Chuck

I am willing cut small jobs when the time permits. I would encourage folks to contact me for availability. For example, right now I am swamped and couldnt possibly take a small job for laser cutting and have one such custom job on my to-do list. I just wont get to it til early next month at the soonest. If time isnt a factor then please let me know what you need. Provide me with either a Corel Draw file or a DXF file of the parts. I can talk you about specifics and the need to always have to adjust the drawings after I get them. They will always need to be adjusted for the kerf of the cut depending on what type of wood you choose. If you want the stuff sooner, You can contact National balsa. They have an excellent laser cutting service and I used them all the time before getting my own equipment. But they will only use the woods they have in stock. Basswood, Maple, Cherry and lite ply.....amiong a few other things. See here for the custom laser cutting services at National balsa http://www.nationalbalsa.com/laser_cutting_s/8.htm You would probably have to double your $2000 estimate for getting a laser cutter of your own the needed software and accessories. That is if you want to cut anything thicker than 1/8" basswood with accuracy and a decent cut. Chuck

Very nice Chris

They were drilled out on a drill press first with a normal bit (round). Then I just took a #11 xacto blade and notched out the corners by eye to square them off. They are 1/16" square. They are not square all the way through. Just deep enough that after painting you would think they were squared up all the way through. They are square only about 3/64" deep into the hole. Thanks for the kind words guys. Chuck

To make the bowsprit....start with a square stick of boxwood 5/16" x 5/16". The inboard section will remain square. The outboard side is rounded off and tapered. There are three square holes on the inboard sides. But these start out as round holes made on the drill press while the entire stick is still square. There is also a sheave on the outboard end. The holes for this simulated sheave are also drilled while the stick is square. Then the outboard end is measured and marked for the 7-10-7 ratios to make it an octagon. From an octagon it is then made round. There are many way to do this. Mini-plan...files...by hand....then rounded off on a lathe or even chocked in your hand drill. Then I made it round...in my hand drill...and taperred it to match the plan while doing so. Once that was done...the simulated sheave on the outboard end was detailed. I used a #11 blade to connect the holes and carve it out a little. Then mini-files were used to round off the simulated sheave. Later I will darken it with pencil. The three inboard holes need to be made square...again there are many way to do this. I decided to just use my #11 blade to carefully square off the corners. The inboard portion will eventually be painted black. The outboard end also has a metal band with four eyes around it. This was made from paper. You could use art tape or even brass if you wanted. Again there are so many choices. It was painted black and weathered so it looked differently than the wood elements painted black. Then it was mounted in the hole at the bow and the fit tweaked. Once it looked good, the bowsprit step was slid onto the inboard end. You wouldnt be able to slide the bowsprit in position if the step was already glued in place. So this is a bit tricky. But soon after I was able to get it all in position and glued securely. Then I touched up the paint and cleaned it up. Next up the long guns can be positioned....but I am unsure of I will add them. They will look very crammed in there. I will have to contemplate that for a bit.

Yes just start a new one and I will delete your old one. All of the photos are missing anyway. So be sure to upload them using the photo upload button on the site when you make each post rather than host them elsewhere. Chuck

The standard practice is to put your wales in first. Measure off the plans. This establishes the correct run of the planks across the hull. I thought that was your hull. That isnt optimal at all. Then you plank from the wales up......and then from the wales down. Even if its just the first layer of planking for the wales. Best to put the wales in first. Whoever's hull that is will have a funny looking wale at the bow and stern. It doesnt look like the correct run of planking was established. Measure from the shear down to the top of the wales and the bottom of the wales....marke it off on each bulkhead and plank them first. It will save you a lot of trouble....BUT yes....you can spile all of the planking. Absolutely. But its always always good practice to put the wales in first. If you look around this site you will see plenty of hulls where they didnt do that and then when it came time to add the wales as second layer....they did in fact measure from the shear only to discover that the wales will not follow the run of the first planking layer they did at all. Which looks really odd when done. Chuck

That is quite the odd shaped hull at the bow. But yes you can spile all of the planking. Usually it is those under the wales that need it most but looking at your bow shape....I am truly at a loss. So yes probably. I cal tell from teh photos that the bulkheads were not faired nearly enough. That probably contributed to the odd shape. Chuck

Its great to see you back again....enjoy the project and dont hesitate to ask me any questions. Chuck

Its simple really....you determine the max width for a plank by choosing the scale widths that were actually used on that vessel. Its not a random choice. Should you end up with an odd number of planks after doing so, then just make one belt with one less strake in it. They need not be all the same. But depending on the size of the ship and country of origin....choose the correct width accordingly. It could be eight inches....it could be 10 or 12". It depends on the ship. The period etc. It doesnt have to be equally divided.

