donrobinson

Hello all and welcome to my build log of the Batelina by MarisStella. I have just completed this kit that I started about 2 1/2 weeks ago and I will now show you the complete build. I decided to hold back on a log thinking it would save some time as I went along, and to give a complete log in a couple of days.
 I took on this build after seeing it being built in MarisStella's log here on MSW, and as all my other builds are months if not years from completion I wanted a "completion" in a short time so the Batelina fit that bill.
 If you are looking for a real bang for your buck this little kit has it all, the materials are excellent and the skills needed to complete her are far from the beginners level. She is a great little kit to practice your planking skills on and short of rigging and cannons has pretty much all the challenges of a full size ship just at a different level.
 The past couple of weeks have been a lot of fun building her and I have defiantly not only learned new skills but have also honed other ones. 
 I think anyone needing a break from the more complex builds in your life and looking for something on the lighter side this kit is your ticket. And, no, I am not a sales rep for MarisStella  
 The kit comes with walnut planks to complete the boat and although they were perfectly fine to use I decided to do a little changing and used cherry wood on some parts, and I also added some little extras( I think just to further stall from going to my other builds)
 
 

 
The contents picture is missing a couple of bundles of planks which I missed putting in picture
 
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  I am not sure why all these pictures turned out blue as they were taken outside. Test fitting the frames and transferring rabbet line to port side.
 

 
My daughter and granddaughter were not near as excited about boat building as me....???? go figure  
 
 
 

Hello All, Thanks for stopping and for your likes and comments.
 Well a week has gone by and I don't have that much to show, For some reason I thought I would have had lots more to show, but I have started on the planking and all is going smooth. At this stage Stefano is 810 mm long so I suppose this is maybe why it is going slower than I thought. No matter there is no rush. The transom has proven to be a little bit of a hair puller outer but fortunately with my already thinning hair there was not much to grab onto and all worked out 
 
The first row of planking installed at top of bulkheads, no tapering done on this strake. The bulkhead extensions are to be removed later on, therefore there is little glue applied to these points of contact with the planks. It is necessary then to pay special attention while installing the first four strakes and be sure there is adequate glue applied to their edges and proper clamping is applied.
 

 
The new shipyard aka dining room
 

 
And here Stefano is beside the Pegasus, the Pegasus is 500 mm in this picture 310 mm shorter than the Stefano. Pegasus is 1:64 and the Stefano is 1:63

 
 This week is the Trabaccolo,
 
See You All Later

Thanks Bob. The finished ship is 1.12 m. when finished so it will take up some shelf space!!

Very nice work Mike, a "building board" is very handy to have does not need to be anything fancy just needs to hold things firm and square

Hello All, Thanks for stopping and for your likes and comments.
 Well a week has gone by and I don't have that much to show, For some reason I thought I would have had lots more to show, but I have started on the planking and all is going smooth. At this stage Stefano is 810 mm long so I suppose this is maybe why it is going slower than I thought. No matter there is no rush. The transom has proven to be a little bit of a hair puller outer but fortunately with my already thinning hair there was not much to grab onto and all worked out 
 
The first row of planking installed at top of bulkheads, no tapering done on this strake. The bulkhead extensions are to be removed later on, therefore there is little glue applied to these points of contact with the planks. It is necessary then to pay special attention while installing the first four strakes and be sure there is adequate glue applied to their edges and proper clamping is applied.
 

 
The new shipyard aka dining room
 

 
And here Stefano is beside the Pegasus, the Pegasus is 500 mm in this picture 310 mm shorter than the Stefano. Pegasus is 1:64 and the Stefano is 1:63

 
 This week is the Trabaccolo,
 
See You All Later

Hello Len and Welcome

Hello All, Thanks for stopping and for your likes and comments.
 Well a week has gone by and I don't have that much to show, For some reason I thought I would have had lots more to show, but I have started on the planking and all is going smooth. At this stage Stefano is 810 mm long so I suppose this is maybe why it is going slower than I thought. No matter there is no rush. The transom has proven to be a little bit of a hair puller outer but fortunately with my already thinning hair there was not much to grab onto and all worked out 
 
The first row of planking installed at top of bulkheads, no tapering done on this strake. The bulkhead extensions are to be removed later on, therefore there is little glue applied to these points of contact with the planks. It is necessary then to pay special attention while installing the first four strakes and be sure there is adequate glue applied to their edges and proper clamping is applied.
 

 
The new shipyard aka dining room
 

 
And here Stefano is beside the Pegasus, the Pegasus is 500 mm in this picture 310 mm shorter than the Stefano. Pegasus is 1:64 and the Stefano is 1:63

 
 This week is the Trabaccolo,
 
See You All Later

Very nice work Mike, a "building board" is very handy to have does not need to be anything fancy just needs to hold things firm and square

Thanks Zoltan, It's been crossing my mind if the first layer turns out good enough I may skip the second layer as it is all copper plates and painted. We'll see.

