gsprings

Decking (using some beautiful holly from Jason from Crown Timberyard):

Long time, no update.
 
That's not to say progress has not been made. Here are a series of posts to bring you up to speed.
 
Completion of walnut layer planking. All in all, I'm pretty happy with how it turned out, despite some errors.
 
 

Progress to report! Second-layer planking has begun!
 
Finally got up the nerve to start laying down the walnut layer of planking. I think I've said it before, but I'll say it again -- planking really intimidates me. However, so far, it seems to be going okay. I am focused on learning rather than on getting all the rules of butt joints right and all that. (I misread my practicum and screwed up the butt joints -- I've got the joints repeating every four layers instead of every five.)
 
So for me that means a smooth layer with as few gaps as possible and no user of stealers or drop planks, if I can help it. I've got the first belt and the garboard strake done on both sides. Used water to bend the planks around the stern. So far, so good.
 
For me, based on the first layer, the hardest planks are the ones that hit at the transition between the transom and the sternpost. We'll see how that goes ...
 

 

Much time consumed over than past 4-6 weeks doing the painting and applying rail caps. I am not a huge fan of painting, and this process taught me a couple of things:
 
1) Do NOT use spray cans because you're too lazy to set up, take down and clean the airbrush. It's too easy to flood the area.
2) Be choosy about how you use different kinds of masking tape. I love the blue stuff, because of its ability to conform to compound curves, but it's a little thick, which creates some places where the lines are not so clean. Should have used the thin yellow Tamiya stuff in those places.
 
Here are some pics of the current state:
 

 

 

 

 

 

 
I've had a ton of time to work on other stuff (e.g., deck furniture) while waiting for coats of paint to dry. One of the things I'm most happy with is my new makeshift mini-mill. Rather than buy one, I mounted a Proxxon X-Y table to my Dremel workstand, bought a bunch of compatible routing bits and voila, instant mill! (Hat tip to Cap'n'Bob for the inspiration!)
 
I tried it out to carve the channels in the swivel gun stancheons. Here are some pics:
 

 

 

So all the summer activities really slowed progress. But I did take a couple of snaps to show what I've been able to get done.
 
In progress on the companionway:


 
More deck furniture, completed and located on deck (masking in place in preparation for painting):
 

 
The piece parts of Syren's cannon and carriage:
 

 
Template for locating drill holes for carriage ringbolts and boltheads:
 

 
I'm looking to accelerate progress over the next few weeks. Painting awaits. I wanted to get the cannon carriages done so that I could do the red on the bulwarks and the carriages all at once. (I should mention that painting is not my favorite thing to do.)

Have made more progress and will post a fuller update with photos later, but wanted to do a quick photo essay on my approach to creating the scuppers and gold pinstripe on the top of the black strake.'
 
First, I measured, cut and filed the scuppers. I am not very happy with the overall shape of the scupper. Not rounded enough. But in the interest of making progress, I'll live with what I got. The overall shape is not going to be very visible anyway, once I blacken the planking behind the scuppers.
 

 
Then I clamped the piece in a vise and sanded to round the top outer edge ...
 

 
With that done. I used a Sharpie to "paint" the piece. Much easier than painting and looks the same under poly ...
 

 
Then I used 3M blue masking tape to mask for the gold stripe that goes at the top of the black strake ...
 

 
I found that a gold metallic marker was highly effective at "painting" the gold stripe. Gave me a lot of control ...
 

 
Then I darkened the planking behind the black strake where it will be visible behind the scuppers and installed the black strake a piece at a time ...
 

I found that the most challenging part of the planking process was getting the width of the planks right, especially at the stern where they need to be wider. I was trying very hard to do the planking without adding any stealers, but ended up with some ugly looking planks at the stern, especially the ones where the lay of the planking goes from running flat to the stern to where they need to bend to run up to the counter. These two planks were difficult to shape and difficult to install, so I'm not sure I took the right approach.
 
Since this was just a base layer of planking, I didn't worry too much about getting the planks aligned perfectly at the bow, nor did I worry too much about filling the gaps between planks with sawdust filler. (I just used gap-filling CA.) You can also see that I was not very good at mating the planks cleanly where they meet the stern.

