Kenchington

Looking good so far! If you leave that char on the moulds, it will stain the planks -- or it would if you bent wet planks over the moulds. Maybe your bending approach will eliminate that. Even sanding almost-all char off mine, I still had staining. But that's not much of a problem if you plan on painting the interior. The bow-transom bevels on the pram are a nightmare but you can slightly adjust the shape of each before laying a plank on it. I'd say that you are good to go for now. The point that you should probably fix before going any further are the steps on the stern transom, between the bevels for the bottom planks and the one for the keel plank. Those need sharp right-angles. Your image shows slight curves, which would push the bottom planks outwards, preventing a tight joint. Trevor

And thank you too, Druxey! At the moment, I feel more depressed but I dare say I will get over that. If nothing else, I get to play at sailmaking next and that is very much more to my liking. Trevor

Thank you, JacquesC! I think its saving grace is the rake of the transom, hiding the mess from view. Trevor

Step 39: Pintles and hanging the rudder In my last, I suggested that the build might go better if the gudgeon straps were long enough to wrap around the bits of tube. For the matching pintles, that is exactly what the instructions show. Progress! Or not. For a metal strap to extend around half the circular section of 1/16-inch tube and reach out, on either side, to just contact the solid surface that the tube is lying on (in the current build: to reach the leading edge of the rudder), that strap would have to be 4.081mm (to the nearest micron!). {That's pi times half the diameter of the tube, plus twice the half diameter.} The shorter of the two photo-etched straps (and I have no idea why they are different lengths) is less than 5.5mm between its nail holes. So, wrapping the strap around the tube, as per the instructions, would place the centres of the nail holes about 0.7mm from the edge of the rudder, at best. That's clearly not viable. I can only assume that the kit's pintles are to be built up the same way as the gudgeons (with the tube glued outside the strap) and not as shown in the instructions! Maybe the best advice to anyone following along would be to get some very thin brass stock and cut out much longer (and somewhat thicker) straps. I did not go that route. With the experience of the gudgeons behind me, I decided to fit the pintle straps to the rudder, then glue on the bits of tube (with epoxy, not CA). That worked. Not easily but it did work. I had intended to round the leading edge of the rudder, so letting the straps extend a bit further from the extreme edge. But then I figured that a broader flat surface would help when gluing on the bit of tube. As I had already extended the rounding of corners a bit too far, during the preliminary shaping of the rudder, I had to mount the lower pintle a little higher than intended, lowering the rudder a bit beyond the corner of the skeg. Not a problem, though I did re-shape the rudder a little so that the mistake would be a bit less visible and took the opportunity for a bit more tapering and shaping to improve hydrodynamic efficiency. Under Step 28, the initial shaping of the rudder, the instructions say "file shallow grooves on the edge of the rudder for the rudder pintles". I could not make sense of that at the time and left it alone. Part of the trouble was that I could think of a couple of reasons to groove the leading edge of a rudder near the pintles, requiring different depths of groove in different places. One purpose would be to make space (between the pintle's pin and the wood of the rudder) for the gudgeon -- all the more necessary if the design has the rudder extending forward of its axis of rotation and so closes the gap between rudder and hull. That can make sense full-size but seemed a bit excessive at 1:12. Another reason might be to set the pintle straps into the wood of the rudder, thus producing a flush surface. Nice in full-size work but absurd at scale, especially when the strap is a thin bit of photo-etched metal. Yet, looking again at the instructions, there seems no doubt that that is exactly what they call for -- even though they also intend the the tubes, rather than the straps, contact the leading edge of the rudder. I simply ignored the call for grooves. Otherwise, the first task was bending a strap into a flat-bottomed U-shape, with right-angled corners. One side is easy: Hold down the strap where you want the angle, slip a knife-blade under and bend. How to do the other side and have the two nail holes lined up to take the same nail? Push, pull, walk away, walk back, push ... and repeat. But I got there in the end. Then mark for the hole, drill and pass a nail through one side of the strap, through the rudder and ... go back to shaping the strap to better align the nail holes. {The instructions avoid some of that trouble by calling for the pintles to be glued in place, with what it calls "bolts" reduced to little more than nail-head decoration (separate ones on each side and not extending through the thickness of the rudder.} Still, it worked in the end, so I could snip off excess nail, lay the rudder on a vice as a substitute for an anvil, give the nail-end a couple of taps and all was good! When fitting the second pintle-strap, there is a need for care in matching the distance between them to that between the two gudgeons, where they sit on the transom. But that did not prose any difficulty. Next, I cut off lengths of tube. None of the instruction's complexity this time. I just laid the tube on the scale marked on my cutting board, set a knife blade 3/32 from the end (by eye) and rolled the tube under the blade until it cut through, then reamed the hole a bit with a mounted needle. Made three of them, so I had a spare without backing up. Dropped the three in acetone to degrease and scraped the surface of the straps with a knife blade, to clean those up and give the glue something to grip. After the disaster of making the gudgeons with CA, I went to the hardware store for some 5-minute epoxy. Paid a bit more for name-brand product but found that one of the two components wouldn't flow. I poked around and got some out but the two evidently did not flow evenly as the glue did not set in 5 minutes, nor 5 hours. (It did harden overnight.) Before discovering that problem, I put a drop of epoxy on each pintle strap, positioned a bit of tube on the glue and then added more epoxy on each side: When I looked again, one tube-bit had fallen away under its own weight, so removed that, cleaned up and left everything for the night. Today, I returned to the fray, with the spare bit of tube and enough epoxy to do a thousand model pintles -- which much increased the odds of getting the right mix of the two glue components: Once that had had much more than 5 minutes to set, I cut away some of the excess epoxy, gave the rudder a final sanding and painted on tung oil, to match the rest of the pram. The instructions expect that the pintle pins will be pieces of the supplied 1/32-inch brass rod. I figured that there was zero chance of my having exactly aligned the four bits of tube (two on gudgeons, two in pintles), so even if I could get the rod into each tube, it would then bind. Instead, I dropped a 0.6mm nail into each pintle tube -- 1/32 being about 0.8mm, I got a little scope for misalignments. Holding rudder to model boat and getting nails into gudgeon holes was fiddly but nothing too bad. Then a tiny dab of CA on each hail-head and the rudder was finally attached! What amazes me even more is that the rudder actually turns on its hangings. I am sure that that was more luck than skill but I'm not complaining! The whole gudgeon/pintle/rudder saga has certainly been the most awkward part of this build so far. All I can say is that it is done (and, for those facing their own pram builds, that means it can be done by someone learning ship modelling). Trevor

