garyshipwright

Hi everyone,
 
I finally got time over the holidays to get back into the shop and to check out the website. Thank you Ron, and Sailor 123... for your comments. The 74 gun ship of the mid 18th century has the perfect balance of form and function--I learn something new every day about how elegantly the shipwrights met a functional need with a beautiful form. Guy, I would be happy to see anything you might turn up on the Bellona.
 
I finally finished the gun deck framing. I did it in record time, compared to my previous work. I followed Gaetan's advice from some time ago, to keep working systematically at the same task, and it will become easier and faster. I worked out a systematic way of numbering the ledges, and I was able to do each process on each piece, before going back to do the next process on each piece. It helped with a rhythm, and it meant the whole deck was built up in each stage. It was harder that way to say that I had finished a few more bays, and could come back later for the remaining bays. I had to keep working to see any real progress, and then it was all done. It seemed to work for me!
 
I counted up. There are 525 pieces in the deck framing itself--beams, carlings, ledges, and knees. And 856 mortices.
 
I am moving on to framing the stern, for a nice change of scenery. I have made some very interesting discoveries about the Bellona framing, while drafting it up. More on that later.
 
Best wishes,
 
Mark
 

Hi Mark,Happy New Year and thank you .
 
  Your build isn't to bad either sir and looked in a little earlier and must say she look's outstanding. Well I didn't think much about the half circle, :mellow: much like your self, not much detail, and did look for info on it but nothing turn up.  The only thing I know for sure was that it sat on top of the scuttle hole that was used to hand up cartridges for the guns. The other day I was adding the scuttle hatch's and went back to trying to figure out what the half circle was. Funny thing is that on Alfred's plan it's just a half circle also, but at that moment  I  was looking at Montague and saw this little square door on the front of the half circle. Bingo it hit me  and with that clue I finally had a plan of this little item,  that and asking druexy what he thought. To me it is a wooden cover that is installed over top of the hatch with a little door in front for handing out cartridges, that could be removed and stowed when they wasn't shooting at each other. Sort of a safety item to keep things out and impending the handing out cartridges.  I just used the size o the hatch it self Mark along with the height of the circle and made the little box with a little hatch in front , just big enough to hand cartridges out. Funny how you can look at the same item a hundred times and on the hundred and first you see some thing new.   
 
 I marked out the rhodings size on some brass plate and drill the hole first for the bearing, milled out their shape and then cut out the height on the little Preac saw. After that measured the bolt holes and drilled them as you can see in the photo's. Was interesting, being am still learning how to make metal part's. Seems that I have been working on that black art for a long time.
 
  As for the deck transom, that was a bit of luck with the help Alex M and his plans. It helped me to figure out how this item was really made. I tried to add this transom but by the time I got it to fit and the middle cut to fit around the rudder there wasn't any strength left to the transom. After seeing how he had made his transom drawing, went looking in the plan's I have and came across a couple that show's how they made this part, so I redid the part and now I had a good strong transom for the upper gun deck.   Also looked to see if this has a rabbet on the front edge for the planking and have not come across one. 
 
Hi Johann and happy New year to you to. Thank you sir, and am finding that by following your log that it is really teaching me a lot. Seems that your metal work is wearing off on me, and maybe one day mine might be half as good as your's. 
 
Thanks John and Happy New Year. Well good sir its all Johann fault.  Seems that I have gone just a little metal crazy from seeing his work, either that, or I have chips on the brain. 
 
Thanks Ben. Problem with the detail sir is that yesterday detail  was great the last time you looked at it ,but  today you ripped it out just because its missing a bolt.   Believe me it will really up your game at making small holes in really small things. 
 
Gary

Hello every one.
I was going through the AOTS of Bellona and on page 27 is a midsection of a 74 gun ship. Am looking for some information on the lower capstan in the model and was wondering what the time frame of it would be and maybe if it has a name other then midship. Am trying to figure about the drop pawl's on the lower capstan and maybe if they came in to use early then what Lavery is saying which is 1787 time frame. I do know that a new type of capstan was insalled on the Defiance in 1772, with drop pawl's, but after testing it it seems to have lost favor and nothing more on drop pawl's untill 1790 or so. The capstan was invented by Anton Eckhardt  who was a prolific inventor of the late eighteenth century. Any way if you know any more about the model in the Bellona book please let me know. I have gone to the NMM but  didn't turn up anything. Thanks folks.
 
Gary

Thank you all, for your support and kind words.
 
