Chuck

Coming soon. Resin cast barrels. I have three sizes of cast resin barrels that will soon be available on my site. Currently I have the 11/16" tall and the 1" tall barrels. I am waiting for my casting guy to make the third smaller size. I may even make a fourth smaller size later as well. I have the two smaller sizes and I am waiting for the last larger size not shown. They are cast in white resin or a light tan like my carvings for the ship models I make. This makes it so much easier to prepare than building my laser cut versions. Those will still be available but these resin versions will give you guys more options. These can be prepared in minutes... Just clean whatever flashing which is minimal. And remove the small vent hole plugs with a sharp #11 blade. Then brush on some gel stain...in my case pictured, I used General Finishes Fruitwood gel stain as usual. I have one coat of stain on these. You can add more to deepen the color as you see fit. Then I just used a black sharpie to color the raised iron hoops. You could use any color you want for those as well. You could use a copper leaf pen for example. It isnt difficult....and takes just a few minutes vs. a much longer time to build my laser cut versions. Each size will be sold two per package. Its unfortunately too late for me to add these in the hold of Speedwell....but when you need to make a dozen or more barrels for the hold its nice to not have assemble them one at a time. And Buckets...crates...and other items will soon follow. And whatever else I can possibly think of...please let me know if you guys fancy something in particular.

Maybe but it looks pretty good to my eye from the pics.

Yes just knock the corner off a bit. I would continue the taper lower a bit…not much by maybe a 3/4”.

That is looking so good...👍

No I wont be selling a wood package. I just dont have time to mill wood and sell lumber. I work directly with Joe at MS. We are old friends that go way back...he mills and supplies me with all of my wood at Syren. In fact we are hoping to go to a yard to pick up a whole bunch of cedar really soon. We are currently very low on it. Chuck

Thanks for saying....

That would be so nice but it probably would put the builder at risk of being abused. Anyway....those gratings You will basically get all of the laser cut parts in this chapter. There are only four hatches with gratings. They are not very large. Here are all of the elements needed. You will get two layers for the jig. The two layers are glued together to form the jig. You also get a right angle jig which is 3/64" thick. The thickness is very important. Lets get started. Start with the coamings. They are laser cut and 1/8" thick. The fore and aft sides are already shaped with the round-up of the deck....or camber as usually described but is an inaccurate term. Use the right angle jig to glue two sides together...dont worry about the laser char just yet. Then glue the remaining two sides together using the same jig to make a nice right angle. Glue the two right angles together to form the coaming. Sand the sides clean which are left a bit longer as you can see in order to remove the char and leave a nice bright smooth surface. Also sand the top sides to clean the char. You can see the cleaned coaming below. Then you can start working on the grating. Again just like my other smaller scale grating kits. Insert the laser cut grating strips in the slotted jig. NO GLUE of course!!! This is just for alignment. Then start adding the cross battens. These are glued in position. They may be too tight as you want a press fit. So just run the small strips 1/16" x 1/16" through your fingers with some fine sandpaper. Not much. Just enough so the battens fit into the slots. see below. There are seven batten strips and seven laser cut grating strips for three of the hatches. The fourth is made the same way but is much smaller on the fcastle. When all the strips are glued in position, remove the grating from the jig. Snip off the edges as shown below. Then sand all four edges clean. Try and not distort the perfect square shape. In the photo two sides have the ends snipped off. The smaller hatchway will have fewer battens and more to snip away. Also sand the top surface clean and smooth. Once again try and maintain the proper shape with the round-up. You will know when its all done when the char is cleaned from the laser cut grating strip squares. The photo below shows the top of the grating and sides all clean and nice and smooth. It makes a nice grating. The holes are 1/16" or 2" on the real ship and perfectly in scale. You should but dont have to sand the bottom side as well. Here is a look. The battens are clearly less thick than the grating strips and these are pretty close to actual construction methods. Or at least the impression of it. And almost done...you will see how nice and tight the grating fits in the coaming. Dont over sand the edges and you should test the grating in the coaming as you sand the edges. In fact, the coaming normally has ledges on the port and starboard sides inside the coaming. These create a ledge that the grating sits on so it doesnt fall through. You can add those if you like. But in my case the gratings fit so snug that they were not required. I simply glued the gratings into the coamings making sure the top of the coaming was flush with the grating. I sanded it smooth with some 400 grit paper. The four corners of the coaming are very sharp at this point. You dont want that. They should be rounded off. But they are only rounded off down to the deck level. That is when you take that same right angle jig and use it. The jig is the same thickness as the planking. So you can place the coaming into the corner and use a sharp #11 blade to slice away the corner. Slice it down to the top of the jig only. You can make a stop cut at the jig level before slicing off the corner. Then just round off the corner. Dont slice off too much. Just a little bit to round off each corner. To finish it off I drilled three holes with a #76 bit. I used 20lb black fishing line to simulate the bolts on the top of the coamings. Three on each side. They cut flush with the top of the coamings with a sharp blade. All done!!!

