EJ_L

Great work! Those tools look fantastic. Bowls look great too. How hard were they to put together?

Welcome to MSW Steve! As both Mark and Joe have already said and pointed out, this is the right place for help on figuring out those tricky parts. Being able to share your build with others adds a lot of fun to building these models. I am looking forward to seeing your pIctures.

Rob, it looks like you are off to a great start on your first build. I admit I too am curious about your hook and rubber band set up you have. It does look like a good way of holding those battens in place. I'm assuming from looking at the pictures that there is just enough tension to hold the wood in place and not bend it out of shape. I think I will follow along and watch your build.

After two days of building canons.... they are still not done.... however they are close. I got the carriages built and most of the rigging ready. I ran out of the blocks I needed but fortunately I placed an order with Chuck last week so I should have more in later this week. Drilled the openings for the barrels and installed the decorative wreaths. Should be able to get them rigged up this week and then I can build the forecastle deck and all the major planking will be completed. Mark, I've taken a look at the Billings Wasa and combining it with a few other interpretations I have seen I think I now have a plan for the capstan. We shall see...

Off to a good start Frank. Looks like you got her straightened back out nicely. I have been noticing warped false keels coming out of the box a lot lately. Mine was the same way but unfortunately I didn't get it straightened out quite enough as I found out after planking. Oh well, it still works. I'm wondering if they are not getting packed correctly or maybe if humidity is getting to them though if that were the case I would expect to find more problems with the wood so I'm leaning towards packing. Not a big deal just another step to be mindful of when starting out.

Happy Birthday Mark! Best wishes for a great day.

Very enjoyable and informative. Great job on your log. I look forward to the next step.

As promised here are some better pictures of the work I have been doing. All the decks have been planked, bulkheads, hatches and ladders installed. All the railings are up and some of the decorations are also installed. Now I am just missing the forecastle and the ships structure will be complete. Before I can install that though I have more canons to build first. 14 more on the spar deck. 5 to either side and 4 bow chasers. This is what I will be spending a good portion of my weekend doing. Then I can build my forecastle deck and on to the bits, kevels and racks for belaying pins and all those other various pieces needed for the rigging. I also have to build a capstan which I only have one vague drawing of. I've been looking around at different logs trying to determine how it should look for an early 17th century. If anyone has a good suggestion I would love to hear it. Thanks for stopping by!

Very nice work. I love the way you have sections open to view inside and the removable sections to open it up even more. With the detail work you have done it would be a shame to not be able to see it. I agree with you that the black pins look better. You will have your work cut out for you on all of those! You said the dragon head was a resin cast, did it come painted too or was that you? Either way it looks really cool.

Welcome to MSW Hervie! It looks like you are off to a great start. You picked a good ship and kit and as you have said there are plenty build logs to help you along. I will follow along with you and wish you the best of luck! Looking forward to your next update.

Hi Michael, just read through your build and it looks like you are moving along just fine. I too am building a Corel kit at the moment and I agree that their plans do leave a lot to be desired and the instruction book I use primarily to track the number of hours I have been working on it. It can be frustrating but I've learned over the course of a couple builds now that no set is perfect and that is ok as I spend large number of hours researching supplemental information on the ship I'm building anyway and rarely rely on one source. It looks to me that you will have yoyrself a very nice model when completed.

Antony, I have come late to the party but I must say your work on this ship is simply amazing! The precision of your joints and detail level is unbelievable. Well done sir! I look forward to seeing more of her as you continue.

Hi Frank. I would like to follow along also as I have not yet had the opportunity to see an Asian ship come together. Looks interesting and I look forward to watching your build.

It looks good to me! Mistakes are just opportunities to learn and we never stop learning.

Happy Birthday Sjors!

Looking good! I will echo what Mike said about the garboard turning up at the bow. Even if it is only a slight bend, once you start adding strakes that bend will become more and more noticable. One way to check this is to keep measuring your space inbetween the garboard and those upper planks. Do your planks still fit in that space with the correct number and widths? If they do then you are ok. If not then you need to reset. What happens is that the spacing at the bow will close out faster that the rest of the hull as it is a smaller space to begin with. If your planks are turning up there thrn that will accelerate that gap closure and you will not have the space to run the same number of strakes at the bow as you have on the rest of the ship. You may be fine but double check you spacing now. It is easier to replace one plank then have to remove a lot of planks or be unhappy with your results.

