easiest way to increase boiler draft was to increase the height of the smoke stack with steam vented separately.  As with railroad locomotives, as steam technology matured, marine engineers worked to utilize every last BTU from fuel bought and paid for.  For sophisticated steam ship designs this lead to all sorts of waste heat recovery devices often located in the smoke stacks.  These harbor craft traveling very short distances did not require these complicated steam plants.

Really nice work Melissa!  The deck structures can be tricky on these small craft as they often slope.  This means that a conventional three view (orthographic) drawing provides a distorted view of the shapes.  While there are manual drafting techniques and of course CAD that can provide a "true view,"  modeling in cardboard will work too and of course then you wind up with patterns.
 
Roger

Unlike steam railroad locomotives, marine engineering practice required use of condensing engines for two reasons.  First, high pressure boilers did not tolerate salt water.  Scaling from salt deposits impeded heat transfer causing failure of  the boiler tubes.  Second, the development of the triple expansion engine, increasing thermal efficiency, required steam in the low pressure to be exhausted well below atmospheric pressure.
 
New York City harbor craft, however appear to be an exception to this rule.  In his excellent book, Tug Boats of New York City, (Photo caption page 85) author George Matteson writes:
"The white vapor emanating from the tug is exhaust steam, which indicates that it is equipped with a noncondensing engine.......  Most small harbor tugs were equipped with noncondensing engines to save expense and because clean fresh water was always available from city hydrants."
 
Railroad locomotives are subject to height restrictions from tunnels, bridges, etc.   These harbor craft were not.  the easiest way to increase boiler draft was to increase the height of the smoke stack with steam vented separately.  As with railroad locomotives, as steam technology matured, marine engineers worked to utilize every last BTU from fuel bought and paid for.  For sophisticated steam ship designs this lead to all sorts of waste heat recovery devices often located in the smoke stacks.  These harbor craft traveling very short distances did not require these complicated steam plants.

There are two types of commonly used small drills; High Speed Steel (HSS) and  Carbide.  You don"t tell us which kind you are trying to use.  Carbide drills are extremely fragile and are intended to be used in some sort of mechanical drilling device.  Any side force will cause them to shatter.  HSS drills are old fashioned but forgiving.  Good quality ones will drill any of materials that we encounter. 
 
Roger

Oh the many hours I've wasted just tinkering around in CAD - fidgetting about lines being a hair out here and there. Not to mention the abject fear of deleting the files by mistake. Then the magic of 'copy as a mirror' or 'snap to vertices' command seduces me again...!
I still have a pot of sharpened H pencils on my desk just in case the power goes off one day.
Ha! My 'dry' January is still going, so that excuse is out as well!

Have just read through this beautiful build and I can add some insight to your smoke stack question.
You are correct in thinking they had a liner inside the smoke stack.
this liner is the actual chimney for the boiler exhaust gases.
The smoke stack we see from outside is sort of decorative.
Getting back to the liner inside the smoke stack.
At the top of this liner there would have been slots cut into the liner’s perimeter just below the top rim.
this would help with draft of exhaust smoke.
these slots would be a few inches wide by a few more inches high.
if you think about it.
heat rises.
the vacuum created by the much hotter exhaust gases would pull cooler air up through these slots creating even more of an updraft.
this would have helped keep the decks clean of coal cinder as well by pushing these cinders more into the hot air exhaust and hopefully dropping them into the water around the boat.
I had seen this on a derelict ship years ago and have never forgotten it.
Here’s my take on the liner aboard a restoration I’ve recently completed.
probably not 100 percent accurate but it gets the idea across.

One last piece of advice in addition, not instead, of the above.
 
Try to pick a subject that will hold your interest.  Whatever you decide to do this, by today’s way of looking at things, will be a lengthy project.  If in a burst of enthusiasm, and seduced by the box art, you buy something and then lose interest later your kit will join the majority of those never completed.
 
Roger
 
 

The worst ship model is one one not built.  I have been attempting to build quality ship models for more years than I care to remember and in the process have built some that were bad beyond belief.  I still have some purchased fittings in my stash that were stripped from the models before they were trashed Over time my skills have gradually improved to the point where I now have a collection of models that I am proud of.
 
My advice is, decide on what type and period of ship that you would like to build that involves the skills that you would like to develop.  Buy the simplest kit that meets these criteria.  Get busy and build it.  Don’t worry if you make mistakes.  Everyone makes mistakes and remembers them.  Finish the model and move on.  Knowledge and skills will only improve over time by doing.
 
 

Your choice of books depends on what you want to do.  Are you satisfied with buying kits and assembling them using kit supplied parts?  Do you want to replace some parts with those that you make yourself?  Are you interested in “kit bashing” to produce a more historically accurate model?  Are you interested in scratch building?
 
Different approaches to modeling require different reference and research materials.
 
Roger

The sharpening book that I have is written by Leonard Lee.