jml1083

Toni, thanks for the tips on other helpful items to bring. Since I'm driving down I don't have to worry about the TSA and having sharp things in my bag.
 
Jamie, thanks. I looked at this workshop last fall but couldn't swing it work wise. It wasn't looking too good for this session either but about a month ago things opened up at work and I was able to book one of the last seats in this session.
 
Well, I'm done with the keel and it's on to the framing jig. The macro lens on the camera really shows every fiber, luckily it looks better in person.
 
Lots of clamps on such a tiny piece. 3 hold the 1.5" spacer, 2 hold the rising wood centered on the keep and 2 to hold the rising wood down on the keel.
 

finishedkeel1
 
Finished keel from the side. The blackening keep flaking off the wire so what I ended up doing was putting a tiny drop of CA glue (used a needle) on the end of the wire which left a very slight bump to simulate the head of the bolt. Also using a needle I put a tiny drop of flat black paint on top of the CA glue.
 

finishedkeel4
 
End view.
 

finishedkeel5
 
 

Hi Bob, thanks! I'm looking forward to meeting everyone and raising that first frame.
 
I cut the rabbet using a 3mm micro V-gouge.
 

rabbet1
 

rabbet2
 
Next step is to glue it all together.
 

Scarf Joint
 
Today I tackled the scarf joint. Like the rising wood my table saw came in very handy. To druxey's point you can certainly do all this by hand but for jobs like this power tools make the job a lot easier and in my opinion, more accurate. The boxwood provided for this exercise is milled to some pretty tight tolerances, for example I used a digital caliper to measure the two keel pieces that I used so that I would know how deep to make the cuts. One piece was .2550" and the other was .2535". I divided those dimensions in half and first cut to almost the center of one then adjusted the blade ever so slightly to cut to the center of the second. Cutting to such close tolerances is certainly doable by hand but not by someone like me, without the ability to make the tiniest adjustments I'd be sunk. I've been a wood carver for years and am used to eyeballing things, it if looks good, it is good. When I got into building ships I had to get used to measuring things. It took me awhile and a lot of wasted wood before I broke down and bought a mini-table saw (Micro Mark) but it has allowed me to do better work so I do understand Sarge's point.
 
To start I held the two pieces, one on top of the other then slid them so the overlap was exactly 3' 4" on my architect's ruler. As carefully as I could I then drew a line on each piece using the end of the other piece as a guide. I then  got to work on the saw and cut to the center of each piece based on the measurements I took earlier minus a couple thousandths. The saw leaves tiny ridges and by leaving a minute amount of wood I was able to sand them away so that when I ran my nail across the joint it didn't catch. I was happy. Here are those 2 perfect pieces:
 

scarf1
 
Next I cut little pieces of thin black paper and glued them to the butt ends of the joints and even though it would never be seen, I also glued it to one of the interior faces of the joint. When I glued it all together I found to my horror that my perfect  joint wasn't anymore, it was off by the thickness of the paper and glue. RATS! I made a mental note that when you measure things in thousandths of an inch the thickness of the paper really DOES matter. Lesson learned.  After a little sanding I ended up with this joint:
 

scarf3
 
This is all that will be visible once I glue the rising wood and false keel in place:
 

scarf2
 
The spec calls for 3' 4" and that's what was delivered!
 

scarf4
 
I really do appreciate the support and the photos from other logs otherwise there is no telling what would have been produced but I'm sure it would not have turned out so well, THANKS !
 
Next up is the rabbet.

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

After a very long absence I'm back at the ship modeling workbench. I've retired since my last posts on my Bluenose (which is still waiting in the wings) and retirement presents its own happy challenges that kept me out of the shop. I'm now up to 4 grandchildren and thrilled that they keep me really busy. The oldest is 9 and the youngest is 8 months old. Competition trapshooting keeps me very busy and during the nice weather I'd rather be on a trap field that holed up in my windowless shop. During the spring and summer months I travel throughout the northeast US for competitions and as a consequence I'm no where near my shop.
 
I have really missed ship modeling but the longer I was away from it the harder it seemed to get back into it. I'm still a member of the Ship Model Society of NJ so I keep in touch with modeling that way but it's not the same as sitting at the bench making something. My Bluenose is years behind schedule and the more I concentrated on trying to get that moving the more discouraged I became. Chuck is a very good friend of mine and he saw what I was struggling with and suggested I ease myself back into it via a group build of the Medway Longboat. That was the best idea I've heard in a long time so here I am. 
 