Thanks Pat. Yes I agree, I think I am going to go natural. One of the guys in my club said if I was going to the trouble to carve the boxwood rather than use castings I might as well show folks that its a delicate hand carved piece by not covering it up. I agree with him and will now move ahead with the others over pieces when time permits.

Very nicely done. I hope you enjoyed the little mini-kit. Its a rewarding project and you did a marvelous job with it. Chuck

24 gauge

I know the feeling. I already have two in college. But my oldest got a free ride though. In fact they pay him to go. These kids are too smart to be mine. I dont know what happened there. Maybe I will get lucky again. Probably not. She wants to be a pathologist. How many years is that??? Cha-ching.......a forensic pathologist. Go figure. Chuck

I have been suffering for a lot longer than you think......I really cant believe it though. I am blessed. She is very smart like my boys and is looking at Princeton too!!!! I might have to sell a kidney. I am so very very proud of her. Chuck

No sweaters for me. The agony.....besides my toothache.....its whether to gild or not??? I am leaning towards no gilding. I do like it but its just me. It also shows every last surface pimple and carving screw up. But it is a royal barge. I think I like the way the carvings look with just WOP applied. Which means I must carve another queen Anne cipher. Oh well!! The close-ups are also brutal....the smaller image looks more like the gilded example in reality. It looks rather nasty in that large photo. Chuck

Boxwood carving for the barge in progress. Using a #11 blade. Its half done. Left side shows the laser cut blank while the right side is almost there. The blanks are glued to a piece of scrap with elmers glue. In this case I just used a glue stick. Make sure its really glued down good. Especially the ends of the thin parts that are susceptible to breakage. I sandwich the glued up piece with another scrap sheet and clamp them together so the piece stays flat and doesnt curl up. The blanks are just 1/32" thick and sandwiching keeps them flat so all the surfaces glue up nicely. Leave them overnight to dry really good.....now you are ready to carve. The finished carving is removed from the base by just dumping it face-first into a bath of 90% rubbing alcohol for 5 or 6 hours. They usually just fall right off the base. Let them air dry and you are good to go. When you dont have lots of time to spend on the model its good to keep these carving blanks around the shop. You can easily spend a half hour or 45 minutes doing a little at a time. There are nine such pieces in this kit that will need to be carved. But dont worry .....a resin casting kit will be available for those who dont want to carve them or give this a try. But I urge to to do so...its a lot of fun and addicting. The guys in the club cant get enough of them to play around with. Chuck

Very soon.....had to spend some summer days with the family before they revolted. Beach, taking kids to see Grandma and Grandpa...Visiting Colleges with my daughter. Still have to go to Baltimore at the end of the month to visit John Hopkins and then to UPenn. Sometimes life manages to halt the building. And this Tuesday some root canal for me. Yippie for me. What a tooth ache I have right now. Then its back to Cheerful! Chuck

Ok you are good to go and have access to the drawings.. Have fun with the project

Wonderful model. It was a pleasure to follow along.

Today I didnt feel like working. So instead I took a crack at carving the monogram of Queen Anne that will appear on the inside of the flying transom. These will be boxwood in the kit probably but the before and after examples pictures are actually cherry. The blanks like the one on the left are just 1/32" thick. I basically used four easy beginner carving techniques. Lots of stop cuts. But they are at a micro level. Its hardly woodcarving and more like chip carving in my opinion. This is the first wood carved decoration I have made in 25 years. I usually prefer to sculpt as you know. So this was a really fun learning experience. I am far far from being any kind of expert and consider myself an absolute beginner. The whole thing was carved with a number eleven blade in my hobby knife. It is far from anything noteworthy but I am happy with it and excited about doing more carving. Which is the whole point. It was mounted/glued to a thick base for carving as you can see. It worked great. After I was done, I literally soaked it in a cup of 90% rubbing alcohol. 1 hour later this carving literally fell off the baseboard. This was just a test for me and I will be carving another in boxwood for the model. This is the piece I wanted to use as a group tech session here as an intro to carving. Not a class of any kind because I really dont know what I am doing. But just a cheap way for folks to get together and exchange techniques. Learning from each other. This piece and the few others for this kit would make a great tech session build. I am planning on getting my whole club together in my workshop next month. We will all be practicing on this and talking about it as a group......lunch included. I think it will be a blast and I hope other clubs might consider it as well.