Yes, another forum but seriously most already know what they are like...thats why I wanted to post publicly for everyone not to take the bait. Its just not worth it. Just stay clear of the whole bunch. Chuck

I am just about to post an update with those...LOL The gratings for Speedwell are different but the same basic concept. They are a different scale to reflect the larger size needed. They will have 1/16" square openings which at 3/8" scale would be a 2" hole. Just right and exactly the same number of holes as the contemporary model. These will all be included in the chapter along with the jig needed. I will have construction pics really soon. I have been distracted lately with the topic on the SOS where the staff and admin are trashing this project relentlessly....but its a lot fun to watch. Many of you guys have sent me messages alerting me about it. I have to thank Ben however for being a brave soul to have something nice to say about it knowing he will get the wrath for it. I must be the worst kit designer in the world if you read some of that stuff over there. But seriously...dont put yourself out there because if you do say anything positive about Syren or any of my projects on SOS they will lambaste you. So no worries. Dont put yourself in that position. Its not worth it. Most folks know its all nonsense. And I am well aware. But thanks for the positive notes of private support. Anyway...back to building gratings.

Looking good!! Well Done.

That looks very good. You can extend it a bit further down the stem if you like. But its very nice. Same with the thickness at the figurehead area. Not much though. Dont be afraid to sand the gripe smooth at the keel intersection as well. There is plenty of meat on the bones yet.

Thanks guys...There are a lot of things I could work on next but I am eager to get the decks planked. So next up I will make all the coaming and gratings down the center line so I can plank around them. Once that is done I will add the waterway and start on the fun bits. It should come together rather quickly once I plank the decks. A quick look at sheet 5 still being tweaked which has all of those details.

Looking forward to seeing your progress. Enjoy the project.

Great News Ben...Glad to see you almost making sawdust again.

That is kind of difficult to do with planking. The planking needs to be sanded. afterwards to be neat and smooth and it will only get wrecked. At least for me. Most items are indeed painted beforehand but I just dont see how you can do it with bulwark planking and have nice neat planking.

What a difference some paint makes. Bulwarks are painted however as usual, I will be applying many more thin coats over the next few weeks as I progress. Before and after...

Actually it survived without a scratch. I was very lucky. But yes they clearly dont know how to handle a ship model. I wonder if Ed Harris also autographed an original Jackson Pollock with a sharpie during that film....LOL. Not that you would be able to tell.

Not for sale, LOL... Interestingly enough, there were about eight or nine models that I placed on the set. Several of mine and many others from members of my local Ship Model Society of New Jersey club. Someone was so taken by one of the models that they bought it. And for a very handsome sum. I have no idea who. It was an anonymous sale through the production studio. So it was a success for many model ship modelers I know. Maybe if it goes well and enough ship model content isnt cut from the final movie, it will also encourage a few to give it a try. You never know!!!

