dunnock

Thanks to Jack-in-the-Blue and Thukydides for the complements and to CiscoH and Glenn for advice and encouragement and to others for the likes. This afternoon I've worked on the preparatory fittings for the second planking, completing the prow assembly, stern post, keel and stern counter. To fit the stern post, the inner counter pattern needed a little fettling around the rudder slot and I had to trim back the ‘garboard plank’ a fraction to fit the prow covers otherwise it was all straightforward and according to the manual. I used some scrap 1.5mm limewood to make sure that the keel slots aligned with the slots in the hull but it probably wasn’t necessary. Stern counter fitted and sanded back The bulwark patterns also needed some sanding at the bow to make all the gun ports line up and these are now clamped in place ready to begin the second planking. It looks like the first plank below the bulwark pattern is not tapered but that is for another day as I’m off to Norfolk for a few days birdwatching. I'll be taking some planking homework ready for when I get back. David

I’ve completed the first layer of planking and despite my best efforts to make a mess, I think it doesn’t look too bad. I may have been a bit over zealous with the filler but I hope that it’s now a decent base for the top layer of planks but before I get to that there’s the prow facings, keel, stern counter and sternpost to add. I've re-read Chuck's pdf on lining off and hull planking and I'll read around the subject a bit more before embarking on the second layer. David

Thanks to everyone for their support , comments and advice. My approach was to measure the length of each bulkhead, divide the length of the longest bulkhead by 5mm to obtain the number of planks required and then divide this number into the length of each bulkhead. This gave me 3mm for each plank at the prow and tapering from bulkhead 3. I rechecked these numbers after every three planks and adjusted accordingly. I don't know why this method didn't work but I'm sure that for whatever reason, I didn't taper the planks enough or from far enough back. It required a few stealers and some odd shaped planks to complete the planking but it's done now and I'll post some pictures in my next post. David

Thanks for all the likes. I have begun the first layer of planking with 5mm limewood but have run into problems and I’m not sure why. The first three strakes went on easily but the next three gradually required more extreme edge bending at the bow to make the plank lie flat on the bulkheads that it was no longer becoming possible to continue in the same way. I stripped back the last three planks and tried different tapers and although better, I still find I need to put in some quite severe bends. The manual, and Chris’s photos of his prototype show that this shouldn’t be necessary. Maybe I have bevelled bulkheads too much. In desperation, I have started planking from the keel but I know that I will need some strange shapes for the last one or two strakes. Thankfully, this is the underlayer but I need to resolve the issue before continuing with the top layer. This shot shows the first of the three planks replaced and two planks added from the keel downwards David

That's quite a project you've taken on newbee but you seem to have got it by the scruff of the neck and made some great progress in stripping it back to something that you can build from. David

Thanks Andrew but you didn't need to go as far as Menorca - 30deg here today and I'm enjoying a glass of wine in the garden contemplating the new wildlife pond I'm going to have to dig this week. Progress on Trial may slow down - unless I can persuade someone that it's too hot for digging and it would be safer to do something in the shade! Enjoy your holiday. David

Schoolboy Error. I carefully lined the horizontal etched line of the bulwark pattern with the level of the false deck and clipped the pattern at every bulkhead. I applied a bit of heat to set the shape and all looked good so I glued it up and even added the first of the limewood planks. Then I noticed a 2mm gap at the slot in the prow. Checking the manual, I realised that I had not read instruction 44 properly which says’ the lowest line (my underline) should be placed at the top edge of the false deck’. Thankfully the plank and bulwark patterns came off without any damage occurring and are now placed in the correct position. The first plank below the bulwarks have also been added. A small amount of tapering at bow and stern and some edge bending at the bow is required for the planks to sit correctly. As it says on the first page printed in red, ‘take plenty of time to study this manual’. Lesson learnt! David

