Srodbro

Haven't posted any updates for a couple of months. Had knee joint replacement surgery which made sitting and concentrating on ship modeling difficult. Gradually getting back into the build. 
 
I did manage to finish most of the masts and yards, added the deadeyes and decided to start working on the whale boat stations. Finished the crane, boat guards and bearer posts. Next began working on the Davits and after studying the plans noted the kit supplied davits are out of scale. The plans show the quarter deck davits are approximately 8' tall, while the remaining davits are 10' tall. The quarter deck davits "should be peaked as low as possible to provide clearance for spanker boom", hence they are shorter.
The kit davits are 9' and do not match the plan profile. Correcting the profile is fairly easy, the davits are soft metal and can be bent to shape. That leaves four davits to be lengthened. After considering a few options I found a scrape piece of 1/8" polystyrene rod that matched the diameter of the lower portion the davits, applied some 5-minute epoxy and the davit is now close to scale. After I finish correcting and detailing the davits the next step is the true test, mounting them! 

Sad news indeed. Curious to see that the poster on the art forum had only a single example of James' work to share, but here at MSW we have dozens, if not hundreds. He was prolific, and he did very good work.

At last, whaleboats are about 98% finished. A number of revisions along the way. Oars and harpoons/lances were made from strip styrene and rod. After much research I decided to add a medium blue strip along the strake to the outfitted boats. Some whalers used different colors for each whaleboat (it appears this practice applied to larger boats primarily to identify the station on the ship) while others used the same color to identify the boats for their particular whaleship. Kate Cory has only three boats.
 
I made the sails from Silk span painted with acrylic paint. Overall, I'm happy with the results and feel it was important to finish these early in the project, so I have them as reference points for various stages.
 
 
 

Permanently added the deck I built earlier and added some color the hull. 


 

 
Working on masts and yards now - slow because I am doing everything by hand - couldn't justify getting a lathe at the moment.

The reconstruction is being performed at Mystic, Connecticut. But, you can’t see a lot of her ( at least you couldn’t in June 2018)

 

The original set of whaleboats that come with the kit are rough shaped solid wood similar to the hull. The revised Model Shipways Kate Cory kit includes laser cut pieces you glue up and shape (similar to their C. W. Morgan). I decided to try the new version as it looked like it would be easier to shape. If that didn't work out, I still had the original set. So, I was fortunate to get a new set and used my Rotary tool to shape the inside. 
 
Thanks for the feedback!

I’ve followed your build with interest. Nice work. 
One suggestion:  You might consider reinforcing the joinery on your fife rails as I did with a bit of brass wire. Later on when you are rigging, a bit too much tension on a line could cause the rails to come apart at a time in the build when repairing the fife rails would be extremely difficult ( as I discovered to my dismay on a previous build). 
Just a thought. 
Here is a pic of what I did on my Niagara fife rails. 

I’ve followed your build with interest. Nice work. 
One suggestion:  You might consider reinforcing the joinery on your fife rails as I did with a bit of brass wire. Later on when you are rigging, a bit too much tension on a line could cause the rails to come apart at a time in the build when repairing the fife rails would be extremely difficult ( as I discovered to my dismay on a previous build). 
Just a thought. 
Here is a pic of what I did on my Niagara fife rails. 

Yep … that’s the true guide, no matter what Hunt ( and I really love his art) or others may show, you gotta be true to O’Brian. 
By the way Hunt didn’t start illustrating Aubrey-Maturin books until many years after the first books were published  (at around Book 11, I think, when O’Brian got a new publisher), then he went back to paint covers for the earlier ones. 
Here’s a pic of an earlier cover with Sophie on it. 5 windows!  Guess this guy didn’t read the book. 

 

Much depends, I suppose, on the scale to which you are working. On my Fra Berlanga ( approx 1:100), I modeled the structure of wood and styrene, applied clear plastic painted on the reverse with black, then used styrene “ angle iron” strips to detail framing around each window.
 
If I was working at a smaller scale, I might cut a window hole as well as I could, then trim around the individual opening, maybe with card strips, or ( what I have become enamored with lately) aluminum tape ( as used by insulation and sheet metal workers) painted, cut to size with scissors and applied around the opening. 

