Erik W

After a short, er . . . 6 ½ year break, I’ve resumed work on my Cheerful.  I imagine few of you actually remember my build.  It was sort of unexpected to be bitten by the wooden ship building bug again.  In August I was on a vacation in the Netherlands visiting the Museum Kaap Skil maritime museum in Oudeschild on Texel Island, off the north coast.  They have a huge 60 foot long diorama of the Texel Roads as it appeared around 1660.  It looks to be about 1/100 scale.  There are 160 ships/boats represented in the diorama!  Seen here: https://kaapskil.nl/en/discover/expositions/ship-in-sight-the-roads-of-texel-and-the-world/ That led me back to Modelshipworld.  And here I am.
 
I feel a bit like Rip Van Winkle waking up from a long sleep.  This website itself has changed.  Yellow Cedar is a new wood of choice. Wood suppliers have changed.  No more Crown Timberyard, but it looks like a good replacement with Modeler’s Sawmill.  Chuck is a few projects further along after the Cheerful (the laser cut fully framed Speedwell is a fascinating project, by the way).  There are still a lot of the same faces here, but the skill level on current projects has kicked up a few notches.  So, my hat is off to you folks.
 
It’s been an interesting few years for me.  We had this global pandemic thing.  After 14 years at the local government, I changed jobs a few times.  I was a bicycle tour guide in Boulder for 7 months (a great way of keeping in shape as a 53 year old).  Was the accountant for Left Hand Brewing here in Colorado.  And finally settled into being an accountant for the National Center for Atmospheric Research.
 
Though not working on Cheerful, I’ve still been active modeling from time to time.  One thing I seem to gravitate towards is building things in smaller scales than the norm, and detailing them to a level of the larger scale (which is why Cheerful is unusual for me, I’d be more comfortable building something 1/96 to 1/144 scale! Haha).  A few of my latest projects - A resin tugboat featured on this website: https://modelshipworld.com/topic/22995-ytl-45-taiwanese-navy-tugboat-by-erik-w-finished-1350-scale/    For my model railroad, an N scale (1/160) 3d printed boxcar that I scratch built full underframe details: https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=55256.msg758608#msg758608   and finished here:  https://www.therailwire.net/forum/index.php?topic=55365.msg760492#msg760492   A 1/72 scale WWII F6F Hellcat on a carrier deck with super detailed engine and cockpit:  https://www.militaryimages.net/threads/f6f-5-hellcat-wwii-usn-fighter-plane-1-72-scale.10858/   And probably my favorite, a 1/72 scale M1A2 Abrams tank with over 400 individual pieces of styrene and wire add by me to customize the tank.  Scroll down to see the scratch built stowage items:  https://www.militaryimages.net/threads/m1a2-sepv2-w-crows-ii-lp-1-72-scale-kitbash.10777/
 
Well, I’ve prattled on enough.  Where I had left off was having finished the hull planking.  The next step is supposed to be tree nailing.  I’ve put a lot of thought into that and I’ve decided to skip it.  It’s not because it’s time consuming and tedious as much as it’s a process that you can’t pull out and redo.  Most things on the build can be pried loose if you’re unhappy with them.  That, and I’d rather jump right back into cutting wood.  That’ll help maintain my motivation to keep making progress.  There are a few really good Cheerful builds out there where the builders have skipped tree nailing, Mike (stuntflyer), Glenn (glbarlow), and Ian (Seventynet).  You all have some outstanding other builds as well by the way.  Something to really aspire to for us newbies.  Ian, I particularly like your Hayling Hoy.  Never thought I’d desire to build a fully framed model before, but now . . .
 
So, where I am now is I’ve done what I’d call an almost-final sanding of the lower hull.  There were a few spots that needed attention.  I’ll do an absolute final sanding and paint touch up later.  That’s why the planking and hull still looks a bit rough.  I’ve also been adding the fancy molding.  It took a little trial and error to get my brass scraper made the way I wanted it.  I’ve added the molding to the stern, and port side.  Feels good to be building again!!
 
If you’re new to viewing this build, it’s good to have you along.  And if you’ve followed along before, welcome back!  Without further ado, here are some proof of progress photos.  It's hard to get the lighting right to show the contour of the fancy molding, but you get an idea from the last photo.
 