Something is weird. My kit had the various knees labelled by the laser-cutter. I can't give you definite answers because my sheet has been cut up as I needed scrap for various bits and pieces. However, I think that the two knees you had glued to the transoms before taking your photo are the stern quarter knees. The stern transom knee is the one with the transverse hole laser-cut through it. (A hole that has no known purpose!) You seem to have two copies of that. The pair of knees at the far left of your image are the ones that go on top of the midship thwart. The bow transom knee is next in from those two, under the mould labelled "25". The pair of knees just above where you took out the bow transom are the bow quarter knees. But you should double check all that! Trevor

A nice, tidy build! Are you moving on to the Norwegian pram next? Trevor

So sorry to hear about Sierra. It is unbearable to have to say goodbye to a companion, but it does get easier over time. Sebastian is fortunate to have found such a good home. Trevor

Step 38: Rudder gudgeons A very, very frustrating day, trying to get started on the serious (for this kit) metalwork. The pram, like most sailing dinghies, has two pintle/gudgeon pairs linking the rudder to the hull. The two gudgeons are fastened to the transom, the two pintles to the rudder. Today was the gudgeons. Each is a combination of a strap (photo-etched brass) and a short length of 1/16-inch brass tube, cut from a supplied piece. When I cut some of that tube for the "hex nut" on the bow eyebolt, I just cut it cold with a knife and it went well. This time, I followed instructions and annealed the tube first to make it more readily workable. A new mini butane torch working over an old ceramic tile saw the end of the tube red-hot in seconds. Quenched it in a coffee mug of cold water and all seemed well. Trouble was the tube had become so malleable that it squashed as I cut it. Would have been much, much better to skip the annealing. Next up, the instructions call for drilling two 1/16 holes in a piece of 3/32 wood, inserting the two off-cuts of tube and filing them down until flush with the wood, thus producing two little bits of tube of equal length. Ever try inserting a fragment of 1/16 anything into a 1/16 hole? Not a good plan. So, ream out the hole a bit and insert brass tube. Start filing and find that basswood is so soft that the fragment of tube enlarges its hole and falls onto a diagonal. Grip excess tube with fine forceps and try filing again. Discard the basswood and just use forceps ... Eventually, I got to a good approximation, at which point the four pieces looked like: Next task is to attach one bit of tube to each strap. The sensible way would be soldering but I have almost zero experience with solder and this was definitely not the time to start practicing, not when I only had one of each kind of strap. Next best might well be epoxy glue but the instructions call for CA, so I went with that. Bad mistake. Before applying glue, the instructions do sensibly call for careful cleaning of the metal. They recommend fine sandpaper. On those tiny pieces ??? Maybe somebody could do it. I couldn't. I gave them a bath in acetone instead (more exactly in nail-polish remover). That worked, so long as the acetone was given plenty of time to evaporate after removal of the brass pieces. OK, so it was then time to pass some 1/32 brass rod through one fragment of tube, place it on the strap, add a drop of CA on each side and leave it to set. Sounds lovely. Except that the tube needs to be centred on the strap, while its hole is perpendicular to the long axis of the strap. Then it has to stay there while enough CA is applied but not too much. And the 1/32 rod has to be removed before it gets glued in the tube, without disturbing the tube. My first one went surprisingly well. The second needed three attempts, then the tube came away after the strap was glued to the transom. Before that disaster, I did get to have two reasonably presentable gudgeons (one seen here with a drill bit temporarily inserted): The gudgeon with short straps goes on the pad earlier placed on the lower transom, just above the keel plank. With a drop of CA to hold it in place and an inserted drill bit (all of my remaining 1/32 brass rod being bent by then) to serve as a guide for aligning the hole with the centre of both skeg and sculling notch, it should have been easy. It wasn't. However ... muddled through in the end. Then drilled one of the fastener holes in the strap and into the pad, clipped short a nail, inserted it, did the other and added a touch of low-viscosity CA to keep the nails in place. Giving time for the glue to set, inserted a drill bit through the upper gudgeon and into the lower one, to make sure that the holes were aligned. Slid the upper gudgeon along the drill bit to get the right height (using the pintles' laser-marked positions on the rudder for a measure of spacing), marked that, aligned the drill bit to the centre of the notch: Then touched some CA to the pencil mark, brought the gudgeon into place, pressed it there for the glue to bite, tried to remove the drill bit ... and the gudgeon left its glue. Cleaned up. Tried again. And again. Finally got the strap in position by the expedient of having the drill bit rip the tube from the strap! At that point, I decided to at least get the strap fastened down. So ... how to drill through the brass (enlarging the etched holes enough for the nails to pass) and into the transom without going right through the wood? How to both snip a nail short enough that it wouldn't go right through and get the super-short snipped end into the drilled hole? I know I couldn't do it. Solution: Drill right through, push nail right through (after dipping the head in CA to hold it in place), then snip off the ends of the nails and file them down flush with the inboard face of the transom: If anyone asks, the gudgeon is through-bolted to the transom, with countersunk bolt heads on the inboard end and dome nuts on the outboard. That's my story anyway! Then it was clean up the loose bit of tube (again!), roll the drill bit between margarine-coated fingers to give it enough grease that the CA wouldn't stick, insert the drill, line everything up, drops of CA on either side, gently pull on drill, twist, pull, twist and pull ... and the tube was firmly glued to the drill bit, not the gudgeon strap! Clean up that mess, apply another drop of CA, then simply place the fragment of tube with forceps, figuring that I will compensate for misalignment when fitting pintles to rudder but ... Lo and behold, I can see light through both gudgeon holes together! They are not perfectly aligned but I may yet produce a rudder that actually moves on its gudgeons: Might have been a whole lot worse, though the end result owes more to luck than to skill on my part. I dare say that I am ham-fisted and that other builders of this kit have done better but this step in the build does seem overly challenging. There ought to be a better way. (Maybe straps long enough to wrap around the tube? Perhaps duplicate straps for when someone messes up a first attempt?) To anyone reading this log before their own build, I would say do not use CA glue when building your gudgeons. At least use epoxy and if you have the skills (or are willing to step aside from the pram and develop the ability), then solder instead. Maybe I will do better when I get to the rudder. Trevor