Mike (Stuntflyer) is also a friend and member of SMSNJ and I've been watching his progress closely both in person and by following his build log here on MSW. We were both at Chuck's house today and they convinced me that in addition to building the longboat, keeping a build log will keep me connected and, I know from past experience, motivated. So, here goes.
 
Work started today and I'm taking photos as I go and will post the ones I think most beneficial to others. If you have questions about how I did something please don't hesitate to ask.
 
To assemble the keel I'm using yellow Titebond wood glue. This will give me time to adjust pieces and things "just right" before the glue sets. I've not had problems with gluing on laser char in the past so I don't sand the char away, in most cases. This first photo shows how a piece looks when it comes out of the billet. The cream colored line is where the little tab was that connected the piece to the billet . 

The next photo shows the extent to which I sand the piece to remove what's left of the tab. As you can see I don't take off very much char or wood. It is only enough that when I run my finger over it I can't feel any sort of bump where the tab was. Once I reach this point I stop sanding.

This third photo is how I assembled the 4 pieces of the stern. The wood is very slightly oversized in thickness so I sanded it until it was very close to .0938" (3/8"). If I didn't do this there would have been less that 1/32" rabbet. I used two pieces of 1/32" scrap, one on either side so that when I clamped it all together the gray clamp holds everything nicely centered. The blue clamp keeps the vertical pieces in contact while the glue dries and the red clamp does the same thing for the horizontal glue joints. The red arrows and thin red lines show the 1/32" alignment pieces.
 

 
I used a lap joint to join the keel pieces but my photos of that process came out horribly which I didn't realize until after it was all assembled. I used a #11 scalpel blade to make a stop cut and then whittled away at it until the joints were only a few thousandths of an inch over size then used sanding sticks to clean it all up. It was easier than I thought it would be. My first inclination was to pull out the mill for this but I realized set up time would probably be longer than the process I used so I didn't go that route.  
 
Tomorrow I'll finish the keel and move on to making frames.
 
It feels good to finally be building again and writing this log.
 
 

After what seems like forever I have completed the cabin, compass housing and the skylight.
 

maincabin1
 

maincabin2
 

skylight1
 

deck1
 
Next up is the aft cargo hatch and the pumps then the wheelbox.

Not a lot to show for this week. Finally finished the wheel box and wheel.
 

 
And the after cargo hatch.
 

 
 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

Very nice work Ken. You and I are at the exact same place. I'll bring my model to the next meeting.

Looking excellent Rich!!!!  Brind some 220 grit and 320 grit sandpaper to the meeting.  We will do a little demo.

I wasn’t going to start a log being a “rookie” at planking and probably having very little to offer, but I’ve decided to join the crowd anyway. I got a bit of a jump on some being able to pick up a kit from Chuck at our club, but Im sure you will catch me as I slow down now that I’m ready to start fairing the hill, something I’ve never done before.
here are a few shots I took.
The first two show the completed keel and the 5 one piece frames test fitted. 

These next two show all the frames finished and glued up. Everything went together real nice with minimal amount of sanding. I do however think I rushed the gluing process and have I a few frames that could have been more snug in the keel notches ..I think I may have to add a shim or two on some frames. 

I plan on bringing the model to our next meeting to get some input on fairing and the like. 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

After a very long absence I'm back at the ship modeling workbench. I've retired since my last posts on my Bluenose (which is still waiting in the wings) and retirement presents its own happy challenges that kept me out of the shop. I'm now up to 4 grandchildren and thrilled that they keep me really busy. The oldest is 9 and the youngest is 8 months old. Competition trapshooting keeps me very busy and during the nice weather I'd rather be on a trap field that holed up in my windowless shop. During the spring and summer months I travel throughout the northeast US for competitions and as a consequence I'm no where near my shop.
 
I have really missed ship modeling but the longer I was away from it the harder it seemed to get back into it. I'm still a member of the Ship Model Society of NJ so I keep in touch with modeling that way but it's not the same as sitting at the bench making something. My Bluenose is years behind schedule and the more I concentrated on trying to get that moving the more discouraged I became. Chuck is a very good friend of mine and he saw what I was struggling with and suggested I ease myself back into it via a group build of the Medway Longboat. That was the best idea I've heard in a long time so here I am. 
 
Mike (Stuntflyer) is also a friend and member of SMSNJ and I've been watching his progress closely both in person and by following his build log here on MSW. We were both at Chuck's house today and they convinced me that in addition to building the longboat, keeping a build log will keep me connected and, I know from past experience, motivated. So, here goes.
 
