mikiek

jbshan - I have heard the paper idea a few times. For sure it is a workable material. Do you lacquer it or use some other type of finish for long term protection? It's pretty humid around here. I would think it would need to be sealed. But then I see you are on the coast as well. BTW - the anchors look good!

That raises the same question. Whether the material is gripped in a vise, anvil or parallel pliers - what do you use to bend/push the part that is sticking out? When I just push with my finger the corner has some roundness to it. I suppose with an anvil you could hammer it?

John or nayone - hope you might still be following this. I have one more technique question for you . Let's say I have a strip in the parallel pliers coming out the side and I want to bend it 90 degrees. If I just push the strip with a finger, that bend/corner comes out a little rounded. How do you get a nice sharp corner?

I never seem to have problems with the jars that Tamiya paint comes in, no matter how long they have been open. I found a site that sells those jars. I've ordered some and will report back if they are identical to the paint filled jars. Would be a nice solution.

Hey guys - you have my interest up regarding the resistance soldering. I have a similar problem like the OP - I need to connect/attach metal parts (brass strip) around wooden masts. It's mainly 1/16" or 3/32" strip. I have a regular soldering iron and a small torch for hard soldering. I've been nervous about using either in close proximity - maybe 1/8" to 1/4" - to the finished mast for fear of leaving a char mark or burning the paint. Would resistance soldering be an option? If yes, or maybe just in general, what size unit would be good for modeling? I've seen as low powered as 30W to well over 500W. I have no intention of using this for anything other than scale modeling. Also is the probe hand piece or the tweezer unit more practical? Could see wanting both but for a first purchase?

Ordered this morning......

My first mate and I just about completed the port side bulwark port framing yesterday. The process was fairly uneventful - although it was like doing it for the first time. Man, my memory has not been helpful during this build. I started out this framing using wood glue and couldn't figure out why it was taking so long. Then remembered that on the starboard side I did a lot of the gluing with the runny CA. The problem is earlier last week I ruined this CA trying to get the top off. Had to take some pliers to it and that ended up ripping off the nozzle as well as the top. I suppose CA (all flavors) is something you should have a backup for. Interestingly, I found a site that sells replacement BSI caps and the screw on nozzles so I ordered a few along with more CA. Speaking of glue, 2 of the brass strips that I glued to wood using the medium CA started to come off. I've re-glued them but I am wondering if there is a better choice for metal to wood. Please let me know if you have a better method. Reviewing the mast plans, I discovered one more metal piece that was overlooked. It's a square bracket that goes right at the top of the main, apparently to hold the halyard for a spanker sail. Got that cranked out but I keep running into a problem with these metal mast parts. If I make a loop or square or whatever that is supposed to wrap around a mast, I am scared to solder it together. Several of these pieces could not be slid down the mast so I had to connect them after they were on the mast. I suspect soldering would put a nice char mark on the wood. Having to use epoxy instead, but that makes it difficult (at least for me) to work with small pieces. For instance, the square I made yesterday has an eyehole on it. Even applying the epoxy with a pin, I managed to cover the eyehole. Plus epoxy is not really pliable afterwards. Again, I'd be interested to know how you guys do this.

Brian - I'm glad you chimed in when you did. I didn't realize something that small - in real life - could be made from wood and still withstand the stress. I did make hoops from brass rod. Had them all painted, but decided to use the laser cut wood parts from the kit, based on your pix.

Don, Elija and John - thank you for your kind words. As I mentioned, it is really nice to begin to see some of the fruits of all my labor. This build began on 10/1/15 so I am 4 months in now. I knew there would be some ups and downs. Yesterday was a real high! John - we are practically neighbors. I am just off 1097 near the big bridge. Your site is quite helpful. Most of this build has gone on based on pix and build logs. I use the plans mostly just to make sure I didn't forget something. I've tagged your site for future reference.

Brian - thank you for the pix. I would not have considered that the hoops were actually wood. I figured that was just a quick way out for the kit manufacturer. Good timing too. I'll probably be installing the spanker mast tomorrow. I made some brass hoops, but now I will consider using the laser cut version from the kit.

Now on to the log. I'm getting ready to do the port bulwark - ports, planking, etc. I forgot how much prep work there is. First the leveling the timberheads. Then adding the top strip from bow to stern. Some of the timberheads were a little wimpy looking so I glued strips to quite a few of them. Of course then you have to sand them to size. Then I applied some putty in the gaps around the waterway. I believe that's all ready to go. I've had a lot of small parts lying around for some time - mostly mast related. I'm tired of seeing them so I decided to get all that put together before moving to the bulwarks. So the masts, tops, etc. are assembled and painted now. The plans call for the tops and sections of the masts to be black so I mixed up something I now call "Evil Black". It's a combination of Tamiya flat back and something they call Rubber Black. It is the blackest color I've ever seen. There is no sheen to it at all - like it just absorbs the light. Of course the pix don't do it justice. I switched out all the mast dowels for Costello Boxwood. All the masts were made from square strips as was the decking. I did a few samples of stain and finish on a fake deck and I wasn't overly happy with the Golden Oak stain I was using. But I'm also sick of fooling around with it, so the parts of the masts that should be stained got a light rub of Golden Oak. And I still don't like it. It just makes the boxwood look dirty. Not sure what I will do when it comes time to color the deck. Speaking of the deck, there's a few pix with it dropped in the hull. Not glued in yet, but it looks pretty nice. The masts called for two items of metal work - the hardest parts I've made yet. One was a ring to go around the fore mast with an eye hole on it. The other is the step for the spanker mast - 1/16" strip that called for some pins to go through it to hold it together. Thank goodness for the drill press! If I had been paying attention, I could have soldered the parts early on and just slid them down the masts. I had to assemble them on them and epoxy them instead. Lesson learned. Speaking of metalwork, I am still going crazy with the rivet punch. I've put them on brass strips and used them in places to look like reinforcing. There's a few on the mast tops. I've kind of given up blackening those parts as any spot with CA glue doesn't blacken. However I am pretty happy with the look of the Tamiya Dark Iron paint. See what you think. After all that I gave myself a treat. I'm not ready to do a permanent assembly on the masts yet, but they do all fit together and stand in the hull so I fitted them together and dropped them in place - not perfectly aligned. Wow! Very nice seeing that! Quite a feeling of accomplishment. Niagara is really tall! Enjoy the pix....