Many of you are curious about this photo. Its floating around the forums without an explanation. I brought my Medway Longboat to the New London show last week where it was photographed.. You may not be able to see it right away but yes I changed this Medway English longboat to be an American boat. This model was used in the movie that I worked on last year which I talked about a while back. I changed the flag and the nameplate on the model. They wanted it to be American and have the Character's Name on the model. They were going to slowly pan across it for the movie and wanted Ed Harris' character name very visible etc. To my Surprise after spending a bunch time with him trying to teach him how to fake being a ship modeler, Ed Harris signed the model. But of course not the base....Black sharpie right across the hull. No fixing that!!! So rather than put the model back to its original English origin and remove the nameplates, I decided to just leave it as is. It will make for a nice conversation piece. The movie is supposed to come out in July I believe....It was about 10 degrees out the day he signed it. The workshop was set up in the garage of the set. I have no idea how they acted as if it wasnt freezing all the time. I suppose that is why he is considered such a great actor. Starring Ed Harris, Dustan Hoffman, Bill Murray, Gabrielle Union, Jenifer Coolidge, Pete Davidson and a bunch of others you would certainly know. We shall see how the movie turned out!!! At least I have a memento for the wonderful experience.

Yes they will all be painted. Basically I will be following the contemporary model for the paint scheme. Thanks for the kind words guys.

Bulwark planking has finally been completed. It really wasnt too bad. You just have to keep plugging away and while making careful cuts between those ports. All the cracks, gaps and dents were filled and sanded in preparation for painting. The second layer of spirketting was added as well to finish off the bulwarks below the ports. The top edge was softened or even rounded off. I dont like to leave a hard edge here. I used a 1/32" strip the same shape and size as the first layer. I took the shapes from the plans because this wide 1/2" strip needs to be tapered like the first layer and shaped before you glue it on. Every model will have slight differences so it will take some time to get it right. Then the top of the sills were very carefully sanded and the cracks filled there as well. I was careful not to sand into the top of the spirketting which would ruin the nice continuous run along its top edge. You can see how bad port sills look now but the surfaces are now smooth and once painted will look really nice. Before I paint however I needed to add the 4 fixed blocks on the inside of the bulwarks. On Winnie, I had used laser cut fixed blocks the same thickness as the planking. You would glue them to the framing before planking and then plank around them. I went a different way this time. I just planked the entire interior bulwarks and then just drilled the fixed blocks through from the outboard side. Then I sanded them clean and reamed them a bit with a round file. To finish off these simulated fixed blocks I took a very small "V" gauge chisel and made a small simulated sheave slot between the two holes. Since the bulwarks will be painted this seemed like the better way to go. You can see the two fixed blocks below at the bow on the starboard side. I used a sharpened pencil to color the sheave to simulate a more appropriate color. I have also hi-lighted in this photo how I planked the bow inboard. I first glued a 1/4" x 3/64" strip down the inboard side below the bowsprit hole. See the red arrow. This allows me to push the planking strakes up against it which for me makes the process easier and neater. There were two more strakes to add on each side of this to plank the bow inboard. The cracks were filled and it was all sanded smooth for painting. Here is a photo showing the aft portion of the bulwarks planked and ready for painting as well. Note the two fixed blocks here as well. The one last thing you might notice is that I did in fact add the margin plank all along the bulwarks. This is 1/4" wide and 3/64" thick. It finishes it off neatly. You dont have to add this yet but I find it easier to paint the bulwarks when I have a nice right angle to paint down to. Hopefully I wont bugger it up and get red paint all over the margin planks. But if you find it easier to paint the bulwarks first without making a mess then fell free to do it that way. At the bow, the margin planks on each side were cut from a 3/64" thick sheet of yellow cedar. I used the plans and planking template provided. I cut it out and used that paper template as a starting point. After seeing what I needed to adjust for a tight fit, I transferred this shape to the wood sheet and cut it out with a sharp #11 blade. If you look at the photo again you can see my first attempt which I discarded. It didnt fit as nicely as I wanted. So I made more adjustments and cut another. You would be best served to buy a few extra 3/64" thick sheets of Yellow cedar for stuff like this. Every model will be slightly different and you will want to go through this exercise as well for a good fit. I am ready now for painting....the bulwarks will be carefully painted red over the weekend. Depending on my honey-do list.

Im not sure…i will check though. Its a ton of work to set up. Let me see what the guys think about it as well…meaning the mods and admin.

All taken care of!!!

Beautiful start and I follow along.

Nicely done. That does look sweet!!