Work started today and I'm taking photos as I go and will post the ones I think most beneficial to others. If you have questions about how I did something please don't hesitate to ask.
 
To assemble the keel I'm using yellow Titebond wood glue. This will give me time to adjust pieces and things "just right" before the glue sets. I've not had problems with gluing on laser char in the past so I don't sand the char away, in most cases. This first photo shows how a piece looks when it comes out of the billet. The cream colored line is where the little tab was that connected the piece to the billet . 

The next photo shows the extent to which I sand the piece to remove what's left of the tab. As you can see I don't take off very much char or wood. It is only enough that when I run my finger over it I can't feel any sort of bump where the tab was. Once I reach this point I stop sanding.

This third photo is how I assembled the 4 pieces of the stern. The wood is very slightly oversized in thickness so I sanded it until it was very close to .0938" (3/8"). If I didn't do this there would have been less that 1/32" rabbet. I used two pieces of 1/32" scrap, one on either side so that when I clamped it all together the gray clamp holds everything nicely centered. The blue clamp keeps the vertical pieces in contact while the glue dries and the red clamp does the same thing for the horizontal glue joints. The red arrows and thin red lines show the 1/32" alignment pieces.
 

 
I used a lap joint to join the keel pieces but my photos of that process came out horribly which I didn't realize until after it was all assembled. I used a #11 scalpel blade to make a stop cut and then whittled away at it until the joints were only a few thousandths of an inch over size then used sanding sticks to clean it all up. It was easier than I thought it would be. My first inclination was to pull out the mill for this but I realized set up time would probably be longer than the process I used so I didn't go that route.  
 
Tomorrow I'll finish the keel and move on to making frames.
 
It feels good to finally be building again and writing this log.
 
 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

After a very long absence I'm back at the ship modeling workbench. I've retired since my last posts on my Bluenose (which is still waiting in the wings) and retirement presents its own happy challenges that kept me out of the shop. I'm now up to 4 grandchildren and thrilled that they keep me really busy. The oldest is 9 and the youngest is 8 months old. Competition trapshooting keeps me very busy and during the nice weather I'd rather be on a trap field that holed up in my windowless shop. During the spring and summer months I travel throughout the northeast US for competitions and as a consequence I'm no where near my shop.
 
I have really missed ship modeling but the longer I was away from it the harder it seemed to get back into it. I'm still a member of the Ship Model Society of NJ so I keep in touch with modeling that way but it's not the same as sitting at the bench making something. My Bluenose is years behind schedule and the more I concentrated on trying to get that moving the more discouraged I became. Chuck is a very good friend of mine and he saw what I was struggling with and suggested I ease myself back into it via a group build of the Medway Longboat. That was the best idea I've heard in a long time so here I am. 
 
Mike (Stuntflyer) is also a friend and member of SMSNJ and I've been watching his progress closely both in person and by following his build log here on MSW. We were both at Chuck's house today and they convinced me that in addition to building the longboat, keeping a build log will keep me connected and, I know from past experience, motivated. So, here goes.
 
Work started today and I'm taking photos as I go and will post the ones I think most beneficial to others. If you have questions about how I did something please don't hesitate to ask.
 
To assemble the keel I'm using yellow Titebond wood glue. This will give me time to adjust pieces and things "just right" before the glue sets. I've not had problems with gluing on laser char in the past so I don't sand the char away, in most cases. This first photo shows how a piece looks when it comes out of the billet. The cream colored line is where the little tab was that connected the piece to the billet . 

The next photo shows the extent to which I sand the piece to remove what's left of the tab. As you can see I don't take off very much char or wood. It is only enough that when I run my finger over it I can't feel any sort of bump where the tab was. Once I reach this point I stop sanding.

This third photo is how I assembled the 4 pieces of the stern. The wood is very slightly oversized in thickness so I sanded it until it was very close to .0938" (3/8"). If I didn't do this there would have been less that 1/32" rabbet. I used two pieces of 1/32" scrap, one on either side so that when I clamped it all together the gray clamp holds everything nicely centered. The blue clamp keeps the vertical pieces in contact while the glue dries and the red clamp does the same thing for the horizontal glue joints. The red arrows and thin red lines show the 1/32" alignment pieces.
 

 
I used a lap joint to join the keel pieces but my photos of that process came out horribly which I didn't realize until after it was all assembled. I used a #11 scalpel blade to make a stop cut and then whittled away at it until the joints were only a few thousandths of an inch over size then used sanding sticks to clean it all up. It was easier than I thought it would be. My first inclination was to pull out the mill for this but I realized set up time would probably be longer than the process I used so I didn't go that route.  
 
