mbp521

On its side, at the stern gets my vote. It shows off the work you put into the interior. -Brian

Thank you Eric. The sunset picture says it all. What a beautiful display of river life. One of the things I truly miss about south Louisiana and living on the Mississippi. -Brian

Thank you Keith. The Titanic was a fun project, and at 53” long it’s a monster. I had to put that one inside, my little shipyard just didn’t have the room to display it. I do have to say though, this build was a lot less messy. 😁 Now you’ve got me to thinking. 🤔 I May just have to go buy a bunch of white and light blue bricks and build me an iceberg. Caroline N first. 🤣 -Brian

Ha ha Keith, the light saber is still functioning, but the laptop is not. I haven't had a lot of time to devote to the build due to work, life and other projects, but things have not been totally stagnant. My old laptop died on me a couple of months ago so it needed to be replaced. Well after 30 years of being a Windows user I finally had enough and made the change to a MacBook. Needless to say, there is a slight learning curve and it took a bit of retraining my brain, but I think I finally figured it out. My biggest hurdle was trying to figure out how to scale down the file size of the photos so they could be uploaded to MSW. This will be my first attempt, so if things run afoul, please bear with me. I dug through all of my pictures on my phone that I have taken since my last update and I think I'm on track as to where I last left off, so here we go. So starting off, I designed the window and door frames on my "light saber" (sorry Keith, it was too good not to use). These I made from gray card stock. The inner frame is just slightly engraved, to show the separation from the outer frame, but not so much that I had to install two pieces. I'm pretty pleased with the results on this. Pilot house window frames. Next, I drew up the plans for the tow knees. These plans included the stair stringers and risers, sides and bases. I used the engraving feature to allow an easier way to align each step as well as the front panel. It took a couple of tries to get my measurements just right, but I finally got it. Here is the results after they have been cut out. The first tow knee going together. Here I marked the locations of the tow knees on the bow. All of the tow knees constructed and temp installed to get an idea of how they are going to look. While I pondered how to paint the tow knees up (really I just don't like painting that much, so I was looking for an excuse to put it off for as long as possible) I started work on the handrails along the main deck cabin. I struggled to get a good view of these from the pictures and videos that I researched but I think I came pretty close to getting it right. My main hang-up was how they were attached to the walls and how far they were located from the walls. I went with my gut that there was about a two inch gap between the rail and the wall given that on several locations you can see where the railing is bent around the downspouts that run from the deck above. The first picture is drilling the holes for the standoffs for the railing. Here are the standoffs going in. For these and the railings I used 1mm styrene. I cut these a little long at first to give me enough play to trim them to the correct length and allow for some sanding to mate up to the railing a little better. The first railing installed. More of the port side railings. Once all of the railings were installed, it was time to suck it up and start painting the tow knees. I didn't take any pictures of the painting process, because it was just painting. But here are the results. Port view of the knees. Starboard view of the knees, You can also see some of the completed railing on the main deck. Notice how the rail curves around the downspouts. Finally, I did a little side project but didn't do a build log on it (it only took a week). This was a birthday present from the Admiral and our offspring. I'm still a kid at heart and I still love playing with Legos, so I thought I would share with the group. Well that is all for now. My "other projects list" is starting to shrink so hopefully I'll be able to devote some more time to the build. I promise it won't be near as long before my next update. Hopefully this will keep everyone's interest for the time being. Thanks for stopping by. -Brian

I thought that was the model shipbuilders motto. 😁 Stairs are my least favorite parts to build along with railings, and on my current build there is plenty of both. That may be the reason I’ve been lagging in the build department. You are really making nice progress! -Brian

I totally forgot to throw my opinion on this one. I’m thinking it looks best on the aft, turned upside down. It’s readily accessible and keeps the rainwater out. -Brian

Congratulations Eric. Another fine build that truly shows your love of the old Missouri River vessels, as well as your expert craftsmanship. It’s about time that I light a fire under my backside and sit back down at the bench and get to work on my build, and your completion of Peerless is just the motivation that I need. As always, I look forward with great excitement to the next project to hit your bench, no matter how long you keep us waiting. 😁 -Brian

Beautiful work Eric. These details are definitely going to bring the boat to life. Out of curiosity, where did you get the crates and sacks from? -Brian

Congratulations Eberhard, what an outstanding build. 18 years, wow! It has been a fantastic adventure following along and can’t wait to jump on board the next one. -Brian

Once again you have produced a beautiful work of art. Sometimes giving into peer pressure yields beautiful results. I can’t wait to see the details you have in store to dress it up even more. -Brian

I don’t blame you there. You could just say the oversized buckets are the ones in the water and not seen. 😁 -Brian

Love that song!

