leclaire

Yeah, I see your point about the direction of any over lapping if you want to do final trimming at the outer edges of the deck. Hadn't considered that. Thanks.

Bob, good eye and good question. Just a personal preference. I think I used a very small overlap when I did the roofing of the Texas and pilothouse, but here decided to lay it flat. Kurt's way is probably more realistic given that there would need to be sealed seams. However, the longitudinal seams would need to be carefully placed so that they shed water downslope (like shingles on a roof). On my hurricane deck, I really wanted to work from the inside out to ensure a good fit (easier to trim at the outer edges of the deck than in a central strip), which meant that overlapping seams would be facing the wrong way. I don't think the effect will be very noticeable either way, though I supposed at the Chaperon's large scale (1:48 instead of my 1:64) it would be that much more noticeable.
Again, wouldn't hurt to test both ways on scrap and see which you like better.

Bob, I'd definitely recommend testing the method off-model first, to figure out the quirks. One thing to consider is that too much paint can loosen the glue, especially at the corners and edges, making annoying curls. That's one reason I like to finish with pastels, so I'm not tempted to overpaint. Of course, a few imperfections just help with the hard-used working boat effect. I bet the real tarpaper got scuffed and torn. I hope it works for you and will be interested to hear about your experience.

Eric - one thing I forgot to ask is in the pictures of your test roof, it appears you laid the tape down with no over lapping (both along the sides of each strip and the joints) unlike the method shown in Kurt's tutorial. Could that have had something to do with the curling issue you mentioned? Or is it just not apparent in the pictures. 

Oh, not to worry, I learned the hard way a long time ago to always test first before doing anything on the model. I have never used pastels in any fashion before so this will be a new experience. Who knows, with my painting skills I may just mess the thing up using only the paint to get that hard-used work boat effect. I will let you know how it turns out.
 
Bob

Thanks for the tip Eric. I am getting close to "tar papering" my Chaperon and your results have convinced me to give this a try. I was getting a little anxious about using Kurt's silkspan method. Don't ask me why, it just looked to be something I could mess up big time.
 
Glad to see you back at the Arabia.
 
Bob

Thanks for the tip Eric. I am getting close to "tar papering" my Chaperon and your results have convinced me to give this a try. I was getting a little anxious about using Kurt's silkspan method. Don't ask me why, it just looked to be something I could mess up big time.
 
Glad to see you back at the Arabia.
 
Bob

The last three weeks have been very stressful and time-consuming for a bunch of reasons I don't need to go into here. This morning was the first time I've felt focused and sane enough to return to the model. The next step involves laying out the tarpaper covering of the hurricane deck. Kurt's digital book on building the Chaperon has some very good advice for simulating this material (see p. 55 and onward), but I adapted this to use a method I like that worked well on my Bertrand. While Kurt used silkspan and matte medium (two things I don't otherwise have on hand), I used masking tape and wood glue (which I have in abundance).
 
I had to determine a proper scale width for the tarpaper, which would have been applied from rolls. Kurt suggests 3 feet. My roll of masking tape meaures a scale 5 feet wide, so cutting this in half produces a reasonable 2.5 foot strip. I used the grid on my cutting mat as a guide for this. First, I laid a strip of tape on the mat, aligned with its grid, then carefully sliced it in half lengthwise using a knife and metal straightedge:
 

I then made a test roof using scrap wood and multiple tape strips, then painted it with diluted black and rubbed dark grey pastel over it. The result looked as I wanted. It's hard to see in photos, but the tape has a really nice rough texture that I think looks really good in person.
 


So I started on the model, working from the stern. I used a brush of roughly the same width as the tape strips to lay glue, then pressed each strip into place. I used pencil to make guiding marks as needed. I cut the strips to create a staggered pattern, just like planking.
 

Here's how far I've gotten. As with planking, the staggering means that you have to work forward over the whole model, so that's what I'm doing. I'll let this batch dry before doing more.
 
Thanks for reading.

Excellent recovery, Eric.  Show me someone who's never screwed up and it's probably the same person who's never tried.  

Nicely put! It's impressive how much a few supportive comments can change one's perspective.