Hello All, Thanks for stopping and for your likes and comments.
 Well a week has gone by and I don't have that much to show, For some reason I thought I would have had lots more to show, but I have started on the planking and all is going smooth. At this stage Stefano is 810 mm long so I suppose this is maybe why it is going slower than I thought. No matter there is no rush. The transom has proven to be a little bit of a hair puller outer but fortunately with my already thinning hair there was not much to grab onto and all worked out 
 
The first row of planking installed at top of bulkheads, no tapering done on this strake. The bulkhead extensions are to be removed later on, therefore there is little glue applied to these points of contact with the planks. It is necessary then to pay special attention while installing the first four strakes and be sure there is adequate glue applied to their edges and proper clamping is applied.
 

 
The new shipyard aka dining room
 

 
And here Stefano is beside the Pegasus, the Pegasus is 500 mm in this picture 310 mm shorter than the Stefano. Pegasus is 1:64 and the Stefano is 1:63

 
 This week is the Trabaccolo,
 
See You All Later

Not sure how I missed this. Congratulations she is beautiful, you have every right to be very proud of your accomplishment.

I have this practicum, actually I have all of them that I bought when I first started two years ago. The second chapter is all about the hull planking, he does skip the second planking as "it is exactly the same as the first" and unless you want a natural hull there was no need for the second layer. I have not gone through the whole practicum yet just the planking chapter, which seems to be helpful. If you are going to paint the hull why use boxwood, I am talking about the Bluenose. He also mentions that there is 70 - 1/16" x 1/8" strips for planking the hull on the Bluenose 

Hello All, Thanks for stopping and for your likes and comments.
 Well a week has gone by and I don't have that much to show, For some reason I thought I would have had lots more to show, but I have started on the planking and all is going smooth. At this stage Stefano is 810 mm long so I suppose this is maybe why it is going slower than I thought. No matter there is no rush. The transom has proven to be a little bit of a hair puller outer but fortunately with my already thinning hair there was not much to grab onto and all worked out 
 
The first row of planking installed at top of bulkheads, no tapering done on this strake. The bulkhead extensions are to be removed later on, therefore there is little glue applied to these points of contact with the planks. It is necessary then to pay special attention while installing the first four strakes and be sure there is adequate glue applied to their edges and proper clamping is applied.
 

 
The new shipyard aka dining room
 

 
And here Stefano is beside the Pegasus, the Pegasus is 500 mm in this picture 310 mm shorter than the Stefano. Pegasus is 1:64 and the Stefano is 1:63

 
 This week is the Trabaccolo,
 
See You All Later

Here are some of the plans, first one is an overall, second one showing how to build masts and spars and the last two are all about the rigging these are just for the foremast. The plans are all scale size so any measurement can be accurately taken off of them , I believe they are 35" x 50" and there is 14 of them. The main mast has three dedicated sheets and the mizzen has one. One sheet is all about the sails and the rest are the construction of hull and various items required. The instruction book is 36 pages which may seem small but with all the information you need on the plans the instruction book is more than adequate. It does an excellent job of outlining the various steps and is easy to follow.
 




 

Hello All, Thanks for your comments, likes and for stopping by
 
 This is Barque Stefano week for me so I will show you some progress from this morning
 
Today was bow and stern filler blocks, the kit supplies these in a block that is partially laser cut I finished cutting mine with my scroll saw. The stern filler block requires you to glue three 20 mm thick pieces together, then shape accordingly. The top of the filler block rises to the stern to allow for the planking or madiere, this rise is approx. 7-8 mm. This should be done first, the next profile can then be made by measuring down approx 20 mm from this edge. The last profile is made by tracing the outline of the last bulkhead from the fore side.
Blocks cut from blank

 
Showing the rise of filler block and how planking will fit

 
Showing the formed blocks, the red marker is just added to better see the lines

 
Stern block attached

 
The bow blocks are much easier to make and follow the same principle, marking the profile lines and shaping
 

 
This last picture is just to show the lines of the hull, started to fair the starboard side to show how things should meet up. Still required are two small pieces of filler on either side of bow, then start fairing tomorrow. Ignore gap on starboard side, that was fixed. Tools used were belt/disc sander, dremel and sandpaper.
 

 
Have a Good Day

Hello All, Thanks for stopping and for your likes and comments.
 Well a week has gone by and I don't have that much to show, For some reason I thought I would have had lots more to show, but I have started on the planking and all is going smooth. At this stage Stefano is 810 mm long so I suppose this is maybe why it is going slower than I thought. No matter there is no rush. The transom has proven to be a little bit of a hair puller outer but fortunately with my already thinning hair there was not much to grab onto and all worked out 
 
The first row of planking installed at top of bulkheads, no tapering done on this strake. The bulkhead extensions are to be removed later on, therefore there is little glue applied to these points of contact with the planks. It is necessary then to pay special attention while installing the first four strakes and be sure there is adequate glue applied to their edges and proper clamping is applied.
 