Best of luck in DC, Mark! Clearing out an elderly parent's house is always a huge task and not to be envied.

Last evening, I got ahead with the instruction's second "Step 43", preparing the boom. In use, it serves purely in compression, to spread the foot of the (loose-footed) sail -- if it is sensibly rigged (not as in the instructions) at least, and very nearly so even with the weird way that the book has the sheet rove. As such, the most efficient cross section should be a circle but the laser-cut piece tapers to such a fine outer end (where there is a relatively large hole and an inexplicable slot) that I was unwilling to thin the other dimension to match. I did reduce the thickness a bit, tapering it slightly to match the laser-cut dimension. I also drilled a transverse hole to take one end of the clew outhaul, since the kit provides no good way of securing that. Then I turned the upper and lower surfaces of the spar into half-rounds, while leaving flats on either side, rather like I did with the yard (where that shape makes more sense). It is also necessary to leave the forward end of the boom (to a measured length of 9/8 inch) square at that stage. There are then two wooden fittings to attach. First is a hook-shaped piece that glues to the flat side of the forward end of the boom. Together, they form jaws that bear against the mast. (The instructions call the "hook" a "goose-neck", though it resembles neither the anatomy of a goose nor the nautical fitting which bears that name.) Once the glue had set, I sanded the extra piece down to match the reduced thickness of the boom, then smoothed off the various edges, including extending the half-rounds along the open side of the boom (opposite the "hook") as quarter-rounds. The other fitting is a cleat for the clew outhaul. The 1/2 inch (=6" full size) that I made for the mast would be grossly too large, while the kit-supplied 1/4-inch one is far too small, so I made one at 3/8-inch. I managed to make that less clunky than the two I did for the mast, so I made another pair of 1/2-inch ones, cut the others off the mast and replaced. (They look much nicer now.) The boom one needs a bit of care in placing. It has to be far enough away from the mast that the outhaul can exert a good pull on the clew, without being so close to the outboard end of the boom that it interferes with the slot and hole that (in my build) will take a sheet fitting. Fortunately, the boom seems plenty long enough. With two coats of clear finish (rubbing down raised grain between), that completed the woodwork on the three spars: The mast and boom still need metal fittings but I will delay those until rigging the model. Before that, I need to face my fears and get immersed in the metalwork for the rudder. (Still waiting on tide and weather to get the tiller-blank to my Dremel for shaping.) Then there will be oar-making, sail-making and rigging to finish the model. Trevor

Thank you for the approval!