You are really moving along with this build now. Great progress and beautiful work! I agree with Keith, I believe the arms were black as well. It’s so hard to put color in those old B&W photos but the could be red as well, but definitely not white. Another thought that comes to mind is didn’t most paddle wheels have thicker buckets on the opposing sides of the Pittman arms to help balance the weight of the crankshaft and provide a smoother rotation? We ended up with about 5” of rain from Beryl, not a lot (by hurricane standards) but enough to saturate the ground a get the creeks to flowing. Hope you all stay safe up there and the waters stay low. -Brian

Speaking of the weather, I’m just sitting here typing this up as I’m watching the rain and wind from Hurricane Beryl pass over us. Just grateful to not be on the coast. Very nice job on the paddle wheel, it’s just a shame that you had to cover up that beautiful maple with paint. -Brian

Beautiful work John! I like the idea of using wire on the pilot house tie downs. The wire should keep them from sagging over time like rigging line does. Your work is crisp and clean. I sure hope you are able to locate your pilot house name boards, it would be a shame to have to duplicate your work on them. -Brian

You have been busy Keith. I’m out for a week and lots of progress has been made. Thanks for the tutorial, I really dig your method of building the ratlines. I sure miss rigging and tying ratlines, it’s been several years since I’ve built a fully rigged ship. I need to get busy with my Caroline so I can get it finished up and get back to some real ship building, and maybe put some of your methods to use. - Brian

Just catching up Eric. Very nice work on the wheels! What I found is that if you are using PVA or wood glue is to put a layer of Saran Wrap between the pieces to keep them from sticking and it’s clear so you can line up the pieces without anything obscuring your view. If you are using CA, that’s a different story. CA tends to stick a little too good. As for the 3D printing, I’m with you on that. They are nice to mess around with and can be handy in a pinch if you need small detailed stuff done that is just too much to deal with by hand (I cheated on my Cairo and ordered 3D printed lanterns). But nothing beats creating things by hand. Although, now you have me feeling a little guilty since I’ve been using my laser tool to create many of the parts on my current build. 😁 - Brian

Looks great Eric! Tedious work to say the least. One down, two to go. -Brian

What’s left to say that hasn’t been said already Keith. Good thing you’ve got your MSW support group helping you along the way and things have a way of working themselves out. -Brian

Nah, don’t like them, take em off. 🤣 Just kidding! I think you have a beautiful solution. After your description I can now see what you are referencing. When I first looked at it I was thinking that the hog chain supports were blocking the door and the sign continued on behind it. It can be a bit of a challenge to make out the perspective of the old photos sometimes. Got it now. -Brian

Eric, I’m kind of curious if the port side sign board was the same size as the starboard just not split at the door seam so that when the pilothouse door was closed the sign presented itself as whole but still allowed for the door to open and close. Just a thought. Love the dry transfer idea though! -Brian

Definitely liking the improved tow knees Eric, and I think you just about nailed the paddlewheel scale. This may be a little off topic of the current subject matter, but I was noticing Peerless’ stern. From the angle of your paddlewheel photo it looks somewhat flat and not tapered. I was curious as to if this was the case or maybe I was just looking at it wrong, but if it is flat, what type of rudder system did she use. Apologies if I jumped ahead a bit, but you know how I like a good rudder discussion. 😁 -Brian

Thanks for the Maggie update Keith! Continued thoughts and prayers going out while she recovers. From what I can see, everything is still on its way to being perfect. As with what Snug and Mark said, I doubt that any of the deadeyes would have been perfectly aligned and even zooming in on the picture you can barely tell the ropes are threaded through the same hole. I had took pretty hard to see it, and since that will be the wall side, we’ll just keep that minor error between you and those of us here on MSW. 😁 -Brian

Jumping on the bandwagon here as well. From the looks of the second photo the pusher bars, they are called Tow Knees on modern day boats, not sure they were called that back in the day. But the entire structure looks like it is built out to flatten the front of the bow to maximize contact with the barges or whatever she was pushing at the time. I hate seeing anyone have to rework part of the build, but I think you are on track to making it right. -Brian

I’ve always loved model railroading, I just never had the time or funds to really enjoy its offerings early on. Now I have way too many other hobbies to get into and still not enough time, so I live vicariously through those that do. Thanks for posting your article Eric, those are some beautiful models. My great-grandfather worked for Missouri Pacific way back when. He was In charge of loading and unloading the rail cars from the ferry that went between Baton Rouge and Port Allen, La. before the Huey P. Long/O.K. Allen bridge was built in 1937. This is a picture that I have hanging in my house of his train and ferry. I wish I could find more information on it and other pictures, it would truly make an interesting build one day. -Brian