Ainars Apalais

Hi, and tanks, Bruce 🙂
 
 

Hi
The Keelson
 

Hello everyone,
 
Finally back at it after a well needed summer vacation. Took a nice little stroll along the Bourbon Trail in Kentucky viewing some beautiful country and giving my liver a good workout. Picked up several bottles of tasty adult beverages and I am now ready to get back at it.
 
This past week I wasn't able to get too much done, but I did take a lot of pictures. So this go-round I started working on the cannon ports and doors. This was a fairly simple task, and I wanted to get them done so that I could start work on painting the casemates. I wanted to paint the casemates and the doors all at once so the color stayed uniform.
 
First task up was to install the sleeves for the upper door ropes (not sure of the proper terminology of these).
 
For the sleeves I used some small aluminum tubing inserted into a small hole that I drilled above the cannon ports.

 

 
I traced the angle on the tubing then cut and filed it to shape.

 
Then inserted the tube and glued it into place.

 
...One down, twelve more to go.
 
 
Then it was on to the port doors.
First thing I did was to make up a simple jig to make sure the doors stayed square and uniform.

 
Next I cut the strips for for the individual door planks.

 
After the strips were cut I used a piece of paper for the backing to help hold things together.

 

 
Once the planks were glued into place, I then drilled the cannon port out.

 
Oooops. Got a little careless with drill.

 
Front port doors in place.

 
Port doors in place. For the hinge straps I used thin styrene strips that I will cover with aluminum tape with the rivet pattern punched into it.

 
 
Finally, upon my return from our trip I was extremely happy to see that my cannons had finally come in. There is still some work to be done on them, they need to be polished up to remove the milling marks, the bores drilled to the correct diameter and the necks and knobs will need to be filed to shape, but I am definitely please with the way they came out. They are a definite improvement over the wooden ones I attempted to make a few months ago.

 

 
 
One cannon mocked up in its carriage.

 
...and finally one set in the gun port. Looks like there will need to be some adjustments made to get the height right, but I'll get there.
 
Well that is it for now, thanks again for all the likes and kind comments and also for stopping by.
 
-Brian

Thank you all for the kind words and condolences. 
 
I realized that today marks the one year anniversary since I started this build. I just wanted to show the overall progress after the first year.
 
Day 1.

 
 
Day 365.

 
Coming along, and more to come. Thanks for sticking with me this past year.
 
-Brian

It took nearly a year to complete, and the work was completed after the entire body was painted and the base was made. Unfortunately, I didn't get a third book on ropes, so I couldn't finish the EDT. Here, I thank all my dear friends who have supported and encouraged me from beginning to end! This forum has given me a great comfort, but also gave me a huge space to show. We all want to make it better for the same reason. I will take some time off later to continue with the next piece! Also hoped that each friend can point out my insufficiency, lets my work be more perfect. Thank you!
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 
 
 

 
 
 

A few more from May, 2019. Again, pictures and captions by Bill Kammermeyer.
 

 Uniform gun-port openings with sills installed. 
 

Time consuming task to make sure the gun-port sills were 45 degrees to the casement and that the gauge still fit flush.
 

Lay-out of tiller rollers on plans for the "iron" arcs that will protect the deck.  After adjusting the tiller "hinges" and rechecking deck layout it was found that the full arc could be used.  1/16" brass sheet with both arcs glued to it with rubber cement. The concave bottom will be cut and filed to the line first, then the convex top. This order gives me more grasping material. The 2 center cuts are easy but filing the edges is more difficult with less material to grasp. Rear deck finished.     Crew and Officer heads, with and without hats.   Steam engines with valve lifters in place.   Bread and butter layup for cutter mold. Just sand and file the high spots down to the low spots and you have a hull.   Plank on Hurricane Deck header that will cover attachments off deck to casement and be a base for the hammock racks.
 

View of port side showing improved interior viewing modifications.
 
OK, next entries will be from June of 2019. 

Hi all, this is the first installment of our "catch-up" for our Build Log for the USS St. Louis. This is a summary for our work as of August, 2018. All of the text and pictures are by Howie Smith. I'm going to try to have these pictures with appropriate captions, so here we go! Would be glad for feedback, as this is my first attempt at contributing to this build Log. Apologies for any inaccuracies. My email is timboni@juno.com
Tim

As part of an overall review of our USS St. Louis ironclad topsides, we focused on the forward 45-degree casement sub-structure with the brass 42-pdr Rifled Cannon Barrel on its carriage dry-fit in the centerline gun port. (Photos 1 & 2).

We then proceeded to outline the remaining process for constructing the  removable center section of this casement which originally consisted of a solid stack-up of vertical beams(Photo 3) between the outer sides of the P & S  gunports covered by similar stacked horizontal beams, and then vertical iron armor plates, which totaled up to a thickness of 25-inches.

