Keith Black

Jonas, welcome to MSW. Glad to have you aboard.

Great rock face, Glen. Does it get painted?

Love the ship's wheel!

BC, welcome to MSW. Glad to have you aboard.

Chuck, welcome to MSW. Glad to have you aboard.

Rob, Glen, Keith (c), Keith (A), and Rick thank you for your kind comments and thank you to all for the likes. I was hoping to post photos this evening but unfortunately that didn't happen, hopefully in a couple of days. Again, a Happy New Year to all and again, thank you for following along.

Drew, welcome to MSW. Glad to have you aboard. https://cloudcraftsite.wordpress.com/2015/09/17/splitting-hairs-a-small-rant-about-terminology/ The above is not exactly what MSW folks mean by 'bashing'. Here it's refinement of a kit model for greater historically accuracy, altered hull, mast, rigging details, etc etc and less about adding parts though that is done at times. If you search bash or bashing in the search box on the main page you'll find many examples. Happy New Year.

Me? I don't know what you're talking bout.

A nice looking boiler and Happy New Year to you, Eric.

I can almost smell that nice looking wood, Andy. Happy New Year.

Keith, Happy New Year.

Something like this? Happy New Year!

Ron, welcome to MSW. Glad to have you aboard.

Like I said, it looks great. At this scale I'm not sure a bolt rope would be visible. So much of what we do is providing impressions and let the viewer's mind fill in the blanks.

In my limited rigging experience, the rule of thumb I go by is the sheave opening is always on the anchored end. for those who have been rigging for 40 years I can hear you saying, 'duh' but for those of us with limited experience this is one of those 'light bulb' moments.

One can't tell manufactured from the real thing. Before reading the text, just looking at the photo, I thought I was looking at some rock you found which would have been astonishing enough on as it's a perfect fit for the project. But then reading that you made the bloody thing is amazing!

Late to the party regarding the visibility of rivet heads. I finally located a photo of the Maine I knew I had somewhere on the day of her christening. The hull is new and and the sunlight is at an angle. Those rivets on a model at scale would not be visible, IMHO. Impeccable work, Valeriy. I look forward to each new post.

Looks a bit shady to me. Well done, Nils.

Dave, welcome to MSW. Glad to have you aboard.

Ian, welcome to MSW. Glad to have you aboard.

Possible reason, less turbulence? Beautiful work as always, Valeriy.

Thank you @Cathead @Roger Pellett @mcb @AJohnson @wefalck @mbp521 @Rick310 @mtaylor @BANYAN @Glen McGuire @Knocklouder @Bob Cleek @My Fathers Son for your Holiday wishes, kind thoughts, and support and thank you to Andy, Siggi, Tom, Dave, and Phil for the likes. It's been busy times at the worktable, I got the gaff rigged and the lifts around the foremast rigged. The blocks at the base of the mast sit at the edge of a diameter the size of a US penny, .75 inches. The distance between the block's inside edge and the mast is .2 inches and .1 inches between the belaying pins and block's inside edge. The block (gaff lift) between the companionway railing is so tight I had to glue the block's sheave side perpendicular to the mast and once rigged, it was twisted 90 degrees to line up correctly. It's kinda like SIB work without the bottle, it's all done with tweezers. The main problem is the thread wants to hang up on everything and the belaying pins are easily bent out of position. I really don't care how long it takes to preform a task at this scale as long as I'm successful. Sometimes the result is more suggestion than 100% accuracy and that'll just have to be okay. I worked Christmas Eve and most of Christmas Day.....'the blocks were hung by the foremast with care in hopes that' Thank you for following along and smooth sailing to all throughout the New Year. Keith

Johnny, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and yours.

Chris, Merry Christmas and Happy New Year to you and yours. Two nice looking Pups.

Aleksandr, great post. Happy Holidays and a Happy New Year to you and yours.......Keith