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drobinson02199

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Everything posted by drobinson02199

  1. drobinson02199
    I have painted the bottom and the side up to the waterline in Hunter Green. Thanks again to Grant (gjdale) for his excellent tip above about using varnish to seal the edge of the masking tape. The edge really looks good. It will be finished with a striping tape, but having a clean edge to work with will make that better. The instructions are ambiguous about when to do this. In one part, they say that they recommend painting the boat at the end. But I didn't want to be taping the boat with the cabins and details on, and this way I can use the same epoxy finish on the entire exterior hull. So build a few more mahogany parts, and then tackle the epoxy finish on the mahogany. Regards, David
  2. drobinson02199
    Interestingly, the kit comes with the rudder and some of the linkages for that, but if you don't buy the running hardware kit (which I didn't as this is a static model), you don't get the propeller or the shaft. But you DO get the skeg. So I ordered a prop from Amazon and then fashioned the shaft from a walnut dowel. I have brass rod, but since the shaft doesn't need to penetrate the hull -- just be faired up to it as if it does -- I decided to use wood to make the fairing look smoother. All of this gets painted the same hunter green color. I think the prop is probably too small, but it will do unless examined closely. Regards, David
  3. drobinson02199
    Here are the front & rear cabin bulkheads. Well-sanded except for final fine sanding, but not finished yet. I'm waiting to do that along with the hull, because it's a 3 step mixed epoxy process followed by 3 clear coat sprays, so I want to do a few things at once. Also need to paint the bottom first. All of that will commence when I get back from a one week trip next week. Regards, David
  4. drobinson02199
    Some drama at the bow. While I was going over the mahogany planking and doing some touch up sanding, there has been an area of the bow where one of the planks was just getting sicker and sicker. Starting to break at the edges. So I bit the bullet and chipped it out (Picture 1) and then fitted new planks in. There are parts of the hull that have more of the kind of space that has opened between the planks that you see here. Not there originally -- the planks seem to have had some "shrinkage". I'm hoping that when I apply the epoxy, it will cause the wood to expand and tighten a bit. My workshop is pretty dry now that it's winter. Anyone have any thoughts on what would happen if I run a humidifier in there before I try to finish the wood? Regards, David
  5. drobinson02199
    Looking over the hull, I have some planks that are not fully adhered to the first planking. The result is that they won't sand down -- too springy. In the past, I've solved this with glue down the edge, but that leaves glue marks. So this time I went in from the back, and ground out small areas where I could apply glue from the back and then pin the planks down. First pic is before gluing, second one is the areas from the back, third is after gluing but before sanding, and fourth is after some additional sanding. It worked! Regards, David
  6. drobinson02199
    Grant: Oh what a good tip! Thanks, David
  7. drobinson02199
    I've now planked the sides and rear transom with mahogany, and I'm pretty satisfied. I haven't hit it yet with the 400 grit -- I'll wait on that until I finish it. See picture 1. The bow area is planked with individual strips running keel to edge, and they are made of balsa and are flimsy and don't sand down well. I covered them with wood filler to try to smooth them a bit, but that area was still pretty ugly. See pictures 2 and 3. Fortunately, the instructions call for spreading a layer of Bondo onto that area after the mahogany sides go on, and because I've built a Dumas boat before, I had some Bondo on the shelf. Pic 4 shows the result, and while it's not final-sanded, it's pretty smooth now and the join between the bottom and sides looks good now. The color changes you see between the Bondo, the wood filler, and the actual wood are actually pretty smooth, although they don't look it to the eye. The waterline leaves the bow and travels across the lower mahogany side, so all of the bottom, and all of the join between the mahogany and the Bondo (below the waterline), will be painted bow to stern in Hunter Green. The finished mahogany is above the water line. Now I have to decide when to paint the bottom up to the waterline. I am paranoid about paint getting under the tape and onto the mahogany, so I'll want to keep the boat oriented so the taped edge faces down. I also don't want to have too much superstructure on the boat when I paint it. So that will be a step coming soon, but I need to read way ahead to see what's coming. Regards, David
  8. drobinson02199
    Mystery solved. The issue for me was the alignment of the first mahogany strip. Common sense says it should be aligned with the bottom of the side of the boat, where the side meets the bottom. But the instructions say to follow the bottom of the side panel, which if you look at the attached pic would leave a gap. I called Dumas, and the common sense answer is the right one. I think what happened is that they intended the sides to overlap the bottom, and I had the bottom overlap the sides. The instructions really aren't clear about that -- in fact, I think if followed literally they lead to what I did. But no matter -- I can align to the true bottom with no problems. But thought I'd post this for any of you who are getting ready to build one of these, particularly for Tom. Regards, David