I challenged myself that I wouldn't make another post until I finished the frames.  I didn't think this was very much of a challenge, as I thought it would be four or five hours work to do the half frames.   Now it is ten hours later (where does the time go?) and I can report progress.
 
I spent much of the day in this situation--
 

 
 
Some frames, having been wet and heated, are clamped to set the curvature, while I hold a freshly glued frame in place with my fingers until the glue sets.  The boat is in there, somewhere.
 
 
Here, the last two frames are clamped to set the curve--
 

 
 
I dropped the boat onto my wood floor twice.  The second time I had four clothespins attached, and I was sure some planking would spring loose, but there were no ill effects.
 
Now all frames are done.  I think.  There are a few that draw my eye due to uneven placement.  I don't know yet whether I will adjust them.
 

 
 
In this view they look more uniform--
 

 
 
There is still quite a lot to do on this boat--
 

 
 
Cheers,
Ron

Thanks, John!
 
Here I have all but one of the full frames bent and labeled.  As I did each one I marked a small "x" on the top of the plug to help me remember which I had done as I went along--
 

 
 
A comparison between a rough frame and a sanded frame--
 

 
 
A few of the frames glued in, and another unfinished frame for comparison--
 
 
 
 
Carefully sanding a frame, first on the inside, for smoothness.  220, then 320, then 600 grit--
 
 
 
 
Then scrubbing on flat sandpaper for the sided dimension, 220, then 600.  I ended up leaving the frames about 3/64 inch wide--
 

 
 
Then the outside (the face to be glued to the planks) was sanded with a small strip of 150 grit sandpaper to reduce the frame to a final thickness of 1/32 inch--
 

 
 
Then the frame can be glued into place.  The clothespins are holding the "pre-bend" of last full frame as it dries.  The frame just glued in hasn't had it's ends trimmed yet--
 

 
 
Current progress with all the full frames glued in--
 

 

 
 
Ron

Thank you very much, Michael.   Best wishes for a happy new year to you and yours!
 
Current activity in the workshop:
 
Removed the last strake of planking.  I might be able to reuse this, or some of it, for the washboard.  My pencil marks on the keel for the frame locations, every 12 inches in scale, are visible--
 

 
 
Wetting and clamping the frames in to set the curve.  After immersing a length of frame stock in boiling water for 20 to 30 seconds, I slowly bend it around the plug.  After that's successfully done (I've lost some material because the wood sometimes doesn't hold together around the sharper curves), I cut the frame piece from the longer length, and transfer it to the hull shell.  Dealing with my fingers and the clothes pins, I can only place a few of these at a time----
 

 
 
Since wetting the wood expands the grain, (and it doesn't shrink back completely, or smoothly, when dry), I've cut these a little full.  When dry I'll need to sand them down to about 1/32 inch square--1 1/2 inch in scale, before gluing them in.  
 
Ron

Hi Mark,Happy New Year and thank you .
 
  Your build isn't to bad either sir and looked in a little earlier and must say she look's outstanding. Well I didn't think much about the half circle, :mellow: much like your self, not much detail, and did look for info on it but nothing turn up.  The only thing I know for sure was that it sat on top of the scuttle hole that was used to hand up cartridges for the guns. The other day I was adding the scuttle hatch's and went back to trying to figure out what the half circle was. Funny thing is that on Alfred's plan it's just a half circle also, but at that moment  I  was looking at Montague and saw this little square door on the front of the half circle. Bingo it hit me  and with that clue I finally had a plan of this little item,  that and asking druexy what he thought. To me it is a wooden cover that is installed over top of the hatch with a little door in front for handing out cartridges, that could be removed and stowed when they wasn't shooting at each other. Sort of a safety item to keep things out and impending the handing out cartridges.  I just used the size o the hatch it self Mark along with the height of the circle and made the little box with a little hatch in front , just big enough to hand cartridges out. Funny how you can look at the same item a hundred times and on the hundred and first you see some thing new.   
 
 I marked out the rhodings size on some brass plate and drill the hole first for the bearing, milled out their shape and then cut out the height on the little Preac saw. After that measured the bolt holes and drilled them as you can see in the photo's. Was interesting, being am still learning how to make metal part's. Seems that I have been working on that black art for a long time.
 