Tomorrow I'll finish the keel and move on to making frames.
 
It feels good to finally be building again and writing this log.
 
 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.
 
 

After a very long absence I'm back at the ship modeling workbench. I've retired since my last posts on my Bluenose (which is still waiting in the wings) and retirement presents its own happy challenges that kept me out of the shop. I'm now up to 4 grandchildren and thrilled that they keep me really busy. The oldest is 9 and the youngest is 8 months old. Competition trapshooting keeps me very busy and during the nice weather I'd rather be on a trap field that holed up in my windowless shop. During the spring and summer months I travel throughout the northeast US for competitions and as a consequence I'm no where near my shop.
 
I have really missed ship modeling but the longer I was away from it the harder it seemed to get back into it. I'm still a member of the Ship Model Society of NJ so I keep in touch with modeling that way but it's not the same as sitting at the bench making something. My Bluenose is years behind schedule and the more I concentrated on trying to get that moving the more discouraged I became. Chuck is a very good friend of mine and he saw what I was struggling with and suggested I ease myself back into it via a group build of the Medway Longboat. That was the best idea I've heard in a long time so here I am. 
 
Mike (Stuntflyer) is also a friend and member of SMSNJ and I've been watching his progress closely both in person and by following his build log here on MSW. We were both at Chuck's house today and they convinced me that in addition to building the longboat, keeping a build log will keep me connected and, I know from past experience, motivated. So, here goes.
 
Work started today and I'm taking photos as I go and will post the ones I think most beneficial to others. If you have questions about how I did something please don't hesitate to ask.
 
To assemble the keel I'm using yellow Titebond wood glue. This will give me time to adjust pieces and things "just right" before the glue sets. I've not had problems with gluing on laser char in the past so I don't sand the char away, in most cases. This first photo shows how a piece looks when it comes out of the billet. The cream colored line is where the little tab was that connected the piece to the billet . 

The next photo shows the extent to which I sand the piece to remove what's left of the tab. As you can see I don't take off very much char or wood. It is only enough that when I run my finger over it I can't feel any sort of bump where the tab was. Once I reach this point I stop sanding.

This third photo is how I assembled the 4 pieces of the stern. The wood is very slightly oversized in thickness so I sanded it until it was very close to .0938" (3/8"). If I didn't do this there would have been less that 1/32" rabbet. I used two pieces of 1/32" scrap, one on either side so that when I clamped it all together the gray clamp holds everything nicely centered. The blue clamp keeps the vertical pieces in contact while the glue dries and the red clamp does the same thing for the horizontal glue joints. The red arrows and thin red lines show the 1/32" alignment pieces.
 

 
I used a lap joint to join the keel pieces but my photos of that process came out horribly which I didn't realize until after it was all assembled. I used a #11 scalpel blade to make a stop cut and then whittled away at it until the joints were only a few thousandths of an inch over size then used sanding sticks to clean it all up. It was easier than I thought it would be. My first inclination was to pull out the mill for this but I realized set up time would probably be longer than the process I used so I didn't go that route.  
 
Tomorrow I'll finish the keel and move on to making frames.
 
It feels good to finally be building again and writing this log.
 
 

Minor progress today but progress is progress.
 
Once the glue dried on the work I did the other day it was time to install the thin keel piece with all the notches for the frames. As with the previous work I did not remove the char from the bottom of this piece and used yellow wood glue so I'd have time to position the piece exactly where I wanted it. In the first photo you can see that this piece is very slightly over sized. This is a good thing so that you can adjust for any slight variances in your model. The fix is to carefully sand off a tiny amount of wood from the FORWARD part of this piece (red arrow shows where to sand).

If you look at the piece you'll see that the forward end is blunt whereas the back end has a small step cut into it. If you sand the back you will create a smaller recess for the frame to fit in. After very little sanding the piece fit snugly without creating a bow (see below).

To get accurate positions for the bolts in the keel I used a small Post-It note. I stuck it to the drawing, traced the outline of where it goes, marked each of the bolt holes, then cut out the template.
 

With the templates stuck to the keel I drilled the holes using a #74 drill bit. The #74 slipped right into the hole even with glue on it.
 
After I finished the first side I flipped the keel over and positioned the templates then drilled the holes using the holes made in the templates from the other side.
 

Once the glue is dry I'll use a razor blade to cut off the fishing line that is protruding above the surface of the wood. A lite sanding and then a second coat of Wipe-On-Poly to finish this part of the keel.
 
On to frames next.