So I made another big mistake. Afterward, I realized that it's become a pattern lately, I think because life has gotten really stressful and I was using modelling as an outlet but this also meant I wasn't focused on what I was doing.
 
So I started laying out the forward part of the hurricane deck. Below, the starboard side is being glued down. Notice any problem?
 

That's right, I forgot to measure and cut the hole for the chimney or even install the chimney. I also didn't fully color the underside with pastel, used too much glue (causing an ugly color smear underneath) and didn't hold the part over the heads (by the wheel) down long enough, so the glue expanded and peeled it back up. I was so upset when I discovered all this, but it's what happens when I'm not focused. I had to step away for a week and not look at the model.
 
Gradually I was able to think through ways to deal with this. I carefully measured, drilled, cut, and sanded the chimney hole, which was nerve-wracking as the strucure is delicate and any breakage would be very difficult to repair. I sliced out and fixed the glue-warped part. I can't do anything about the color smear underneath, but at least it's hard to see from most angles. Here's the fixed deck, with clamps still holding down the repaired back part.
 

Here I'm attaching more of the deck:
 

Here's how I meant to do the starboard side, until I sat down for stress relief and got ahead of myself. Here, I've pre-measured and cut the hole so that the deck piece can just drop down on top of the already installed chimney, and made sure to fully color the underside.

So now the whole hurricane deck is installed. Here are two views of the current status.
 


It will be another few weeks before any updates as we'll be taking several short trips to Arkansas to help my in-laws with various things. I hope when that's over I can focus again and keep going. Next, I'll be applying the "tar paper" covering of this deck and painting it all black. Then it's railing time.

Good Evening Auger;
 
They would certainly have been notched out, as the iron bands were proud of the mast's surface. I know that I have seen this described somewhere, but I cannot remember where. Failure to do this would have allowed the battens to distort and crack under the localised pressure from the shrouds and other objects looped over the mast head.
 
The lower part of the mast had its core bound together with iron bands, and the fishes and paunches applied over the bands were notched out to sit flush on the core.
 
Incidentally, I see that you are using James Lees's book. Do not rely on his statement that iron bands are seldom seen on models before 1800 as a guide to full-size practice. After the American colonies became independent, the supply of New England masts dried up, and the Navy could not obtain trees of the same size elsewhere. The trees they formerly purchased from the colonies were large enough to supply most masts as a single tree. After the loss of this supply, they came to rely much more upon 'made' masts, comprising smaller pieces all carefully interlocked. These needed iron bands to hold the component parts together. 
 
From the late 1770s onward, there are a large number of drawings of masts made at various dockyards, all of 'made' masts, listing the sizes of the component timbers and their costs. These all show iron bands around the core, and each seems to be the relevant Master Shipwright's suggestion for overcoming the shortage of large trees (this is my assumption, and is not stated as such on any of the drawings) 
 
For any vessel built or re-masted from 1780 onwards, I would use metal hoops on the mast. 
 
All the best,
 
Mark P

A bit more progress framing the hurricane deck:
 


I also added the railings protecting the main staircase.
 
If you look closely you can see another goof. I ran two of the longitudinal beams too close to where the chimneys had to be (they aren't installed permanently yet) and had to file a slot on the outboard sides of the chimneys to let them sit where they needed to be. It's going to be essentially invisible when the decking is in place, but it caused some temporary gnashing of teeth.

I just wanted to thank you for this recommendation. As a fan of maritime fiction (and non-fiction) and sci-fi/alternative histories I thought this series would be right up my street and I was not disappointed. I've nearly finished the first volume and if Taylor Anderson keeps up the same standard I'm looking forward to the rest of the set. I agree it's not high literature, but I like his style and he delivers good plot lines, characters and descriptions. What more can you ask of a good escapist page-turner?
 
Derek

Thanks for the review, Chris. I have been looking for a new "page turner" to get immersed in and this sounds like it might be just the ticket.
 
I just ordered the first in the series and I'll let you know how it turns out.
 
