Tim Curtis

THIS POST IS WHERE I AM AT THE MOMENT.
 
Installing the bridge railings. The gaps seen near the traffic lights is for the swing gates that block the road traffic.

Painted the railings and the cement parts. The road is concrete (cement with gravel) and will be my next job.


That's it so far.
Will be posting updates as I reach certain milestones.
 

Tim! Thank you for Your prayers in my behalf! Tomorrow I have a study on the MRI, but I'm sure everything will be fine! I hold onto life with both hands!

How is your health? I pray for you.
Tim

The fourth production

 

 

 

 

Due to illness I am forced to stay at home, but my hands found to do.

Hello all,
I have not posted in a while but I have been picking away at odds and ends.  I finish sanded the outer planking above the wales, moved a gunport that was in the wrong location... but we won't talk about that much.  I mistook a centerline of the port for the edge and it ended up a 1/2 port too much aft.  It was the gun port just forward of where the stairs on the outside hull would be.  On the picture above (post #95) it was the 6th one from the bow on the port side.  It needed to be moved forward.  That is now behind me and only the people who read this post will know.   All the port linings are finished and now I am dry fitting the deck beams for the upper gun deck.  Things are going a bit slower now that the weather is pretty nice and other hobbies are kicking in.  Just wondering, is spring yard clean up considered a hobby???  I have been waiting for the "yard fairies" to show up but it doesn't look promising.
 
I also need to start figuring out how I am going to get my Constellation to the Northeast Ship Modelers Show in New London, CT at the end of the month.

Start building and dry fitting the upper deck beams.
 
Tom

I finished the planking above the wales... finally.  Still need to do some final sanding but the hard work is done at least for the top half.  I think I will start back on the decks and work to dry fit the upper gun deck to make sure all my cannon ports will line up correctly.  It will also break up the time spent planking and allow me to continue to use my current jig to hold the hull upright and square for as long as possible while working on other things.  I picked up a nice little tip from our own mtaylor if I remember correctly about using painters tape to cover up all the grates and other holes on deck to help keep the sanding dust from going to the below decks.  Thank MSW and mtaylor!!
Enjoy the pics,
Tom



Tom

Start of small boats production

Today to keep things moving I decided to tackle the main boom.  Lots of little details to be worked out - the hull is different from the Pride of Baltimore rigging plans I am using so I need to adjust, like extending the boom length.Again happy with the result and in only a few hours.
 

Lots of tiddly bits, made from the scrapwood pile.  Boxwood for the jaws, and basswood for everything else.  Metal straps are again scrapbooking black paper.  Even needed cleats on the underside.  I am reminded why I like 1/48th scale, I couldn't have done this any smaller.

Still need the boom rest added to the main mast and the ring tail boom extension but that will be for another day.

Cheers!  Mark

Coamings installed and making progress on decking. Using the supplied basswood, I'm going to leave the finish natural. From what  can tell the Emma at Mystic now has the deck painted black; I'm going to paint the rest of the boat so I really would like to see some natural wood. Artistic license! I'm using a mat finish lacquer from a spray can and will rub it down.
 
BTW, I deliberately sorted out my deck wood by shade, and tried to vary the shades of adjoining planks to add contrast and "interest". I'm not sure that I'm happy with the result, it might be a little "much"!
 
You can see the importance I place on an orderly and neat work area!
 
The color to use for the bulwarks and sides of cabins is a pale off-white, cabin roof and hatch covers are a more yellowish "buff". I have a couple Floquil railroad colors in my stash that should work but they're up at the lake so I'll let you know what I will use over the next couple days.
 
I won't make much progress this coming week (I'm drywalling and taping my daughter's garage) but hope to finish the deck, do some sanding and filling of the hull, and start the bulwarks.
 
Please let me know if you have any questions!
 
Steve

Hi all,
 
I've been gone getting my ticker re-plumbed. Had a bad ekg, then a heart catheterization for a stent, found out a stent wouldn't work. I had a triple bypass at the Gainesville/Shands V.A. Hospital within 4 days. Had a bleed, they stopped that. I went home for  3 weeks and passed out. Ambulance to Tallahassee this time as they could only get me back to the V.A. hospital by chopper for $40.000. I spent 5 more days with them trying to figure out where my blood went. Anyways, the V.A. was terrific [Tallahassee too] and I'm all patched up and am shortly to finish Lightning. Below are some pictures of me adding rigging that I forgot to put on earlier. It is a terrible job getting in behind what was there. Also Lightning has that recessed deck with the flying bridges making it very hard to get to the belaying pins.

My wife rescued me. Here are pictures showing the hinged parrel, and a yard going up. Note that I attached the rigging to the yard before putting the yard up. At this stage I found the work the hardest part of the build yet. I have the whole mizzen complete, part of the main, and the fore royal up. I'll post this work soon.
 