Steps 42 (mast-making) completed, 43 (first of two "43s", mast fittings) advanced & 44 (yard) completed Thus far, this log has dealt with topics that mostly belong in the province of the boatbuilder -- which I am not, though I am an end-user and have maintained their products. As the build progresses into the pram's rig, however, I am moving into areas that properly belong to the sailor and there I do claim some expertise. That work begins with three spars: mast, boom and yard. (The rig is technically a boomed standing lug. Lug sails have their heads bent to "yards", which are hoisted by a single halliard at the slings, not to "gaffs", which have jaws encircling the mast and are hoisted by both peak and throat halliards -- albeit some clever arrangements make those from the same length of line). The yard is the simplest of the pram's three spars. I had that more-or-less shaped last night but it was about 3mm deep at the slings, say 1.5" full-size equivalent, which seemed excessive for such a small sail. So I reduced that to about 2mm (1"), restored the tapers and rounding, then gave it a first coat of Model Shipway's clear finish. (It will need a quick rub-down to remove raised grain, then a second coat.) As supplied in the kit, the yard has a top-to-bottom laser-cut hole in each end for the earrings (to stretch the head of the sail along the yard). Those would be better drilled side-to-side but I won't mess with such a small spar. The piece also has two holes at the slings for an eye for the halliard, which leads me to ask: What kind of a sailor drills bolt holes through a spar, at the point of greatest load? Resisting the temptation to question someone's sanity, I suspect that the answer is: The kind of sailor who thinks that rigging a boat starts with a visit to a yacht shop to buy nice, shiny, stainless-steel fittings! The proper way to attach our pram's halliard to its yard is a stuns'l halliard bend (Ashley's #25) -- simpler, quicker, lighter and cheaper than any metal fitting. Plus, it is easy to move the halliard along the yard, if you think that some adjustment would improve the set of the sail. So, while I won't bother about filling the two tiny holes, there will be no metal eye. While the yard is better with more depth than width, the mast definitely needs a circular section throughout, yet the two thicknesses glued together made it very much greater in one dimension than the other. Fortunately, while buying miniature plane and chisels for shaping planks, I also picked up a tiny marking gauge for marking bevels on inside curves on a table I was building. That came with a matching double gauge which I never expected to use but which proved ideal for marking the required amounts to take off the mast blank: The miniature plane then made short work of thinning the mast-blank down. (A case of having the right tools for the job ... though they don't come cheap.) Both ends of the mast are very gently tapered, so the planing had to be followed by some careful sanding. With everything "four-square", it was time to drill any holes. The mast comes with only one hole, for the halliard, laser-cut. That only needed cleaning up with a drill bit (mostly because the two parts of the mast blank were not absolutely aligned). The instructions call for a second hole and some shaping to give the appearance of a sheave for the halliard, set in the mast. I would not do that full-size for such a small boat and hence there is no need in the model. {With such a small, light sail, a "dumb sheave" (a shaped hole, with no rotating sheave inside) is fully adequate, whereas an actual sheave would require a large slot cut through the mast, with a second hole at right angles for the axle -- together a major (and quite unnecessary) area of weakness.} What the halliard-hole does need is a bit of a groove on either side, so that the halliard isn't hauled across any sharp angles. Those grooves were easily worked with a suitable jewelry reamer. Next below that hole, the mast will get two brass photo-etched tangs, for the upper ends of the shrouds. The instructions want each one fastened by its own nail, with those cut so short that they do not interfere with one another -- meaning about 1mm long. That would be madness. I will use one nail and peen its cut end into a second head after all is assembled. However, it did need a hole drilled through the mast, from side to side. No problem. Lastly, the instructions call for two more holes to be drilled, to take an eye for the tack downhaul to reeve through -- though they do not explain where that line should be belayed. That, again, makes no sense. What the tack downhaul needs is a cleat, not an eye. So, with little more than a single hole drilled, it was time to turn the four-square mast into an octagonal section one ("eight-square" in the terminology of mast-making) then round off to circular. The kit includes a "spar shaping jig" -- a narrow board with a stop-block at each end and 5 notched supports that hold a four-square spar with one angle upwards for sanding to an octagonal section. (The kit only provides 4 of the 5 supports but the Muscongus Bay sloop kit has the same rig with another 4, one of which can readily be pirated.) That worked well, though the previous planing had (inevitably) removed the laser-burn marks showing how much to take off to achieve a regular, octagonal section. I just judged it by eye. Careful work with sanding sticks and paper then produced a nice, rounded mast. There are two, or in my case three, wooden fittings to be added to the mast after it is rounded. The first is a cleat (in the original nautical sense of that term, meaning a projection from a spar or other object, usually to stop something sliding along the parent piece), in this case for the upper end of the forestay. The kit-supplied cleat is tiny, even before char removal, and would hardly be there at all after cleaning up. It was easy to shape a replacement at double the size: To get that to sit on the curved surface of the mast, I followed the instructions and wrapped 220 paper around the mast, then sanded the base of the cleat to match the spar's curvature. My attempt to glue it in place using white glue failed because it was too difficult to hold the cleat in place while the glue set. A dab of CA solved that one by the much-reduced holding time. The other two required fittings are cleats for belaying the halliard and tack downhaul ("horned cleats" in original terminology, before "cleat" came to mean, amongst the yachting fraternity, any belaying point). Again, the kit-supplied one was grossly inadequate. It was under 1/4-inch, meaning 3" full-size. I might use one like that to belay a flag halliard on a small boat (if our pram was to show any flags) but it is laughably inadequate for either halliard or downhaul. I made two new ones, of 1/2-inch (6" equivalent) size. They turned out clunkier than I would like but that will mostly be hidden by the lines belayed on them: Note the kit-supplied version in the second image. Once those were glued on also, I had a mast fit for its first coat of clear finish, hence to two near-ready spars: Tomorrow: Boom, maybe rudder and/or tiller. Or maybe I will turn to sailmaking. That should be fun! Trevor