  9. drobinson02199
    Hull now complete through the first planking (I really should say "paneling"). Next step is mahogany strip planking, but I need to ask Dumas a question first about alignment -- the instructions are clear, but if I follow them what will show on the boat doesn't make sense to me. Regards, David
  10. drobinson02199
    The hull is beginning to take shape. Regards, David
  11. drobinson02199
    No, a static model. These are so beautiful, I just wanted to build it for display. Regards, David
  12. drobinson02199
    Here's the start of the hull. This was a difficult assembly. The boat "sheer" is stapled to the workbench, and the instructions say to glue the frames to it, and then glue on the keel. Lots of issues doing it that way. So I glued each frame from bow back to the keel, dry fitted that assembly and let it dry, then glued the next frame, dry fitted again and so forth. Then I glued all the frames to the "sheer" at the same time. That worked well and the result is what you see. Regards, David
  13. drobinson02199
    Thanks, Robert. Hope you find it interesting. The frames on this boat are made up from subassemblies. Here's frame #3 (from the bow). Regards, David
  14. drobinson02199
    Back from my one month trip to Asia and ready to ease back into ship modeling. This kit is part of the Dumas Chris-Craft series. Unlike most Dumas boats, this one has a planked hull. What's in the box: Pictures of the box cover with a close-up showing the model. Lots of wood, unsorted. Some good-looking mahogany strips and some very fragile laser-cut mahogany. Manual and lots of charts and drawings. This one should be a challenge -- the manual says it's a very difficult kit. The part I want to get right is the finish on the hull. I'm going to spend some time with the manual before I start on this. Regards, David
  15. drobinson02199
    She looks more beautiful each time you post. Regards, David
  16. drobinson02199
    Beautiful work on the rigging, Zappto. Regards, David
  17. drobinson02199
    Beautiful work. Your rope coils are exquisite, and also your line seizings. Wonderful craftsmanship on the rigging. Regards, David
  18. drobinson02199
    Thanks to Chris, Steve and Lou. And Chris, if you worked as fast as me, your models wouldn't look at beautiful as they do. I am selective in my picture taking to not expose my more awful "goofs". Regards, David
  19. drobinson02199
    TITANIC IS FINALLY FINISHED! I have posted completion pictures in the Gallery of completed kit ships, but I couldn't resist this one that shows the "place of honor" for this model in my office. Ensures that I will look at it multiple times each day. 😁 A few final construction notes. Some of these you'll see better in the Gallery pictures: The kit instructions use a plain wood dowel painted brown for the masts. Couldn't stand that idea so I found a walnut dowel of the same size and used that. I bought a finished walnut base. The kit includes a MDF base, but I've never figured out how to make one of those look like wood, and I didn't want a black base under this one. You'll see a yellow stripe down the side between the white and black parts of the structure. This is in the box picture, but not in the instructions. I did it by using the planking strips, which were perfectly sized, and pre-painting them. Even conserving the supplied rigging thread, I ran out after rigging the Marconi antenna and didn't have enough for the leads down to the ship, so I used some spare from another kit. I wanted to get this done this week as we are headed off for 5-6 weeks for a long Asia trip. When back and time adjusted, I'm going to do the Dumas Chris Craft Commuter next. Should be a different challenge to get the finish right. Thanks to all who have followed this build -- for your encouragement and help. Regards, David
  20. drobinson02199
    Wonderful Regards, David
  21. drobinson02199
    Popeye: OK, got it. I gave you measurements for two boats. The larger one is 2960, and the smaller one is 2961 (they are called "dingy" and "cutter" respectively in the English instructions. These part numbers are unique to the Titanic kit. If you call Ages of Sail, ask for James. He's really good, and sometimes they keep an open kit around to cannibalize for missing parts. You might be able to persuade him to sell you a "sprue" from that vs. ordering from Amati. Two "sprues" come with the kit. Regards, David
  22. drobinson02199
    Popeye: Thanks for the comments. You asked "Do the sprues have part numbers?" What's a sprue? Thanks, David
  23. drobinson02199
    Finished the lifeboats on the starboard side. I'm pushing to finish the boat, because I go away at the end of this week for 5 weeks and want to have it done before I go. Regards, David
  24. drobinson02199
    Before going into mass production on the lifeboat davits, I wanted to make sure I understood how it all comes together, so I did two davits and one lifeboat and mounted them. Result below. The stern lifeboats (like this one) hang partly out from the deck. The bow lifeboats mount flush to the edge of the deck. Regards, David
  25. drobinson02199
    Here's one of the lifeboat davits not yet painted and dry-fitted on the deck. This is a five piece brass assembly with a lot of bending, but it's not too difficult. I think these will add some real detail. Also a pic of the funnel stays, which are now finished. Next steps are to finish all the davits and paint them, then add eyebolts to the lifeboats, and then mount and rig them. Regards, David

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