Erik
 

Thanks for all the 'likes' folks.  This week I finished the margin planks/waterways.  These took some time.  Those scarph joints aren't easy to get clean and tight, but by the last one I had a system down.  The 1/32" x 1/32" waterways were straight forward.  The only real challenge there was making them 1/4 rounds.  I did that by holding the square stock at a 45 degree angle on my cutting mat and running an emery board over the edge.  I'd do a few inches at a time, and lightly sand back and forth about a dozen times as I worked my way down the length of the wood strip.  I repeated this process two more times.
 
I'm excited to move on to building the deck structures now.  It will be a nice break from the various planking tasks I've worked on for the last couple of months (fancy molding, bulwarks, cap rail, margin planks, waterway).
 
Erik

Thanks for all the 'likes' folks.  This week I finished the margin planks/waterways.  These took some time.  Those scarph joints aren't easy to get clean and tight, but by the last one I had a system down.  The 1/32" x 1/32" waterways were straight forward.  The only real challenge there was making them 1/4 rounds.  I did that by holding the square stock at a 45 degree angle on my cutting mat and running an emery board over the edge.  I'd do a few inches at a time, and lightly sand back and forth about a dozen times as I worked my way down the length of the wood strip.  I repeated this process two more times.
 
I'm excited to move on to building the deck structures now.  It will be a nice break from the various planking tasks I've worked on for the last couple of months (fancy molding, bulwarks, cap rail, margin planks, waterway).
 
Erik

Great joinery, neatly done overall, a joy to follow your build.   Hope a lot of others take a look.   
Allan

Thanks for all the 'likes' folks.  This week I finished the margin planks/waterways.  These took some time.  Those scarph joints aren't easy to get clean and tight, but by the last one I had a system down.  The 1/32" x 1/32" waterways were straight forward.  The only real challenge there was making them 1/4 rounds.  I did that by holding the square stock at a 45 degree angle on my cutting mat and running an emery board over the edge.  I'd do a few inches at a time, and lightly sand back and forth about a dozen times as I worked my way down the length of the wood strip.  I repeated this process two more times.
 
I'm excited to move on to building the deck structures now.  It will be a nice break from the various planking tasks I've worked on for the last couple of months (fancy molding, bulwarks, cap rail, margin planks, waterway).
 
Erik

Thanks for all the 'likes' folks.  This week I finished the margin planks/waterways.  These took some time.  Those scarph joints aren't easy to get clean and tight, but by the last one I had a system down.  The 1/32" x 1/32" waterways were straight forward.  The only real challenge there was making them 1/4 rounds.  I did that by holding the square stock at a 45 degree angle on my cutting mat and running an emery board over the edge.  I'd do a few inches at a time, and lightly sand back and forth about a dozen times as I worked my way down the length of the wood strip.  I repeated this process two more times.
 
I'm excited to move on to building the deck structures now.  It will be a nice break from the various planking tasks I've worked on for the last couple of months (fancy molding, bulwarks, cap rail, margin planks, waterway).
 
Erik

Thanks for all the 'likes' folks.  This week I finished the margin planks/waterways.  These took some time.  Those scarph joints aren't easy to get clean and tight, but by the last one I had a system down.  The 1/32" x 1/32" waterways were straight forward.  The only real challenge there was making them 1/4 rounds.  I did that by holding the square stock at a 45 degree angle on my cutting mat and running an emery board over the edge.  I'd do a few inches at a time, and lightly sand back and forth about a dozen times as I worked my way down the length of the wood strip.  I repeated this process two more times.
 
I'm excited to move on to building the deck structures now.  It will be a nice break from the various planking tasks I've worked on for the last couple of months (fancy molding, bulwarks, cap rail, margin planks, waterway).
 
Erik

Thanks for all the 'likes' folks.  This week I finished the margin planks/waterways.  These took some time.  Those scarph joints aren't easy to get clean and tight, but by the last one I had a system down.  The 1/32" x 1/32" waterways were straight forward.  The only real challenge there was making them 1/4 rounds.  I did that by holding the square stock at a 45 degree angle on my cutting mat and running an emery board over the edge.  I'd do a few inches at a time, and lightly sand back and forth about a dozen times as I worked my way down the length of the wood strip.  I repeated this process two more times.
 