MIke I thought the same thing about having to step over that rail and then it being a foot deeper on one side. I could see a lot of awkwardness, tripping and banged shins and knees on either height. Maybe not the best design...

Ciaran, Your ship looks good and considering it has been sitting idle for that many years, thats even more impressive as often they get damaged while on the shelf. It is good to see you returning to the hobby as well. We have had many discussions lately about people leaving for many of the reasons you did so it is nice to see someone return and try again. Unfortunately I do not know of any easy way to straighten out the hull at this point as the planking locks it into shape. As Jeff said it probably originated with a warped false keel from the beginning. Hopefully someone else may know of a way. Don't feel too bad about the proper names. I find myself stopping to look up what something is called all the time. Best advice I can give on that is to try to use the proper terms once you have learned them a lot. The more you use them the easier it will be and as I'm sure you are like most of us and do not sail or build ships on a daily basis, the only time you will really get the chance is when you post on here. Good luck and I look forward to seeing her come together.

Mark, Bob, thank you for your condolences.

The Couronne shipyard has resumed work after an extended break. We took time off to mourn the passing of my first mate Brinkley. He developed cancer unexpectedly and had to be put down last Tuesday much to the Admiral's and mine sorrow. This, combined with having to take time to finalize plans for the new shipyard which has started construction today we had a busy and rather stressful week that did not allow time for ship building. However, now I'm back at it and so here is a quick picture update of the work that I have managed to do in the past couple of days. She is slowly climbing upward and starting to flush out some details. I think I will have lots of good build time this week so I will see what more I can get done and also take some better pictures of the whole ship soon. It feels good to be building again!

That is a tough call. I agree that the drawings do look like the decks are at the same level. I also agree though that I think it would look better and was probably lower down in side the cockpit. With a solid hull that might make for some carving out of the deck to make it work. I would do some research on other build logs or even google images and see if you can find what others have done. Ultimately like Bob said, it's your ship and decision. Which ever way makes you happy.

Those sacks do look great! I have just accepted that gluing myself to things with CA glue is just a part of the process. It is a step located somewhere between sanding and installation. Hahaha!

The garboard is wider than the other planks though I do not believe it was 2' wide as that would be a hard piece of lumber to find. I believe about 1' give or take a couple inches would be more accurate. It's width can change also as it goes from bow to stern. It will be narrower at the bow, widest in the middle and narrow again at the stern. This is to create a straight edge to run the rest of the planking off of. Make sure the garboard does not curve up at the bow.

I apologize Chris as I am probably one of those members who misunderstood what you were trying to do with the thread. I think another big issue that causes the new builder to get in over there heads is how they are introduced to the hobby or ships in general. They see the Constitution, Victory, Cutty Sark etc. and want to build them because those are the ones in abundance and available to see in person. The inspiration is set to that level of wow! and it is hard from that point to want to build a much simpler ship. Many of the simpler starter kits are of less famous ships and as such they get fewer people who even know about them much less want to build. Then as I have seen others say, "canons are cool!" As a kid inspiration is going to come from that 100 gun man of war and not a small 0-4 gun vessel. I think that to help encourage first time builders to choose a simpler ship to start from is that we need to find ways to promote those smaller, simpler vessels. Just in the 6 month I have been apart of this community my knowledge and exposure to other ships as expanded immensely. I'm not completely sure the best ways of doing this but perhaps one idea would be to somehow find ways of featuring beginner kits and make them appealing. Possibly by listing their history or significance to a particular country by talking them up much like we see on the more popular ships. Even perhaps create a section on here that is specifically for beginner ships so that new comers to the hobby can see other first time builder's work so that they feel more comfortable sharing their work and not feel like their skills are sub par when all they see are some of the great works that are on here.

I am guilty of not finishing some of my kits. In fact there are a few of them listed in my signature as unfinished. One of them I do not feel bad about as it is a joint projects with a friend while I was still in the Navy and is now awaiting his retirement. The others either had issues with the kit, the instructions or I just lost interest in finishing them. The fact that they are plastic kits also has something to do with it as I have grown to love wooden ships more. I still may sit down and finish them one day.