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SkiBee

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  1. SkiBee
    Welcome Bud I to have build many a plastic model and tried my hand at a wood boat many years ago but put it away shortly after I started. I recommend the following thread on this web site: New to ship modelling? But what do you build first? I am a big Novice when it comes to wooden boat models. I've built the Grand Banks Dory and learned so much from it. I'm building the Norwegian Sailing Pram now and continue to learn a lot. I had started another boat when I decided I needed to back up and learn and practice on a easier and cheaper model. Good luck and as has been stated above, start a build page for any boat you build as you can get a lot of help from others and improve your learning curve.
  2. SkiBee
    I bought a small Stanley Wood Plane to use on the oars, spars and mast. I just sanded the oars on the Grand Banks Dory, I did a good job but I wanted to try a plane this time. The plane was great on the oars, to round (octagon) the shaft and to reduce the thickness on the blade. I’m GLAD I tried the plane; it worked a lot better then sanding the blade. I just used medium sandpaper to round the shaft then fine sandpaper to smooth the shaft and blade. Instead of paper to simulate the leather I used some left-over sail material, I thought it would give a more simulated leather texture than the paper. I think it worked out really well. I painted the leather a brown and stained the oar with a light oak stain and wiped it off right after I applied it. I then planed off the edges of the boom and gaff and then sanded them to be round. They ended up a little more oval than round due to sanding the char off the wood. I wish they had pre-cut the spars wider so there would not be this problem removing the char. When sanding I broke of the tip of the Gaff were the laser hole was, so I had to drill a new hole and ended up with a Gaff that was about 1/16” shorter. I think I will go ahead and make the Mast and decide on my best guess to the above questions that I sent to Model Shipways.
  3. SkiBee
    Sail The building up the sail was pretty straight forward, I the cloth first between two moist paper towels to get the creases out. The instructions said to cut out a 8”x12”, but that is the size that was provided in the kit. So I tried to be careful laying out the sail on the cloth to ensure I had enough material for the reinforcements. I used a pencil to outline the sail and the width of the edge doublers. I should have coated the sail before marking since I could not get the pencil marks off later and some of them showed through in the final product. Instead of using water down glue, I used my wife’s decopage which is watered down white glue. I did end up watering it down since I thought it was going on to thick. Then I added the edge reinforcements while the base decopage coat was still wet and coated them with the decopage and added the sail stiffening battens with white glue. I flipped the sail over and coated it with decopage and added the corner reinforcements in the same way as the edge strips. Instead of cutting the sail out with a knife, I used very sharp scissors and it looked just fine. Then I used a fine tip brush with just a very small drop of paint on the end and just barely touched the sail to create the lacing holes reinforcements. I did this on both sides of the sail. I noticed due to the slight porosity of the sail that the paint did expand more then I hoped. A couple of lessons learned; I would have drawn the lines on after the first coat of decopage and been more careful to ensure I cut the lines off to prevent the lines from showing through on the final product. Second, I would not have had the corner reinforcements been so big.
  4. SkiBee
    The Mast I decided to try my hand at building the mast from the two laser cut halves, I glued the two mast halves together, also built up the spar shaping jig and left them overnight to ensure the glue was dry. While I was waiting for the glue to dry, I started to read how to make the mast. I read this section a number of times, studied the drawings on page 5 of the mast schematic and the picture on page 30 of the halyard sheave. I also, looked at the finished pictures and did some web searches for pictures, but the only ones are what are on the Model Expo site which are not detailed enough. The instructions seemed to contradict itself a few times. The first is, on page 29 the instructions say to drill 4 holes for the ‘eyes’ at a right angle to the laser hole. The schematic on page 5 shows the eyes are in the same plane as the halyard hole. So, I sent the following questions to Model Expo. I’m having a problem with the instructions about the top of the mast. The schematic on page 5 shows one hole drilled at the top of the mast for the ‘halyard block’ and a ‘Shroud eye’. I cannot find any other reference to the ‘Shroud eye’ in the instructions. Also, the instructions speak to a ‘halyard sheave’ not a block, and the halyard sheave requires two holes. > What is the purpose of the shroud eye? > Is it optional for a one hole for the halyard or to drill two holes and simulate a halyard sheave? > The instructions state to drill to holes near the top of the mast, one at 5/16” and one at 3/8” inch. However, the pre-drilled laser hole is 3/8” from the top of the mast. So, is the hole at 5/16” for the halyard sheave if you want to simulate a sheave? > Also, the schematic on page 5 does not show the two back stays. > The instruction does not say how far down to drill a hole for the back stays. How far down should the hole for the back stays be drilled? While I wait for an answer I will move on to the sail.
