VictoryGuy

Thanks GrandpaPhil and Wallace! I'm glad to see there are others working through the same ship and scale. Both your builds look fantastic and please feel free to give me any input/advice as things progress - it's all new to me! I'm actually further along but ran out of time to post the other photos last night, so I'll add them this evening. I've managed to finish much of the stern gallery and paint the hull (you're right Wallace, the paint did solve my two tone problem). Please let me know if you have any suggestions! I decided to paint the hull copper rather than install actual copper plates. The jury's still out on the look for me, but I figured I can always copper it later if I change my mind. I painted the rest of the hull in the former yellow/black scheme instead of the newer beige/pinkish tone on the actual ship. The kit's instructions on building the stern gallery are a bit vague, so I built the inside out of balsa, then planked and trimmed with walnut strips. Thankfully I'd painted the brass stern gallery pieces 20 years ago, so that saved me some time. Here's the before & after: I added the gunwale planks and finished painting the upper decks in black. The cannons/gunport frames aren't glued in yet, I just put them in temporarily to properly position the gunwale planks. I'm moving on to the rudder & bow sections now, and will post some photos once I make progress.

This is my first ship model build so please excuse the mistakes. I actually started this model in the mid '90s with the delusion I would build it over a summer, quickly realized I had no concept of what it would actually take, then got distracted by multiple kids and life in general. The result was I took about 20 years off, but always planned to pick it back up again. I dusted it off earlier this year and have finally started to make progress. When I stopped in the '90s I had only completed the ribs, deck, the upper portion of the hull planking, and a few gun ports (that was about the time I realized the true scope of the project). So the first thing I did was finish the gun ports....... Then I moved on to hull planking....first layer (a little rough) Second layer....getting a little smoother High tech waterline tool.....the two-tone wood colour is due to a 20 year gap between laying the planks!