For now I'd like to include some detail shots of other parts of the ship also. Some related to rigging, some not. Some show fairleads
 
Bruce.
 
 

As soon as the ratlines are done I will mount the davits and boats. Braces go over this area so I think it's time to put them on. Another thing to catch a finger on...
 
I have no pictures yet but I'm doing the ratlines. I quickly learned to use tape wrapped around the tweezers to limit the amount they open. They would damage the work when they opened.
 
For doing work shaping blocks I modified a set of tweezers. A lot of blocks are tiny at this scale. Some smaller than a grain of rice.  I'll try to remember to take a picture of them.
 
All the photos for a bit. I've a brass Fairfield coal drag conveyor and a stock pen to build to bring some money in. It kills me to have to take time off from the Lightning. I'll keep an eye though to reply to anyone.
 
Bruce

Young America - extreme clipper 1853
Part 209 Forestay
 
The forestay was a fairly simple job to install, but before getting into it, I should say a few words about my sequence.  I am sure there are many approaches to this, but my general plan is to work fore to aft, bottom up, so I will do the standing rigging on the lower masts, working aft, then either go on to the lower yards or topmasts – not decided yet.  Details on the lower shrouds like fairleads, staves and ratlines will be added later when convenient.
 
The first picture shows the installed forestay.
 

 
It is 10½" rope (like the lower shrouds), doubled around the masthead with a seized collar, secured with four seizings on each leg to bullseyes with iron straps shackled to eyebolts in the knightheads.  These were installed earlier.  The lower legs are seized together above the lower seizings.  The rope is served around the collar and at the lower ends and the upper part around the masthead is leathered.
 
The next picture shows the leathered collar bedded on the shrouds.
 

 
The next picture shows the extent of the upper serving and leathering and the upper seizing.
 

 
In the next picture the lower ends of the stay have been hauled up and clipped so the seizings can be put on.
 
 
 
The starboard seizing has been started in the picture.  The next picture shows the lower legs completed and the lower seizing installed to pull them together.
 

 
Finally, the completed stay from above.
 

 
There is quite a bit of work to do on the bowsprit, but because the forestay is secured at the knightheads, I can defer this until the fore topmast is being fitted.
 
Next, the main and mizzen lower mast rigging, but first I want to replace all those topmast backstay chains and channel deadeyes discussed in an earlier post.
 
Ed

Richard
 
Thank you. I quite like yachts - the lines are elegant and the planking has less severe curves than many vessels, hence its easier to produce a reasonable result. I am a little surprised the more builders don't build yachts before moving on to something more challenging. I did a years machine training when I stared my apprenticeship and then did no more for 44 years. Many retirees seem to start using machine tools when they retire and quickly become proficient - helped by many good you tube videos. As you have used lathe I don't think you would find learning milling would be a problem. 
 
Today I started on the mast fittings. I think this will be a topic for some time.
 
Altair has a waterproof boot between the bottom of the mast and the deck. This covers the reinforcing ring at deck level. The shape of the reinforcing ring gives some definition to the canvas of the boot. I thought It would be worth making a reasonable job of the reinforcing ring because the shape was interesting enough to provide a different machining challenge.
 
I turned the basic profile of the 2 reinforcing rings on the lathe before cutting 8 slots on the mill (with a .160" end mill) to represent webs. (The turned profiles are one behind the other on the brass bar in the photo below.) Drilling out the bore was the final operation before parting off. The bar is .750" diameter and the bore is .500'. The height is .375".


In the photo below I am milling the slots in the second ring - the bar is held in a chuck mounted on a rotary table. 
 

I have included a few shots of the first ring in position on the fore mast.
Here is the second ring on the main mast.I made a start on the fore mast lower spider - when complete it will have a couple of winches attached plus some other detail.
 

This set of photos shows the progress on the windlass and the lining on the main deck. The lining needs to be installed so the crank handles can be added. I don’t have an organized approach to building but she seems to be moving along well.

Today I spent a frustrating few hours trying to remember the form of the mast location feature I had cut into keel. For the life of me I couldn't remember. I resorted to peering down the 1/2 inch mast holes cut in the deck, this approach was destined to fail. I then tried to use a skewer to feel the shape, another stupid idea that didn't work. I gave up, had a cup of tea and switched on the computer. Coincidentally it opened on page 1 of my build log and there staring me in the face was the answer. I felt like a complete idiot!!!!!
 

With this vital piece of information I set about milling U shaped slots in the end of two sapele dowels I had purchase for the main and fore masts. Altair's masts are circular and parallel except for the top 1/5. so very little shaping is required.
 

I used the mill because I wanted the slot to be accurately centred so that the masts would be vertical about the centre line and have the correct rake fore and aft.
 
Some time later the masts had been stepped.
 

