John Allen

Dear Bob Cleek,
you are right, it is not a Byrnes saw and most of the points you are mentioning are really the weaknesses of the saw. I thought of buying the Byrnes but I was repelled by the price and the additional shipping costs. One comment: I was also a little been puzzled by the uncommon blade type. But there are some providers - at least in Germany - who are selling a lot of blade subtypes which are also suitable for the NovelLife saw:
https://www.saegeblatt-shop.de/produkte_kreissaegeblaetter-5-metallkreissaegeblaetter-din1837&din1838-86-BAY14006306100-24848.html

May be I am dissapointed at the end, I will put some further reports when I start the real use. So far I have only tested it.
Thank you for your comment.
Clark


 

Tom,
 
JoAnne's should have Tulle it comes in a variety of colors, Gdale put me on that one, I used black on my Vic. It has the diamond pattern.
 
John

Hi John - thanks for the suggestion.  Unfortunately 3.1mm scales to 4 inches on the model.  The rings and connectors are only about 2.5 inches.
 
I'm satisfied with the approach I've taken - just need to make some changes to get a little more precision and consistency.

Frank,
 
Go to e bay seller yadanabeads1  antiquated 32 feet of copper figure 8 connectors $ 17.60 2x5x3.1 mm when zooming in on pic look at the 8 connecting rings may help I didn't look further but there were lots of other options.
 
May be promising.
 
John

Sadly a massive waste of brave young men, led at that time by incompetent British officers. Sadly history repeats itself and we never learn
 
Jim, another nice one.

Frank,
 
Go to e bay seller yadanabeads1  antiquated 32 feet of copper figure 8 connectors $ 17.60 2x5x3.1 mm when zooming in on pic look at the 8 connecting rings may help I didn't look further but there were lots of other options.
 
May be promising.
 
John

Frank,
 
Go to e bay seller yadanabeads1  antiquated 32 feet of copper figure 8 connectors $ 17.60 2x5x3.1 mm when zooming in on pic look at the 8 connecting rings may help I didn't look further but there were lots of other options.
 
May be promising.
 
John

Frank,
 
Go to e bay seller yadanabeads1  antiquated 32 feet of copper figure 8 connectors $ 17.60 2x5x3.1 mm when zooming in on pic look at the 8 connecting rings may help I didn't look further but there were lots of other options.
 
May be promising.
 
John

Very nice work, Keith!
 
Are you sure you don’t have ‘master craftsman’s genes In your DNA😊😊?
 
Cheers. 
 
Patrick

Nice metal work as usual Keith, seems like a nice quality brass you use as it cleans up and 'works' very nicely?
 
If my first trick is unworkable you could always try my fallback option    Try flicking it so that it flies off the workbench into some place you cannot immediately find it - it will turn up a few weeks later  
 
cheers
 
Pat

Depending on where you are there is also the chance some individual has use the tree for target practice. Have seen many clips of people milling local timber only to find lead pellets or shot in the felled trunk.

Should be some of the best stuff you can get. You may have to cut through a lot of junk but the sound wood you find will be of the best. Watch out for foriegn metal in it as fokls over the years have driven nails and staples into them.

Part 96 –Oyster Dredge
 
Kathryn’s dredges are very similar to the dredges found on all skipjacks.  They consist of a dredge body of welded steel rods, with a basket consisting of linked rings for the bottom part of the basket, and a rope net for the upper part of the basket.  The basket is attached to the body via rings.  The following photo is one of the better dredge photos I was able to find online.
 
                        
 
The plans for the Willie Bennett have a very good pictorial description, including measurements, for the dredges.
 
                        
 
My intent is to make the dredges as close to reality as possible.  My first task was to determine how to make the network of rings for the basket.
 
The rings were made by wrapping 34 gauge black wire around a #53 drill bit – this gave coils of rings that are the correct scale dimensions.
 
                        
 
The individual rings were cut off the coils
 
                        
 
The rings needed to be pressed closed and straightened.  This was accomplished using a pair of Xuron needle-nose pliers.  In the following photo the ring on the left is as cut from the coil, while the one on the right has been straightened.
 
                        
 
Given the number of rings involved (plus plenty of spares) this was a fairly boring but necessary task
 
                        
 
When manufacturing the ring groups, the individual small rings were held in the miniature copper alligator clips from Radio Shack.  These clips were in turn held by third-hand tweezers held in a weighted base.
 
                        
 
I decided to use thread as the figure-eight small rings that are used to join the round rings of the net.  I tried .007” thread, but this proved to be much too thick. I have some 16/0 fly tying thread (about the diameter of a thick human hair) which proved to be satisfactory.
 