Step 40 (Display Stand) completed Finally had some half-decent weather, though colder than the spray paint would like (10C, meaning 50 for those who still follow Herr Fahrenheit), so I warmed it and the baseboard over a heater vent before heading out to a windless, sunny spot. Paint went on well despite the challenges, though my masking was less than perfect and I will need to re-touch the oil on the display-stand's plinth. Still, once the paint was dry the model supports went in nicely, all square without trouble (and a drip of CA in each hole to keep them that way: That's kit supplied basswood baseboard (sprayed with hardware-store primer and gloss white), glued to a $5 offcut of jatoba (run across my router table with an ogive blade mounted, then oiled and wax-finished), acrylic-rod supports (optional extra recommended in kit instructions), with copper tape for filler and decoration, topped with kit-supplied basswood supports (primed and painted with kit paints). Far from perfect but much, much better than my dory model has (so I am learning!). Looks nice with the (still incomplete) model on it too: I have been working on the spars too, but they will keep for a later update. Trevor

Apologies for an irrelevant aside ... but you did mention lighting and artistry: Back some 20 years ago, I was aboard Kruzenshtern when we came to anchor off Rostok (Germany) in a misty twilight, waiting to enter the port for their "Tall Ships" event. Then a three-master emerged silently, half-visible through the darkening murk. Like that, it would not have needed much imagination to see her as a ghost ship. Then her anchor was let go, her sails hauled up with bunt and clewlines ... and someone flicked a switch, instantly illuminating lights on every mast and yard, so transforming the "ghost" into a fairy dream-ship. Magical! I didn't have my camera at hand and it likely wouldn't have captured the effect anyway. But a challenge for any ship-modeller more interested in art and lighting than miniature precision. Trevor

You've done a wonderful job with her, Bill. Congratulations! Trevor

Step 48 (first "48", rowlocks) advanced, Steps 42, 43 & 44 (spars) commenced With daylight for aid, I got the brass rowlock-pad protection on. First thing was to drill the rowlock holes down into the inwale (previously, they only passed through the pads). In a full-size boat, the holes would need to pass right through, so that a length of cord or light chain, attached to the rowlock, can hang down inboard, preventing loss of the rowlock but allowing it to be unshipped when not in use. That's great but drilling so deep risked damage to the sheerstrakes, so I only went far enough to accommodate the kit-supplied rowlocks. Placing the photo-etched brass protective pieces wasn't hard. I impaled each one in turn on the point of a bamboo cocktail stick, touched a tiny dab of CA to each end of the brass, inverted the boat, put tip of stick into rowlock hole, flipped everything upright, assisted gravity in getting the brass into place, then gently pressed it down. The only trouble was when I had too much CA, letting the brass swim around before the glue caught. I then left the glue to set before getting onto the hard part. Each of the four brass plates needs two nail holes drilled. (OK after the first one: That time, I drew the drill back too vigorously, it caught in the brass and pulled the metal off its glue. Back up and try over ...) Then each of 8 0.6mm nails had to be picked up with forceps, snipped for length, placed in its hole, lined up ... and pressed home. I think I snipped twice as many nails as I placed, though where the others went, I cannot say. Anyway, the job was done and adds some nice, shiny brass to the model: Rowlock (technically a "crutch") only inserted temporarily, as I don't want it causing trouble until the rigging is finished. While the CA was setting, I got the three spars out of their basswood sheets. The mast is in two halves that have to be glued together, back to back: Lots of clamps and yellow glue -- yellow for strength and because the edges where it might ooze out will be sanded for char anyway. Once the two halves were united, they formed a spar with rectangular section. That will need to be taken down to square, including the tapering towards head and heel, matching the laser-cut sides -- all before taking off the corners (making it "eight-square") ad rounding off. The boom has its own complications which can wait for later. I did begin work on the yard (which the instructions bizarrely call a "gaff"). Its lower edge needs to be straight, to receive the straight-cut head of the sail, but its upper edge can taper from the slings towards either end. I just gave it straight tapers. The basswood stock was thicker than the laser-cut piece was wide, so the spar started with a rectangular section throughout. I have shaped the upper and lower surfaces into half-rounds but, so far, I have not tried to reduce the thing to circular. Strength and stiffness would be better with some depth to the section. later, I'll take another look and see whether I like what I have. I might sand more. Enough for now! Trevor

Heavy rain today, but not complaining: It's the same system that coated much of Ontario with ice, bringing down power lines and cutting power to many. It's passing to the north of us, fortunately for me, though not for those living around the Gulf of St.Lawrence. And hard on anyone making their living at sea, as ever. And for me, more rain now means more water in the well, come July and August!