Thanks. Unfortunately I wont be going to the Conference this year. My niece is getting married that same Friday night and it looks like a weekend gig. We will be in Philly for the wedding all weekend. I cant wiggle out of this one. I hope I still fit into my leisure suit!!!!

And I almost forgot.....use the paint very thin. Dont use is too thick. I use it the consistency of watercolor. As if I was building up countless layers of thin washes of paint. Slowly working towards an opaque surface. After about the tenth coat I sand with 320 grit paper and apply another ten coats. But I only lightly sand the paint......without removing it using a very light touch. Yes steady control of breathing is very important....a somewhat steady hand also helps. And keep your workstation clean...no dust, absolutely no dust. Use clean fresh water to thin the paint on your pallet. Chuck

Its so hard to explain in writing. When I was in art school, there was a whole semester class on how to use a paint brush effectively and what shaped brush to use. Its counter to what most would think as well. I have a 1/2 hour tech session on describing the techniques developed because its something you must see to really get. Even better still, it is best to hand out brushes to those watching and have them try it as you go. Surprisingly there is a lot to point out even though you wouldnt expect that to be the case. This class at Parsons was about color theory but also about brush handling. We had to draw small square swatches, 1" x 1" and paint them to create our own swatch book of color theory. The color theory aside, the teacher was vigilant in demanding these swatches be painted by hand with a brush and you stay in the lines. That each swatch be perfectly flat with not a trace of brush strokes. If there were any....you would get a really poor grade. It wasnt until a decade after I took that class that I recognized how important it was for our hobby purposes. I will try and put together something with photos to describe the techniques. Just for starters...I dont have any flat brushes in my shop at all. They are worthless for painting smooth areas you dont want brush strokes to appear on. I also have no small brushes in workshop at all. I have only medium and large round brushes. They are soft and medium soft. More suited for water colors than for oils or acrylic. This is because even though I am using acrylic paint, they are used more like water colors. To understand why, the lightbulbs always go off when folks see me use a flat brush in the traditional way and I describe how it is wrong for our purposes and show what happens when you use them. Everyone uses flat brushes....throw them away except for maybe using them as dust brushes. Then I describe how to effectively use a round brush that most would think is way too large for our purposes. But after showing how to paint in the right direction and pull the brush as I am cutting a straight line, they are converted pretty quick into believers. This usually starts with drawing a square box on a piece of soft basswood 1" x 1". It is very possibly if not easier to paint this square swatch perfectly flat with no brush strokes evident afterwards.... and cut in the lines around the perimeter so you have a sharp clean box freehand with a round brush. No taping or masking required. But again.....better to see it than describe it. And then there is the surface prep and crack filling before you even start painting. AND...very important....PINKY's up. How to use your pinky finger as a control. Resting your pinky finger on the surface to steady your hand and gain lots of control. If by chance there is no good place to rest my pinky in a certain part of the model, the painting clearly doesnt go as well. Its very important to learn what to do with your hands and how to hold the brush. I have showed quite a few people in my shop how to do this and maybe they are better with their words and can explain it better. But I will attempt to take some pictures as I paint on some basswood. A notoriously bad wood to paint and expect to get a good finish on. If you are using better wood like box or in my case cherry its even more of a pleasure to do. I used Galleria Windsor and Newton Brand acrylic paint from a tube. BUT...the paint as of late is slipping in quality so I have switched to Grumbacher brand and like it very much. But for some odd reason I decided to use the Windsor and Newton on this model. The color is Crimson...straight from the tube.

Thanks Ben, I hope you are doing well. I actually made a good deal of progress on the benches for the barge. Just finished painting the bench details. So far, everything except for the molding along the shear has been laser cut for this kit. Some etched details Include the panels on the bench armrests....and beading along the bench seat tops. Next up will be planking inboard with the risers and adding the thwarts...Its a very quick build in comparison to other projects. The last photo shows just how large the model is. It is not a small model. A bit longer than 18".

Thanks I hope you are right about folks being interested. Its always a nerve racking experience to spend the time and money developing something like this with the hope folks will want it afterwards. I am having so much fun building it at any rate.