Bob
 

So that was strange. I wrote a whole update post, which was then eaten when I tried to post it by some Firewall Error. But when I went back and did a test post it went through. So here's a shorter version because I don't feel like rewriting it all.
 
Bending beams for the forward part of the hurricane deck:

Connected together and installed on the model, using pins at the back:

Adding vertical supports and testing the heat shields that keep the chimneys from burning passengers or setting the boat on fire; these are made from scrap PVC:

Heat shields painted and vertical posts all complete:

View from the bow:

If you look closely, you may be able to tell that this structure is a bit out of alignment; the forward curve is closer to the port side than the starboard. It's fairly obvious from some angles and not at all from others. Redoing would mean starting over on this entire structure and I'm not up for that, so I'm going to do my best to hide it. The finished model will have enough detail and complexity that I think it'll be pretty easy to overlook. This is why I'm not a professional (among other reasons).
 
Happy (soon) New Year to all of you.

Got the stern half of the hurricane deck glued down:
 

Edges need some trimming but I'll do that all at once when the whole deck is installed.
 
The larger news is the arrival of a new tool in the Cathead workshop:

That's a Byrnes table saw on the workbench. Technically a Christmas present, but I wanted to make sure all was in order. I did one quick milling of some Eastern Red Cedar scrap I had lying around, making thin planking-scale pieces and veneer strips. It's really pretty in person:
 

I hope I never have to buy model wood again. Living on 40 acres of mostly woodland with an orchard mixed in, I have lots of fun self-harvested stuff to play with, and this will let me mill up quite a bit of stock from my scrapbox. Reusing things and avoiding waste is a big deal for me, so I'm very excited for this development. A Missouri River craft of some sort built with all Missouri wood sounds like a really fun and unique project once Arabia is done.
 
Happy Holidays to all of you. Our big celebration is a solstice party this weekend for a variety of rural friends and neighbors, featuring homemade mead and some good traditional fiddle-tune jamming.

Still plugging away. I filled in the tops of the wheel housings and painted both assemblies:


I started building the frames that will support the hurricane deck out over the stern (the roof of the boiler deck). You can see the beginnings of these in the above photos. These will be really delicate, so I gave some thought to how to make them stronger and easier to assemble. The plan I came up with was to insert small pins into many of the joints, using a small drill bit and leftover brass nails from a kit.
 


Above you can see one such joint, with the pin sticking out at upper right and another pin ready for another joint at upper left. I bent a beam in a full 180° curve to form the deck's stern contour, and attached a central supporting beam:

Here's that beam installed on the model. Each end fits into a pin in the already-installed framing (see next photo down), with a pin into the deck beneath the stern-most support:


More framing. This is now ready for the hurricane deck to go on. I also built the rear staircases between the two decks, using basically the same method I did for the pilot house stairs. These aren't glued in yet, just set in place for appearances.

Another view of the hurricane deck framing and stairs:

You may notice that I included a bit of an upward curve here toward the stern. I think this adds some style and is similar to other boats of the era. Finally, I started cutting thin sheets of wood to form the base of the hurricane deck. As this will be fully covered in simulated tarpaper (like the pilot house and Texas structures), there was no need to plank it.

These aren't attached, just set in place to test the fit. I think I'll use pastels to lightly color the open bottoms of these rather than waste paint (and risk curling the thin sheets).
 
That's where the model stands. Current plan is to work my way forward from here. I started at the stern as I expected it to be simpler, the forward framing will be more complex, so now I have a better idea of the mechanics I want to use.
 
At times this project feels like it'll never end, then I get moments where it seems like it's racing along. Thanks for reading!
 

Interesting. I bought a small disc sander for my bench a few weeks ago and even though the amount of dust produced is minimal (no large sanding projects so far) I have been thinking of some way to capture what does fly in the air. Looking forward to the ideas our members come up with. They are a creative group for sure.
 
Bob

I'm 40 but am involved in mostly "retiree" interests like model building, birdwatching, and playing American/Irish/Scottish folk/bluegrass music. I generally stick out like a sore thumb. There is an element of generational change, but it's also true that most people in my age bracket +/- 15 years are deeply involved in some combination of working, saving for retirement, raising kids, etc. and that leaves relatively little time or funds for outside hobbies. I've never attended an NRG conference even though I'd like to because flying across the country for a several-day event is pretty expensive per unit time, especially when I have limited time off and the first priority for that goes to family visits and regular travel interests that usually don't correspond with conference locations or timing.
 