I'm excited to move on to building the deck structures now.  It will be a nice break from the various planking tasks I've worked on for the last couple of months (fancy molding, bulwarks, cap rail, margin planks, waterway).
 
Erik

I was hoping for a little more progress this week. The problem was that I started nit picking.
 
One of the things that I've been wanting to do from the beginning was to avoid any color matching with paint for areas that might not have turned out as expected. Typically that would be something like an open butt joint or where two different wood types join together thus changing the uniformity of the look.
 
Looking at this closeup photo from my previous post, it's not hard to see that the AYC quarter panel is a lighter color than the end grain of the wing transom which is made from boxwood.

 
The lower section of the quarter panel for the most part is covered by planking. However, some of the lighter AYC color will be seen after the planking is completed. Knowing that, I decided to remove some of the AYC from the quarter piece and replace it with boxwood. Actually, it was quite easy to do and I was able to complete the work in less than an hour. See photo below.
 
Fashion piece
The fashion piece was cut from 5/32" sheet. The tricky part was getting a nice flow into the bearding line and a good joint along the deadwood and wing transom. I ended up having to make two of these in order to get the one I liked. I left the top of the fashion piece standing proud. Also, I left some of the paper template attached which could be used as a sanding template. I recommend doing this rather than trying to get a perfect fit everywhere. It's hard to explain as to why, just that it's easier to fit the piece and fair the top into the wing transom afterwards. If I end up back into nit picking mode, I might do a bit more work at the bearding line transition.
 
Also, note that the boxwood filler is in and mostly faired.

Mike
 
 

Thanks for all the 'likes' folks.  This week I finished the margin planks/waterways.  These took some time.  Those scarph joints aren't easy to get clean and tight, but by the last one I had a system down.  The 1/32" x 1/32" waterways were straight forward.  The only real challenge there was making them 1/4 rounds.  I did that by holding the square stock at a 45 degree angle on my cutting mat and running an emery board over the edge.  I'd do a few inches at a time, and lightly sand back and forth about a dozen times as I worked my way down the length of the wood strip.  I repeated this process two more times.
 
I'm excited to move on to building the deck structures now.  It will be a nice break from the various planking tasks I've worked on for the last couple of months (fancy molding, bulwarks, cap rail, margin planks, waterway).
 
Erik

Another way would be to place a flat sheet on a flat bench or table so it hangs over by a wee bit. If you're right handed, place the sheet on the "right" side table edge. That makes it easier to sand the sheet without having to twist your body. Tape down the edge sitting on the table. Round off the over hanging edge using the 11" bar sander like this one from Great Planes. After that you could rip the rounded strip away from the sheet with the table saw or cut if off the sheet with a #11 blade.

Thanks for all the 'likes' folks.  This week I finished the margin planks/waterways.  These took some time.  Those scarph joints aren't easy to get clean and tight, but by the last one I had a system down.  The 1/32" x 1/32" waterways were straight forward.  The only real challenge there was making them 1/4 rounds.  I did that by holding the square stock at a 45 degree angle on my cutting mat and running an emery board over the edge.  I'd do a few inches at a time, and lightly sand back and forth about a dozen times as I worked my way down the length of the wood strip.  I repeated this process two more times.
 
I'm excited to move on to building the deck structures now.  It will be a nice break from the various planking tasks I've worked on for the last couple of months (fancy molding, bulwarks, cap rail, margin planks, waterway).
 
Erik

Thanks for all the 'likes' folks.  This week I finished the margin planks/waterways.  These took some time.  Those scarph joints aren't easy to get clean and tight, but by the last one I had a system down.  The 1/32" x 1/32" waterways were straight forward.  The only real challenge there was making them 1/4 rounds.  I did that by holding the square stock at a 45 degree angle on my cutting mat and running an emery board over the edge.  I'd do a few inches at a time, and lightly sand back and forth about a dozen times as I worked my way down the length of the wood strip.  I repeated this process two more times.
 