                        
 
The only problem in using this thread is that it’s so thin that it easily slips through the opening or split left in the rings. To correct this, each ring had a small drop of medium (gap-filling) CA glue applied to the split in the ring.
 
Each end of the thread was fed up through the pair of rings to be joined
 
                        
 
and then down through the opposite rings.
 
                        
 
The ends of the threads were brought up each side of the thread weave created above and tied in a simple knot.
 
                        
 
The ends were brought down around the thread weave, and double knotted.
 
                        
 
Finally the thread ends were brought up again and a final knot was made on top of the ‘figure eight’ configuration.
 
                        
 
                        
 
A drop of CA glue was applied to the knot to secure it, using a small pin held in a pin vise as the applicator.
 
                        
 
After the CA dried the ends were trimmed using a sharp scalpel.
 
                        
 
The result was a passable pair of rings joined by a “figure eight”.
 
                        
 
I proceeded to tie a few rings together, and found that holding a string of rings required an adjustment to the placement of the holding devices.
 
                        
 
                        
 
(As can be seen in the above photo, Optivisors were a necessity for this process)
 
Overall, the experiment was a success.
 
                        
 
                        
 
I found that I’ll need to use something to keep the intervals between the rings consistent, and I also need to follow a better method of tying and gluing the threads to allow the joints to remain loose and flexible.
 
I’m fairly confident that I’ll be able to make a net of rings for the dredge basket.  The net of rope or twine will also take some experimenting, but I have a few ideas of how to get it done.  This will have to wait until the dredge frames and the ring nets are completed.
 
So, the next priority is to make the dredge frames.
 
Thanks everyone.

John,the phrase "Lions led by Donkeys"comes to mind.
 
Dave 

Frank,
 
Figured out how many teeth on the lead bar? Are you going with ring mesh bag or rope and rings, would think this would be the most difficult part of dredge build.
 
Good Luck John

Sadly a massive waste of brave young men, led at that time by incompetent British officers. Sadly history repeats itself and we never learn
 
Jim, another nice one.

Great job, and congrats on an unusual model!

Thanks for all the likes folks. And for Popeye and Mark - I won't be adding a figure to this model, though I do appreciate your thoughts.
 
The Base was a little too shiny after the varnish, so I knocked it down a little with some 0000 steel wool and furniture wax. Here is the completed stand:
 

And here is the stand with the fuselage attached (note: I later replaced the steel phillips head screws with brass slotted screws, with slots aligned to the grain of the wood of course!):
 

 
Then it was simply a case of following the instruction sequence for attaching the wings and the tail section, along with the rigging. The instructions for this phase were particularly poor but we got there in the end. 
 
It was very difficult to photograph the completed model because of the wing-span, but here are a few overall shots:
 

 

 

 
And here are a few close-ups of various sections:
 
Top View:

 
Underneath:
 

 
And another from underneath:
 

 
Posting these last couple of photos showed me that one of the rigging lines had parted company with its pulley - that has now been rectified.
 
That completes the construction of the Da Vinci Flying Machine. One year and eight months in the making – would have been a lot less if procrastination and other priorities hadn’t interfered! For those who may be curious, the wing-span is 102 cm / 40 inches.
 
Now I can turn my attention to the next project(s)....
 
I will be starting on Chuck's Medway Longboat shortly, but I may also try to multi-task and start on one of my two Pocher car models. We'll have to see - there is still a bunch of 1:1 scale woodwork going on in the "big" workshop!
 
Thanks to all who have followed along with this build, for your support and encouragement. I hope you have enjoyed watching as much as I have enjoyed building this kit.

Well, I had thought that over the Christmas holiday period I would be able to finish this model, but.......
 
The model has lain dormant for quite some time as I contemplated fixing the mesh to the wings. The instructions give two options – simply glue the mesh to the struts using CA glue, or for added realism, sew them onto the struts. It was the latter part that added to the delay. Not only was it a mind-numbing task to contemplate, but the actual doing of it was a lot like the task of completing the ratlines on a model ship. So, it seemed that many other priorities in the workshop and around the house managed to make their way ahead of this task. I finally decided to bite the bullet, put on a talking book and set to. In the end, after months of procrastination, it only took about three days per wing, plus another day for the tail assembly. The task was aided by the use of a curved upholstery needle but remained a slow and tedious process nevertheless. Now I know why talking books were invented!
 
Here is the result:

Prior to final assembly, the stand needs to be temporarily completed to aid in the assembly process (it can be removed later if a ‘flying’ display is desired). The parts for the stand are pre-shaped and required only the forming of a bevel on the top part of the mount, some pilot holes for fixing the fuselage, a final sand, and then staining and varnishing. The instructions recommend a gloss black finish to provide contrast for the model, so I chose a black spirit-based stain (two coats), with a clear gloss varnish over the top. I'll post some photos of that once the varnish dries and then I can do the "final" assembly.
 