Steps 36 & 37 (first metal parts) completed, Step 40 (display stand) advanced While waiting for a chance to get serious with my replacement tiller, I have pushed ahead with other steps in the build. For one, the pram needs an eyebolt in the middle of the bow transom (for towing, hauling onto a trailer or whatever). The inboard end of that bolt bears a plate to anchor the lower end of the forestay. Although the instructions make no mention of it, the kit includes a length of brass rod pre-bent to form the eyebolt. It also has the rigging plate as one item on a sheet of photo-etched brass. The model-builder is required to cut off a short piece from a (kit-supplied) length of 1/16" brass tube, to serve as an imitation "hex nut". The cutting went easily, following a recommendation (found here on MSW, not in the instructions) to insert a 1/32" brass rod into the tube, then roll it under a craft-knife blade. However, I did need to bell the end of the tube with a jewellery reamer. That also came into use to slightly enlarge the bolt-hole in the rigging plate. When ready for fitting to the model, the three pieces seem tiny: The instructions call for the eyebolt to be set into a slight groove around its bolt-hole, thus sinking the bent end out of sight -- the groove to be formed by pushing the blade of a very small screwdriver into the wood. That didn't really work for me but I did bed the bolt down nicely, none the less. Getting the plate and the tube-as-nut over the end of the bolt was challenging, but mostly because of poor lighting and poor eyesight. Once all was ready, it just needed a drop of CA glue, then the "nut" pushed home, while keeping the plate aligned with the pull of the future forestay. A few minutes for the glue to set and the end of the bolt could be clipped off. All looks OK: Next up were the two chainplates ("stay plates" in the instructions), inserted into the slots previously sawn in the inwales. I don't know whether oiling the wood caused the slots to close up or perhaps I was just too scared to saw far enough. Whatever it was, the slots were way too small. Once I accepted that and sawed them longer, the chainplates (photo-etch pieces identical to the one for the forestay) fit easily. The problem is with the kit-supplied nails. As other MSW build-logs have noted, Model Shipways should provide their 0.7mm nails with this pram kit but they actually pack it with a supply of much larger nails, as in: That's one of the chainplates (larger hole for the shroud, smaller for the fastening nail), with the kit-supplied nail above. No way that will go through the hole intended for it! To the left is an alternative nail that came with a rather nice Amati pin-pusher that I picked up at my local hobby store, but even that is too large. Below it is a 0.6mm nail from a supply I ordered in from Dry-Dock Models. (Those readers in the USA can go to the source and get extra nails from Model Shipways. I don't fancy the unpredictable delays at the border just now, with our respective governments edging into a trade-war!) The Dry-Dock nails proved OK in diameter but had to be clipped to half the length, lest they go right through the side of the boat. Holes have to be drilled for the nails, of course. I thought that it would be a huge challenge to line up the nail (in its drilled hole) and the hole in the chainplate, while both were embedded deep inside the inwale. In practice, I pushed a mounted needle (i.e. a point set in a handle) into the drilled hole, used that to ream the hole out a bit, then jiggled the chainplate until the needle found the right hole. Pull the needle out, insert the stump of the nail, add a drop of CA glue, push nail home and all was well. Just needed a little bend of the chainplate to align with the future position of the shroud: I tried moving onto the rowlocks (in Britannia metal) and the protective plates (photo-etched brass) that go on the pads seen in those two images. It proved too difficult without daylight, so that must wait for tomorrow. Meanwhile, I have been pushing ahead with the display stand. That is needed sooner rather than later, as the model needs elevated support once the (projecting) rudder is in place. I'm still waiting on the weather, so that I can spray another coat on the baseboard but I have made up the supports: The top pieces are kit-supplied and shaped to match the hull (needing only a little bevelling, after removing char). I decided to paint them, so that they are distinct from the boat itself. I toyed with the idea of a metallic finish but decided on less-prominent white. The kit includes a 1/4" dowel for the supporting pillars but the instructions suggest acrylic rod and I figured that would be nicer. Its also turned out to be very easy to work. Whichever material is chosen, there have to be slight flats where the wood supports fit over the rods. The acrylic yielded very easily to a file. After the first flat began to take shape, I laid it flat on top of a box, then worked the file on the other side of the rod, parallel to the box-top -- flipping the piece over every few file-strokes, until the supports just fit over matching, equal flats. I suspect that would have been much harder if done in wood. A dab of CA and tops were glued to rods. They do need a little care to ensure that the horizontal axes of the tops are perpendicular to the length of the rods. One annoyance yet to be faced is that the laser-cut holes in the baseboard are much larger than 1/4". As I have some adhesive-backed metallic-copper tape on hand, I am wrapping enough of that around the bottom end of the acrylic rods to make a firm push-fit. Most will be out of sight, down in the baseboard, but I'll add a final neat turn to give a flash of colour. That, however, must wait on the weather for outdoor spray painting, then the fitting of the supports to the baseboard. Still have to do the tiller etc. (Step 35), the rudder, with its metalwork (Steps 38 & 39), the oars and rowlocks (Steps 45 to 48 ... the first of two "48s") -- and then it will be on to the sailing rig (Steps 42-44, 48-57). Trevor