  5. SkiBee
    Buying a jeweler’s saw and a fine blade was what I needed to do, it cut the tube beautiful. I used my miter box to help hold the tube and get a square cut. Installing the fwd eye bolt was a challenge, not sure which wire rod to use but then I figured out it was the one that fit in the tube of the stay plate. The problem I had with the side stay plates was finding the hole in the plate with the nail to drive it in. Finally figured out that if I had a little glue on the end of a tooth pick it would hold the head of the nail straight so I could start to get the nail into the hole. The rudder gudgeons went ok, except for cutting the nails, I lost two nail heads as they went flying when I cut the nail down to size. I then cut them with the nail head in a paper towel to capture them. I assumed that the lower gudgeon plate was one of the two 4-hole photo-etched parts and just cut it to fit with two holes. I did use the brass rod to hold the short piece of tube at roughly a 90 deg angle to the plates as the directions said, it worked well. I left the rod in when I glued the lower gudgeon on the riser and made sure it was aligned with the middle of the transom U-shaped notch. Then I slipped the upper gudgeon over the rod as I glued the upper gudgeon to the transom, that way I was hoping that the two holes would end up aligned with each other as I installed the rudder. The rudder pintles were a challenge since there were not two of the same size plates with just two holes left on the photo-etched sheet. The longer of the two plates worked ok and I ended up using it for the upper pintle. The shorter one really did not look right after I bent it and installed the short piece of tube. So I made a longer plate from some of the photo-etched sheet excess, which work nicely. I did end up shorting the pintle rods from what the instructions call for to make it easier to install and I think it looked better. I still had to file a little indent above the upper pintle to install the rudder's upper pintle. Now on to the mast.
  6. SkiBee
    The installation of the rub rails was fairly straight forward as well as the sanding of the rudder and dagger board. I painted the hull with what I thought was off-white spray paint, but I found it to white and did not like it. Plus, I think I like the little texture that brushing paint on gives, as this is a wood hull not fiberglass. So, I found a creamer white that that my wife had, I was very happy with the results. I used Tamiya Red Hull acrylic paint to paint the inside of the boat. I found it a little to dark but stayed with it since I was using a light stain on the floor boards and thwarts. I also, noticed that after the first coat the paint looked a little streaked like the internal hull looked a little worn. Started the tiller and extension, I guess I need to buy a jeweler’s saw to cut the tube. Tried a Dremel but the small piece kept flying off and a file did not give a good result either.
  7. SkiBee
    I’ve tried to refer to the actual boat schematic on page 3, but as a Novice, I do not find it very helpful as a to scale dwg of the actual Model boat. This Pram is designed to be the second build for a novice after the Grand Banks Dory, which I think is a tremendous idea to have a few models in a series to gain skills and confidence. I’ve read in numerous places in this web site of people who started and quit the hobby due to getting frustrated with a complicated build and don’t try again for years, myself include. Thus, the instructions should be written for the novice with no experience other than the Dory to facilitate that growth. I do find the instructions very helpful but as anything we should strive to make things better.
  8. SkiBee
    Mast Step, Chain Plate Slots & Rowlock Pads Installed the Mast Step and the only problem was I pushed a little to hard in the middle of the step to seat the glue and broke it at the mast hole, you can see the repair in the pic. For the Chain Plate Slot, I drilled two holes at either end of the slot then just used a model knife to cut a thin slot between them just by pushing the blade through the wood a few times. Rowlock Pads: Followed the instructions and used a chisel blade to shave off the ends on the pads a little at a time. The problem came when I went to install the aft pads, there were no instructions on where to install them. Looking at the pictures I could not tell exactly where they were to be glued but I made an assumption that they would be the same distance aft of the mid-thwarts as the fwd pads were from the fwd-thwarts. It seams to look similar to the small pictures in the instructions. Again, a scale drawing of the model would have answered the question and been very helpful. I know I’m a broken record about the scale drawing of the model, but I would be very helpful.
