tkay11

Wonderful! A real treat to have followed and learned from! Thanks! Tony

What a nice imaginative idea! I'll enjoy this. Tony

It's a lovely model you've been building, and the Caldercraft models are generally amongst the top brand of kit makers. To answer your question about the rigging, I can suggest three lines of thought. The first is to get Petersson's book "Rigging Period Ship Models". Among the rigging experts there is a lot of banter about inaccuracies, but it does give a very good simplified introduction to rigging square rig ships. It has beautiful diagrams that break down each part of the rigging separately so that you can step back from the overpowering complexity of a rigging diagram. There is also Mondfeld's excellent book on Historic Ship Models. You can find both books used, at reasonable cost, on eBay, Amazon, Alibris or AbeBooks. There's even a Kindle edition of the Petersson book. The second line of thought is to go to the National Maritime Museum's website and research your ship. The may well have plans available. Finally, you can search for other builds of Mars on the web, which may give some help. Tony

Great idea! I wish I'd had the thought of using spacers before. Thanks very much, I'll definitely do that in future. Tony

Very interesting, because I've ordered a card kit (Allège d'Arles) and I was thinking of using plywood instead of the card for the internal frame. Tony

Really nice and impressive work! Were the gunports so rounded? Tony

He's a very well-known authority of merchant sailing ships. You can visit the David MacGregor Library at the Brunel Institute in Bristol. They have a collection of his plans which you can purchase. It's at https://www.ssgreatbritain.org/brunel-institute/library. I haven't read any of his books, though, but they are well-reviewed. Now you've brought up the topic, I'll get the first in the series. Thanks for doing so! Tony

Moxis, that's an excellent piece of work, and a great idea. Thanks! Tony

This question has been asked so many times that it may be better for you to have a look on the various replies on this site. The answer is problematic because it all depends on the type of kit you want, the level of detail, the cost, the scale, the material it is made from, the level of instruction, the materials in the kit, your expectations, your level of skill, your previous experience etc. So different people will provide different opinions. I suggest you look at the large variety of Victory build logs to make up your own mind. Tony

First thing: take a deep breath, think about it, and don’t give up just yet. What is it that you are finding difficult, precisely? If you can narrow it down, just ask a question. This is why it would help to start a build log, as it shows the step at which you find difficulty and people will come to your help. Every modeller started somewhere, will have made mistakes and learned from them. I would bet that your particular problem has been encountered by many here. of course, as I suggested, you may not like the hobby or overcoming the problems, but I’d suggest at least giving it a go. Tony

Sound advice, wefalck. Thanks! Tony

If you use PVA for sealing knots, it's the white version you want, rather than the yellow versions. Tony

Thanks again, wefalck, for the time and experience you put into providing answers! I'd thought about brass paint but was worried about the appearance being of paint rather than brass or copper. Tony

Thanks very much for the information. It’s beautiful wood. Nice idea to use flooring! Tony

Some great ideas, wefalck! I’d thought of a 6mm plastic test tube which I could cut a section out of and hen cover with copper leaf. But I like the idea of trying to shape the brass rod. I also thought that the box type of portable binnacle might be more likely. As to the plexiglass I wasn’t clear that this type of binnacle had a glass cover, assuming the compass had one. I have already found a good compass drawing to fit inside. Thanks a lot for your very good advice! Tony

Your difficulties and questions show the value of studying other logs. CA glue overflow is extremely difficult to get rid of. It stains the wood. I can only think of soaking in acetone which may necessitate removing the part. It’s worth avoiding by using extremely sparingly, applied with a pointed stick or the filed off end of a sewing needle. For sealing knots nail varnish or similar is often recommended. Some use dilute woodworker’s PVA. PVA can also be used diluted to stiffen fabric. Tony

I am thinking of making this my next build and was reviewing yours. Could you let me know the wood you used for the masts? Tony

The other cutter that is very similar to the Lady Nelson is the Sherbourne. There are some worthwhile build logs you could look at, especially those by Sherbourne Tar, Gregor and dubz that go into a lot of the historical detail, the different ways or rigging and belaying, and modifications from the kit parts you may want to consider. Tony