  As for the deck transom, that was a bit of luck with the help Alex M and his plans. It helped me to figure out how this item was really made. I tried to add this transom but by the time I got it to fit and the middle cut to fit around the rudder there wasn't any strength left to the transom. After seeing how he had made his transom drawing, went looking in the plan's I have and came across a couple that show's how they made this part, so I redid the part and now I had a good strong transom for the upper gun deck.   Also looked to see if this has a rabbet on the front edge for the planking and have not come across one. 
 
Hi Johann and happy New year to you to. Thank you sir, and am finding that by following your log that it is really teaching me a lot. Seems that your metal work is wearing off on me, and maybe one day mine might be half as good as your's. 
 
Thanks John and Happy New Year. Well good sir its all Johann fault.  Seems that I have gone just a little metal crazy from seeing his work, either that, or I have chips on the brain. 
 
Thanks Ben. Problem with the detail sir is that yesterday detail  was great the last time you looked at it ,but  today you ripped it out just because its missing a bolt.   Believe me it will really up your game at making small holes in really small things. 
 
Gary

Hi Alistair. Your very welcome sir. At the moment am still probably go with the frapping and some gun's in different placement like being tied up  but that is hopfully in the near future.
 
Have a small update guys. The planking of the gun deck is finish  and should not be adding any more at the moment. The Captain did come around and talked about overhauling the pumps and bearings and a few other things. The old bushing set was wooden,  and figure I would try to make some metal ones. Figure that if I don't work more with metal, won't ever get any better at it. Do believe I finally figure out and got myself some good drill bits, for drilling very tiny holes in metal. With the sensitive drilling attachment  it helps me big time, from breaking a ton of the small bits. Any way I milled out the shape of the roding's, believe thats what they are called and drilled the holes for the bolts to keep them in place.
 
  The pump housing tubes and main mast partner was taken out and given a new look and then reinstalled , the partner and pump tubes that is. Also added the aft scuttle hatches with the cover some what just sitting on the bottom half. Now I did come across a item and thought it would be nice to add. On Montagu and other 74 gun ships they had this half circle cover, which I believe was made of wood, had one small door in front, just big enough to hand out cartridges,  and covered the scuttle hatch that was used to hand up the cartridges from the orlop deck. This hatch was between the aft riding bitt's.  It probably was stored when they were working the anchors and cables. Another up date in the works folk's.
 
Just something to think about  folks,the next time you have to glue something in place. If you can just peg the item to the hull or deck with maybe a bit of glue on the peg, it just might save you from having a headack on your hands. Just to give you a ideal of this, all of Montagu gun deck planks are only held in place with a tiny bit of glue on the pegs. If I had to tear out or remove some planking all one has to do is pry up the plank sand down the peg's and your ready to go. When I first installed the main partner and pump's very little glue was used and things were more or less just pegged in place. Made removing them a whole lot easier and clean up was a snap. Just something to keep in mind folks. 
Gary 



 

Hi Johann and Happy New Year        .
 
Thank you for the new photo's.  I really wish more would show how they make their fitting's as you do. Am  not the best in the world at doing that but will try harder in the future. By showing other's your work it is like the teacher showing the students how to read or do math, which I always need help on.  Thank you very very much. Even the small bits are a real joy to see how you make them. Look fwd to seeing more in the future sir. Just a question sir but what type of drill bit's do you use and were do you get them? They look like bit's made for brass.
 
Gary

Hi Johann and Happy New Year        .
 
Thank you for the new photo's.  I really wish more would show how they make their fitting's as you do. Am  not the best in the world at doing that but will try harder in the future. By showing other's your work it is like the teacher showing the students how to read or do math, which I always need help on.  Thank you very very much. Even the small bits are a real joy to see how you make them. Look fwd to seeing more in the future sir. Just a question sir but what type of drill bit's do you use and were do you get them? They look like bit's made for brass.
 
Gary

Hi Alistair. Your very welcome sir. At the moment am still probably go with the frapping and some gun's in different placement like being tied up  but that is hopfully in the near future.
 
Have a small update guys. The planking of the gun deck is finish  and should not be adding any more at the moment. The Captain did come around and talked about overhauling the pumps and bearings and a few other things. The old bushing set was wooden,  and figure I would try to make some metal ones. Figure that if I don't work more with metal, won't ever get any better at it. Do believe I finally figure out and got myself some good drill bits, for drilling very tiny holes in metal. With the sensitive drilling attachment  it helps me big time, from breaking a ton of the small bits. Any way I milled out the shape of the roding's, believe thats what they are called and drilled the holes for the bolts to keep them in place.
 