Our model will duplicate this construction on the starboard side past the centerline structure (Photo 4 ) and then diminish by layers on the port side to reveal the underlying structure. This section will remain removable to maintain access to the gun deck until final stages of model assembly.

We also reviewed the positioning of Vince & Tim’s galley stove and associated furnishings on the gun deck (Photo 5)


and Bill’s exhaust stack thru and above the Hurricane deck (Photo 6 &7).
 

 
This was followed by a second dry-fit of Bob’s port & starboard main steam engine cylinder wooden cores in the engine room,  on their support ramps (Photos 8 & 9).
 
 


The first stage of the bow casement, consisting of the vertical beams and gun port framing for the removable center section has been completed (Photos 10 & 11). The  red beam edging indicates intentional disruption of structural members to reveal underlying or internal model features  The second stage will consist of attaching a layer of stacked-up horizontal beams which include a similar diminishing effect as their ends near the port side.
 

We spent a considerable amount of time discussing Tim & Vince’s problems cutting out the thin triangular strips of .030” thick Fomica substrates for the pilothouse armor plates and after a few experiments, it was decided that rather than sawing or cutting, a belt sander was the best solution and Bill graciously agreed to provide them a 1-inch table model belt sander to use for this purpose..Vince and Tim have made excellent progress shaping and fitting the Formica substrates for the pilothouse armor plates (Photo 12). They also have added .002” thick copper foil to the substrates for one of  the octagonal  pilothouse’s sides as seen in these photos. The foil will be chemically blackened and secured in place using the simulated ¾” bolts and washers previously stamped from No. 18 Escutcheon pins.


The pilothouse has also been dry-fit to its location on the Hurricane deck to verify its proper relationships to the ventilation funnels, galley stove exhaust stack, skylight and forward casement.(Photos 13 & 14)
 

Bill has developed and fabricated a series of improved steam pipe shut-off valves and control wheels (Photo 15) which will be integrated into his steam distribution piping system
Activity will now shift to construction of the stern 45-degree casement and laying planking on the stern deck itself. As a pre-requisite, we decided to revisit the stern deck nautical operations, equipment locations, and  functional geometry  before  committing to casement and decking configurations. None of the existing published aft deck drawings appear to depict a completely satisfactory operating geometry that is also compatible with the few existing contemporary photographs. This includes the 4 mooring bitts, 4 tiller control chain rollers, tiller arc of travel , tiller support roller track and bulwark mooring line guides.
At the heart of this issue, it appears that the tiller was lengthened sometime during City Class ironclad construction but the resulting mechanism geometry wasn’t adequately documented.


Since the USS Cairo iron tiller(Photo 16) was recovered with the USS Cairo and a photograph of the USS DeKalb(Photo 17) locates the bitts, our stern deck reconstruction utilizes these two features to locate the remaining elements to establish rudder travel which was reportedly inadequate in any event.

 National Park Service (NPS) drawing dated 1967 for the USS Cairo (Photo 18) depicts a short tiller (Colored orange to which we have appended its actual length in green) and its resulting geometry.


Our reconstruction geometry is over-laid in red upon the NPS drawing dated 1981 of the USS Cairo (Photo 19) and depicts the maximum rudder travel achievable using the recovered tiller length and will remain the basis for our USS St. Louis model (Photo 20).
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Following work about starboard, next step, the same ladder other side :
 

 

 

My weekly evening pics :
 

 

... And one hour later, with sunset light :
 

 

Hi All,
 
Thank you for all your likes!
 
It was time to make fore and main course (sail) rigging.
So first I had to make blocks... one of the biggest on this ship.

...quick milling of sheave imitation on piece of wood.
Then just cutting individual blocks and shaping them by hand using files, sanding paper and sponges, et voilà, blocks ready.
 


 
Then I was ready to make fore and main sails tacks, sheets and clew lines.

Fore course 
 

 

 

 
Main course
 

 

 

 
Also I've finished spritsail rigging.
You can see also big bulls-eye block attached to one of the fore shroud. Sheet pendant goes thru this block and then forms tackle fixed to the hull by ring and then rope is belayed on staghorn seen in the background on the photo above.

You can see also first ratlines on the fore shrouds. This will be my next task... to complete them.
...and beside ratlines... only bowlines left... and rigging will be nearly done. 
After that it will be this time where I have to "organize" whole rigging. Trim ropes excess , belayed them on corresponding pin, cleat, kevels and staghorns.
 

