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Thanks, Greg. Tricky would be one word. A right-royal-pain-in-the-*** would be another.

I reached a milestone today: the first planking belt has been completed. So far, I am pleased with the appearance. For anyone toying with the idea of building a clinker- planked hull, I am finding this a lot more difficult than carvel construction. There is no room for error and edge-bending that last half-millimeter does not work the way is would on a carvel hull. I have found that the easiest way to secure the planks during gluing-up is with planking screws, placing a piece of scrap between the cross-piece of the planking screw and the plank to prevent denting. My layout has a butt joint at frame M. I decided that this was too far forward and placed a basswood filler between frames K and M. The first belt has four rows of planking; the upper two belts will each have five. So far it appears that a stealer will not be necessary but I will have a dropped plank in the upper belt.

Thanks, Paul.

After you posted, I went back to my discs and noticed the same problem. The situation is as follows: you (and I) have the original discs from the early 2000's sold by Clay Feldman. The discs sold by the NRG are not the same. The NRG Early Years disc includes the information on the 4 discs sold by Clay. The Middle and Later Years discs contain the remaining volumes. The NRG indices work on Win 7 and 10; Clay's discs only work on XP. To view these articles you would need to have the Later Years disc.

Thank you to everyone for the likes. JD, I am using diluted yellow glue. And yes, I am gluing along the rabbet as well as on the bulkhead. I tried it with gluing just the bulkhead for fear of glue bleeding out onto the hull but that was a disaster. Waiting for the glue to become tacky has prevented any problems.

Thank you, druxey. That is the only place there will be an issue. I did several layouts and this one was the least problematic unless I installed bulkhead filler blocks. This is the first POB model I have made in a long time; I really appreciate the spacing options provided by POF construction.

Planking has commenced. Thanks to everyone who responded to my request for more information on clinker planking. Before any planking could be cut, the planking belts needed to be laid out. This was done with chart tape. The lowest rows of tape represent the garboard and broad strakes. The garboard was made up of four planks. It feathers into the sternpost and keel at the deadwood and ends on the stem just above the boxing joint. On the upper part of all the planks is a rabbet to accommodate the overlapping plank. After some experimentation and based on the diagram from Goodwin's book on Alert, I decided to make the rabbet approximately one-third the width of the plank and at a 10 degree angle. The prototype had a narrower rabbet but this gave me a wider gluing surface. The rabbet was formed on the mill and cut to a depth of 2/3 the thickness of the plank at the widest part. The broad strake was made up of three planks. At the stern and stem posts the clinkering gradually tapers to a smooth surface. The overlap of the planks is easily seen in the next pictures. The easiest place to see the planking rabbet is on the broad strake at frame "H". These pictures illustrate the tapering of the garboard and broad strakes into the keel and stern post, and each other.

I have a variety of 'gators...3", 5", 7", straight, curved, serrated teeth and toothless. The same with Bellucci scissors (the correct name for alligator scissors). After all, I am an ENT. I rarely use any of them and reach instead for curved watchmakers forceps or a Webster needle holder. The scissors are not designed to cut thread larger than 7-0 (0.07mm diameter) and would dull quickly with rigging thread. I do not know about the cheap ones but "real" ones are made from a an alloy that is next to impossible to sharpen except by a professional. The same can be said for Castro-Viejo's but I have used them to cut nylon serving line since the diameter I use is 8-0. The Webster has no serrations on its jaws so it will not shred rigging thread.

On the contemporary model, the hull is clinkered below the wale. No fastenings are shown either above or below the wale, which prompted the question initially. I am showing her at the time of commissioning in 1779. She was not coppered until 1780.

All they had at the local store was coated wire so I ordered bare wire from Amazon. I was not sure how the coating would affect the patina over time, as I will not be blackening the copper. I considered purchasing Goodwin's Alert until I saw the price: $153 plus shipping!

Thanks everyone. Roger, that article is perfect. For anyone else who is interested, it is on page 204, not 220, December 1999. That issue has several other interesting articles: capstans, building Cyane by Gil McArdle and how to make planking clamps. B.E, I do not have Goodwin's book. If it isn't too much bother, please send me the information. Allan, I was surprised how inexpensive a roll of copper was. I have decided to use 3/4 inch copper nails which at scale is 0.02" or 24 gauge.

I will do my best to explain. As you go aft, the angle of the garboard relative to the keel diminishes from almost 90 degrees at the dead flat to zero at the deadwood. The "notch" represents that transition point. The photo in the manual is exaggerated. This is a picture of the area in question. The transition is in blue. Omitting it is OK too.. The shape of the garboard is different on every ship and depends on the hull shape. On this hull, the width of center part of the garboard does not change much.

John, druxey, thank you for the information. Time to start looking for the appropriate diameter copper wire.

I am getting ready to begin the planking on Swallow 1779, a British clinker-planked cutter purchased by the Royal Navy when half built. I cannot find any reference as to how the hull planking would have been fastened to the frames. Any help would be appreciated.

Then again, some people really like catfish!

Thanks for the information, druxey. By any chance, would you know why pear is so susceptible to insect problems whereas other fruit woods (like apple) are not?

I do not have any reference other than logic. If the rudder needed to be unshipped, at least some of the platform decking would need to be removed to raise the rudder high enough to clear the pintles. I am also guessing that it would be much easier to install the tiller if you could see the mortise in the rudder head, rather than blindly fishing around with a relatively heavy chunk of wood. Also, on the photo of the model, the center planks are missing, exposing the rudder head. Leaving only the center part of the platform unplanked was my original plan but as this is a POB model, the area looked too messy to leave open. I much prefer the look of natural pear vs. swissed. I find the latter too pink. My understanding is that the steaming process makes the wood more stable but my billets are over 20 years old and show no cracking or warping.