That was my choice and it is working for me: Dory finished and pram well advanced now, with the lobster sloop waiting. But be warned: The included tool set is very basic and you will certainly need to add to it. I'm sure that I could have been more economical, but I have already spent much more on tools than on the combo kits themselves. Trevor

Mark, It's a bit difficult figuring out what is going on without a side view of your model. The top view shows your "beakhead" (which the builder of the prototype probably called a "gammon knee" -- in full-size construction, it was a knee-shaped piece, bolted to the forward face of the stem), so I think it is there and probably as prominent in side view as would be expected. So I think that the problem is that the planks that form the bulwarks (starboard and port) meet too far forward. Your illustrations show the internal framework of the model with three pieces projecting towards the stem (labelled "12" and "21" in one image). I suspect that you have to bevel those until the bulwark planks meet on the centreline of the centre framework piece (#12) and in contact with that piece. It looks like you currently have a gap there, with parts #21 (one per side) not bevelled enough. That may be wrong. I'm only trying to interpret your images. But that's what it looks like from here. While I am writing: I'm new to the world of wood models of wood ships, but the community seems to have developed a terminology all of its own that does not always line up with the terms used by the men who built the full-size prototypes. As I am reasonably well versed in the latter, I can get very confused by some postings on MSW! But that doesn't mean that the model-builder's terminology is wrong, just different. In full-size (wooden) shipbuilding, a "false keel" is a sacrificial piece put onto the bottom of the keel to protect the primary structural timber from wear, tear and worms. That's not what you meant in your post, of course. The "keel" is the longitudinal piece at the bottom of the whole structure (usually straight and made from one tree whenever possible -- though it never was in a large ship). That may or may not be replicated in a kit. There is, of course, no equivalent in full-size ships to the centreline, backbone structure typical of plank-on-bulkhead models (which would obstruct use of the internal space of the vessel). There is no term for something that doesn't exist. I think that what you were referring to was that centreline backbone. I've seen it called the "keel" or "false keel", here on MSW, both of which confuse me (though I'm leaning to cope!). Maybe there is some other term that a significant proportion of model-builders use. If not, this forum would be the best place to forge some agreement on what it should be called! Trevor

IF I try (and it's still a big "if"), I would tie it in a fine thread around a dowel, then slide the finished Turk's head off the dowel and over the end of the tiller. That's the easy part. Taking the slack out of the weave until it was tight around the tiller would be the challenge. A simple Turk's head (like the one illustrated), tied in cord around a 1-inch dowel, is easy. Working in thread around a 1/8" diameter model tiller, with a longer knot? Maybe worth trying? Have to make the tiller first. So far, I have thinned down some scrap jatoba, producing crude 1/4-inch stock. But trying to whittle a tiller out of that with modelling tools very quickly taught me why we work in basswood! I'll need to get busy with coping saw and Dremel, both its cutting and sanding attachments. It won't be quick but plenty else in the kit to keep me busy. Trevor

There is a very large (maybe unlimited) family of knots called "turks heads", basically regular inter-weaving of (usually) a single length of cord to make a tube -- normally formed around something solid, like a tiller, (though you can make turks-head bracelets if the material is stiff enough and there is someone in your life who would wear one!). They are hard to describe, so maybe an image extracted through Google:

They are different boats, modelled at different scales. The Model Shipways one is a 15ft dory (dory sizes being measured as length of bottom, not overall) at 1:24. A 15ft dory is a two-man boat and towards the large end of banks dory sizes. In the 19th Century, they were used in halibutting, while the cod fisheries used smaller dories. I'm not sure but that may have changed before the end of the Canadian dory-schooner fishery in 1963. The Midwest dory is modelled at 1:12 and looks to have a 13" bottom. If so, it represents a 13ft prototype, suited to the banks cod fishery or else fishing along the shore, but still a two-man boat. It also looks to have much stronger sheer than the Model Shipways one, so a different design within the same overall family. But, either way, yours is coming along nicely, Palmerit! Trevor

