gjdale

I want to make ships like this when I grow up.

Looking great Aydin. Can't wait to see her with her finish coat on!

I like the faux leather Aydin - can't wait to see it on the seats.

Planking
 
Planking the hull turned out to be a little trickier than anticipated, and included a “near disaster”. Planking the first side, I followed as closely as I could the lining out marks, having first tapered the planks to fit against these. The problem was in the lateral bending of the planks. Ideally, they should have been spiled. However, the planks provided are not sufficiently wide enough to spile (and I didn’t have any sheet stock that I could substitute). The kit planks are also wide enough that edge bending is very difficult, if not impossible. The result was a less than even surface. On the second side, I decided to adjust the lining out marks to allow the first (chine) plank to fall naturally – which took it exactly one strake higher on the lining out marks at the bow. This meant that I had to insert a wedge shaped piece below this plank, but the remaining planks on that side went on somewhat more easily than the first side. The result also meant that I managed to maintain alignment of planks on either side at the bow.
 
The near disaster came when I went to give the hull an initial sanding to even out the surface. Following the lead of others who have gone before me, I broke out the powered mouse sander and set to. I must have been a little too aggressive in one place because I suddenly noticed that I had sanded through the entire thickness of the planking and could see the white plastic showing through. Oops…..  I also discovered that on the other side, one plank had developed a hole – not sure how, but the timber is very dry and brittle. Hmmmm, two repairs to make!
 
My first thought on repairing these was to use epoxy putty, but one of them was quite a large area and was going to look dreadful. After sleeping on it for a couple of nights, I decided that I would remove a section of the planking and patch it with new planks. Another few days to consider exactly how to achieve this, and I finally gave it a crack yesterday. I used a mini circular saw blade held in the Proxxon rotary tool and gently made some “stop” cuts at the extremities of the section I wanted to remove. I was then able to insert the blade of a No.11 Exacto knife and prise the damaged planking free. A quick clean up with the drum sander in the Proxxon to remove the residual glue and it was ready for the new timber. I took my time in shaping in the “patch” parts, and even managed to spile some thinner sections to get a very close fit. I also used some epoxy putty (Milliput) to blend the area at the bow where the timber transitions to the plastic sheeting of the hull bottom. After a careful HAND sanding, I was quite pleased with the results. Here are a couple of views of the completed repair job (forgot to take pictures of the “before”).
 

 

 
 
And here is a close up of the bow, showing the alignment of the planking. The stem is not perfect, but as it will be covererd later by the cutwater, I’m happy with it as is.
 

 
Then, at last, it was time to start on the deck planking. The process starts with the attachment of the edge or margin boards. These are die cut parts, slightly oversized, and are relatively easy to fit. Once in place, the outer edges are sanded back flush with the sides, and a strip of white “caulking” (.04” x .08” styrene) is applied to the inboard edge. The next step is to place the centre plank on the forward deck. This requires that a length of caulking be sandwiched between two planks (3/8” wide mahogany), then shaped to fit the bow and fixed in place down the centreline. Compared to the hull side planking, this was dead easy!
 

 

 
The remainder of the deck planking will follow a similar pattern, with a plank being glued to a strip of “caulking” before being shaped and affixed as a pair.  I’ll be back when the deck planking is complete.

Neat idea for the oars support Jack. Looking forward to seeing the final photos.

Nice work Bug. Tedious, but the end result is worth the effort!

Thanks for the kind words,
and for the LIKES.
In the meantime, I made the shot garlands for 18 pounder and 30 pounder.
Here are the pictures :

 

 

 

 

 

Hi John,
 
thats a nice comment ,I`m pleased that you like the model ...
I`ve been searching now for weeks already in order to find little scale figurines in 1900 period fashions, and some suitable crew members, they are so rare and hard to find because obviously the are not being produced in the scale 1:160 any more
 
Nils
 

 
for promenade- and boatsdeck (gauge N, scale 1:160)
 
 

 
some of the crew sailors for deckwork (gauge N, scale 1:160)

Build day 28 - Sanding. 
 
3 hours today.
 