A lovely package arrived from Vanguard Models arrived the other day. I have built ships boats and some of the deck furniture from Vanguard but this will be the first of Chris’s ship models that I have built and I was excited to get started. The box contains a comprehensive (70 page) photo-illustrated building manual, 11 sheets of plans and part diagrams as well as numerous sheets of mdf, pear-wood, PE brass, strip wood, dowels and stand on which to display the finished model. Andrew (AJohnson) has already posted photos of the contents of the box so I won't repeat it here. The build starts by making a cradle for the initial stages of building up the hull structure. It looks delicate but is more robust than it appeared when removed from the mdf sheet. The bulkheads drop nicely into the keel without any need for sanding. I found it easiest to begin the preliminary sanding of the bow section bulkheads with parts 15 and 16 fitted (but not glued) in place. Once bevelled parts 15 and 16 are put aside until later. Chris’s manual shows the bulkheads being bevelled using a Dremel. I’m not so brave but it doesn’t take long to sand them back by hand. The stern assembly is next up and once glued and sanded back, it required a little bit of easing to slot into the keel. The centre-line patterns are given as 14 in the book but are numbered as 23 on the parts themselves. I fitted and glued the lower deck (part 25). Belatedly, I then decided to put some strips of planking down the centre line. They probably won’t be visible when the final deck is in place but I may want to have some of the hatches open. Once the longitudinal bracing parts are slotted and glued in place the whole structure firms up nicely. I sanded and applied a couple of coats of matt varnish to the deck beams and ledges before gluing them in place. The stern frames are next to be added but first I sanded off the char from the parts that are later to be painted. Part 85 is the inner layer of the stern transom and the book advises that the design was changed to make it less delicate, however I still managed to crack it when I removed it from the sheet. Luckily it didn’t break in two so I was able to glue it and no harm done. The inner stern counter pattern is fitted next. I gave it a quick dip in water and clamped it in place and left it to take up the slight curve of the hull. Other builders of Vanguard kits have said how well they go together and HM Trial is no exception. The kit is very well thought out and goes together without any need to fiddle around sanding back bulkhead slots or worrying that everything is square and correctly fitted. The last couple of days have been a joy. David

A great start Andrew and no better way to spend a wet Bank Holiday. David

Thanks again for all the likes and generous comments. Diana is the biggest and most complicated ship that I have built but I've really enjoyed the challenges that it presented. Although it took a lot of time and some hair pulling, I'm glad that I went with the open rails on the quarter deck and my thanks go to Ray and Robdurant for showing me the way. Also my thanks to the many others on these forums that have posted tips, help and advice that I have shamelessly copied. I've managed to take some better photos of the finished model which I've added below. I hope I haven't overdone it! Thanks all for looking in. I hope to see you again on my log of HM Cutter Trial David

Dave, My understanding is that glass would be heavier even if I might be able to use thinner sheets. The density of glass is about twice that of acrylic sheet. Also I would be quite nervous of handling the size of glass sheet I need. David

Mugje, Thanks very much. I particularly like the Tamiya Blue even if it's not that easy to apply. Once again many thanks Andrew. I had a good start on the boats by using Vanguard's kits and modified them according to The AotS DIana David

Thank you very much B.E. but however good it may be is no small part due to your inspiration and the many tips and techniques that I've picked up from your logs and particularly from Pegasus.

Many thanks for your kind words Andrew. I have been looking around a bit more and I think that you are right, the case will have to be at least 5mm thick acrylic. I priced a couple of custom-made cases and they are very expensive. I made a smaller case for HM Cutter Hunter but have never tackled on of the size need for DIana. I have completed a new stand so I now have the final case dimensions and will order some sheet next week. David

I see that it’s been over a month since I last posted an update but there’s been a lot going on over the summer with holidays and things to do in the garden. I had two weeks on a birding trip in Brasil in the last half of July which resulted in 1500 photos to go through – making progress but still not finished. In between times I have been doing some work on Diana, mostly tidying up but after much procrastination and with full approval from my wife, I have mounted the remaining ships boats. I made a star decoration for the catheads using styrene rod and strip (with acknowledgement to B.E. for his method and description in his Pegasus blog). A pair of Chris Watton’s stern lanterns have been fitted. The lanterns are mounted on brackets formed from 1mm brass rod soldered and then blacked. Last but not least, my daughter, who has a much steadier hand than I, painted the ensign and union jack on tissue paper which I have steamed into shape and hung. The flag dimensions were taken from a copy of Flags for Ship Modellers by Alec Purves. A range of sizes is given for the period and I chose what seemed the most in proportion to the ship, that is scale 128x67mm for the ensign and 43x24mm for the jack. AotS Diana lists an ensign staff of some 35’ but I imagined this getting in the way of the boom so have raised the ensign on a halyard from the gaff. The jack staff is 15’5” or scale 73mm but this was a little short for my flag so I have increased the length to 80mm. Several repairs to rigging have had to be made owing to my clumsiness when manoeuvring the ship and I also damaged one of the stern lights. I am waiting a replacement from Vanguard Models. At the same time I have taken the opportunity of ordering my next project, HM Cutter Trial. I’m now eagerly awaiting delivery from UPS. I now need to make a display case to keep Diana safe from further damage and dust. A glass case of the required size about 1280x850x500mm is going to be very heavy and expensive so I’m planning to make one using acrylic sheet but I’m not sure what thickness of sheet to use. I was thinking 5mm but perhaps I can get away with thinner. If anyone has any experience of cases in acrylic, I be interested to hear your thoughts. I’ll write something of a conclusion on the build and post some better photos of the finished ship when I have been able to set up a suitable backdrop. In the meantime thanks to everyone who has been following this blog and for all the encouragement, help and support that you have given me over the last two and a half years. David

I'm thinking that this will be my next project after Diana and hope to start within a month so I'm following with interest. David