I've had very good luck with the Tamiya paints I buy. Their jars seem to work well. Paint in opened jars is always in good shape. Those jars have just a plastic top. I came across a place that sells those, so I ordered some. I'm hoping this will help!

Lionfish - I've never seen that at Home Depot. Where would that be located?

One more sheave question. Or maybe it's a modeling question. Let's say for a moment that I did want to fully detail the sheaves in the masts, including the wheel and pin. How in the world does someone cut a notch that thin in a mast that's about 1/8" thick ???

Sounds like a winner Ken. I've always stored house paint upside down. The problem with those little paint jars is the paint seems to destroy the seals - cardboard or Styrofoam. Using the plastic as a seal would eliminate that.

I'm kind of mixed about the seals. My experience with the Testor's bottles (cardboard seal) If you get paint on them i.e. shaking the jar or turning upside down, the seals tend to absorb some of the pigment. So I'm hesitant to reuse the seal with another color. Will look into the plastic squirt bottles or syringes.

A good thought Elijah - thanks for staying around.

I could have sworn there was a thread here on storing mixed paint but I can't seem to find it. I'm a little ticked right now. I have been using those Testor's 1oz paint jars to store leftover acrylic colors that I have mixed. I went to take a look at a couple I had bottled up about 6 weeks ago and both lids were loose - paint was ruined. Sure, it's possible I might have not tightened one of the lids but not both. I wonder if those cardboard seals are really worth anything? Which brings up the bigger question, how do you store your paints? Not the stuff that comes straight from the store but the stuff you have to mix to get a certain color or shade. I've bought 2 different brands of paint jars. One had a cardboard seal (as I mentioned) the other had a styrofoam seal which dissolved after a few weeks. The jars that Tamiya paints come in seem to keep the paint intact. There doesn't seem to be any seal on those just the plastic lid. I'm definitely saving those as I empty them.

Thank goodness for this log! I got to sizing up the the port framing and didn't remember much of what I had done on the starboard. Memory just ain't what it used to be. I'll have to get the routine down again. It will be interesting to see how I do it this time - with a little more modeling under my belt. Was checking the leftover paint from the starboard bulwark. I had mixed a green for the inner bulwark and a yellow for the outer. What I didn't use I put in some of those 1oz paint jars. Looking at them tonight, both of the tops somehow loosened up. The paint is ruined. I'm willing to concede that I could have left one of them loose but not both! Not sure what happened. I'm going to make a post in the paint forum about long term storage but I'd like to hear from anyone here about that if you have a good method.

Well, I've been working on the masts for a while. Got many questions answered in that forum thanks to all the good folks here. One big lesson learned - CHECK THE PLANS - then double check. I got burned several times by pieces that need to go on the stick before too much shaping happens - because later is too late! As much as I would like to see a fully assembled mast, I have been reluctant to do that yet. Same reason as mentioned above. I have not included any pix - I imagine most everyone has seen masts before. Taking a break there, I am moving back to the hull. I finished gouging out notches for the frame under the deck. The keel and bulkheads are a mess now but the deck does drop in nicely. I think I made the situation worse by adding framing for all the structures. All that required notches just like the frame cross pieces. I've begun to work the port side gun/oar ports and bulwark. First thing up was to get a square strip on top of the timberheads. They were fairly unlevel so I needed to add several shims on top. I was also reacquainted with the fragileness of the timberheads. I managed to break 2 before I got the top strip glued down. Hopefully, that will protect them a little. Adding the gunwale strakes was an eye opener. I have been dealing with boxwood (replacement) strips for the decking. Now it's back to basswood, at least for a while. I couldn't figure out why the strips were feathering so much when I sanded them. After using the boxwood for a while, the finished basswood strip is just downright ugly. When I get to the real hull planking I will go back to boxwood, but since the starboard bulwark is basswood I wanted to be consistent. Overall, I think the move I took to do the masts was a good break. Now it's actually nice to have the hull back in my hands again!

Goo information from all three of you. I did find something in Darcy Lever's book that looked similar and in about the same place. He called it a cleat. Yes they are on the masts, yards, bowsprit and probably other places I haven't gotten to yet. So just a wedge shaped piece of stick is a good enough representation? Just asking because some look a little different than others on the plans (see pix below) I also have a follow up question on the sheaves in the masts. The first pic below shows a sheave in the top and top gallant masts near the foot. Does the notch for these go straight through from the octagonal side shown to the opposing octagonal side. My first reaction to the plans was that I am looking at the notch head on and that it goes straight back, not through the mast. I would be pretty nervous trying to drill through the mast at that angle - even with a drill press. Thanks for all the feedback! This has been a helpful thread for me.

I've all the mentioned bookmarked. My order from SpecialShapes arrived yesterday. I now have more brass strips than I will ever know what to do with.

Henry - if you check Ken's Niagara build log Page 8, post #160, the 3rd picture from the top, right about the middle of the plan page you can see a chock called for on the mast. This is similar to chocks called for on other components. They all look like little bumps on whatever surface they are on. I suppose I should PM Ken and see what he did.

The choices are getting fewer.....

Henry - I believe it was 1812 - 1813