ahb26

Thanks, Bob. She's sitting on the mantel now, and some day I'll get a case for her. She puts a smile on my face every time I look.

Well, we're having fun now! Since the deck and cockpit have already been painted, I decided to build up the cabin in such a way that it could be removed from the frames for spray painting, saving me the trouble of masking and potential overspray. To do that, I added bracing to prevent the assembled cabin from twisting and coming apart. In the first photo, I've added two wide strips under the vent windows. The micrometer is being used to hold the frames snug against frame 3, since I don't have any clamps that large. Next, I glued on the cabin front against cleats. This was a delicate operation. Here's the cabin off the boat: and set in place: You can see the additional cross brace I added at the front to make sure it doesn't come apart. I need to fettle the cabin roof some before I paint the cabin, but I can't glue on the roof until the cabin is glued in place because I need access to the inside of the cabin.

Thanks for the likes - much appreciated. I have added some deck items. Chafing strips and cleats at the stern - At the bow, chocks (on the supplied pads), the as yet unpainted samson post, and my solution for the section of decking that I cut away to allow it to lay flat on the foredeck. I plan to paint the plank down the middle (king plank?) white to provide some visual interest. Final installation must wait on completion of the cabin. As I worked with the cabin sides, I noticed a problem that could have caused some real headaches. The inside surfaces of the cabin are marked where they are supposed to glue to frame 4. As you can see, with the forward ends and vent windows aligned, the frame marks do not line up. If one were to glue the cabin sides on the marks, the front ends would be misaligned, as would the cabin and vent windows (not that that matters so much). In order to keep the laser marks hidden, I chose to use the marks on the port side (LCB2) as the frame 4 reference, leaving the starboard frame marks about 1/4" ahead of the frame. This is all dry-fit. In preparation for bending the cabin walls to shape, and lacking a wide enough clamp, I made up a fixture from 1/4" square stock (left over from Emma C. Berry) that goes through the vent windows and holds the sides firmly against the frame. After the wood has been moistened, the forward ends will be pinched together to the correct width and allowed to dry. That's the plan, anyway. Note that I had to cut away a slice of the window frames to clear frame 3 - on both sides. The instructions for this step seem to date from another time, when frame 2 protruded above the deck. They say that the cabin sides should be glued to frame 2, but frame 2 is completely under the deck.

Five weeks on, more or less - the holiday season with its usual alarums and excursions - and in between, sanding, filling, masking, priming, painting, trimming: the hull is basically finished, with just a few deck items to add. Here's a quick summary. After initial sanding and filling (with MH Ready Patch), the first coat of primer reveals more areas needing work. Sand, prime, repeat until satisfied or patience is exhausted. Then mask the waterline and attempt the first coats of the hull color. (It looks grey in the photo but is actually bright white.) There was more filling and sanding and painting until I couldn't stand it any longer and removed the masking tape, revealing the previously applied waterline. Both the waterline and the red-brown paint beneath it needed touch up. I used paper guides to position the rubbing boards on the side of the hull: Next step was gluing on the pre-cut sheet deck. In order for the deck edges to lay tight against the cockpit coaming, I had to scrunch the deck sheet in such a way that it wouldn't lie flat on the foredeck. I cut about 1/16" out of the center in that area, resulting in a visible seam. I have a plan for that, once the cabin is installed. At the stern, the deck sheet isn't quite long enough to reach the front edge of the transom. In this photo, the 1/16" square toe boards have been installed along each side of the hull, but a similar sized piece across the stern would not quite cover the bare wood, so I used a 1/8+x1/16" strip there. Final step was to install the sheer strakes (which I had prepainted in the trim color) along the sides and across the stern - and here we are. I will work my way into the cabin next.

That's a very nice blue and will look good with the other colors. I looked at lots of photos of lobster boats and there's plenty of variation, so you can't go wrong. I'm using a fairly bright Kelly green on the roofs and the rub rail. A lot of boats use the same color on the deck but I think that would be overpowering in this case, so I've painted the deck gray. White hull above the waterline, red-brown below, and a black waterline.