There have not been any modifications to the half hull kit this year. Did you have something specific in mind?

My very sophisticated background is a black fleece blanket! It works nicely since it does not show wrinkles and is extremely portable. I am thinking of buying a light grey one for a more neutral background.

This is probably the last update for a few weeks. There is always so much to accomplish when the weather is nice. After the rudder was finished, I located where the tiller would have been inserted and made a square opening for it. I could now finish the platform. I viewed the platform as a lightweight structure which had no permanent fastenings. Boards could be removed to get access to the rudder head and the whole assembly could be disassembled for extra deck space when in action. For this reason I made the structure from box rather from the holly I was using as decking. For the same reason, there are no treenails. Later I will add ring bolts to facilitate removal of some of the boards. The model shows two rows of planking on the platform bulkhead. The lower row is thicker and I duplicated this here. The center opening is for the sweep of the tiller.

Thanks John. I agree Gregory that it is a unique appearance. It is simply pear (not swiss pear) that I had been saving for several years. I will be using the same wood for the hull planking.

Having learned my sequencing lesson, I decided to make the rudder while I would still have access to the area under where the platform will be built. The shape of the rudder was taken off the plans except that it was shortened to just below the platform planking. The rudder is made from three pieces: the main piece, the blade and the backing piece. The plans did not show a sole piece. The main and backing pieces were made with a simplified table joint and black paper was used to represent the felt between the two pieces. The width of the main piece mirrored the width of the sternpost; the blade tapered to 3" aft. The joints were initially all cut with a chisel but after making a mess of two blade blanks, I made the blade cuts on the mill. The backing piece with its felt were added and the mortises for the pintles were made. A line was drawn on the fore end of the rudder, through the back of the pintle mortises; this is the bearding line. The for end of the rudder was then tapered from the bearding line to the midline of the fore rudder. This allowed the rudder to rotate freely with minimal gap between it and the sternpost. Finally, a coat of finish was applied. An egg-shaped opening was made in the counter to accommodate the rudder head through its arc of rotation. I have also replaced some of the planks on the stern, eliminating the previous gap next to the sternpost.

Well, Druxey, there was not much in that bottle to begin with! This is the first time that I am building a model from plans I developed and without a specific sequence of construction. I should have consistently followed the same sequence set down in TFFM. But even though it is frustrating, I am learning an incredible amount from even my floundering.

Time to direct attention to the counter and transom. Swallow has a square stern. The model shows these planks installed on the bias. I used pear for these planks as that is what the hull will be planked with. I left them long to allow for notching for the hull's clinker planking. The counter and the transom are planked with costello. Each plank is cut to shape, not edge bent. In the third picture the length of the counter is best appreciated. The transom will have a decorative treatment applied later. It looks different because I chose not to apply a finish to it. The gap between the transom and counter will be covered with a decorative molding. The gap between the sternpost and the stern planking will need to be addressed. This takes me to the sternpost. As I was planking the stern it suddenly occurred to me that I had not installed the sternpost. This is 13" wide at the top, tapering to 10" at the keel. The aft edge is rounded over and the rebates for the gudgeons are cut in. Since I did not want to remove the aft segment of keel, this was incredibly difficult to maneuver into place. To my horror, the keel was 1/4" too short. My only option was to remove the aft section of the keel and two sections of keelson and replace it with a longer piece. I had not been pleased with the appearance of that section of the keel so this problem was a blessing in disguise. The photo shows the old and new sections for comparison. The shim under the keelson is to keep the ship level in the building board as there is a curve in the bow fore and aft. The color difference will decrease after another coat of finish is applied. The bulwarks are still a little high to prevent damage prior to installing the cap rail. My biggest hope is that all of the serious problems are behind me!

It has been a long time since posting any real progress. Sorry, but I would rather be in the garden than in a work room. Over the last few months I have found myself replacing most of the inner and outer planking and a portion of the deck. After the outer and inner bulwark planking was finished I realized that the bottom of the oar ports should run in the same line as the bottom of the gun ports. As you can see from the following picture, they did not. So the planking was removed where necessary and the oar ports were framed in the proper location, as seen in the second picture. The paint on the decorative strip looks the worse for wear but this will be touched up towards the end of the build. I had originally made the thicker part of the inner bulwark planking one row. Further research told me that this should be made two rows wide and therefore, after the inner bulwark planking was rebuilt after repositioning the oar ports, it was necessary to remove it all again to replace the lower row with two rows of planking. At this point I decided to construct the beams for the aft platform. I discovered that I had misinterpreted the plans. The model shows an aft platform with the tiller coming out from under the platform. The plans, in retrospect, do not show a platform at all and the fore end of the tiller is shown to be almost four feet above the deck. The lines which I thought represented the fore and top of the platform were in fact a decorative molding line and a station line. I will simply say that when I discovered this situation I walked out of the work room and poured myself a stiff drink (maybe two). I had to decide between the model and the plans. So far, whenever there has been a conflict, I have gone with the plans. This time I decided to use the model as my guide. I had planked the deck "knowing" that the platform would extend almost to the last gun port. In examining the model, the platform only extends to a few feet aft of the gun port. Therefore it was necessary to remove and replace all of the decking aft of the capstan platform to compensate for the too-short deck. (Back to that bottle, I'm afraid.) I installed two beams to support the platform planking and planked the transom bulwark. I was very lucky to match the color of the old and new decking. The first picture shows the end of the planking initially. The others are after the deck was elongated. The notch on the bottom of the front beam is for the sweep of the tiller.