98 hours into build in total.   Sanding finally started today. I spent altogether 3 hours: - Rasping and shaping the rear arc moulds, - first coarse sanding of the hull (not the deck, yet) using 80 grit paper with random orbit sander. - first filling of the gaps with sand dust / glue mix   I had promised to post some photos during this dusty job. Here are some of them.    First, I rounded the arcs with a rasp (check a few photos above to see their initial shape). The dark parts adjacent to the planks are not gaps, but laser burn marks. I will cover them with the sand dust filling as well:     This Proxxon random orbit sander is my best friend in these days:     Collected plenty of sand dust on the way. Left: sand dust. Right: rasp dust (for rough filling):      After 3 hours of sanding with Proxxon, the hull looks smoother and the gaps have been revealed and therefore I thought it is time to make the first filling of the gaps. The paste I prepared with sand dust and white glue/water mix is quite thin, therefore I will need to repeat the filling process. This makes the progress slower compared to a thicker paste but I guess the result will be worth it. Here are some fillings.        I will continue tomorrow with more fillings and corrections before moving to next sanding sequence. Thanks for watching!   /Aydin

Hello druxey,
 
I've used it before to make a replica of a seventeenth century sundial but, I never thought of the ship model connection. I have to say, cutting the rectangular windows from the mica was a lot easier than cutting the round piece for the sundial.
 
 
Interesting idea about the paddlebox. My paddlewheels are bigger than yours!

Thanks steamschooner and Michael
 
Michael,  It's good to hear from you again.  I hope you had a great time while you were away.  I've missed your posts and look forward to seeing you back at it!
 
 
I spent all of this last week finishing up the bunks and interior planking.  I still need to add the rails to the bunks and my wife has volunteered to make all the mattresses.  I've started on the windows -- just the interior side of the frames.  I'll add the mica and outer half later after the walls are painted.  This makes it easier to paint the exterior frame before installing it.
 
 

 

 

 
 
Close up of three completed window.  I really like the effect of the mica - Thanks druxey for suggesting it.

Planking
 
Planking the hull turned out to be a little trickier than anticipated, and included a “near disaster”. Planking the first side, I followed as closely as I could the lining out marks, having first tapered the planks to fit against these. The problem was in the lateral bending of the planks. Ideally, they should have been spiled. However, the planks provided are not sufficiently wide enough to spile (and I didn’t have any sheet stock that I could substitute). The kit planks are also wide enough that edge bending is very difficult, if not impossible. The result was a less than even surface. On the second side, I decided to adjust the lining out marks to allow the first (chine) plank to fall naturally – which took it exactly one strake higher on the lining out marks at the bow. This meant that I had to insert a wedge shaped piece below this plank, but the remaining planks on that side went on somewhat more easily than the first side. The result also meant that I managed to maintain alignment of planks on either side at the bow.
 
The near disaster came when I went to give the hull an initial sanding to even out the surface. Following the lead of others who have gone before me, I broke out the powered mouse sander and set to. I must have been a little too aggressive in one place because I suddenly noticed that I had sanded through the entire thickness of the planking and could see the white plastic showing through. Oops…..  I also discovered that on the other side, one plank had developed a hole – not sure how, but the timber is very dry and brittle. Hmmmm, two repairs to make!
 
My first thought on repairing these was to use epoxy putty, but one of them was quite a large area and was going to look dreadful. After sleeping on it for a couple of nights, I decided that I would remove a section of the planking and patch it with new planks. Another few days to consider exactly how to achieve this, and I finally gave it a crack yesterday. I used a mini circular saw blade held in the Proxxon rotary tool and gently made some “stop” cuts at the extremities of the section I wanted to remove. I was then able to insert the blade of a No.11 Exacto knife and prise the damaged planking free. A quick clean up with the drum sander in the Proxxon to remove the residual glue and it was ready for the new timber. I took my time in shaping in the “patch” parts, and even managed to spile some thinner sections to get a very close fit. I also used some epoxy putty (Milliput) to blend the area at the bow where the timber transitions to the plastic sheeting of the hull bottom. After a careful HAND sanding, I was quite pleased with the results. Here are a couple of views of the completed repair job (forgot to take pictures of the “before”).
 

