rcweir

It's been a while, again, since my last posting, but I have been busy on the model with several things. First, I realized that my decision long ago to realign the gunports created conflicts with locating some of the hanging knees which brace the upper deck beams. Consequently, I had to make four dagger knees which slant away from their beam at ~45 degree angle. What I did was to make a very long blank with the same profile as one of the kit-supplied hanging knees, and then cut my daggers out of it. I needed four altogether (a left and a right on each side of the ship). These aren't installed yet, but they're all finished and ready to go. I have to make a long trip to Ring Bolt City before the knees go on. In the photo below, the kit supplied knees are on the left, and my daggers are middle and right. Just to be clear, these are needed to clear the gun ports and also to ensure there's room on the side of each port for the gun rigging. I hope to have photos of these in place "soon". Next task was assembling the guns. This step, too, is not entirely complete. Dutch gun carriages differ from the English style, and most disconcerting for me are the itty bitty wheels. For this kit they're just a bit too itty bitty to center the gun on the port, so I made an axle assembly (based on Longridge, which is the best reference I have) to get them up another millimeter. I'm also making quoins, but haven't figured out yet how to put attractive knobs on them. Another undone thing for the guns is to blacken them chemically. I am going to try very hard to do this well and not have to fall back to paint: that's the project for next weekend. Luckily, there are some very good guides on MSW. Then there was installing the ladder from the hold to the gun deck. The kit says to place the ladder at the forward starboard corner of the hatch, but I didn't like that because, since the hold over there is unplanked, there was no real footing for the ladder. So, I've put mine on the centerline, sitting on the keelson and fully under the forward edge of the beam above. This way it's got a credible footing and the post also makes sense as a beam support, which there are examples of in the Batavia plans that I have. Also, I eliminated the hand grips on the ladder below about 6' - no need for them to go all the way down to the deck. Details of the hatch were hard to come by in the kit instructions and in all the references that I have. I settled on a coaming 2mm high x 3mm wide, set the forward and after pieces on their respective beams, and the side pieces rest in the binding strakes' rabbets. I put a rabbet for a hatch cover in the frame but I don't plan to make a cover for it. Just to give an idea of how I'm going to reach Ring Bolt City, I've cut about a couple of dozen 1.5mm rings (following Chuck's technique in - I think - his Winnie log). My very rough guess is that I'm going to need 60 or so, which assumes a good deal of wastage. Finally, for some reason the kit doesn't mention gunports. But they're surely necessary. I've made them, but with the ports completely filling the space between two wales, the hinges are going to be tricky for me to make reasonably convincing. The finished model will have the ports all open. And that's all for now. I have to rush off to the job now that provides the paychecks. (Which means I'll go hunting for typos later!) Thanks for viewing, Bob