Much depends, I suppose, on the scale to which you are working. On my Fra Berlanga ( approx 1:100), I modeled the structure of wood and styrene, applied clear plastic painted on the reverse with black, then used styrene “ angle iron” strips to detail framing around each window.
 
If I was working at a smaller scale, I might cut a window hole as well as I could, then trim around the individual opening, maybe with card strips, or ( what I have become enamored with lately) aluminum tape ( as used by insulation and sheet metal workers) painted, cut to size with scissors and applied around the opening. 

Much depends, I suppose, on the scale to which you are working. On my Fra Berlanga ( approx 1:100), I modeled the structure of wood and styrene, applied clear plastic painted on the reverse with black, then used styrene “ angle iron” strips to detail framing around each window.
 
If I was working at a smaller scale, I might cut a window hole as well as I could, then trim around the individual opening, maybe with card strips, or ( what I have become enamored with lately) aluminum tape ( as used by insulation and sheet metal workers) painted, cut to size with scissors and applied around the opening. 

Looking very nice, Harvey!

Hi Harvey. I just ran across your excellent build log of the Gjoa. Thought you might be interested in the actual village where Roald spent some time in Canada's Arctic. I was last there in 2003 aboard the Canadian icebreaker, Sir Wilfrid Laurier and went ashore with my watch partner Ed. We had a wonderful time walking the tundra and exploring the derelict boats nearby the village. Here's some pic's of what it's like in the high Arctic.
 

See Harvey’s post #1 ( there is an English version of Northwest Passage) and the book The Last Viking by Stephen Brown. 

Here’s a quote from Brown’s book:
 
”As the days grew darker and colder, the men tried to prepare themselves psychologically for the dreaded monotony of the long winter they faced living in the deserted, frozen expanse under a dome of perpetual dark. The daily routine, as far as anyone could predict, would consist of magnetic observations, hunting, taking care of the dogs and feeding themselves, with only a few extended excursions to pass the many months. The members of the small band had already grown tired of each others’ company, and with little to occupy them once winter set in, the lack of new company proved to be the greatest challenge.”
 
Add to that the discovery of blond haired, blue-eyed Inuit several years later …
Yeah … plenty there to dramatize!

See Harvey’s post #1 ( there is an English version of Northwest Passage) and the book The Last Viking by Stephen Brown. 

Here’s a quote from Brown’s book:
 
”As the days grew darker and colder, the men tried to prepare themselves psychologically for the dreaded monotony of the long winter they faced living in the deserted, frozen expanse under a dome of perpetual dark. The daily routine, as far as anyone could predict, would consist of magnetic observations, hunting, taking care of the dogs and feeding themselves, with only a few extended excursions to pass the many months. The members of the small band had already grown tired of each others’ company, and with little to occupy them once winter set in, the lack of new company proved to be the greatest challenge.”
 
Add to that the discovery of blond haired, blue-eyed Inuit several years later …
Yeah … plenty there to dramatize!

See Harvey’s post #1 ( there is an English version of Northwest Passage) and the book The Last Viking by Stephen Brown. 

See Harvey’s post #1 ( there is an English version of Northwest Passage) and the book The Last Viking by Stephen Brown. 

I started making blocks. First large sizes, there are only a few of them, and then non-traditional shapes. "lift block", "sheet block" and "fiddle block"...
The base on the milling machine, then hand-made..🔥







I plan to produce small-sized pulleys "by machine" on a milling machine using shaped milling cutters..😴

Being grandson to a blacksmith and great-nephew to a wheelwright I was attracted to this kit as a break from model shipbuilding, and I have just finished building it. I found your build log very helpful especially for the reach-fifth wheel assembly … I agree, the instructions could have been better in this regard. 
Regarding the question of when to paint the Britannia fittings:  There seems to be no avoiding several attempts, whether painted prior to assembly or after. Seems every modeling session included painting and touch-up. 
Regarding the wheel spoke length:  You are right, they are exactly the right length. In fact, I found that after cleaning the char from the spokes and rims, the spokes were too short. I solved this by wrapping the interior groove of the hubs with several turns of tape to effectively make the hub diameter larger. 
The kit, I thought, was deficient in a couple of ways. First, there is no detailing of any breaking mechanism. Second, and more frustratingly, there is no means for attaching the wagon to a horse, even after purchasing the single horse harness-hitch kit. Conceivably, the mysterious “axel couplings” might have been intended to facilitate the attachment of the poles running from the front axel along the sides of a horse for steering, but there is no hint in the wagon kit ( nor in the harness-hitch kit) that this is the case. 
But, I couldn’t have been too disappointed with the kit since I have recently purchased the beer wagon and two-horse hitch kits. 
Again, it was a big help following your log. 