 

 
 
And here is a close up of the bow, showing the alignment of the planking. The stem is not perfect, but as it will be covererd later by the cutwater, I’m happy with it as is.
 

 
Then, at last, it was time to start on the deck planking. The process starts with the attachment of the edge or margin boards. These are die cut parts, slightly oversized, and are relatively easy to fit. Once in place, the outer edges are sanded back flush with the sides, and a strip of white “caulking” (.04” x .08” styrene) is applied to the inboard edge. The next step is to place the centre plank on the forward deck. This requires that a length of caulking be sandwiched between two planks (3/8” wide mahogany), then shaped to fit the bow and fixed in place down the centreline. Compared to the hull side planking, this was dead easy!
 

 

 
The remainder of the deck planking will follow a similar pattern, with a plank being glued to a strip of “caulking” before being shaped and affixed as a pair.  I’ll be back when the deck planking is complete.

Once again, many thanks for all the kind words and to those who hit the 'like' button.  Progress has been slow lately due to other commitments, so only a mini-update this week. 
 
Installing the sub-decking was straight forward:
 

 
 Took the opportunity to fill some of the dings in the hull using a two-part Epoxy putty (Milliput Terracotta) and she is finally ready for planking.
 

 
The instructions would have you just lay complete planks the length of the hull, from the chine up to the sheer. I tried that on one side and wasn’t happy, so ripped it all off again. Then I lined-off the hull using tick-strips in an attempt to do better by tapering planks fore and aft and having the same number of strakes throughout. Here is the lined-off hull:
 

 
So far, the tapering seems to be working quite well. I've been using a miniature plane to taper the planks and have to say, it beats the pants off sanding! Much easier and far less mess. The supplied planks are not wide enough to spile, so I will likely use some shorter plank lengths in addition to tapering, to cope with the bow curvature. I got as far as laying three strakes the second time around before I ran out of CA kicker – a real must for this process. So, it’s back on hold until I can pick up some more supplies.
 
More pics once substantial progress has been made with the planking.
 
 

Here is a quick update as to how Phantom looks tonight.



Until next time!

Very nice work Grant. The hull planking was a real bugger. As you said the deck is much easier the hatch behind the cockpit was also a little difficult for me to get those seams to line up with the deck seams. Keep up the good work!

Construction: Frame, Keel and Chine Installation

The frames are then installed, with the aid of a special template jig as they are not perpendicular to the sub-deck. When installed correctly, they have a slight lean aft. Epoxy is the recommended glue for this job. I used the 5-min type and it was quite good to work with, having a reasonable working time to get things aligned correctly, and then setting reasonably quickly after that.



Once all the frames are installed, the Fwd keel is inserted. I used Epoxy to glue the forward part to the sub-deck, and then wicked super thin aliphatic resin into the frame joints.




The next job is to insert the Butterfly Keel, which is a two piece keel (one either side of the centreline) extending from Frame Four aft to Frame Eight. Once that is installed, the next job is to install the Chine. This is an interesting construction method. The Chine is made of two 1/8” thick strips of balsa on each side To start, the ends of the two strips are glued together for the first inch, with about 1/4" overlap. Once dry, this section is then glued into the notch in frame one, using a liberal amount of Epoxy and left to cure for at least one hour.



Once the epoxy has cured, a bead of wood glue (I used the aliphatic resin again) is run between the two strips, and these are progressively bent to shape, clamped and glued to each frame notch in turn with thick CA and the assistance of some CA kicker. Sounds complicated but is remarkably easy and all done in about 5 minutes.



Once all the glues had dried, the overhang was trimmed flush with the transom.



This completes the lower hull framing. The next job will be to install the “underplanking”.

Edit: I may have been mistaken about some of the materials used. See post #19 below for further thoughts.