The only remaining problem will be what to do with it once it's completed. It may end up hanging from the ceiling in my study/office/workshop.

Happy New Year to you and the family, Grant.
 
A nice challenge, looking very good .... would have loved to lay my hands on this kit, but unfortunately it is no longer available ...

It's been a long time between drinks for this log! The usual "life got in the way" excuse applies - mainly work-related - but I have managed to re-commence work on this project in the last couple of weeks - spurred on by receipt of my Medway Longboat kit from Chuck!😉
 
The somewhat tedious process of shaping all of the spars was the next step. 
 
The two spars of shape ‘B’ were sanded square and set aside. Of the 30 spars of shape ‘A’, eight were sanded square and set aside. The remaining 22 were tapered square from two thirds of the way back to the end of each rib. After tapering square, these 22 along with two that were not tapered, were all shaped octagonal. I found the easiest way to do this was using a very small hand plane. All the spars were then given a finish coating of Shellac followed by furniture wax. Here are the resulting spars, although the photo does not really show the shaping terribly well.
 

 
It was then on to the main wing spar shafts. Although the kit provided some 3/16” dowel for these, I used some 1/4" square boxwood stock to make these. After cutting to length, I started by drilling the holes as indicated in the plans while the stock was still square. I then used an approximation of the 7/10/7 rule to draw some layout lines for shaping to octagonal, for which I again used a small hand plane. The spars were then chucked in a hand drill and sanded round to the final thickness of 3/16”. It sounds like a lot of work, but this progressed quite quickly in the end. One end of each main spar was then shaped with a ‘step’ to receive two parts similar to a gaff neck (the part is unnamed in the instructions). These parts, together with the shaped end of the spar shaft, form a housing for the next part called a ‘spring clamp’, into which a wing-tip spar (cut from the spar shape 'B') was inserted. Once all the shaping was complete, the spar shafts received the usual treatment of shellac/furniture wax. I forgot to take any progress photos of this stage. 
 
The spring clamps were shaped from 1/4” x 3/32” Cherry stock and fitted to the spar shaft housings using a dab of glue and three ‘seizings’. Here is a photo of the completed main spar shafts, with wing-tip spars inserted.
 

 
and a close-up of the spring-clamp arrangement... 
 

 
All of the shaped spars, together with the main spar shafts, will now be used to construct the wings.

Thanks Mobbsie and Druxey - the storage cabinets certainly make life a little easier in the "big" workshop.
 
On with the build....
 
Wing construction begins with making formers for shaping the wing ribs. Paper templates are provided for two shapes of rib. The templates were applied to some scrap 12mm plywood, cut to rough shape on the scroll saw and refined on the spindle sander. To speed up the process, I cut four of shape ‘A’ and two of shape ‘B’. The completed formers were then covered in packing tape to prevent glue adhering to them.
 
The wing ribs are each formed by laminating two pieces of 1/8” x 1/16” and cold moulding them on the plywood formers. This simply means applying a thin bead of glue between the two laminations and then clamping them to the plywood formers. It is a very simple, yet very effective way of achieving the curved shape for the spars. Once the glue has dried, there is virtually no spring back. In the photo below, you can see the two different former shapes, one rib being moulded to the former, and two completed ribs after moulding.
 

 
In the second photo, are the complete set of ribs: 30 of shape ‘A’ and two of shape ‘B’.
 

 
The ribs now all require further shaping dependent on their final location on the ribs. This will be a slow process......
 

Thanks Mark and Piet, and also to all of the likes.
 
Well, I finally got to spend some time in the model workshop today, after eight months of 1:1 scale work. In the end, it took me only a couple of hours each day over the weekend to complete the fuselage. Two side-bars were cut to size and fitted with various pulleys and cable guides before fitting. The only tricky part here was finding a way to clamp them while the glue set. Then a couple of split pins were shaped into a horseshoe shape with a piece of bamboo across the open ends to form handles. A piece of cordage was then connected from these to the crankshaft. 
 
Here are a couple of pictures of progress to date.
 

 

 
After taking the pictures, I realised that the cordage had come away from the pulleys on the neck ring – it should pass around these as well as going through the cable guides.  And that completes the construction of the fuselage. Wings are up next.

Next up was a storage and charging station for some of my cordless tools. Another Brad Rodriguez design.
 

 
Then it was back to the workbench. I decided I really needed some built-in storage under my main workbench. So I made an “original” design to fit four drawers and a cupboard. It was really hard to get in place to take a photo, but you’ll get the idea….
 

 
The drawer/cupboard unit has a space above it for storing my sharpening stones, shooting board, and bench hook.
 
The drawers house some of my hand tools: chisels, gouges, auger bits, and planes.
 

