mikiek

OK - I tried a couple of pins. I will say thank goodness for alligator forceps. They make reaching across a rigged deck a lot easier. They also help with the over/under wrap. Worst part of it all is holding the line tight until the white glue dries. It will be a slow process.

Rich - I think I will probably give what you describe a go. As far as looking better I see your point, but I wonder if this is one of those things that no one notices but the modeller.

Thanks for that Rich. I'm also concerned that reworking with a under/over wrap will end up with me doing more harm than good. Can you get away with just one under and one over? Do you have to hold the line in place while the glue dries?

Well the plan at least to this point was feeding a line thru a hole in the pinrail then jamming the pin in the hole after that. And then of course adding a coil. I guess if I actually did wrap the rope around the pin with a under and over then glue the rope it might not be too hard to get a rope loose later on. And it probably wouldn't matter then if the pin was glued or not. Unfortunately, at this point that is a lot of rework. I will reassess.

Looking good Rowboat. I like the 2 tone hull. It adds a lot of interest. Different plans have different ways of depicting parts. As you have noticed eyebolts are rectangles here whereas on other plans they may be circles. Good plan in getting to know your lines and know what they do. The running rigging will be interesting because in most cases they should actually work - like hoisting a sail or adjusting a yard.

Hello Rowboat - I apologize for leaving you hanging for so long. I am just now getting back to E and trying to finish up. Maybe you are past this stage now, but as to your question - forestays do not have blocks, the backstays do use a tackle that attaches to the deck with an eyebolt. Of course your shrouds will be rigged to the deadeyes and you will need to add ratlines to those. NOTE: the plans do not show ratlines on the shrouds running from the main top up to the top and top gallant masts. You may want to add those. Your running rigging will almost always have at least one block and often two usually near a mast or yard and the other end will run down to the pin rail. Make sure you have all blocks seized to masts or yards before you start playing with rope. Trying to add those later is not fun. It is worth rechecking your parts with the plans to make sure you have them all in place. While I gripe about the plans somtimes, they did a smart thing when showing the rigging by breaking it up into multiple drawings. That way you can focus on one area and be pretty sure you haven't overlooked something. Find the drawings that have running rigging going down to the pin ring on the mast and fife rail and do those first. Then work out from there. If you do the opposite you will be reaching thru outside ropes to reach inside. I also did all the fore/aft sails and jibs before moving to the square rigged ones. Again, those are inside and easier to get to if you do them first. You caught the suggestion to not glue any pins while you are working. In fact I just put a post in the rigging forum asking about not gluing the pins at all. I am seriously considering that. I have another model on display and after just 2 years on display several of the ropes are droopy and with the pins glued there is no way to adjust them. I'll let you know how that conversation turns out.

I am finishing up Enterprise. All the rigging is in but I have not glued pins in yet as I want to go back and tighten some of the lines. Then I need to add rope coils on the pins. That got me to thinking which is always a dangerous thing. My only completed square rigged model has more than a few droopy lines after 2 years on display. Those pins are glued so there is no way to tighten the lines now without major surgery. This is making me think about NOT gluing the pins on E. This would allow adjustments down the road but the catch seems to be I would have to leave enough rope coming out the underside of the rail so that I could grab hold of it if I needed to tighten. I guess the coils would hide most of that. I'm wondering how you guys have handled this?

Auger - your sails appear to be like mine. Someone else commented here that the sails from their kit did not look like mine. Since you are in France I assume you bought your kit over there? I bought mine from Cornwall Models in the U.K. Do you happen to remember if there was a sail upgrade option when you bought your kit? I sort of remember that but I can't say for sure. Otherwise we have been wondering why the sails in kits from the same manufacturer would be different. Only other reason I can come up with is maybe a US version and a E.U. version of the kit?

The doctors orders? We will both get there one day. Stick with it!