Planking
 
Planking the hull turned out to be a little trickier than anticipated, and included a “near disaster”. Planking the first side, I followed as closely as I could the lining out marks, having first tapered the planks to fit against these. The problem was in the lateral bending of the planks. Ideally, they should have been spiled. However, the planks provided are not sufficiently wide enough to spile (and I didn’t have any sheet stock that I could substitute). The kit planks are also wide enough that edge bending is very difficult, if not impossible. The result was a less than even surface. On the second side, I decided to adjust the lining out marks to allow the first (chine) plank to fall naturally – which took it exactly one strake higher on the lining out marks at the bow. This meant that I had to insert a wedge shaped piece below this plank, but the remaining planks on that side went on somewhat more easily than the first side. The result also meant that I managed to maintain alignment of planks on either side at the bow.
 
The near disaster came when I went to give the hull an initial sanding to even out the surface. Following the lead of others who have gone before me, I broke out the powered mouse sander and set to. I must have been a little too aggressive in one place because I suddenly noticed that I had sanded through the entire thickness of the planking and could see the white plastic showing through. Oops…..  I also discovered that on the other side, one plank had developed a hole – not sure how, but the timber is very dry and brittle. Hmmmm, two repairs to make!
 
My first thought on repairing these was to use epoxy putty, but one of them was quite a large area and was going to look dreadful. After sleeping on it for a couple of nights, I decided that I would remove a section of the planking and patch it with new planks. Another few days to consider exactly how to achieve this, and I finally gave it a crack yesterday. I used a mini circular saw blade held in the Proxxon rotary tool and gently made some “stop” cuts at the extremities of the section I wanted to remove. I was then able to insert the blade of a No.11 Exacto knife and prise the damaged planking free. A quick clean up with the drum sander in the Proxxon to remove the residual glue and it was ready for the new timber. I took my time in shaping in the “patch” parts, and even managed to spile some thinner sections to get a very close fit. I also used some epoxy putty (Milliput) to blend the area at the bow where the timber transitions to the plastic sheeting of the hull bottom. After a careful HAND sanding, I was quite pleased with the results. Here are a couple of views of the completed repair job (forgot to take pictures of the “before”).
 

 

 
 
And here is a close up of the bow, showing the alignment of the planking. The stem is not perfect, but as it will be covererd later by the cutwater, I’m happy with it as is.
 

 
Then, at last, it was time to start on the deck planking. The process starts with the attachment of the edge or margin boards. These are die cut parts, slightly oversized, and are relatively easy to fit. Once in place, the outer edges are sanded back flush with the sides, and a strip of white “caulking” (.04” x .08” styrene) is applied to the inboard edge. The next step is to place the centre plank on the forward deck. This requires that a length of caulking be sandwiched between two planks (3/8” wide mahogany), then shaped to fit the bow and fixed in place down the centreline. Compared to the hull side planking, this was dead easy!
 

 

 
The remainder of the deck planking will follow a similar pattern, with a plank being glued to a strip of “caulking” before being shaped and affixed as a pair.  I’ll be back when the deck planking is complete.

Neat idea for the oars support Jack. Looking forward to seeing the final photos.

Nice and easy - if you happen to have a mill and know how to set it up properly , Mike!

This is where mill is very handy - I can easilly make joints on 2-8 planks at the same time (assuming the same thickness), and they would be perfectly fit in all dimensions, tight and with a consistent angle. It takes about 8-10min for the batch including the setup. And no need for the careful markup - just make sure that all planks have the same angle in the mill vice.
Without mill, it was a lot of fitting, took around 30min per joint (instead of 10 for a number of joints), and it was hard to get tight fit on a thick stock.
Cutting perfect scarfs by hand is a skill to learn, doing it with a mill is a simple procedure that does not require any skill. Easy-peasy! One of the biggest reasons that pushed me to buy the mill.
 
Here are some basic pictures of the process. I use a wooden "template" that fits under the planks inside the vice to ensure correct angle.
 

 

 

Paint Complete and Deck Staining
 
After weeks of masking, painting, waiting, sanding, and repeating, my Bluenose is painted!  It was very, very satisfying to remove the multiple layers of masking tape that I had piled on over the last month.
 

 
There was a good deal of touching-up required, especially on the waterways and bulwarks.  Those had been airbrushed early in the process, but there was some bleeding, so I touched those up by hand.
 