  9. SkiBee
    Inwales, Quarter Knees & Thwart frames To bend the Inwales, I turned the boat upside down and traced the curve of the sheer strake, then wetted the inwale and bent it to the traced curve. Then I glued them in per the instructions. I used both transoms to draw a line on the inwale to get both the vertical and horizontal angle that I need to cut the inwale to. This worked out very nicely and only required a small about of sanding to finish the fit to the transoms. Then I glued the forward and aft quarter knees, they required a little sanding to get a good fit to the transoms. I did try to get the same angle on both knees by measuring from the top of both transoms to the end of the knee, this worked well. The Seat and Thwart Frames did not work out as well, I had the same problem with them as I did the Bottom Frames, that is getting the right angle to fit my boat. I ended up with some gaps but I did not want to sand them two thin. Also, the vertical placement was a challenge. I was not sure where the top of the frames should be. Here again a scale drawing of the model would have been helpful. Also, not sure what the ‘bevel’ was being talked about for ‘A’ and ‘B’ frames, a picture or drawing would have been helpful. I bent the floor board cleats a little to much, so I just glued one half of the cleat to the haul and then I’ll glue the other side once the glue is set and I hope the bend relaxes a little. Since my planks ended higher on the aft transom then the model was designed for, I had to draw a new curved line on the aft to cut to. Then I whittled most the excess transom with a model knife and then finished up using sanding stick to get the final curve. Sorry the fwd transom pic is blurry.
  10. SkiBee
    Received the missing parts from the kit today, so back to building.
  11. SkiBee
    I spent some more time trying to clean up the excess glue on the planks and fine sand them. Also, I found that the Aft Transom Knee on the inside had pulled away from the keel plank, so I used alcohol to soften the glue where it was still glued to the aft transom and then re-glued so that it was in contact with both the transom and keel plank. Then I built and installed the Dagger Board Case, I ended up with about a 1/8 inch gap, fwd to aft, in the slot pre-cut in the keel plank. I double check the way I build the dagger board case and I think it was right, so I just used some wood filler in the gap. I do wish there were full size model plans to answer some of these questions. Also installed the bottom frames, starting with frame 3, aft frame, but had a hard time sanding and fitting my haul. I ended up leaving a small gap between the bottom side plank and the garboard plank and at the very top of the frame. I believe this is a result of my planking being off. I went to add the Inwales but I couldn’t find the wood, I had inventoried my kit when I received it to the inventory sheet in the kit and everything was there. I noticed that there was a different material take off on page two of the instruction manual. From this I determined that I was missing 9 pieces, the loose strips and dowels that are normally packaged together. I contacted Model Expo and they are sending the pieces. Please feel free to comment, critique and make recommendations; otherwise I won't learn.
  12. SkiBee
    I'm a beginner too, I started with the Lowell Grand Banks Dory and then started the 18th Century Long Boat by Model Shipways. After I finished the planking and some interior work I noticed that the Norwegian Sailing Pram had just become available and ordered it. I stopped my build of the 18th Century Long Boat and started the Pram. I wish I would have build the Pram before starting the Long Boat, I might have not made some of the mistakes I did. Please see and comment to my build log and I hope it helps you in your build of the Pram. I do recommend that you start a build log too, it is a great place to ask questions and get very helpful input from others. Also, as the instructions and numerous places on the web site say, take your time it's not a race but a journey of learning by mistakes and accomplishments. I do recommend that you inventory your kit to insure you have everything, I inventoried my kit to the separate inventory list that was in the kit. But when I went to install the Inwales, I determined that I was missing all the loose lumber, the strips and dowels. As a novice model builder like myself, I recommend that you keep a separate log of recommendations to the kit and instructions and send to Model Expo. I look forward to following your build and have fun.
  13. SkiBee
    Had to take a few days off for other non-important life maters, now back to what is important The Build. The rest of the planks went better than the garboard planks, but when I got to the sheer planks I found it easier to glue the forward end to the transom off the work platform. That way I could hold it while the glue set. You can see some wood putty on the edges of the garboard plank where I cut a little to much and off the edge when I was cutting the rabbet. I also have to work on getting the excess glue wiped off better in the future. I did soften the lumps of glue with alcohol and used the tip of my knife blade to scrape it off. In my opinion there is too much excess left glue, would be a bigger problem if I was going to stain the hull. During the planking I was not thinking about having to plank to a specific spot on both transoms. Assuming that the lines that were etched on both transoms were a plank to line, I blew it. As you can see on the aft end, I was about a ¼ inch over the line and on the fwd end I was short about 1/8 inch. Looking at the instructions I’m not sure it will matter in the final build, except for not being exactly to scale. I believe a note should be added to the instructions to be aware of the final plank to line. The installation of the Skeg and Bilge Keels went well, I do believe a better picture or scale plans are need to show the placement of the Bilge Keels fwd/aft distances.