Realistically, there may well be another generation waiting in the wings to take up model shipbuilding once their kids move out, they finish paying off college loans (theirs and/or their kids), and/or they're financially comfortable enough to retire. Keep in mind that, the younger you get, the less likely any of those things are to happen at an equivalent age to older generations, given the changing nature of the job market and the economy, at least in the US. The average 40-year-old now has more debt, less job security, and less-well-off kids than a 40-year-old 20 or 30 years ago, so it'll be harder to draw them in.
 
I don't disagree that there's a potential need to "reach out" somehow and connect with people who might be interested in this hobby if they were exposed to it. I'm not sure social media is really the way to go, but I also avoid it like the plague so I'm biased. I've been thinking about this and don't know the answer; I'm rather unrepresentative of my generation so don't have a good insight into the right approach. A few years ago I tried offering an Intro to Wooden Model Building class through a local adult-education program that has lots of craft-type classes, but it only got two signups and was cancelled for lack of interest. Don't know what else to try.
 
I don't think it helps that people are increasingly disconnected from older modes of transportation that used to be far "sexier", like ships and trains, which are now increasingly bland and standardized (to an amateur eye) and ever more out of sight, out of mind. Most older modellers now still grew up in the passenger train era and with a one-generation memory of the great naval battles of WWII; my generation has almost no direct connection to such things in ways that encourage the urge to recreate. Now I'm just rambling; told you I was an honorary old person!

Interesting. I bought a small disc sander for my bench a few weeks ago and even though the amount of dust produced is minimal (no large sanding projects so far) I have been thinking of some way to capture what does fly in the air. Looking forward to the ideas our members come up with. They are a creative group for sure.
 
Bob

Interesting. I bought a small disc sander for my bench a few weeks ago and even though the amount of dust produced is minimal (no large sanding projects so far) I have been thinking of some way to capture what does fly in the air. Looking forward to the ideas our members come up with. They are a creative group for sure.
 
Bob

The rope colour depends on period and region - plus the treatment and grime as mentioned above.
 
Hemp was the main raw material until cotton was introduced from the US. Hemp has a pale yellow to beige colour, while cotton is more whitish.
 
Stockholm (pine) tar leads to a darkish brown colour, while coal tar makes the ropes black. With age and weathering, both tars become more greyish.
 
If you work on an 'artisanal' style model, you may want to have only two colours, for tarred and for untarred rope. When you want depict a real life ship, you may want to use several slightly different colours to represent different makes and ages of the ropework.

Cog, that's strange. I've run into similar problems every now and then on random websites, where I'll get a notice about security configurations being incorrect so the browser blocks it. My memory says it's usually major government sites (like NASA or NOAA in the US), so I suppose that fits for the Missouri Department of Natural Resources. I've found that using a different browser solves the problem, don't know why it happens in the first place.
 
No idea why Missouri would have it in for the Dutch otherwise. Belgium, maybe, after InBev bought Budweiser, but we don't have any beef with the Netherlands that I'm aware of.

Happy Thanksgiving to all the American readers (and the rest of you)! I'm grateful to have a community like this that makes this hobby so much richer than toiling away in isolation.
 
I've been quietly working away at planking the port wheel housing.
 

I decided to add the two windows shown in the painting; I don't know whether or not they were really there, but you can see similar features on other vessels. I built frames for these and added backing so they'd fit right into the planking (like a window in a model kit). Since you can't really see behind these, this was an easy way to get them installed.
 

I then hung them from the planking and started planking around them.
 

And here's the fully planked port side.

There's a fair bit of detail to add here, various vertical ribbing and so on, but it'll come later when the model is closer to being complete. Next I'll start planking in the upper surfaces of both wheel housings.
 
Thanks again for being part of this journey, I wouldn't (and likely couldn't) be doing it without you.