I'm happy with the results as a first effort, but I have a long way to go. Hoping what I learned with this layer will give me a much better result with the walnut layer, where my standards will be much higher.
 

 

 

 

 

Got the first layer of planking done and will post pictures, but I wanted to share a few pictures of the process first. I decided to try to use a method that I saw in a PPT presentation available here at MSW. The methodology involves marking off the plank width at each bulkhead then using packing tape to get the spiling profile for each new plank.

Step #1: Lay packing tape over the adjacent plank already on the model.


 
Step #2: Use a fine-tip sharpie marker to copy the line of the existing adjacent plank and the position of the bulkheads onto the tape.
 

 
Step #3: Affix the tape to a piece of planking stock of the appropriate thickness.
 

 
Step #4: Using the planking widths that were previously determined at each bulkhead, mark the width of the new plank on the tape.
 

 
Step #5: Connect the width marks using a french curve to determine the line of the other side of the plank.
 

 
Step #6: Affix the new plank to the model, snugged up as tight as possible to the existing adjacent plank. In this case, it was the diminishing plank, so you can see the bend that was required around the stern.
 

 

More progress on the AVS this weekend. I carved the rabbets for the bow timbers (the knightsheads and the timberheads) and fashioned the timbers using the profiles provided in the kits plans. They're probably too tall, but I can cut them down later once I get the above deck planking completed.
 

 

 
In order to thin the bulkheads to the appropriate width to install the waterways, the practicum that I'm using recommends installing a couple of exterior first layer planks to provide stability. This reduces the possibility of breaking the thinned bulkheads off near the deckline, which I've already done once of twice. So I installed the planks using a few pins to hold in place while I used superglue. I would have preferred to to do some edge bending on the bow portion of the plank, rather than use pins to hold, but the width of the first plank (1/4") seemed to limit the amount of bend that I could get in the plank.
 

 

 

 
And here are the planks once installed ...
 

 

 
Then I turned my attention to the waterways, which are installed along the inboard edges of the bulkheads. These pieces have to be beveled to allows the cannon carriages to get closer to the bulkheads. I used a compass to mark the edges of the bevel on the inboard and topsides of the waterways and used a sanding disk on the Dremel to cut the bevel. I wanted as sharp an edge to the bevels as possible. This was the best way that I could think of the get that, short of carving the bevels.
 

 

 
With the waterways installed, I moved on to start the first layer of planking on the transom. First, though, I painted the interior of the stern frames black so that one wouldn't see raw wood when peering in through the stern lights. I wasn't clear whether the stern planking is meant to butt up against the side planking or vice versa, but I'm not too worried about it for the first layer of planking.
 

 
As usual, all comments and feedback are welcome ... especially any constructive criticism.

The past few days have been highly productive ones in the basement workshop. (I've been shirking the work I get paid for.)
 
I wanted to go ahead and install the bow filler blocks before I got to work on the fairing. I saw a scroll saw technique (used for making very nice 3D Christmas ornaments) that I thought I might deploy on the blocks to reduce the amount of carving / sanding. The technique involves using the scroll saw to make cuts in all three dimensions. This is enabled by using packing tape to hold the pieces together as the separate cuts are made. The sequence goes like this:
 
1) Trace the rabbet line onto the wood block and make the cut. I then used the disc sander to sand the deck angle into the top of the block.
 
2) Draw the line of the larger of the two adjacent bulkhead lines onto the piece of the block that will ultimately become the filler piece. (See first photo.) Put the two pieces back together and wrap with clear packing tape. Cut the bulkhead line with the scroll saw.
 
3) Take the piece that will become the filler piece (there should be four pieces now, after two cuts) and trace the deck outline onto the top. Then put all four pieces back together, tape it up and make the final cut. The piece you end up with is on the left in the second photo below. It is much easier to carve and / or sand to final shape (see third photo).
 

 

 

 
After I got the bow blocks in place, I went about fairing the hull, testing at various point along the bulkheads with a plank. Think I got it to a pretty good point. This is the first time that I have faired a hull, so I fully anticipate downstream issues, though I tried to be thorough.
 