 
The new shipyard aka dining room
 

 
And here Stefano is beside the Pegasus, the Pegasus is 500 mm in this picture 310 mm shorter than the Stefano. Pegasus is 1:64 and the Stefano is 1:63

 
 This week is the Trabaccolo,
 
See You All Later

If there is enough wood on the billet, cut the pieces out very roughly then use a drum sander on your dremel for final shaping. If the pieces are going to be painted coat the delicate areas with thin ca glue, this will harden the wood up and help prevent splitting then cut and shape as mentioned. 
 This all I got, hope it helps.

If there is enough wood on the billet, cut the pieces out very roughly then use a drum sander on your dremel for final shaping. If the pieces are going to be painted coat the delicate areas with thin ca glue, this will harden the wood up and help prevent splitting then cut and shape as mentioned. 
 This all I got, hope it helps.

Hello All, Thanks for stopping and for your likes and comments.
 Well a week has gone by and I don't have that much to show, For some reason I thought I would have had lots more to show, but I have started on the planking and all is going smooth. At this stage Stefano is 810 mm long so I suppose this is maybe why it is going slower than I thought. No matter there is no rush. The transom has proven to be a little bit of a hair puller outer but fortunately with my already thinning hair there was not much to grab onto and all worked out 
 
The first row of planking installed at top of bulkheads, no tapering done on this strake. The bulkhead extensions are to be removed later on, therefore there is little glue applied to these points of contact with the planks. It is necessary then to pay special attention while installing the first four strakes and be sure there is adequate glue applied to their edges and proper clamping is applied.
 

 
The new shipyard aka dining room
 

 
And here Stefano is beside the Pegasus, the Pegasus is 500 mm in this picture 310 mm shorter than the Stefano. Pegasus is 1:64 and the Stefano is 1:63

 
 This week is the Trabaccolo,
 
See You All Later

Good Morning All, I trust and hope you all had happy holidays and are now back to the reality of life once again.
 I took the last five days off of my Trabaccolo build to do a little work on my neglected Pegasus, she was very happy to be in the shipyard once again.
First up was fairing the hull, sorry no pictures, then was to install the plywood gun deck. Before doing this supports were required as per so many other logs such as Mike's(Landlubber Mike). So you can see in the pictures how I accomplished this using some 3 x 3mm posts and 1.5 x 5 mm planks.
 

 
Next was the infamous plywood gunport pieces, I had little problems with these which still worries me  . I soaked them for about an hour then bent them using a curling iron. I needed to move them approx 5mm forward as one of the oar holes was being blocked by a bulkhead, but other than that it went smoothly.
 

 
While waiting for glue and paint to dry I thought I would put together the cannon carriages. Many have complained about the Amati carriages , mostly about the quality of the plywood. I am thinking they must have changed their stock as I found these ones to be quite durable and easy to work with, you can be the judge as to how they look. Amati does include 18 carriages and 16 cannons, I'm thinking these extra carriages will work fine as stocking stuffers next Christmas or even mount some chocolate in them and they could be a Easter bunny thing, at any rate they will not go to waste.
A point to note is Do Not paint the bulkheads black above the deck if you wish to paint red later    . Mine took a minimum of ten coats to cover then I just quit.
Here I am using the mill with the sensitive drilling attachment to drill the axles for the pins that hold the trucks on, then it was on to assembling.
 

 
A little out of order but here you can see the result of moving the gun port sides ahead by 5 mm. The stem post and bowsprit are not glued in place, looks so good I feel like making the real bowsprit now.
 

 
And here she is ready for a battle, well kind of, and loaded up for next stage of deck planking
 

 
Here the planking has started using the kit supplied planks. I decided on a four plank shift using 120 mm planks. I built the aft bits as they are noted for not fitting properly mine required minor adjustments and fit perfectly. So with the gunport sides causing no problems and now the bits fitting good I am really getting concerned about my usual not so good luck.  
 In my excitement to start planking I forgot I should have built the hatches first, I don't think this will pose too much of a problem, I will carry on as is and see what happens later with the hatches.
 

 
Have a Good Day

Looking good Pierre, not sure where you are thinking about treating. As long as you don't have to glue to the surface later you could treat it now, I always tend to get a little excited about how it's going to look and give it a coat early on in the game.

Thanks Pierre    , she looks like a fine looking kit that should make into a great model, I see a few cannons and a couple of ships boats to be built. Going to be fun, I'll be watching for your log.

Great looking shop Pierre, I am feeling like a slob after seeing this   . Hope you had a great holiday season and I'll be watching for more.

Coming along nicely Pierre. When I plank I will put a bead of white glue along the edge of the plank then on the bulkheads put ca glue.Little or no need for clamping, just a little finger pressure is all that is needed. 

Looking good Pierre, not sure where you are thinking about treating. As long as you don't have to glue to the surface later you could treat it now, I always tend to get a little excited about how it's going to look and give it a coat early on in the game.