Barrels, Sea chest, Bucket In providing equipment I decided at least on the barrels, sea chest and bucket in addition to the oars. I’m still debating whether to try to make a portable binnacle, but reckon this boat would not have been used for any journeys requiring its use – so may decide to leave it out. Barrels As I had not made barrels before, I looked into the different ways of making them, and decided to try two of them. The first method was using a solid core of a wood dowel to which is added the width at the middle by ringing it with wood strip or, as I did, a strip of masking tape. There were a number of problems with this method. The first was that no glue I used would stick satisfactorily to the masking tape. That is why it would have been preferable to use paper strips or else strips made of very thin wood shavings. I ended up using excessive quantities of PVA. The second problem was that given the compressibility of the tape, it was difficult to keep to the width of the staves so that all would have the recommended 4” width (at scale). As a result there was a lot of variation in the width – which was to some extent compensated by sanding. The big advantage of this method is that the staves overlap the ends of the barrel, so requiring no further drilling out to leave an overlap. The planking on the ends of the barrel is of course placed first, before placing the staves. I found it was useful to soak the staves first and curve them in a template jig using a hair dryer for rapid shaping. The second method involves cutting long angled strips of wood and gluing them together to form a cylinder. I chose to have 20 staves cut to an 180 angle (20 x 18 = 360). This was because the stave width at the circumference of a 10mm diameter cylinder would then be equivalent to 4” at full size. I found this part to be very simple to do using the Proxxon FET bench saw angle function which has a nice accurate guide to the degree of rotation. The barrel was then fixed on to a dowel which could be held in the lathe, and it was shaped to the correct curvature using a template. The barrel was then stained using walnut crystals, and bands placed with strips of black card. You’ll see the photos later in this post. Sea chest I made the chest using a card base on to which wooden planks were glued. A locking plate (made of card) and stanchion (0.4mm copper wire) were added, along with rope handles, two 0.5mm brass rod hinges and two supporting bands of black card over the curved top. Bucket Making the bucket was initially very puzzling to me. I could see others have made the bucket using the same method as for the barrels – namely the making of angled strips bundled together to form a cylinder, shaped and then hollowed out. I just could not see a simple way of hollowing it out while keeping the angle of the staves. In the end all I did was make the staves individually using as a guide the end dimensions of 10mm tall with a 7mm base. In order to keep it simple I restricted myself to 8 staves for which I made a pattern, glued to a strip of wood, then cut and angled the edges with a razor. I then took the gamble of just gluing the edges to each other, one stave at a time, in the knowledge that the grip of PVA would be sufficient to keep the parts together while adding them to one another and then curving into a cylinder. I left the cylinder to dry overnight, then glued the base on. As I had used white maple, I tried staining with my walnut crystal stain, but it didn’t alter the colour very well, so I had to paint with brown acrylic and finish off with a home-made shellac varnish. I added a rope as a handle. This now leaves me with the choice of whether to go with a binnacle and a boat hook. I can’t see my way to the method of making either one, but I’ve asked a question on the forum about the binnacle and I’ll see what answers I get. Otherwise I’ll be labelling this build as complete. Tony

I am trying to finalise the equipment for my build of M. Delacroix's Chaloupe Armée. One of the possibilities is to include a portable binnacle of the type shown below: At least this is the design in Dane's card model of a French 18th Century Longboat. I have no idea as to whether a binnacle would have been carried in an armed longboat, or whether this is even the type. However, I would be very grateful for opinions: 1. On whether one like that in the photo would have been carried, or whether another type would have been carried. 2. How I might approach making a round-topped cylinder (probably in brass) that could be cut away to reveal the compass. Dane's card model suggests making the dome from a series of triangles around the perimeter that would then be bent inwards to meet at the top as shown below: I thought of approaching this by cutting it out of 0.04mm brass shim, but that would leave the problem of bringing the triangular parts together in a seamless way that would also look good. The dimensions would be something like 6mm diameter and 10mm high. So all suggestions as to how to proceed are welcome. I don't mind if the suggestions including leaving this out altogether! With best wishes to all those in lockdown, Tony

Good job! Tony

You're the judge. If you do put treenails in the deck, they should be barely visible. At 1:64 they have to be 0.4mm diameter, then covered by a stopper of the same colour as the deck with the faintest of margins on the rim of the plug visible. Then imagine yourself looking at a real ship from the deck, where you can barely make them out when your eyes are 5 feet or so away, and then put yourself in the position of looking at the deck from from 64 times that distance. That would be 320 feet or 97 metres. Do you want to be realistic, or draw attention to your skill or do you want to replicate models? It's an old conundrum. Tony

You just need acetone to debond CA. It's much cheaper than commercial debonders. You'll find your planking much easier without stem, keel and sternpost as you can sand and edge with greater freedom. If you haven't already done so, it's really worth studying the planking tutorials provided on this site in the articles database before you start on that. The first layer is not critical, but provides good practice for the second layer. You can always make mistakes less obvious if you're going to paint the hull -- so that's always a good escape clause. Because the Lady Nelson is so similar to the Sherbourne kit, it's also useful to look at those builds to pick up hints and tips on overcoming problems, discussion about historical accuracy and when to overlook the sequence of steps suggested in the instructions. The builds by Dubz, Stockholm Tar and Gregor are especially useful in this regard. I haven't built the Lady Nelson myself, so don't know whether the second layer of planking is 1mm thick, but you might like to use thinner (0.5mm) planks than those provided in the kit. This makes it easier to bend and to fit in the space between the bulwarks and the stem, keel and sternpost. Tony

You might find that it's useful to protect the stem, keel and sternpost using masking tape as you've put them on before planking. As a result you'll be doing a lot of sanding and gluing which might damage these parts. Tony

Oars As indicated in the recent posting, I made the oars from three pieces. I only made 10, rather than the 20 that it would normally have, partly because of having to stow them all and partly because I reckoned that with the sails up there would only be effective room for 10 oarsmen. The oars were stained using my own mix of walnut crystals diluted 1:30 in water. As you can see, this ended up with them being rather blotchy. The sleeves were made of black card 0.2mm thick. The problem was where to place them on the boat, and then how to fix them. There were three possibilities: along the centre, on either side of the foremast, or held over the sides. I went with them being held over the sides as being the most efficient use of space. So how to fit them to the sides? Naturally this should be based on a loop, but I needed to be able to adjust the loop so that the oars would hang exactly at the gunwale, and also ensure that there would be no unsightly knots visible. The solution was a simple one of seizing together the two ends of a loop that had already been strung round a thwart in a way that would allow easy adjustment. So now I have to think about how to make a barrel, a boathook, a chest and a binnacle. I may well fail! [By the way, for those who look at the rake of the mizzen mast, it is at the prescribed angle. The main and fore masts are almost vertical.] Tony