 
With the fairing complete, I moved to the transom. As I mentioned in my last post, I have paid much attention to the issues that Brian identified with frame #1. As he ably illustrated, the plans (and the kit instruction book) are very clear that frame #1 is to be beveled to create the necessary angle to get the neighboring window installed correctly. However, the practicum that he and I used seems to have missed this detail.
 
So I measured to find that the upper width of the frame is about half of the bottom of the piece. I drew a line along the midline one the top of the frame and sanded to give the frame a good approximate of the angle need. Frame there, I held the inboard window in place to located frame #2 and the outboard window to locate frame #3.
 

 

More progress to report!
 
Given how clumsy I am and anticipating the high likelihood that I might somehow break the model, I decided to add reinforcing blocks between all the bulkheads, including full shaped blocks between the A, B and C bulkheads (thanks, Brian, for the inspiration!). So I measured all the gaps between bulkheads to size the blocks and cut up a long 1/2" x 1/2" square piece of basswood. I used my Byrnes table saw to do the cross cut, but as you can see, the blocks turned out very ragged and I had a lot of cleanup to do. Any suggestions for how to get clean cross cuts is appreciated.
 
These blocks are very handy not just to provide a lot of strength and stability, but also to let one correct any bulkhead distances that might be a millimeter here or there.
 

 

 

 
As I noted, I decided to do full shaped blocks to help with plank layout between bulkheads A-B and B-C. Unfortunately, I got a bit careless with the Dremel drum sander and put some fairly deep cuts into my keel. Not thrilled, as there a tad too deep to completely sand out without getting the keel too thin.
 

 
Now much chastened, I moved onto the false decks. I put a centering line on all the decks and proceeded to glue on the cabin deck. Like others, I found the deck to be a tad short, so I cut a this strip to cover the foremost bulkhead. You'll see that in later photos.
 

 
Then I went on to install the horizontal deck beams, which provide support to the quarter and main decks. 
 

 

 
That process led me to discover that I had installed the reinforcing blocks too high on the bulkheads, and they now interfered with the main deck beam. I took the lazy way out and just cut some material out of the bottom of the beam to allow for the blocks. (I could have unglued the blocks and reinstalled, but I thought this would work fine.)
 

 

 
I also found some time, between all of this stuff, to cut holes in the top of a paint bucket lid to create a "wood bucket."
 

 
 
 
 
 
 

With the rabbet cut, 'twas time to fit the bulkheads. Like many other AVS builders, I found that some of the bulkheads did not completely reach the bearding line when seated so that the tops of the bulkheads aligned with the top of the center keel:
 

 

 
So I used some basswood strip to add material to the bulkheads and faired the upper end of the shims into the bulkheads:
 

 
And then went to work on installing the bulkheads:
 

 

 

 
Installing the bulkheads revealed that I did not do the best job at fixing the angles created in the center keel bulkhead slots by the laser cutting of the parts. The result of these angles not being 90 degrees is that a couple of bulkheads might be off a millimeter here or there. (Once I realized what was happening, I corrected on later bulkheads.) I will correct for this when I install strengthening blocks between the bulkheads. Anyway, I was pretty happy with how the bulkheads turned out:
 
Then I created a building board and installed the pieces to complete the mast mortise. (Installing these pieces would get very difficult once I put in the strengthening blocks between the bulkheads. I'll be removing the mortise pieces to get a tracing of the mast box to better shape the mast tenon later:
 

 

 

 

 
This brings the log up to date.

As I noted in my previous post, I'm a bit further ahead in my build that I am in my build log! (I'll try to be better!)
 
Here are some more pics to show more of my progress -- these won't bring us fully up to date, but closer ...

A look at my clean(ish) bulkheads after removing the laser char:


 
Like many others who've done this build, the bottom piece of my keel was too long, which resulted in the slot for the stern post being in the wrong place. So I widened the slot to align with the sternpost tab thencut the top half of the bottom keel horizontally and slid it over to close the gap created by what was now a slot that was too wide. It looks a little rough in this picture, but I've since cleaned it up and will use some sawdust filler to hides the new seam created where I made the cut.
 
(Having just read this description of what I did, I am sure to have thoroughly confused any reader. Maybe this pic will help.)
 