Almost there... Finally! Trimming, sanding, filling, sanding etc. yet to go, but I'm relieved to have reached this point. This side is a bit cleaner than the other but still somewhat haphazard. Four drop planks at the bow... and some poor planning at the stern, resulting in the odd angled filler piece. Hoping for smoother sailing, er, motoring from here on!

After alternating planks on each side, I decided to finish one side in hopes of learning lessons to apply to the other. So, the starboard side is done (apart from trimming at the transom) and a fine mess it is. It will take a lot of sanding and filling to make it smooth, and I am not sure how fair the result will be. The planks have a sharp edge bend amidships and that may result in a visible break in the curve of the hull. We shall see... I went through contortions to reduce the plank count into the remaining space at the stem: There was more space at the stern and a single drop plank was sufficient. From a distance it doesn't look too bad. However, the potential break at the midpoint is visible. I think this occurred because I tapered the planks in each direction from there, resulting in a build-up of width. I probably should have maintained a constant plank width across the middle few frames and just tapered a bit at the ends. I think the port side is in better shape than the starboard was when I stopped alternating sides. I'll see if I can do a better job of letting the planks tell me where they want to go.

Thanks for the likes! Progress has been slow, partly because other things are going on but also because planking is not my strong suit. I know enough about it to be dangerous but not enough to be sure of myself, so I procrastinate. The kit includes two huge bricks of balsa from which small filler blocks for the bow may be carved. Some builders have dispensed with these but I decided to give them a try, in part because I've never made them before. The first one took roughly forever to carve and shape, but I eventually got it close enough to glue in, figuring I could fine-tune it during the process. I realized that I could use a thinner piece so that only the stem end of the plank was supported. This made for much quicker shaping. In this photo, the garboard strakes have been installed. The kit comes with two laser-cut garboard strakes, each 1" wide and tapering to the bow. I didn't like the way these fit - they seemed a bit short - so I used individual 1/4" planks instead. In retrospect, I wish I had tried a bit harder with the laser-cut pieces, since I had to use up eight planks that I will need to replace. When I installed the sheer strake, it required a bit of coaxing at the stern to conform to the sheer. For the next strake down, I used a stealer to ease the run of the plank. At this point, I needed to think about how to handle the different widths of planking at each bulkhead. I was already tapering each plank at the bow. Now I made up tick strips and tapered the full length of each plank according to what the tick strip indicated. I discovered that I really had to wrestle the plank into place at the midpoint with this approach. It was time to fall back and regroup. The instructions recommend using 1/8" wide planks to get around the turn of the bilge, and the kit provides plenty of them. I started working down (up in the photos) from the sheer with these planks with no tapering. They went in with no difficulty. So that is where things stand. I am going to try tapering the 1/4" planks again, except this time I'll soak them prior to hanging. Eventually, I'll run out of room at the bow and stern but I'll deal with that when it happens.

With most of the bulkheads installed, I was able to trial-fit the cockpit sides. I temporarily replaced F4 in the keel, inserted the cockpit sole, and started working the sides into position. I discovered that they needed to be notched where subdeck beam at F8 crosses, and that they were too long. Here is how they were modified to fit: I was now ready to paint the cockpit areas and glue everything in place. I selected an accent color (Kelly Green) and painted the cabin door trim - the rest of the cabin wall and the cockpit sides were painted white, and the cockpit sole painted gray. I glued F4 and the sole into the bulkhead structure. With F3 also in place, I was finally able to glue on the subdeck. This was generally straightforward except at the rear of the cockpit, where all my little spring clamps were called into play. At this point, another problem became apparent: The top edges of the cockpit sides had a gap, both horizontal and vertical, to the edges of the subdeck. After more head scratching, I noticed on the plan (just one sheet by the way) what appeared to be the cross-section of a small coaming around the cockpit. I made up three sections of 1/8" square basswood, which fill the space nicely. I have painted the finish deck but decided not to install it yet - a good choice since planking (a topic for the next entry) would not have been kind to it.

Thanks, Bob. My mother-in-law also loved Maine. This boat will be named after her (Helen) and the home port will be where they had a cottage (New Harbor). I read over your review several times and the handsome product encouraged me to proceed.