Thank you for the vote of confidence, Mark! Mine is likely to be the most unique tiller, to date, for any build of this pram kit. Whether it merits more than uniqueness, time will tell. No progress on it today, however. (Not because of anything to do with models: I had to instal a new kitchen stove and advance work on a little table I have been building.) Still, that gives me a chance to explore some of the issues that have led others to grief over this step in the kit's construction. The pram has a tiller/rudder arrangement that, in the full-size prototype, is really very clever. When all is in place, the rudderhead is firmly locked inside the end of the tiller. Yet at the extreme end there is a (probably bronze) bolt, hooked into a slot in the rudder. Raise the forward end of the tiller and the bolt can drop out of the slot, allowing the tiller to be unshipped in seconds, after which the rudder can be lifted inboard too -- a very useful feature when bringing the boat to shore. Another, and very necessary, feature is a tiller extension, allowing the helmsman to steer while sitting on the windward side of the boat, where her (or his) weight will counterbalance the heeling effect of the wind in the sail. When a gust hits, the helmsman will need to throw his (or her) weight to windward, while putting the helm down, so that the boat can luff up towards the wind -- spilling some of it from the sail. Without either an extension or the arms of an orangutang, it's not possible to do both at the same time, so our intrepid sailor would likely to be in for a swim. Unfortunately, re-creating all of that at 1:12 scale is challenging. According to the instructions, the completed tiller, with its extension, should look like: That's the tiller itself made of three pieces, with the slot at the left to fit around the rudderhead, and the extension pivoting on a brass rivet. There's a cross-piece handle of brass at the end of the extension and a larger brass rivet to hook onto the rudder. The instructions say that all three pieces of brass should be cut from the 1/16-inch rod supplied with the kit. Previous build-logs seem agreed that only the one at the rudder end of the tiller should be in 1/16, those at either end of the extension being in 1/32 (also supplied with the kit). So that's what it is supposed to look like. But what it looks like is downright ugly. Maybe it's a practical object, though its ergonomics are poor, but it's just a steering stick, not worthy to be called a "helm". More on that theme in a moment. Meanwhile, the parts the assembly is to be made from are tiny: That shows the main tiller piece (released from a 3/32-inch sheet), the two side pieces (still in their 3/64 sheet) and the tiller extension (with a spare, as the first attempt is almost certain to go wrong!), laid out over a 1-inch grid. Three of the five holes needed for the brass bits are laser-cut. The other two have to be drilled -- one of them side-on through the 3/64-inch thickness of the extension. {Note that the instructions call for a 1/16 rod to be passed through a hole drilled in a 3/64 piece of (soft and friable) basswood. Since 1/16 is 4/64, that was never much of an option! Even passing 1/32 brass through 3/64 basswood can't be easy.} The ends of the brass piece that hooks to the rudder, and also those of the pivot for the tiller extension, have to be tapped with a hammer until they mushroom into neat heads. That much is explained in Step 35 of the instructions, along with the rest of the tiller construction. OK, maybe. But many of us coming new to building wooden ship and boat models may have some experience of woodworking but often little of metalwork. I knew the word "anneal" and knew that it had something to do with metal, but I did not know what it meant, nor why it was needed. The kit instructions do explain annealing (though only briefly) but they do so under Step 38, which explains construction of the rudder gudgeons. When I first read through the booklet, I thought that annealing was something only applicable to the rudder hangings. From previous build-logs, I don't think that I'm the only one to make that mistake. It was only when I read of the frustrations of hammering hard brass rod, inserted in a miniature tiller, that the truth slowly dawned: The rudder's metalwork needs to be annealed too! It's really no wonder that constructing the tiller has caused more angst than most other steps with this pram kit. MSW comes to the rescue, however, and not only on the annealing issue: Amidst the build-logs on this site, one part of the solution is offered: Don't make the tiller out of basswood but replicate the parts in something tougher! Obvious once it has been suggested. Taking that route then opens other possibilities. For one, our little pram would readily be sailed single-handed, when the solo sailor would want to sit astride the midships thwart. (Sitting in the sternsheets would mean that his (or her) body weight would cause the stern to squat, ruining the balance of the boat.) To get the end of the tiller into a comfortable place for the helmsman to hold, while sat on the thwart, its main piece should reach about 3.5 inches forwards from the rudder, not the 2.5 of the kit-supplied piece. That's the ergonomic problem addressed. As to aesthetics: I'm going to resist the temptation to get lyrical about the ethos of going to sea in small sailing boats. Suffice to say that on any sailing vessel the helm, be it tiller or wheel, is the point where a human hand connects with the boat (or ship) and guides her in the dance with wind and water. It is the point of command, not just of an officer commanding a helmsman, but of a human will commanding the vessel. Not for nothing are ship's wheels decorated with polished brass, while tillers are adorned with turks heads (which only pretend to be there as hand-grips!) or even carvings. In that vein, our little pram deserves better than the boring, straight stick provided in the kit. It deserves side pieces that merge into the central piece, not ones hacked off with simple bevels. It deserves a tiller that, although necessarily square in section at the rudderhead, transforms into a rounded section. It deserves at least a ball at the end, even if 1:12 turks heads would be a bit much. And maybe a splash of colour -- a contrasting wood, certainly, maybe the tiller's tip dipped in white paint or even gold. So that's the plan: A longer, more elegant, more robust tiller and matching extension, constructed from a colourful hardwood, with freshly annealed brass. And I haven't entirely given up on the idea of a turks head grip too. Trevor

Nice and neat, as I would want it in a full-size boat. Ideally, I would have the edges of the boards follow the smooth curve defined by the intersection of horizontals drawn across the floorboard battens and the curved faces of the garboards. Next best would be a straight (but angled) cut across each board, approximating to that curve, followed by cuts at right angles to the length of each board but forming a regular series. But at full-size, I could get into the boat with a tape measure, place each board, measure, cut, place again and repeat until satisfied -- then nail or glue the first board, double check the next one and so on. It's much more difficult with bits of 1:12 basswood flipping about inside a scale hull. I could (and should) have persevered anyway but I didn't. Not worth ripping them out and starting over though. Just something for others to learn from my mistake. Next will be the tiller and that will give me scope to draw eyes away from the floorboards!