  The pump housing tubes and main mast partner was taken out and given a new look and then reinstalled , the partner and pump tubes that is. Also added the aft scuttle hatches with the cover some what just sitting on the bottom half. Now I did come across a item and thought it would be nice to add. On Montagu and other 74 gun ships they had this half circle cover, which I believe was made of wood, had one small door in front, just big enough to hand out cartridges,  and covered the scuttle hatch that was used to hand up the cartridges from the orlop deck. This hatch was between the aft riding bitt's.  It probably was stored when they were working the anchors and cables. Another up date in the works folk's.
 
Just something to think about  folks,the next time you have to glue something in place. If you can just peg the item to the hull or deck with maybe a bit of glue on the peg, it just might save you from having a headack on your hands. Just to give you a ideal of this, all of Montagu gun deck planks are only held in place with a tiny bit of glue on the pegs. If I had to tear out or remove some planking all one has to do is pry up the plank sand down the peg's and your ready to go. When I first installed the main partner and pump's very little glue was used and things were more or less just pegged in place. Made removing them a whole lot easier and clean up was a snap. Just something to keep in mind folks. 
Gary 



 

Hello Doris and Happy New Year 
Not sure what to say that has not allready been said but for one to talk about your work, one would have to put you in the ranks of Michelangelo, Willem Van De Velde, Grinling Gibbons and a few other's. Outstanding Doris, just outstanding. 
Gary

Hi Johann and Happy New Year        .
 
Thank you for the new photo's.  I really wish more would show how they make their fitting's as you do. Am  not the best in the world at doing that but will try harder in the future. By showing other's your work it is like the teacher showing the students how to read or do math, which I always need help on.  Thank you very very much. Even the small bits are a real joy to see how you make them. Look fwd to seeing more in the future sir. Just a question sir but what type of drill bit's do you use and were do you get them? They look like bit's made for brass.
 
Gary

Finished cabins and other details




General view:

Dear friends,

first I want to wish you all the best for the New Year.

I am pleased and honoured reading your posts, thank you very much for your support and feedback. I appreciate it a lot.
Well, I build paper models over 30 years and still there are plenty of things, I could make better. The most important is - to do it with love.

Yesterday I finished the cabins, so I am bringing now many pics and you can enjoy the atmosphere of luxury interior in Royal Caroline yacht. I do not have exact description or plans of real cabins (suppose it does not preserved), so I created it by my own imagination and taste.

About removable roofs - it is a question - of course this could be interesting opportunity to watch the interior in a full detail, but the ship will have complete masts and rigging so that makes impossible to move/remove the decks and roofs. I did not thought about this solution.
BTW, all is visible through the windows, especially after lighting.
 
Some pics -  view into the windows

Hello,
I wish you all a happy new year.
And here it goes further with the current preparation of the strap hinges.
First, the bands (1.6 / 0.4 mm) were cut from sheet brass. Then the bushings were cut from a brass round tube.
  
 


To be continued ...

Looking good Ed. She has come a long way since you started her. Seems that am going to have to get some more popcorn and take a bathroom break so hold on till I get back. Wonderful build Ed. Gary

Hi Alistair. Your very welcome sir. At the moment am still probably go with the frapping and some gun's in different placement like being tied up  but that is hopfully in the near future.
 
Have a small update guys. The planking of the gun deck is finish  and should not be adding any more at the moment. The Captain did come around and talked about overhauling the pumps and bearings and a few other things. The old bushing set was wooden,  and figure I would try to make some metal ones. Figure that if I don't work more with metal, won't ever get any better at it. Do believe I finally figure out and got myself some good drill bits, for drilling very tiny holes in metal. With the sensitive drilling attachment  it helps me big time, from breaking a ton of the small bits. Any way I milled out the shape of the roding's, believe thats what they are called and drilled the holes for the bolts to keep them in place.
 
  The pump housing tubes and main mast partner was taken out and given a new look and then reinstalled , the partner and pump tubes that is. Also added the aft scuttle hatches with the cover some what just sitting on the bottom half. Now I did come across a item and thought it would be nice to add. On Montagu and other 74 gun ships they had this half circle cover, which I believe was made of wood, had one small door in front, just big enough to hand out cartridges,  and covered the scuttle hatch that was used to hand up the cartridges from the orlop deck. This hatch was between the aft riding bitt's.  It probably was stored when they were working the anchors and cables. Another up date in the works folk's.
 