In preparation for assembling the bulkheads to the keel, I dry-fit everything. I discovered that the fit of the bulkheads was very loose, due in part to the thin keel material. I trial-fit the cockpit sole and found that it was too wide to fit between the bulkheads toward the stern (F8 and F9), and too long. After puzzling over this for a while, I reshaped the sole plate as shown below. This provided a snug fit against all bulkheads and no excess length at the stern. Frames F8 and F9 have cutouts at the top to receive beams that support the subdeck, but the beams were not provided in the kit nor were they mentioned in the instructions, although they do appear in the photos. I made up beams from scrap, including a slight crown which I traced from F2. I placed the subdeck over the bulkhead tabs, and secured everything with rubber bands. I wanted to use the subdeck to position the bulkheads before gluing them. In addition to the bands holding the subdeck down, I used a band around the stem to hold the subdeck as far forward on the stem as possible. I also used bands to hold F5 down tight in its slot, counteracting the natural flex of the subdeck. I had previously noticed that F5 sat a little high and filed the slots to make it flush with the top edge of the keel. When everything was in place, I used thin CA in the bulkhead-keel joints, then reinforced the joints of F5-F8 with blocks. (I didn't glue F3 and F4 at this time, partly to avoid having structure above deck level and partly because I intended to paint F4 before installing it. I also didn't glue F9, the sternmost bulkhead, wanting to wait until the cockpit sides were sorted.)

I selected the Lobster Boat because I wasn't in the mood to take on a complex rigging-intensive project. We've spent a lot of time in Maine - my family has deep roots there - and I've always enjoyed watching the lobster boats, even though I am allergic to the beasts. This boat will probably become a gift for someone in the family. As noted elsewhere, this kit has been revised recently and so some aspects of the build may be new to those who built the kit recently. Originally, I believe this was a Laughing Whale kit. BlueJacket has updated it at least once since they acquired Laughing Whale. Right from the start, I encountered some minor problems. Nothing insurmountable, but it seems worthwhile to point them out as the log goes along to forewarn future builders, in case the problems persist. I have progressed as far as planking, so the first few entries will catch up. I started by assembling the cradle. I discovered that the stretcher dowels were a bit undersize and the holes for them a bit oversize, resulting in a very loose fit. I fixed this by wrapping the ends with glue-soaked paper strips prior to assembly. The next step is to drill the rudder to accept a 1/16" brass rod as the rudder shaft. I found that the rudder (and the stem and keel) were a bit on the thin side, 13/128" to be exact, leaving little space for a 1/16" hole. I set it up on my drill press as carefully as I could and it still drifted slightly off line - not enough to be a problem, however. I don't know how anyone could do this without a drill press - not I, certainly! I had to sand the brass rod down some to get it through the hole.

Trouble: You have so much dried glue on your finger you can't use your fingerprint to unlock your phone. Real trouble: You glue your finger to your phone. Christopher, looks like you got the laser-cut garboard plank to work well.

Hi Christopher, I have been working on this kit for a couple of months. I am planking now, and I will try to get my act together and start a build log. I have encountered a few issues, same as you. The kit has indeed been revised since a recent log (apparently abandoned) and it may be something of a work in progress. The cockpit sole didn't match up exactly to the frames and had to be shaped and trimmed a bit. As you discovered, the cockpit sides left a gap to the subdeck. I addressed this by adding a coaming made from 1/8" square stock, which is shown on the plans: Unfortunately, the top edge of the coaming is not of even height above the subdeck over its length, but I'll live with that. When I started planking, it seemed to me that the supplied laser-cut garboard strakes were not long enough - but this may be a misconception on my part of how the planking should work at the bow. In any case, I used four individual 1/4" strips instead, which means I will need to order more of those strips. Also, I added a stealer at the stern below the shear strake. I will follow your build with interest, and get my own log started.

Thanks!

Yankee Hero is finished. The dry transfers didn't want to transfer so I replicated them in MS Word and glued them to thin strip wood for placement on the hull. Not ideal. I soaked the anchor line in the dregs of my morning coffee to give it some color. Thanks to all who looked in and left a thumbs-up!