This entry is just about the upper deck beams. Although the upper deck beams will not be installed for quite a while - the gun deck will be fitted out first - I got to work preparing them early. My motivation was that I don't want my model to show the carlings as passing through the main beams. On the lower deck I dealt with this by adding blank facings on the two outer deck beams. But, for the upper deck, I'm doing something different - making two new beams which are not drilled through. This turned out to be an unexpectedly fortuitous decision! I made the new beams by cutting out slightly oversize blanks and tacking them to two of the laser-cut beams with dabs of PVA. Then I just made the profile of the blank side match the companion beam. At the end I was very careful to drill the carling holes only part ways through. Once the profiles were true and the carling holes located, I drizzled each with 91% isopropyl alcohol, waited 15 minutes, and pulled the two pieces apart. The original master beams were undamaged by this process, so I ended up with a couple of spares. With the end beams finished, I fitted each of them in place (but no glue!) (Ignore the interior beams in the next photo, for now.) That work went smoothly and I'm happy with the result. But, having done that, I thought it would be wise to make sure that the tops of these two new beams were in the same plane as the interior ones. What I was surprised to learn was that it wasn't really possible for me to put the interior beams in at all. Neither the instructions nor any of the build logs I've seen mention trouble with the upper deck beams, so I don't know why I'm special here. Because the beam shelf was glued in earlier (and had to be in order to do things like build the gun ports and install the top timbers), and because the sides of the ship are tilted steeply in at the upper deck, I couldn't maneuver the beams in from the end and twist them into place. I also couldn't push them into place from the side, through the gaps in the top timbers. The gaps are wide enough, but the presence of the higher wales on those in-tilting sides didn't leave enough clear length. Sorry, but I don't have clear photos that illustrate the dilemma. My first thought was to trim the beams so that they were just able to go through the top timbers and drop into place. I tried that on two of the beams (remember the two spares?) That did work, but trimming those arched beams resulted in them sitting 1-2 mm lower than the properly fitting end beams. That's how last weekend ended. Over the next several days I mulled over how to solve this dilemma. One solution I considered was to insert ~1mm pads on the interior beam seats: this would have let me use the two beams I'd shortened. I didn't like this because I thought that the pads would be visible and there was so little meat left for a footing on those shortened beams. Then I thought about sawing each beam in two, with a long longitudinal cut. They could be glued back together, in register I think, and the cut could be hidden under the to-be planked (starboard) side. My main objection to this is that it was a fair amount of work, fairly high risk, and the result couldn't be totally invisible. But, in fooling around with the pieces, trying to see what the possibilities were, I realized that the top timbers' thickness was enough extra space to allow one beam end to be pushed through the opposite side timbers, into the beam seat and beyond into those extra 2.5 mm and thereby allow the other end of the beam to get past the upper wale and drop into place! That's the technique I used. In the next picture of the port side, all beams are (temporarily) in place. I number them 1-7 from right to left. Obviously the end beams, 1 and 7, are fine. And you can see that the seats for both 4 and 6 align almost perfectly with gaps between the top timbers. Therefore, my job was to carve into the top timbers impeding 2, 3 and 5. Only one side of the model has to get this treatment, so I did it on the port side, which will ultimately be completely planked inside and out. And thus I have a completely hidden solution. The next photo shows how I carved 2, 3, and 5. For 3 I also had to remove part of the forward 1/2 of the beam end, but only a section that will be hidden inside the shelf's seat. Two and 5 didn't require any adjustments to the beam - just a bit of top timber chopping. Here are a couple of close-ups of the work for 2. In this case the top timber was blocking on the left. Notice that 3 hadn't been touched yet when these photos were taken. And a view checking the alignment of the full set of beams. It's not perfect now, but within sanding tolerance once they are permanently installed. You might think that it was a little scary carving those timbers, but I was relaxed about it since the worst that could happen was damage to an exterior plank which could be easily replaced. If I had forseen all of this, probably the only thing I would change is that I'd carve up the top timbers before putting on the exterior planking. Access then would be simple. It probably can't be done before the top timbers are in place because the precise alignments between beam seats and timbers isn't known until they are. Thanks for visiting, Bob

Last week I painted the port gunport frames, then installed the four wales on each side. After the wales, the regular planking to port was continued from the turn of the bilge up to the top wale. (Wales are black to port, but only stained on the unplanked starboard side.) On Sunday, I only had a bit of time available for the model, so I treenailed all of the gun deck planking that's been installed. There will be more planking later. The treenails are birch toothpicks sawn in half, as before. The holes are drilled to .9 mm, also as before. Nothing very exciting, but it's forward progress, and a couple of pages turned in the instruction book. In the same period as I did this work I also was working on the beams of the upper deck. They will be the subject of the next post (which I will start shortly, but first the pooch needs to walk.) Thanks for looking, Bob

Olli, your Duyfken build will be fun to follow. The criticisms of the sophistication of the Kolderstok line are valid, but I also think their kits are at least as exciting as the other manufacturers mentioned, but in a different way: who else has ever given us kits of the famous Dutch 17th types? For me, Kolderstok kits are a long-held dream come true. I'm very interested in hearing how your investigations of the carving develop. Are you thinking to do it digitally, or hand carve? Bob