I'm excited to move on to building the deck structures now.  It will be a nice break from the various planking tasks I've worked on for the last couple of months (fancy molding, bulwarks, cap rail, margin planks, waterway).
 
Erik

Thanks for all the 'likes' folks.  This week I finished the margin planks/waterways.  These took some time.  Those scarph joints aren't easy to get clean and tight, but by the last one I had a system down.  The 1/32" x 1/32" waterways were straight forward.  The only real challenge there was making them 1/4 rounds.  I did that by holding the square stock at a 45 degree angle on my cutting mat and running an emery board over the edge.  I'd do a few inches at a time, and lightly sand back and forth about a dozen times as I worked my way down the length of the wood strip.  I repeated this process two more times.
 
I'm excited to move on to building the deck structures now.  It will be a nice break from the various planking tasks I've worked on for the last couple of months (fancy molding, bulwarks, cap rail, margin planks, waterway).
 
Erik

another piece:





 

Completion: Equipment of the main fore yard
With the attachment of the studding sail booms, the equipment of the main fore yard was completed.
This means that this yard can be placed on its side next to the others until it is finally installed on the model. Finally, a picture that shows the entire yard with a detailed section.

 
Everything that seemed possible and sensible was attached to the yard, which will make the later rigging work on the model a lot easier.
Next I will equip the fore topsail yard, similar to the main topsail yard. However, in an adapted form in terms of rope strengths and block sizes. Many rigging elements were already made with the parts for the main topsail yard. In this respect, I can assume that the new phase of work will progress a little more quickly. In addition, the research for the detailed training has also been completed.
 
Sequel follows …

Update from the stern

@giampieroricci
Many thanks vor your nice comment, and also thanks to the others for the LIKES.
 
Continuation: Equipment of the main topsail yard – eye splices for sheets
If I remember correctly, some time ago a dear fellow model maker once described weaving linen as a “complementary meditation”.
I discovered another passion by making eye splices... 😊.
But seriously, making splices is really relaxing. The feeling of looking at the result also conveys a certain fulfillment, at least for me.
After many attempts, I am now more or less able to make usable eye splices in almost any rope thickness.
In the meantime I have formed the ends of the main topsail sheets and main topgallant sheets with eye splices so that I can later create the connection already described using a toggle on the clewline blocks or on the clewlines.

 

Up soon …

My goal is to see how many tools I can use, and buy.  However I do appreciate the point about working with wood almost nothing you can’t do, or undo, and I agree there is something about the feel of it wood…

I was out of town visiting family in Annapolis, Maryland, for a few days this week.  While there, I went to the US Naval Academy Museum.  Not my first visit there, but always a fun outing.  And grabbing lunch downtown afterwards is a must as well.  On the 2nd floor, the museum houses the Rogers Collection of wooden ship dockyard models, as well as newer built models from all eras of naval history on the 1st floor.  If you haven't been to this museum, I highly recommend it.
 
I did manage to make some progress on my Cheerful.  I added the cap rail.  The cap rail is 7 pieces cut out of 1/16" sheet.  One piece for the stern, and 3 for each side.  I have quality digital calipers accurate to .0001" to measure with, so getting the rail to a uniform width was easy enough, it just took some time to sand down.  The cap rail measures in at a bit under 5/32" wide.  I also fashioned the hawse plates out of 1/32" thick sheet.  This was pretty straight forward with first cutting the plan out and then transferring the lines to the wood sheet.  Drilling the hawse holes in the hawse plates and bulwarks was pretty easy as well.  I had an issue with drilling and filing the bowsprit hole though.  While the hole was aligned properly, parallel to the keel and level with the keel, I got a bit carried away with enlarging the diameter up to the final bowsprit diameter.  When I inserted the a 5/16" drill bit shaft to double check the diameter, there was a little slop as it passed through the hawse plate.  I did that thing where I tried to convince myself I could live with it.  I couldn't.  So, I pried it off and fabricated a new one.  This time though I deliberately left the bowsprit hole a smaller diameter than what the bowsprit will be.  I figure it makes the most sense to tweak the hole diameter when I have the bowsprit made, so I can adjust it to the actual diameter.  Live and learn.
 