Just something to think about  folks,the next time you have to glue something in place. If you can just peg the item to the hull or deck with maybe a bit of glue on the peg, it just might save you from having a headack on your hands. Just to give you a ideal of this, all of Montagu gun deck planks are only held in place with a tiny bit of glue on the pegs. If I had to tear out or remove some planking all one has to do is pry up the plank sand down the peg's and your ready to go. When I first installed the main partner and pump's very little glue was used and things were more or less just pegged in place. Made removing them a whole lot easier and clean up was a snap. Just something to keep in mind folks. 
Gary 



 

Looking good Ed. She has come a long way since you started her. Seems that am going to have to get some more popcorn and take a bathroom break so hold on till I get back. Wonderful build Ed. Gary

Hi
I wish you a happy 2014
 
last photos 2013 of the Fleuron
 


 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
rekon54

talk to you soon
rekon54

Young America - extreme clipper 1853
Part 32 – Frame Alignment/Fairing
 
The aft half and cant frames are bolted to the sides of the keelson/deadwood, so these cannot be installed until that assembly is in place.  The keelson comes first, but to install that it is necessary to have the inboard faces of at least the floor timbers well faired.
 
The first step was to check and, if necessary, adjust the alignment of the installed square frames.  The first picture shows this being done with a batten.
 

 
It can be seen in this picture that there is a gap over the center frame.  To correct this, the pin holding the top of the frame to the ribband was removed and the frame pushed downward slightly on this side to adjust it outward.  A new pinhole was drilled while holding the corrected position – as shown in the next photo.
 

 
All the frames aft of 0, on both sides were checked and five or six were adjusted in this way before proceeding with the next steps.
 
The outsides of the frames between the floor heads and the ribbands were then faired as shown in the next picture. 
 

 
In this picture a cabinet scraper is being used on this part of the hull.  This tool has some advantages for this.  First, it works with the grain so sanding out cross grain scratches is reduced.  More importantly, it allows you to easily see when the frames have been leveled out – or which frames are out of line.  Pre beveling of the frames before setting greatly reduces the amount of work in this step.  No cross grain sanding was necessary in these areas.
 
With the outside of the frames faired out, the floors could be faired to receive the keelson.  This fairing was done out to the floor heads.  A rotary tool with a flapper wheel as shown in the next picture was used for some of this, so taking this fairing out at least to the floor heads is advisable before installing the keelson.
 

 
This tool also has the advantage that it sands with the grain.  In the next picture the fairness is being checked at the floor heads.  The frames above the floor heads are still a bit rough.
 

 
Finally the joint face with the keelson is leveled out as shown below.
 

 
All this work was done in the forebody earlier to install the forward part of the keelson and the forward deadwood.  The next picture shows the first section of the lower tier of the aft keelson installed.  Copper wire bolts through every other frame have been inserted through into the keel and epoxied.  The frames are now well secured.
 

 
The next section of the upper keelson tier is ready to be installed.  The dark areas are still damp from washing off the epoxy for the bolts with isopropanol.
 
The central model support bolt hole comes through the aft end of the keelson section in this picture.  The next task will be to cut a mortise around that hole to insert a nut – next time.
 
Ed

I will skip over the ice storm, providing refuge to a family of 8, car issues, the holidays and such and actually do some modeling on the last day of 2013:  The object is the stove stack.
 
Into my stove I had cut a slot for an 1/4" brass tube which I procured locally.  Luckily I decided to just put everything in place with this oversized tube 'just to make sure.'  Well, it was very obvious the angle was significantly off:
 

 
Pondering this it all made sense.  The stove was sitting on a deck that had a slight pitch up towards the stem.  Looking at the plans the base of the stove was indeed angled to allow the stove / pots to sit level with the water line.  how many times have I looked at these and never seen that?  So I added the appropriate shim and brought the angle to rights:
 

 
With that taken care of I was able to use the deck beams to mark off the different levels.  These checked out with the plans (always a good thing) and I identified the height and angle required which I cut out with a very fine toothed straight saw:
 

 
After some silver soldering (got so excited I didn't take any pictures) the pipe was complete.  A good result for not so much work.  It still needs to be blackened but this will wait.  I really like the solid feel while still able to remove it out of the way for now.
 

 
This pipe now sits as Mr. Hahn constructed it.  I am still scratching my head if I will go ahead and construct the brass cover assembly.  Next job is the berth deck waterway so I can start planking that deck in.
 
Merry Christmas and Happy New Year,
mark