I spent the time since the last post framing the gun ports. As in other cases with this model, I worked on the mostly-hidden port side to get techniques down before finishing up on the exposed side. And after reading the instructions one more time, I decided that the proper reference point for locating the ports was the lower outer edge of the upper deck beam shelf, not the lower inner. This meant I had trimmed the futtocks .5mm too low, so to compensate I made the lower sill 2.5mm thick rather than 2. After the lower sills, I did the uppers. The kit comes with a template piece to establish the height for the port opening, but for easier marking at the proper angle, I made a longer one that could reach all the way across. Making the sills was slow work, but not very difficult. As always, my greatest trouble was marking precisely and then actually seeing the marks so I could cut to them. At the end, I made a rough check of how the cannon would sit. Since I am expecting that I will make my own wheels for the carriages, this trial doesn't matter much. (I've learned from build logs that at least one other modeler of this kit has made his wheels to position the guns properly.) In the final picture you can see that the lower sill of the center port doesn't appear to be horizontal. That's something I hadn't noticed in real life, and I'm going to need to do something about it. That's all for now. Thanks for looking, Bob

It is a great looking model! A friend of mine made a CLC single (1:1 scale) many years ago, and your model brings back fond memories.

The next order of business after finishing the ledges was to plank the port side of the gun deck. Instructions say to leave the three outermost planks loose until the trusses (futtock riders) are installed. But just a single plank opening is sufficient for me to move them in and out, and that's also what the instruction photos show. I made sure to stain the undersides of the planks before installing them! The nibbing strakes are also installed now; these are the lowest planks, P&S, on the interior sides. For me, these are important items. First of all, their thickness controls how well the futtock riders will sit against the sides of the ship above and below the gun deck. Secondly, their upper edges are useful when checking levels, so it's good if the two pieces have the same, uniform width. The instructions call for the strake to be 2mm, but on my model that was too much. After sampling a few thicknesses for fit, I found that 1.5mm was perfect for my futtock riders. The "top timbers" make the last level of hull framing. Construction of them is not very different from the lower levels of futtocks, but this time there are two different sizes. The first 9 top timbers have two notches at the top for clinker planks, while the last 10 are a little taller, with three notches. The lower two notches are at the same level for the entire length, which is an important detail to observe when installing them. Before installing any of the top timbers figure out where you want your gun ports to lie, because the timbers over the ports are not installed yet. The instructions are conflicted on this, but in reading the other build logs I think the designer has agreed that putting the ports at timbers 3, 10, and 17 looks best. That's what I'm doing. As on the lower framing levels, the corners are installed first. I followed my earlier practice: all four of mine lie between two futtocks. So my two initial forward timbers are actually one frame in from the absolute corner - which I installed last of all. (Remember, the two-notch top timbers start at the end where the mast step is.) I was very, very careful to make sure these were properly located, that the tops of the two pairs were level, and that the notches were horizontal. I did find that the laser cut timbers match the kit's drawing of the framing very precisely, so in a sense this was quite easy - all the checking I did only confirmed that everything was where it ought to be. The instructions seem to say that the upper deck beam shelves should be installed after the four top timber corners are installed, but I waited until all the timbers were in before doing mine. The alignment combs are just as useful for installing this level as in the earlier ones. I'm posting a lot of photos of this work since I often wished I had more examples to look at. When all the timbers were installed (aside from the gun ports), I realized one timber was not quite properly seated. As I had used PVA to glue them in, it just took some 91% alcohol and a bit of patience to pull the misaligned frame out and reinstall. The shelves went in nicely, and confirmed that my 1.5mm nibbing strakes were the right thickness. The alignment of the shelves, like all the other framing work, is critical. I measured and checked every way I could before actually applying glue. The futtock riders, by the way, are not glued in yet - they're held in place during this work by tape down in the hold. Once the shelves were installed, I started working on the gun ports. The lower edge of the frames on which the port sill will lie is found by using a laser cut block that's 15mm high. The top of that block is put against the bottom of the deck shelf and the bottom of the block marks where to cut the frames. At least that's how I interpret the instructions, and it seems to result in a good location. I also believe that the instructions want the lower sill to be horizontal, i.e. parallel to the plane of the waterline. The supplied block was not much help for finding the horizontal, but I used a 150mm ruler for this which, by good luck, was 15mm wide. With the ruler I could easily get a horizontal line by putting the top of the ruler against the bottoms of the two shelf beams. Until it dawned on me that my ruler was perfectly sized, I was expecting to have to make a long piece of the right width. (The ruler I'm speaking of is not the one on the next photo, but it shows up in the last set of photos, below.) That's all for now. Have to make some coffee and descend to the basement for today's work. Thanks for looking, Bob