Erik

Over the last week I planked the port side bulwarks.  I spent a few hours today doing the final sanding of both sides of the bulwarks which included thinning the areas of the bulwarks tops that were thicker than the others in preparation for adding the cap rail.  I carefully thinned the 1/32" thick spirketing to a thickness somewhere between 1/32" and 1/64".  I then rounded the edge of the top spirketing plank a bit.  Lastly I softened the edges on the stern frames to reflect the look of Chuck's visible stern frames on his Cheerful build.
 
Erik

Ian, Thanks for the kind words!  I have had your Cheerful build bookmarked.  I like the way your Cheerful has more bare wood showing than most.  It looks great!  And thanks for noticing my efforts at getting good photos.  It actually takes some time to set everything up.  Since I photograph on my work surface, I have to move everything out of the way.  And I can only really photograph on the weekends when I have time during the day while the sun is shining, as a good portion of the overall lighting is from a window.
 
I added the 1/32" thick planks below the gun ports.  I did these as hull length single planks to keep the plank run looking smooth.  I also wound up adding a 1/32" x 1/32" strip along the bow area between the 1st and 2nd gun ports beneath the two main planks.  This was probably unnecessary, but when I measured the gap it came out to be pretty close in height to what will be the 3/64" thick deck plank plus the 1/32" thick waterway.  So, better safe than sorry.  I then did a bit of sanding to thin the 1/32" planking as Chuck suggests in his monograph.  Once I have the port side planking to the same point, I'll further thin both sides slightly, and round the hard edge a little.  I've always found when modeling 2 sides that are supposed to be symmetrical, completing them to 90% or so, while working on first one side and then the other, and then finishing both sides at the same times helps make it easier to get them where they look identical.
 
Erik

With the holiday thrown in, my time to work on the Cheerful over the last week has been a bit limited.  I did make some progress though.  I'm part way through fabricating the margin planks.  The 5 short planks across the stern were a bigger pain to get correct than I expected.  I wound up scrapping 7 by the time I was satisfied with the 5 good ones you see here.  The port side margin planks were slow going as well.  I first made a 1/4" wide paper template in order to get the inner bulwarks shape correct as well as the location and basic shape of the scarph joints.  I made a card stock mock-up of a scarph joint from Chuck's plans that I used to transfer the shape of the joint onto the margin planks after they were formed.  As of now, I have all three port side margin planks complete, I just need to glue them together and attach them to the model.
 
I added a photo of the tools I used to fabricate the margin planks.  This photo actually shows about 90% of the entirety of the tools I've used to build my Cheerful.  Not pictured are more files, sand paper, more emery boards, and some clothes pins and clamps.  This project is very much a manual and low tech process for me!
 
Erik

Druxey, Thanks for the kind words.  One thing I like about the manual low-tech approach, being relatively new to the hobby, is it has helped me really understand the strengths and weaknesses of the boxwood I'm working with, and what it can and can't do.  There really is something special about working with wood, as compared to styrene, plastic, resin, etc.  It's hard to put into words, but there's an added level of enjoyment that working with the wood provides.
 
Erik

With the holiday thrown in, my time to work on the Cheerful over the last week has been a bit limited.  I did make some progress though.  I'm part way through fabricating the margin planks.  The 5 short planks across the stern were a bigger pain to get correct than I expected.  I wound up scrapping 7 by the time I was satisfied with the 5 good ones you see here.  The port side margin planks were slow going as well.  I first made a 1/4" wide paper template in order to get the inner bulwarks shape correct as well as the location and basic shape of the scarph joints.  I made a card stock mock-up of a scarph joint from Chuck's plans that I used to transfer the shape of the joint onto the margin planks after they were formed.  As of now, I have all three port side margin planks complete, I just need to glue them together and attach them to the model.
 
I added a photo of the tools I used to fabricate the margin planks.  This photo actually shows about 90% of the entirety of the tools I've used to build my Cheerful.  Not pictured are more files, sand paper, more emery boards, and some clothes pins and clamps.  This project is very much a manual and low tech process for me!
 
Erik