Deck furniture looks great Per. Some day we will finish our builds huh? 😉

The saga continues. Went back for round 2 and ended up breaking a pinrail off the bulwark. That meant unpinning all the ropes to glue it back. Luckily it was just a 5 hole rail. The only good thing was 2 of the pins were glued in, so I had to rip them out. But that means when I re-pin, those ropes are now adjustable. A small win. Down side is 2 of the ropes were already trimmed leaving no chance of restringing them - not enough rope to go thru the hole and pull thru from the underside of the rail. I wasn't about to re-rig a new rope so I tied a few inches of extra rope to the end. That works but now there's a small knot in the line. I think I'll live. The alligator forceps proved their value again - was able to grab the pinrail, apply the glue then reach thru the rigging to the bulwark on the opposite side to place the rail. No other way that could have been done. I'll reiterate in case you missed my first lesson learned here - DO NOT glue pins to rails until the very end of your build. You will need to adjust sails and rigging at the end. In fact, I would suggest paying more attention to the holes you drill into the pinrail. If you get them the perfect diameter where the pins fit snug you probably shouldn't even need to glue the pins at all.

Wow man - I got up some gumption this afternoon and headed to the shop to start adjusting sails. This is really going to take some time. I loosened up a rope so I could bring one side of a yard down to level it and that loosened two rigs on the other side. Tightened those up which loosened the brace. Probably took 30 minutes to get the yard level and now the sail hanging on it has a foot thats too loose. 😣 I'm finding alligator clips to be extremely helpful here. I clip one on the rope I am working with so it's easy find in all the others. Like I said, this is going to take a while......

The rework was worth it. One thing that can help with soldering is be sure the surfaces you are soldering are hot as well. A drop of hot solder on a relatively cold surface will not bond very well. That's why I started using a butane torch for soldering instead of an iron. It's easier and quicker to heat up your surfaces before you apply the solder. If you use a torch you can also switch to silver or even gold solder, which for me seems to work better. And as I mentioned earlier, be sure there is no gap between the 2 surfaces.

Atze99 - I had to rethink the deck for a minute. I did use a stain there, but it is actually a clear stain - Minwax Natural Stain. I use that one a lot in various places on a build. It has no real color, but gives the wood a deeper, wet look especially down in the grain. I highly recommend it especially on premium wood. Your mileage my vary. Always test before you apply to your build.

Hey Rowboat - just reread your earlier post. Most likely you will not want to use a gloss finish. It just gets too shiny especially if you display under a light. Satins are about as glossy as most folks might use. As you mentioned, I think matte is probably the finish of choice. There's a lot of modelling finishes out there, Valejo makes some good ones, but also most of your home finishing products will work too. Just stay away from the shiny stuff. And always give any product a test before you apply to your build. Different woods can respond very differently to the same product. I even go as far as gluing 4-5 hull or deck planks edge to edge on some scrap so you have a big surface to test with.

Thank you Rowboat. Good to see you again. She's almost ready to cross the finish line but it's been hard to get motivated to wrap things up.

Atze99 - I did my best to NOT color anything in this build. I tried to make it look like the cover of the kit box. While it certainly is not realistic, I felt that the colors of the wood are attractive just as they are. I still feel that way. Same thing for the guns - usually we would blacken them somehow. I just left them brass. The deck & hull received several coats of satin poly finish. May do a few more before I call it complete.

Good information Toni - I have found the gators to be most useful reaching thru rigging or whatever to grab a line. For instance running a line thru a port side pin rail hole but I can't grab the end afterwards. I have to turn the model 180 degrees and reach across the deck and thru the rigging to reach the loose end. Beyond that, I see your point - tweezer-like tools can be a better choice.

Hey Tom - As you finish out the guns, don't forget to be aware of a few eyebolts/rings that should be on your deck in between a few of the guns. You don't need to do anything with them right now but make sure they are still accessible. I believe there are also a few on the inner bulwark as well. Just make sure you can still reach them.

Yeah - no kidding. I'm ready to buy and still don't see the page. It's 12:13am CDT. No purchase options available.

Midnite in what part of the world? 🙂

Will you update your site web page for Flirt then? I realize I am a few hours early but I don't see a way to order.

Per - I can understand your friends obsession. It happened to me with Naval Action as well. Fortunately I was able to see the light and limit my involvement there now.

Hello Per and Darrell. Thank you for looking in. As I'm sure you guys know, it's a good feeling to get to this point. It has left me with NO excuses to not clean my workbench, which I did last nite. I can actually see the countertop again.

Your blanket makes an interesting diorama 😜