Installing ledges on the starboard (exposed) side went very smoothly today. After all the practice I had on the soon-to-be-covered port side, marking and cutting the mortises was a quick job and there was much greater consistency in the result. Marking is tough for me with these tiny pieces, but I recently acquired a pair of Narex violin marking knives (with right and left hand bevels). Besides being sharp, the angle is quite sharp, letting me get into tight areas. They helped a lot marking the mortises. I also tuned up my little 1.5mm flat chisel so that its edge was straight as well as sharp. The chisels are from Micromark, and I can't say I think they're wonderful tools, but they are affordable and useful. You can see in the finished result that the top/left side of the next photos is more uniform than the other. And, after today's work, the look of all the deck support timbers is similar to the illustration from Witsen back in post #31.Today's work is on the left. Tomorrow I'll be working on planking the port side and getting the frames up for the upper deck. Thanks for looking, Bob

This is a short post. I've started installing the ledges for the gun deck. Ledges are the small strips parallel to the deck beams which rest on the carlings. I'm trying to make their joints with the nibbing and binding strakes more like authentic practice, which is a lap joint into the rabbet on the strakes. This is a finicky process for me, since those pieces have a tiny 1.5 mm cross section. Yesterday I finished the port side, and that's what these photos show. I did port first (which will be almost entirely hidden once the planks go down) so I could settle on the procedures for the other side, which will remain unplanked. Later today I'll start the starboard side. Starting in August I've cut back my work week to just three days, so in theory I should start progressing a little less slowly. (It takes some time to adjust to having a standard 4-day weekend.) Thanks for looking, Bob

Thanks Canute & Chuck for your comments. I tried to do approximately as Canute advised: I put on a first coat of Minwax polycrylic as a sealer, but I don't think that I sealed well enough. The intent was for the stain to act as a glaze, i.e. coloring the wood but not soaking into it. Next time I'll be more thorough with the sealer. I do want the aged look that stain can provide, I just don't want it to look like the ship's cat threw up on it. Chuck, what wood dye are you using? Bob

It's been a long time since my last post, I'm afraid. I've made it past an important milestone, and collected a few scars in the passing. First, here's my ship's cargo. The barrels have different finishes, I know, so I'll probably save some for the next project. The two leftmost are Chuck's work, which set the standard. The third on the left is my best effort at matching Chuck's. All of them are quite usable, though. (I have one more, a wooden one from the Syren boxwood kit, but it's not quite done and didn't make it into the pic.) Now's when it gets ugly. My big effort was to stain the hold, and it didn't go very well. I started with a light coat of polyurethane (Minwax polycrylic satin), sanded it very lightly, then brushed on stain (Minwax penetrating golden oak). On the planking it did fine, but the blotchy result on the futtocks and knees was like a knife in my heart! The obvious thing to do was sand it all down and try again, but a big complicating factor was the protruding bolts in the worst pieces. Eventually I decided that I had to improve the bilge riders, but the futtocks would be much less visible and they could stay as they were. So I dug the bolts out of those four big timbers and sanded the tops. And then recoated with the poly and restained. This resulted in something much closer to what I had hoped for. Plus, with the passage of time, I have adjusted to the shocking transition from the original white basswood to the stained wood, which now shows so much texture (for good and ill). Now that the hold was stained, I could move on to installing the lower deck beams. I'm intending to provide support for the deck planking, i.e. the carlings and ledges, in a way that's closer to the prototype. For the carlings (the thin longitudinals that connect the heavy beams), I've cut in rabbets on the side that won't be planked, to simulate authentic joint. In Dutch ships of this era, there were long strengthening planks at the deck edge (nibbing strakes) and near the centerline (binding strakes). I've cut rabbets in these 2mm planks which will later join with the 1mm regular deck planks. I'm working now on the ledges, but don't have any pictures of them yet. Thanks for looking. I'll be more prompt with the next posting! Bob