In the last month, I've made progress and reached the point where there are just a few details left. I made up the boom rest and pin rail assembly, using the cut-off stub of mast dowel to get the shape right. I decided to forego the shrouds since the instructions plainly state that there were none. The forestay and topping lift do a good job of holding the mast in place at the correct rake, once the main sheet is tensioned. Here is an intermediate state of rigging: and as completed. Instead of the Britannia blocks supplied with the kit, I used 3/16" Model Shipways walnut blocks. I used BlueJacket mast hoops instead of the supplied split rings. For the jib sheets, I used smaller-gauge BlueJacket rigging line left over from a previous kit, and ran them through 1/8" Syren blocks rather than directly through the eyebolts. As I was trying to figure out how to glue the tiller to the rudder in just the right place and angle, it occurred to me to pin them and allow the tiller to pivot vertically. With some difficulty - the slotted area of the tiller is fragile and I broke it while drilling - I was able to do so. The instructions mention that the standing room area could be closed off from the hold by a system of panels running in grooves, to prevent the catch from spilling in. I gave some thought to how this might look, and came up with this: The frame is glued to the back end of the hold and panels are dropped in as needed. With the rudder installed, the tiller rests on the sternpost and is parallel to the deck - just dumb luck on my part! So all that is left is the anchor and the name and port transfers. Next post should show the finished product.

The hull is more or less complete. The molding around the base of the cabin and hold was fiddly as expected but turned out OK after a bit of filler and paint touch-up. I installed the bowsprit, gammon iron, and Samson post, and made up the sheet traveler, drilled the holes and fit it, but it's not glued in yet - I'll do that in the rigging process. The camera reveals the gaps between some of the deck planks and the cover board - they sure didn't look that bad when I was gluing them in... Next step is to shape the spars and outfit them. At this point I have a question. The kit does not show shrouds for Yankee Hero. The rigged model created by her builder doesn't have them, and an etching taken from a photo of a similar boat does not appear to have them either. However, modern versions of Quoddy boats of the same size as Yankee Hero do have shrouds. I'd like to add them - in part because I like the look, but also from a practical point of view, it would be useful to have additional bracing for the mast since it doesn't have much penetration to the hull. In order to get the mast to the correct rake angle, I will need to shape the bottom end so it has a slightly loose fit, further increasing the need for lateral stabilization. So the question is: Would it be reasonable or expected for Yankee Hero, or a similar boat of her size, to have shrouds in that era?

Deck planking is done - a long, fiddly process. I planned to start at the bow with a king plank and work out from that. The sides of the king plank needed to be parallel with each other and with the sides of the hold structure - I got close but not perfect. Gluing it in... Next I glued in, at long last, the hold and cabin assembly, locating it with the dowels I installed previously. I installed the planks in three groups. The first group built out from the king plank to the planks that run along the sides of the hold. Again, it was critical to get these right since the remaining planks would be fitted to them. I cut and fit the planks on the hull but laying them out on the plan gives a better idea: Note the slight asymmetry - the sides of the hold are not quite on the centerline I used for the king plank, as shown by the differing widths of the long outer planks. Everything glued in... I sanded and varnished the individual planks before gluing them in since there was not enough room to properly sand the deck. Next I filled in the area between the long planks at the stern, working toward the middle. Here the planks are dry-fitted, with a wider plank in the middle. Note the slight taper in the wider plank, resulting from lack of parallelism in the starting points and/or the crown of the false beams. Once those planks were glued in, I filled out the sides of the deck. I replaced the wide central plank behind the hold with a normal-width plank and a little tapered sliver. It's not perfect but I'm pleased with the look. Putting the crown in the deck was a lot of work and created some problems, and it's hardly noticeable, but I'm still glad I did it! Next I need to install the mitered trim strips around the cabin and hold, a job I am not looking forward to.

Frank, in another thread, you asked about how to insert captions between photos. When I'm working on a post, I drag the photos into the area that says "Drag files here..." As I compose the post, when I reach a point where I want to insert a photo, I create some space (hit Enter three times), position the text cursor in the middle of the space, and then go down to the Uploaded Images area, hover over the desired photo, and click "Insert." The photo will be inserted where you left the text cursor, and you can continue entering your post after it. Note that any photos you don't enter in-line - i.e., left-over photos - will appear at the end of your post. Looking forward to seeing that jig fill up with frames!