I use the spirit level to make sure the hull was level and then used precision eyeballing to align the masts with the edge of a window frame. I installed the widow frame some years ago so I knew it was plumb. The rake was checked against a different window frame - spot on at 3/4 inch rake top to bottom.


 I couldn't resist getting a feel for what she would look like so I temporarily put the deckhouses etc in place.



I now have a lot of metal work to do to kit out the masts.

Thank you John.
 
I had been looking forward to a change from doing cleats so I had a go at a bit of detail that I had been looking forward to.
 
The main sheet has 3 attachments to the deck, a single pulley port and starboard and a central double pulley attached to the deck via quite an elaborate shock absorber. Its this latter feature that I decided to attempt next. The sketch shows the detail.
 
The shock absorber has 2 compression springs which close when load is transmitted from the central main sheet block via the floating collars. I thought it would be kind of nice to make a working version. The whole thing is a little over and inch wide and .250 high.
 
The 2 deck fixings were turned from bar and drilled on the mill. I ground a couple of profile lathe tools to assist the task.
 

The floating collars were also turned on the lathe and drilled on the mill. I used the same profile tool that I had used for the balls on the deck fixings. The shaft is .060 wire.
 

The spring was the most difficult bit. I spent ages ferreting through my rainy day boxes until I found something that I could butcher.
 

The floating collars are attached to the block shackle by 2 large U shaped connecting brackets. The brackets pivot on pins protruding from either side of each collar.
 

Nuts on each end of the shaft complete the assembly.
 

Once again the plans are not great and show the shock absorber mounted in the wrong position. The internet saved the day.
 

 

Thursday, March 30, 2017
 
More details, the job begins to get interesting and fun. Now I'm back for 4/5 days in Milan, I plan to return to Pisa next Tuesday. So do not expect news soon.
 
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Wow! Very nice detail in something so small.
 
Jesse

Such lovely work! That lifeboat is brilliant also.

Thanks Pierre and SC. 
Oars made from one piece. Sanded, filed and then bent a little at the ends.
 

Young America - extreme clipper 1853
Part 205 – Making Lower Shrouds
 
Before getting into making shrouds, I completed one more chore that has been on my mind for a while.  The brass poop rail was becoming more tarnished by the day, so considering that it was losing its shiny appeal and that the original was probably iron, I decided to paint the rail white.  See the first picture.
 

 
I decided on white based on the photo taken at San Francisco.  After degreasing with acetone, the rail was painted with gloss white enamel – two coats, slightly thinned.
 
The lower fore shrouds shown in the following pictures are 10½" rope, laid up from three strands of Barbour Irish linen thread.  An adequate discussion of rope making, cotton vs. linen, and size matching is beyond the scope of this log, but I have been working on a description for Volume III.  My rope making "machinery" and process has undergone major development since my first efforts 20+ years ago – but is, of course, still not perfect.  For dimensional reasons and the difficulty in making good four-strand rope without a central core, the shrouds are three-strand, even though four-strand was typically used for these.  They are also right-handed, in keeping with American practice at the time.
 
Shrouds were made in pairs that were looped over the mast head, starting with the forward starboard pair, followed by that pair on the port side and continuing in that way.  In the first picture, the third starboard pair has been cut to length, looped over the mast and is being marked at the ends of its served length – at the futtocks - with a white pencil.
 

 
The shroud was then removed and transferred to the serving machine as shown in the next picture.
 

 
Before putting tension on the rope, needles were inserted through the rope at the white marks so serving thread could be pulled through to help secure each end.  Starting at the right, after pulling the thread through, the rope was then served, initially over the thread end, then up to the second needle which was threaded and pulled through to complete the joint at the second end.  In the next picture, an earlier served shroud has been looped over the mast and is being marked at what will be the top of the seizing to show the extent of the outer parceling that was used as an added protection against damp in the closely packed bights.
 

 
With the shroud stretched between two vises, white PVA glue was applied and the shroud wrapped with strips of tissue, working from each end toward the center as shown below.
 

 
The white PVA dries softer than Titebond making it easier to loop the shrouds later.  After wrapping, the shroud was looped over the mast until the glue dried.  The parceling was then painted with artist's acrylic paint.  After the first coat dried, the seizing was put on as shown below.
 

 
The last picture shows both gangs of shrouds looped over the fore mast head. 
 
 
 
An alligator clip is holding the final pair while the parceling glue dries.  After seizing and painting this pair, the shrouds will be ready for the deadeyes at the lower ends to be turned in.
 
Ed

My health has declined in the last 6 months Haven't been able to do much at all. Have started to rig the breech lines  on the carronades. This kind of work is much more difficult for me now than it was just last year. I see that things will be going much slower for me so there will be longer periods of time between updates but I'll be doing what I can when I can.
 
Not much to show but it's a start.  One of our pets keeping close by for some comfort.
 
Jesse