 
I must admit that I was really very apprehensive heading into the process of cutting the rabbet along the keel. But now, having completed it, it wasn't nearly so hard as I thought it would be. Don't know that it's the best job ever (I simplified the task by just using the keel itself as the bottom cut of the rabbet, rather than try the more accurate, and difficult, methods out there). Here are the results:
 

 


 

I am nearing completion on my first major effort (it's been a long journey) and have a fairly basic question.

All the rigging is hitched to all the appropriate cleats, etc., and I need advice as to next steps. Do I glue the hitched line to the cleats and cut off any excess rope? If so, what glue best to use and how closely should I clip the line to the cleat or other belaying point. I want to create rope coils off the model and hang them from the cleats as I don't think I've got the skills to use the actual excess line to create the coils. 

How do most folks do this? Thoughts?

I am nearing completion on my first major effort (it's been a long journey) and have a fairly basic question.

All the rigging is hitched to all the appropriate cleats, etc., and I need advice as to next steps. Do I glue the hitched line to the cleats and cut off any excess rope? If so, what glue best to use and how closely should I clip the line to the cleat or other belaying point. I want to create rope coils off the model and hang them from the cleats as I don't think I've got the skills to use the actual excess line to create the coils. 

How do most folks do this? Thoughts?

I'm just glad I don't have to build it again!

So ... the holidays rolled around and despite entertaining the Admiral's extended family at our home this year, I found time to FINISH the smack. That's right, I've reached the end of the long road I started in May. First wooden model done. And I loved every minute of it. I'm hooked.
  Lord knows it isn't perfect, but I am very happy with how it turned out. And I've learned a ton.
 
I couldn't have done it without the valuable assistance of all the MSW lobster smack and friendship sloop builders before me. Your logs (and I read all of them that made it onto MSW v2) were an incredible reference. I also want to thank everyone who helped me along the way, patiently fielding all my dumb questions. I'd especially like to thank:
 
Chris Coyle
Joel Sanborn
Dan Sweeney
Dee Dee
Yves Vidal
Mario (Cap’n Rat Fink)
Popeye
Altduck
Chuck Passaro
 
The bad news for all of you is that I am gearing up to start Model Shipways' Armed Virginia Sloop, so expect a whole new slew of dumb questions.

Here are lots of pics, let me know what you think:
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Decking (using some beautiful holly from Jason from Crown Timberyard):

Great looking start, Captain! Will be jealousy watching as your progress zooms ahead of mine. Stupid job.

I could......but nope.....  this is really something everyone should learn to do.  Its not very difficult and if you are a serious builder and want to learn how to plank properly,  this is the perfect project to try lining off.   There are only 9 strakes per side in one belt.  It cant get any easier.  I do try and make these projects as easy to build as possible.  But I draw the line at these fundamentals....I am a person who believes this is the one thing folks need to try and learn to do themselves.   Its the reason why I stress its importance on every build.   And as part of the group it is something that should be considered one of the "educational" aspects of the project.   I even contemplated NOT including the laser spiled planks for a moment.  Some say I am slowly approaching an "assembly" project like a plastic kit rather than something that is actually created.  So I have started choosing more deliberately how far to take the engineering.   
 
Hopefully that doesnt seem too harsh....but it does take the fun out of it for some.  I would even suggest that you discard the pre-spiled planking and instead plank it all without the aid of the laser cut materials.  I may even offer them only as an extra but its something that I have thought about quite a bit.  Any thoughts???
 
 
 
 

Decking (using some beautiful holly from Jason from Crown Timberyard):

Launching ways (Fun because I got to use trig to compute angles for machining channels in support beams):

Long time, no update.
 
That's not to say progress has not been made. Here are a series of posts to bring you up to speed.
 
Completion of walnut layer planking. All in all, I'm pretty happy with how it turned out, despite some errors.
 
 

why Greg!   were you holding out on us?  OMG pal........you've made some really decent progress.........and quite nicely,  I might add!    flaunt it good buddy.......your do'in an awesome job  

Very nice, Greg.  Everything looks great.  Your planking turned out well.  If there are errors, only you will see them!  Good job!