I still need to do some final touch ups on the yellow and white stripes on the outer hull, but I decided to ahead and get the deck stained first.  I went with a darker shade than originally planned on (kind of a last minute decision), but I'm really happy with how the deck turned out.
 

 
Hopefully I'll get those stripes on the hull cleaned up this week.  
 
I'm still debating if I should go ahead and get some poly on the deck now, or wait until later.  
 
The entire hull was airbrushed, and I decided on the specific colors after doing some tests on a large piece of basswood.
 
For black, I used Model Master's Flat Black (I know that 'midnight blue' is more historically accurate, but I didn't think I would be able to get a good shade of that).  The red portion of the hull was Model Master's Insignia Red (probably not the 'right' shade of red, but it was the one I liked the most).  For white (both on the stripe and on the bulwarks) I used Humbrol Flat White.  The yellow stripe was Model Master's Insignia Red (which wasn't my plan, I was going to use Humbrol Trainer Yellow, but grabbed the wrong bottle without realizing it).  The grey was Model Master's Light Grey.
 
After I get things cleaned up with the stripes, I still need to put some kind of clear coat on top, but I'm not sure what I'll use yet.
 
I'm excited to get things moving again!  
 

 
 

19 AUG 2016
 
Completed the shaping of the stem assembly.
Chiselled in along the lower/middle/upper stem post to get the relief depth then sanded to shape.
Then did the same to the knee of the head and extension as it is narrower yet again.
Did a little damage on the edge of the filler pieces with the last step.
A little cleanup to be done on her... a few passes with finer grade paper and a tack cloth.
 



 
I have yet to add the cutwater strip to the stem assembly and the last pieces of the rising wood on top of the keel.
Then I will start building at the stern, adding the transom pieces.

Friday, August 19, 2016  
The basement of the "display case" finished . . now only the plexiglas cover is missing.  
01 20160819_143241.jpg

 
Details of the device for housing the oars, with the grooves to hold them in position at the correct distance.
 
02 20160819_143253.jpg

03 20160819_143304.jpg

 
That's all for now.
 
Most probably you will not have further news for some time.
 
The plexiglas cover will be made by a craftsman specialized on this kind of tasks and I have no idea about the time it will take to make it . . 
 
Only then I will be able to shot some final images of the entire, finished model.
 
Cheers, Jack.
 

Young America - extreme clipper 1853
Part 168 – Binnacle
 
"Odds and ends" seems to be the order of the day for the past month or so.  Not the best prescription for a lazy, hot summer.  Too easy to procrastinate.   Big consuming tasks are better.    On these little projects it is first research, then the drawing, then the modeling and photos – one step at a time.  The binnacle is one such piece.  A small part, but to judge by the mess left in the shop, one would think it had been the entireTitanic.
 
It started out as a cherry cylinder, turned to the ID of a brass tube from which two decorative rings were turned.  The next picture shows stage 1.
 

 
The four-paned glazed top was next.  It too, was made from a section of the same tube with the glass mullions filed out on the end as shown in the next picture.
 

 
The solid rod in the tube helps establish a constant depth and prevents the vise from squashing it.  The next larger size tube was used to make a ring to fit around the bottom of the top – shown below.
 

 
Telescoping tube is very handy for making a variety of assemblies.  I try to keep a stock on hand.  The mullions were then bent to the center and the assembly silver soldered.  The parts at this stage are shown below.
 

 
The cap was then sawed off the tube.  I did not want to leave the top without glass but making and fitting small panes like this is well beyond my ability, so I decided to make a small Plexiglas® prism to fit inside the brass top.  In the next picture a rod is being turned to the diameter of the wood cylinder.
 

 
A four sided prism was filed at the end of this until it fit well in the brass top.  It was then polished using Micromesh® sticks, followed by buffing – shown below.
 

 
The assembly was finally glued together using small droplets of thin CA.  The final piece is shown positioned on deck in the next picture.
 
 
 
I guess the two rudder pendant chains will be next.
 
Ed

Looking great Aydin. Can't wait to see her with her finish coat on!