After sanding, filling, repainting, and several rounds of touch-up, I was satisfied enough with the paint, but I was nervous about how fragile it was - especially the green. I have not previously used a matte varnish on hulls but it seemed like a good idea in this case. The photo shows the not-yet-varnished hull and a test piece I made up to make sure the spray enamel matte varnish was compatible with the paint. Judging by the test piece, the varnish does a good job of protecting the paint. Here is the varnished hull: The varnish dulls the gloss of the green paint and white stripe tape, and de-emphasizes the flaws. However, the bottom of the hull is slightly shinier now since the varnish is not as completely flat as the paint. Now it's on to the topsides!

Well, the paint arrived just after I submitted the last post. Hull painting is finally complete, but it was an arduous process and other activities demanded my time so it all took a while. I drew a waterline - dictated more by how the hull sits in its cradle than by the line in the plans and templates - and painted below the waterline with Vallejo Model Colors Cavalry Brown, brushed on. I have not previously used Vallejo paint. The paint covered very well and dried completely flat. The color is very close to Model Master British Crimson that I have used on previous models - not quite as red. Next I ran a strip of the 1/16" tape supplied with the kit around the top edge of the painted area. So far, so good. I had chosen a Model Expo dark green for the hull color. It didn't cover that well and required several coats. I didn't try to keep it off the tape since I intended to remove the tape later. (This is pretty much in accordance with the instructions.) The green is shinier than the brown. Now, for a color accent, I masked off the rub strip and painted it yellow (another Model Expo paint). This is not in the instructions, but I thought it might be a reasonable addition. (It's also an homage to the colors used on early Team Lotus race cars, before they started painting their F1 cars like cigarette packs.) I stripped off the masking tape and... The masking tape did not prevent leakage, and it also pulled up some of the green paint. I don't think that paint adhered to the primer all that well. Bummer. I touched up with the green paint as best I could, then removed the white tape and replaced it with fresh tape to make the boot top. But let's face it, the surface above the rub strip is far from perfect. Rather than live with it, I decided to do another round of sanding and filling in that area. That took a while - results in the next post.

Puttering along while I wait for Model Expo to get around to shipping the paint I ordered. I got the rudder set up, first mounting the pintles and offering up the rudder to the stern post - then mounting the gudgeons. I ended up with a little more space between the sternpost and rudder than I wanted - but still relatively pleased with the outcome. I continued to work on the hull and worked out the placement of the waterline. I tried the painting white boot top area, intending to mask it when applying the hull colors, but I wasn't pleased with the result, so I sanded everything off and resprayed with a gray primer. This of course exposed more imperfections. After going back and forth about the order of operations, and still waiting for the hull paint, I decided to tackle the toe boards with the assumption that it would be a messy operation, requiring more sanding to clean up glue. I have a large supply of 3/64" strip stock left over from Emma C. Berry and decided to use some of it (cut down to 1/8") for the toe boards instead of the supplied 1/16"x1/8" strips - easier to bend and slightly less chunky. I cut scuppers in each strip, then wet them and bent them to shape. Gluing the toeboards to the covering boards was, as expected, challenging and a bit messy. I learned enough that if I had to do it again, I'd do a better job - isn't that usually the way? The stern was tricky since the hull seems to dip down there slightly, resulting in a gap between the toeboards and the hull. I had made up a small extension to the sternpost and tried to fit the toeboards to that, but I finally ended up filling the junction of the toeboards with a small piece of wood, as I have seen others do. Now it's more filling and sanding. Yankee Hero at this point is a bit of an ugly duckling and it's difficult to envision the beautiful swan I hope she will become. I also built the bowsprit and Samson post. That's it for now.

It's easy! The first post in this forum tells you how.

That is one sturdy jig! I think in some cases I traced the frame bevel lines onto tracing paper, used pinpricks to transfer from the paper to the frame, then hand sanded. For some of the frames I just winged it. I was hesitant to use the sanding drum since it's so easy to go overboard, and my carving skills certainly weren't up to the task (although since then I have done some carving on a solid hull and gotten a better feel for it). I think many builders prefer to leave all the fairing until planking time, once the frames are securely mounted and braced by the clamps and deck framing.