grsjax

1/4" or 3/8" MDF works great.  Very smooth and hard.  Paint it a light color to protect the surface from liquids and you are ready to go.

1/4" or 3/8" MDF works great.  Very smooth and hard.  Paint it a light color to protect the surface from liquids and you are ready to go.

1/4" or 3/8" MDF works great.  Very smooth and hard.  Paint it a light color to protect the surface from liquids and you are ready to go.

1/4" or 3/8" MDF works great.  Very smooth and hard.  Paint it a light color to protect the surface from liquids and you are ready to go.

Chris,
 
I do all of my modeling on a nice desk I don't want damaged.  I use a piece of cardboard cut from a large box and have a smaller piece of cardboard taped on top.  I have a medium size cutting matt above the cardboard.  Off to the left side of the large piece of cardboard, I have a box lid to hold my supplies.  I can set up/remove all this from the desk in under a minute.
 
Erik
 
 

When I was doing plastic model building, I took a 1/4 thick piece of birch plywood cut to about 18" x 24", lined the bottom (table side) with peel and stick felt to protect the dining table, tacked 1/2 sq rails around 3 sides and used that as a work surface. Those self-healing green mats in JoAnn's or Michaels work well also. The nice thing about the plywood work surface was that it was portable.

How about a large self healing cutting mat, which is what i have on my work table. Amazon has some that are 48" on a side.

In addition to what Gaetan and Joe recommend let me add a good ceramic stone, usually white in color, roughly 1200-1500 grit. Do not need lubricate, sharpen dry, clean with Comet type powder cleanser and toothbrush when they get really dirty (actually it's metal deposited on the surface) - they do not clog like other stone and put a nice edge on any knife or chisel. Use them all the time on my carving knives.

Gravers used by jewelers are also a good tool for doing fine carving.  They come in different shapes and can be found fairly inexpensively on ebay and Amazon.
  This is a cheap set from Amazon. 

This book Complete Guide to Woodcarving is the book I used to teach myself woodcarving about 8 years ago now. It is a  step by step guide to everything from knife selection, sharpening, layout, even step-by-step carving projects. It is available thru Barnes & Noble. Ellenwood's book is consider by many carvers to be an excellent beginners book.
 
Another excellent book are the many books by Harley Refsal, while not nautical in nature, he teaches the Scandinavian Flat Plane style of carving. This book Art & Technique of Scandinavian Style Woodcarving and Woodcarving in the Scandinavian Style both contain excellent step-by-step instructions for the beginning carver. Both are available thru Barnes and Noble and I have used both books to teach myself carving.

I am interested in finding information on American sailing barges.  I already have a lot of info on the San Francisco barges as they are well documented and there are some still afloat.  However barges from other parts of the country are harder to find data on. 
 
"American Small Sailing Craft" by Howard Chapelle has a little on gulf coast barges and I have found mention of barges in Maine and on the Chesapeake but little else.  Sailing barges were a major contributor to water transportation in the U.S. before the wide spread introduction of steam and I would like to know more about them.  History, plans, pictures or anything else anyone can direct me to would be appreciated.

When you think of the time it takes to build one of these models, you don't say what it is, the time taken to plank a deck isn't that significant.
You could plank over it and timber is very cheap. I don't think you will remove all the wood filler from the decks by sanding. I replanked with my model the San Martin because I was unhappy with the width of the planks and the colour after finishing with Danish oil.

If this were my model, I would scrape, not sand the deck. A single edge razor blade will work. Scraping up will clean things up and might improve the look of the trenails by removing the surface.
 
Roger Pellett

Gravers used by jewelers are also a good tool for doing fine carving.  They come in different shapes and can be found fairly inexpensively on ebay and Amazon.
  This is a cheap set from Amazon. 