Not a great deal has happened since my last post: I've installed a lot of bolts and knees in the hold: enough of them that I believe now it's time to apply finish in that area. The first photo contains all the different bolts I'm using: 1.4mm resin bolts on the keelson, 1.2mm resin on the big bilge and floor riders, and 20 gauge copper wire for all of the knees and the bilge stringers (slightly thicker plank that's right at the break of the bilge). Next are the four futtock riders which won't be installed for a while, but they reach down into the hold and have to have their lower part fitted now - I put this picture in since it shows the copper wire bolts before they're trimmed. Below is a view mainly to show what the carlings will look like - they're the square longitudinal boards that pass through the beams. The last three photos are just different views of the current state. As I said, I think it's time to stain the interior, so the next posting ought to look different. Thanks for looking, Bob

Yesterday was the only full model day I'll have over the long weekend. I'm still working on the hold, trying to get it ready for staining. The first task was to install the (toothpick) treenails on the starboard side. Next, I installed 1.4mm 3d printed round bolts on the keelson. Both of those steps went smoothly. I'm proud (and surprised) to be able to announce that not one of those 12 little dots disappeared into the ether. I need, though, to improve the uniformity of exposed heights when I install these things - the appearance is not quite as uniform as I'd like. I have to be very selective where I use the bolt heads - each $11.00 set includes about 4 dozen bolt heads in 5 different sizes, both round and hex. That sounds like a lot, but I can probably only use the two smallest sizes of round heads, which works out that they're costing me about 10¢ each. Therefore, I also need a lower tech, lower cost solution for the high volume bolts, like those on knees. What I'm going to do there is to use 20 gauge copper wire, which you can see in the photo I've used for the bolts in the bilge stringer. The wire is slightly smaller in diameter than the treenails (.8mm vs .9mm), but it protrudes up, and that dimensionality makes them more prominent. I'll use the same wire bolts for the knees, too. I do have to blacken them, which I believe I've got figured out, but haven't done on the model yet. After bolts, the next task yesterday was to install the bilge and floor riders that help brace the mainmast. The bilge riders (the four heavy knees in the pictures below) needed some work to fit properly in their assigned position - the inevitable adjustment that's necessary for pieces like this. Those very heavy timbers will get 3d printed bolt heads - probably the next size down (1.2mm) from what I used on the keelson. When they're all done, I think it will be time to put a coat of WOP and stain on the hold. After that there are a few straggler tasks necessary before I can install the lower deck beams: I have to fit (but not yet install) some composite knee-like fixtures that the kit describes as trusses, but which are termed "futtock riders" in Ab Hoving's edition of Witsen. These are (to me) odd-looking timbers shaped somewhat like the letter 'f'. I believe they were stiffeners to help tie the deck beams into the hull structure. But what matters to me right now is that I make sure I've got a reasonable fit on their lower portions while the hold is still easily accessed. Another task in the hold is to load some cargo - I've got several barrels that will need to be secured down there. I'm still trying to figure out the stain. These are all resin barrels from Syren; the two with painted bands are demos that Chuck kindly included in my order. The others are a result of my own various, unfinished experiments with stains.

This is a short addendum to the last report: last night before dinner I made the time to install the last pair of knees in this first go-round. Now I'm all set for the next step, which is to install the mast support timbers that you can see sitting in place (and not yet fitted) in the second pic. I'm happy to move forward, even if it's just a short distance. With a little bit of luck I will get in some work on the 4th, but otherwise I'll be away for the long weekend. Thanks for looking!

I made some progress this past weekend: first I finished cleaning laser char off of the parts that will be installed in the hold. Not the most fun job, but most of that had already been done, so it didn't take me long to finish up. I intend to build framing and support for the decks that's more accurate to actual practices than the kit calls for. The first step down this path is to cut dados on the beams to hold the carlings. These are not necessary for the model because the kit beams have laser-cut holes that pass all the way through: a great way to ensure the model's carlings are perfectly aligned and well-supported. But, visually, I think the dados add a lot. And if they're going to be done then they have to be done now, before the deck beams are installed. Once the dados were cut, I started fitting and installing knees. The instructions call for them to be installed along with the lower deck beams. But I'm not gluing the deck beams in yet: leaving them out now allows for much better access when fitting the knees (a fiddly process), and will make it easier for me to install the mast supports, install the bolts and other hardware, and apply the stain in that area. And that's it. I still have to install the forwardmost pair of knees (I'm working from inside out). After that I can install the mast support timbers. Thanks for looking!