Many thanks for the compliments Dave although I find getting a realistic 'weight' to them is quite difficult. I think that the hanks and coils are definitely a work in progress David

Thanks as always for looking and for the likes and comments The blocks arrived from HiS Model and the ropes from RoS so I was good to go with everything to complete Diana. The catfalls are rigged although I had move some of the belay points around because I had wrongly rigged the jib boom guy. The spritsail yard rigging was completed with sheets and clue lines and then I moved on to the boom and gaff. These were completed, as with the rest of the rigging, following Steel, Lees and the AotS as closely as I could. The only issue I met was with the main yard braces. In all of the references, the belay cleat is sited forward of the sternmost carronade, meaning the running part must somehow pass the gun in order to reach the belay. This doesn’t seem sensible to me. If I have this wrong or their is a better solution, I would be interested to hear. Now I have a lot of tidying up of the lines to do, hanks to make and then some finishing touches like adding stunsail booms, stern lanterns and the remaining ship’s boats. I now have an enjoyable dilemma of which will be my next ship model? It could be HMS Trial when available or the new version of Speedy or maybe HMS Flirt. A few weeks yet to think about it. David

Thanks everyone for the likes. Starboard bower anchor is completed. There is no stream or kedge anchor supplied in the kit so I bought the nearest I could find to the patterns in the AotS from CMB. The stock supplied with the stream anchor was too short and heavy looking so I fashioned a replacement from a piece of 5mm square spruce. I stained the finished stock with ‘Jacobean Oak’ and used heat shrink tubing for the ‘iron’ rings. The finished anchor is lashed to a bower anchor before fixing it to the forward channel. The kedge anchor is lashed to the sheet anchor in the folded position according to the illustration on page 235 of ‘Seamanship in the Age of Sail by John Harland. Harland states that the sheet anchor is tied against the starboard forward channel with the anchor cable fixed and running to the outer hawse hole. I’m waiting for some 7mm triple blocks for the cathead falls to complete the anchor set up. The boomkin stays have never looked right to my eye with only one stay fixed with 0.5mm rope. Checking with Steele, 0.8m would seem more appropriate and I believe that there should be two stays on each side for this size of ship. I have changed them accordingly and am now much happier with the result. Thanks for looking in David

Thanks David, Yes I used Gutterman dark brown thread. The ratlines take a lot of thread so it would be expensive to use anything else. David

https://www.hismodel.com/ Based in the Czech Republic. Good range of accessories and very reliable in my experience David

David, I can feel your frustration. I felt much the same when working on Diana's shrouds but yours look great so it was worth the effort. David

Thanks to all for the likes and encouragement. I made up the four bower anchors a while ago but now seems the right time to add them to the model. I thought that I would have a go at making the anchor bouys for the to add a bit more detail to Diana. I used 8mm limewood dowel as the basis for the bouys and roughly carved them with a scalpel and then finished with sandpaper. Lavery shows four rope slings coming from top and bottom of the bouy with an eyelet seized to take the lanyard and anchor rope. I decided on a simplified route and fitted eyebolts in each end. The form is served with Gutterman polyester thread which is about 0.3mm. I found it easier to wrap the thread from each end towards the middle. Another simplification I made is to add only two slings from each end, both for the sake of sanity and because four slings looked overcrowded to my eyes on this small bouy. The slings are threaded around the hoop and fixed with a false splice. The lanyard 0.25mm, is tied to one end and the anchor rope 0.45mm is spliced to the other. The anchor rope tied around the anchor flukes and then held to the shaft with three seizings. The excess rope is coiled and held with four ties around its circumference. The anchor is tied to the model with the cathead stopper. A 6mm rope with a stopper knot in one end and threaded through the anchor ring. I wasn’t entirely sure of the arrangement of the stopper but I have placed the knot in the cleat on the aft side of the cathead and passed the other end through the ring and tied it off around the cathead. The shaft is held close to the fluke by a length of chain fixed to an eyebolt in the end of the forward channel. A length of 0.6mm rope is spliced to the other end. The chain wraps around the shaft and the rope is tied off to the timberhead. The coil of anchor rope and bouy are tied to the shrouds. The port (best bower?) is completed with the anchor cable threaded and fixed through the hawse hole. Moving on to the starboard… Thanks all for looking in David

Amazing work Jason and a great to see your thoughts behind the process David

Thanks Andrew but I'm just borrowing the ideas of Blue Ensign Dave - no problem and thanks for your compliments. No air brushing just ordinary artist's paint brushes. I tend to dilute the first couple of coats and light sand in between and then just build up the layers until I'm happy. The blue is Tamiya Medium Blue XF18. The colour is nice but the solvent based acrylics are very fast drying. I've not tried but it may be an improvement to add Tamiya Retarder to slow the drying down. David