While completing my previous build, I was very unhappy with the anchor ropes supplied because they were completely out of scale. After some research I decided to build my own rope walker. It only cost me about $50 AU to make. The main cost was the motor and coupling. Perspex I had left over from another job and the variable speed/on off attachment from my Domanoff Serving Machine proved most useful. Mini bearings were very cheaply sourced from eBay. I have labelled each picture in an attempt to show how it was constructed. I intend to make as many ropes as possible for my current build - Caldercraft's Bounty when the time comes. Hope somebody gets some ideas from this post.
 
Cheers
Steve

Gravers used by jewelers are also a good tool for doing fine carving.  They come in different shapes and can be found fairly inexpensively on ebay and Amazon.
  This is a cheap set from Amazon. 

I have not tried Chuck's #11 knife blade for carving (yet); mainly because the type of carving I do - figures and caricatures - would probably snap the blade on the first cut. Haven't tried the new Flexcut micro gouges either; I recently got a set of the now discontinued DockSide micro chisels.  I am looking forward to trying my hand at Chuck's miniature carving project.
 
I am a self taught woodcarver. Picked up a book (see my post here)  and started reading and practicing. My first knife was the "bench" knife shown on the extreme left in photo below: I found this knife very frustrating to use and after joining a woodcarving club and consulting with some of their experienced carvers and trying out some of their knives, I switched to a style made by Dave Lyons called the Lyons knife (naturally) shown in the 2nd and 3rd photos. The design of the handle is more ergonomic and fits a lot nicer in the palm of your hand without fatiguing your hand after hours of carving. I might add that Dave's knives came razor sharp right out of the box and required no additional honing on my part - something I spent hours doing with the bench knife. Oh, the 2 knives to the right of the bench knife in photo #1 are chip carving knifes.
 

 
For finger protection I recommend the finger guards shown in the photos below. They are leather on the bottom and an elastic material on the top and come in small, medium and large sizes to fit all finger sizes. The one on the right in the photo fits over the thumb while the one on the left  fits over the forefinger
 

 
And finally I constructed a bench hook as shown in these photos, the design is shown in Ellenwood's book referenced above. The notch in the back allows the piece to be placed in a diagonal position against the side stop. The gap between the side stop and the back is to allow chips to be removed more easily.
 

 
I can get into a discussion of chisels and gouges at a later time as interest dictates.

Cherry and holly.  Oil or poly for a finish.

I am willing cut small jobs when the time permits.   I would encourage folks to contact me for availability.  For example,  right now I am swamped and couldnt possibly take a small job for laser cutting and have one such custom job on my to-do list.  I just wont get to it til early next month at the soonest.  If time isnt a factor then please let me know what you need.
 
 
Provide me with either a Corel Draw file or a DXF file of the parts.  I can talk you about specifics and the need to always have to adjust the drawings after I get them.  They will always need to be adjusted for the kerf of the cut depending on what type of wood you choose.
 
 
If you want the stuff sooner,
 
You can contact National balsa.  They have an excellent laser cutting service and I used them all the time before getting my own equipment.  But they will only use the woods they have in stock.  Basswood, Maple, Cherry and lite ply.....amiong a few other things.
 
See here for the custom laser cutting services at National balsa
 
http://www.nationalbalsa.com/laser_cutting_s/8.htm
 
 
You would probably have to double your $2000 estimate for getting a laser cutter of your own the needed software and accessories.
That is if you want to cut anything thicker than 1/8" basswood with accuracy and a decent cut.
 
Chuck

Cherry and holly.  Oil or poly for a finish.

For wood it doesn't matter....however, hss are better quality.
 
 
Pamela

Cherry and holly.  Oil or poly for a finish.

I am a big fan of using Maple as decking , with the large scale of my models I can get away with the grain patterns. I have also used Mahogany, Bubinga and Brazilian cherry. So I agree with Gaetan, ( your taste , your choice )
 
Good luck with whichever decking you decide on,
 
                                                                                Keith

Maple is a cheaper alternative to holly. Also holly is hard to weather. Generally deck wood is of a lighter color but it doesn't have to be. Some use boxwood or even pear (unsteamed pear which is lighter).

you will have 20 different answer and the 20 answer will be good
 
my answer would be: your taste, your choice