Being grandson to a blacksmith and great-nephew to a wheelwright I was attracted to this kit as a break from model shipbuilding, and I have just finished building it. I found your build log very helpful especially for the reach-fifth wheel assembly … I agree, the instructions could have been better in this regard. 
Regarding the question of when to paint the Britannia fittings:  There seems to be no avoiding several attempts, whether painted prior to assembly or after. Seems every modeling session included painting and touch-up. 
Regarding the wheel spoke length:  You are right, they are exactly the right length. In fact, I found that after cleaning the char from the spokes and rims, the spokes were too short. I solved this by wrapping the interior groove of the hubs with several turns of tape to effectively make the hub diameter larger. 
The kit, I thought, was deficient in a couple of ways. First, there is no detailing of any breaking mechanism. Second, and more frustratingly, there is no means for attaching the wagon to a horse, even after purchasing the single horse harness-hitch kit. Conceivably, the mysterious “axel couplings” might have been intended to facilitate the attachment of the poles running from the front axel along the sides of a horse for steering, but there is no hint in the wagon kit ( nor in the harness-hitch kit) that this is the case. 
But, I couldn’t have been too disappointed with the kit since I have recently purchased the beer wagon and two-horse hitch kits. 
Again, it was a big help following your log. 

Being grandson to a blacksmith and great-nephew to a wheelwright I was attracted to this kit as a break from model shipbuilding, and I have just finished building it. I found your build log very helpful especially for the reach-fifth wheel assembly … I agree, the instructions could have been better in this regard. 
Regarding the question of when to paint the Britannia fittings:  There seems to be no avoiding several attempts, whether painted prior to assembly or after. Seems every modeling session included painting and touch-up. 
Regarding the wheel spoke length:  You are right, they are exactly the right length. In fact, I found that after cleaning the char from the spokes and rims, the spokes were too short. I solved this by wrapping the interior groove of the hubs with several turns of tape to effectively make the hub diameter larger. 
The kit, I thought, was deficient in a couple of ways. First, there is no detailing of any breaking mechanism. Second, and more frustratingly, there is no means for attaching the wagon to a horse, even after purchasing the single horse harness-hitch kit. Conceivably, the mysterious “axel couplings” might have been intended to facilitate the attachment of the poles running from the front axel along the sides of a horse for steering, but there is no hint in the wagon kit ( nor in the harness-hitch kit) that this is the case. 
But, I couldn’t have been too disappointed with the kit since I have recently purchased the beer wagon and two-horse hitch kits. 
Again, it was a big help following your log. 

Being grandson to a blacksmith and great-nephew to a wheelwright I was attracted to this kit as a break from model shipbuilding, and I have just finished building it. I found your build log very helpful especially for the reach-fifth wheel assembly … I agree, the instructions could have been better in this regard. 
Regarding the question of when to paint the Britannia fittings:  There seems to be no avoiding several attempts, whether painted prior to assembly or after. Seems every modeling session included painting and touch-up. 
Regarding the wheel spoke length:  You are right, they are exactly the right length. In fact, I found that after cleaning the char from the spokes and rims, the spokes were too short. I solved this by wrapping the interior groove of the hubs with several turns of tape to effectively make the hub diameter larger. 
The kit, I thought, was deficient in a couple of ways. First, there is no detailing of any breaking mechanism. Second, and more frustratingly, there is no means for attaching the wagon to a horse, even after purchasing the single horse harness-hitch kit. Conceivably, the mysterious “axel couplings” might have been intended to facilitate the attachment of the poles running from the front axel along the sides of a horse for steering, but there is no hint in the wagon kit ( nor in the harness-hitch kit) that this is the case. 
But, I couldn’t have been too disappointed with the kit since I have recently purchased the beer wagon and two-horse hitch kits. 
Again, it was a big help following your log.