 

 
...and at the moment model looks as below 😉
 

 
 
Cheers,
Matt

Night shots and interior of the great cabin:
 

Thank you Victor ! I didn't know about it, I will try ! 
Work on the Soleil Royal goes on, this time I shoudn't disapear for a few months... well, I hope !
I'm working on the decorative parts of the third deck, much time to adjust these small elements... But the result is there, it's quite good looking. The boxwood parts are 0,5mm, and they are made round on there edges. (sometimes I struggle with english language to exprim simple ideas !! 😅)
 
 
 

Thank you everybody for your kind words and encouragements. You know, I really hate to be an unreliable man, and I feel unconfortable with saying I will post pics and I can't. But everytime I think I will have some time to go back to the workshop the amount of work (my real work I mean) increases and I'm away from home much more than I would like to... And as you can imagine with the Covid-19, things are not going to be better anyway soon. But that's my job and of course it is the priority.
Anyway, I have at last some real improvement to show so here are the pics !
At first I had to make some shaped pieces of wood (lisses de rabattues, don't know the english word, wich are molded) with a tarabiscot. Then I can plank the rest of the ship. I had to correct my drawings concerning the sheer cap railing (rabattues) and make them more parallel to the other "préceintes". (I don't find the english word, but I suppose it makes sense anyway). It came from an advice Marc gave me a few years ago. I did not make them more curve, in fact I even made them more straight, but I gave them less a "fan" shape. 
So at last it goes forward. The left side is a little late but will be done in a few days. 
Thank you for your interest, regards,
Marc

 
 

Fittings

Flags

I eventually gave up trying to make the flags from Modelspan or thin cotton cloth, and instead opted to print them on to ordinary copy paper at a resolution of 2000dpi. At least the definition was ok.


 
The method was to print the two sides of the flag edge to edge with a 0.2mm gap. I then laid a 0.1mm line down the middle of the inside and folded each end of the line over to form a loop. The two sides were then glued together using a stick glue.


 
Again the monograph does not reveal the origin of the arms on the flags, but a search revealed them to be of the Provence Alpes Côte d'Azur.
 

 
Anchor & Grapnel

I had to make the anchor 3 times before I got the hang of the sequence necessary. The monograph suggests drilling a hole for the arms, but that would still leave the problem of how to solder the remaining two arms at 900 when using solder that has only one melting point.


 
I eventually hit on the following sequence:

1.    Cut a 4mm brass rod to the maximum diameter (1.63mm) of the shaft (i.e. the diameter of the head and crown.

2.    Drill a 0.7mm hole for the ring

3.    Drill two 0.5mm holes at right angles to each other for the arms near the crown.

4.    Mill 0.5mm grooves for the arms from each of the holes.

5.    Cut the arm between the holes to the final diameter (0.9mm).

6.    Insert the first bar of two arms through the first hole at the crown, then bend them together until they sit in the grooves. Solder with silver solder.

7.    Re-drill the hole in the second hole so that it passes through the paired arm in the first.

8.    Insert the second paired arm through the second hole, and repeat the process for the first paired arms.

9.    Bend all the arms to right angles at the same spot. This makes it easier to solder on the flukes exactly.

10.  Prepare the flukes by cutting a 1mm strip of 0.07mm brass at a sharp angle at 1.5mm intervals.

11.  Wipe the flukes with a cloth impregnated with isopropanol then solder to each of the arms.

12.  Bend the arms to their final shape.

13.  Blacken with Sodium Metabisulphate solution (5%)
 




 

 

 

 

 

 
I now just have to put their ropes on, make the stand, and those will be shown in the next post.


 
Tony

That’s some nice looking planking. 

This is how I make the blocks.

@mbp521
Hi Brian,
thank you for your nice comment and thank you to all the others for the many LIKES.
 
Here is the continuation of my report:
I imitated the leather lining of the caps accordingly.I use real leather with a thickness of approximately 0.25 mm. I split the thinnest leather I could buy with my own device.

 

 

 

I have been working on the topmasts. They will be painted and varnished.

I have spent a lot of time on the boxing joint.  It is dry fit here.  The stem is now centered side-to-side, and reaches the forward point as it should--
 
 
 
 
A close-up shows that there is some final tidying up of the upper curve to do, as it reaches the aft end of the joint--
 

 
 
Here it is after that final shaping has been done--
 

 

 
 
There are still many pieces to be shaped and fit before the boxing joint can be glued.  The next piece will be the tricky lower apron, and here it is roughly cut out, and and held in place against the stem and keel to test its initial fit--
 

 
 
I  have also marked and drilled the holes for the keel scarf bolts, and lightly marked the rabbet line--
 

 
 
Ron

I have finished the installation of the cant frames.
I hope I have interpreted well the shape of the rising wood !
 

 

 

 

Good morning.

Cathead supports have been made and installed.

I continued with the forecastle planking and cap rails. Forecastle has been covered partially like quarter deck and waist deck,