 
A recent addition to the workshop has been a small thickness planer, so of course it needed its own cabinet, so I made a repeat of the Drill Press cabinet for it:
 

 
I needed somewhere to store an amazingly large collection of screws and other fasteners. I found some neat storage trays in the hardware store and made up some plywood housing for them, mounted again on the French Cleat system. And I needed somewhere for a growing collection of smaller clamps as well. 
 

 
 
 
Back in February, I attended a three-day workshop learning how to make Bandsaw Boxes.
 
Here is a couple of photos of my first two boxes, made from Australian Red Cedar and completed during those three days:
 

 

 
And here is my third, unfinished box, made from Huon Pine:
 

 
It is ready for the drawer faces to be carved with finger-pulls.
 
And finally, completed today, was this 3-d design end-grain cutting board for the kitchen. Design is by a Russian woodworker, whose website is MTMWood.com He does some amazing work and I purchased a copy of his plans/instructions for this. The finished board is about 530mm x 330mm x 50mm thick. Timbers used were Jarrah, Walnut and Rock Maple.  The “client” is happy with the result…
 

 
So, as you can see, while I may not have been building models, I have not been idle over the last eight months or so....
 
Now, back to modelling.........I hope..........
 

It’s been quite a while since I updated this log, so I thought I’d show you what has kept me out of the model shipyard for all of this time…
 
It all started with a desire to sort out the storage arrangements in the “dirty” workshop – ie the garage, which has to do double duty as both workshop and home for two cars. Then a visit to the Timber and Working with Wood Show resulted in funding approval for a new table saw to assist with the modifications while retaining all 10 digits.  Because of the need to retain the primary function of the garage (ie housing for cars), all cabinetry was made mobile so that the workshop could be configured “as required” for whatever the task at hand demanded.
 
The first cab off the rank was storage for my ever-growing collection of “hobby” machinery. For this I made a 1.5m long cabinet that would house the Sherline Mill and Lathe on top. The design was from Brad Rodriguez at Fix-This-Build-That. Taking pictures now is a little awkward, but here is the overall cabinet with the Sherline Machines under their dust covers on top.
 

 
 
In use, they can be either kept in place, or moved to another work surface:
 

 
Inside the cabinet are two doors concealing two full-extension pull-out trays that house yet more machinery, and four drawers for all of the lathe and mill accessories, air-brush equipment, etc.
 

 
 
The next thing I decided to make was an assembly table that would double as an outfeed table for the table saw. For this, I combined the plans/ideas from three different woodworkers. The top is a torsion box design by Ron Paulk in the USA. The frame is a design by Paul Sellers (UK), which is knock down design, and I added to that by putting 3” castors on the legs. Then I used an idea from Dave Stanton (Australia) to make the top similar to the Festool MFT table (only larger).
 

 
The top is made from ¾” plywood. It’s about 1.5m long by about 900m wide. The cut-outs around the side panels serve to both reduce weight and provide handy temporary storage for tools as you go. The dog holes are laid out using the UJK Parf Guide system, which guarantees alignment and spacing. I also added T-Track around 3 edges. The top is sturdy, and although it is fairly heavy, I can lift it on and off the frame by myself with relative ease.
 
Here is a view of the table top removed for storage. You can see the basic construction of the frame, and the locating slots for seating the table top securely. The aprons of the table are held together by half-lap joints and held securely by crucifix joints in the tops of the legs. Two stretcher/bearers are housed in dovetail joints to complete the frame.
 

 
Here is a close-up of the crucifix joint on one leg during disassembly.
 

 
Once completely disassembled, all of the frame components sit neatly on the extension wing of the table saw. The whole thing goes together in about one minute flat. Same for disassembly.
 

 
 
Next up were a mobile timber storage cart and some mobile bases for both Drill Press and Spindle Sander. While I was at it, I made a table for the Drill Press. It’s a bit hard to tell in this photo, but yes, that is a timber storage cart full of, well, timber…..
 

 
The Drill Press cabinet and the Spindle Sander cabinet are essentially identical, except that one has four drawers ,while the other has one drawer and a cupboard. The designs were based on more from Brad Rodriguez at Fix-This-Build-That.
 

 
Next up, I really wanted some storage for finishes and other “stuff”. I based this on a design from Jay Bates. After I made it, I realised I needed a second one…..
 

 
Also in the above photo you can see my large clamp rack (another Brad Rodriguez design) and a small storage rack for my Random Orbital Sander and various sand papers to go with it (also designed by Brad Rodriguez). All of the wall-mounted cabinets are mounted using a French Cleat system. This makes it really easy to move things around if you change your mind about placement of items as the cabinets are not fixed to the wall.
 
More in the next post…..