  14. SkiBee
    More mistakes on the Garboard planks, I could not dry fit the garboards prior to cutting the rabbet and beveling the other side of the plank. I was still waiting on the glue to set on the keel and bottom planks, to many clamps and rubber bands. This resulted in the error that I cut the rabbet and beveled the planks on the wrong side. I did not want to make new garboard planks and it appeared that the side plank fits nicely next to the garboard plank anyway. You can see that the angle on the end of the plank is going the wrong way to the transom. The good thing was the planks were long enough that this did not matter. I actually formed the curves in the side planks by dry fitting them to the mold/transom, then wetted them and used a hair drier to set the curve. It worked very nice. You can see that the forward end of the side planks fit better next to the garboard planks and fwd transom, much better then the garboards. It looks like I cut the rabbet on the wrong side, but I think that is due to the finger pressure I was pushing down on the plank why the glue set. I still feel that if there were full scale model plans with the kit or in the instructions, I would not made these errors. Still, I thank everyone that gave me input on were to cut the rabbet, THANKS
  15. SkiBee
    Thank you all for your input. Kurt, I was wondering after I cut the full length rabbet if it was just on the end. It's great to have a place to go to get help.
  16. SkiBee
    HELP, does anyone have recommendations on how to cut a rabbit into planks without cutting thru the plank and chiseling to deep. I was not happy with the results of cutting the rabbit into the garboard planks. I first used a angle blade to cut the depth of the line then used a chisel blade to chisel out the rabbit to the cut line. In a number of areas I cut all the way through the plank when I was cutting width line and then I chiseled to deep past the cut or took out to much. So my rabbits were all over the place.
  17. SkiBee
    I did bevel the two bottom planks to the etched line. I bent the bottom and keel planks around a large margarita glass but then when I went to dry fit on the build board it was way too much of a curve. So, I had to weigh them down on a flat surface overnight which took out most of the bend. I found it easier to set the curve by wetting the plank and rubber band it to the transoms and mold frames. However, in the areas without a mold board, it resulted in a extra bend down, see picture below where I circled the bend. I’m hoping that when I glue the keel and garboard planks to the bottom planks it will take out the bend. I also had a problem with keeping both transoms square to the board and each other. I think that the interference fit with the transom and the build board supports had to much play. So I’m going to try and glue some extra supports to the board to limit the movement of the transoms to keep them square.
  18. SkiBee
    Fwd & Aft Transoms: These seemed straight forward but when it came time to glue the knees on, I wasn’t sure from the instructions did the short or long end of the knee get glued to the transoms. I did look at the full scale plans on page 3 and it looked like the short ends went next to the transoms. The lines on the outside of the fwd transom did help in sanding the fairing bevel. The aft transom was a little more of a challenge to bevel, it appeared from the lines on the aft face of the transom indicated different amount of bevel as you went from the bottom to sides. I hope I did it right, time will tell when I plank the sides. By the way, I do like when the kit includes a build board, I had to build my own for the 18th Century Long Boat. Started to dry fit and look at how the bottom planks are installed. For the two bottom planks, the instructions state that there is a 1” etched line that you are to bevel to. But the line is not an 1”, looking at the picture it looks like maybe they were referring to a full scale 1”. On the inside of the outer planks and the keel plank there are etched lines but no reference to them in the instructions. I had to assume that they were there to indicate the amount of overlap of the keel plank and the outer bottom planks. Time will tell as I plank the hull.
  19. SkiBee
    This is kind of my second build, I finished the ‘Lowell Grand Banks Dory’ and got about half way through the ‘18th Century Long Boat’ both by Shipways when I decided to shift to this boat the ‘Norwegian Sailing Pram’. This is the second in a beginner series of “progressive model tutorials” designed by David Antscherl. I did learn a lot about wooden ships and how to build wooden models from the Dory. I decided to shift sails when I noticed that the Pram was finally for sale by Model Shipways and I thought I could use the additional learning experience especially rigging. The Long Boat rigging is supposed to be fairly simple but the Pram rigging looked even simpler. One thing I’ve noticed is that the instructions for these ‘beginner’ models seem to assume the builder knows a fair amount of how to build a model boat. In my years I’ve built many plastic models but not wood models and I’m really a novice. So, I’m keeping track of recommendations to improve the instructions as I progress through this build. First, I’ve notice that the Pram instructions are missing a lot of instruction points that could easily be corrected with a few annotated pictures and plans. I strongly recommend that a set of scaled plans be included in the kit. The only plan is the one below that is from a real pram design. Even though the Dory was a simple boat to build, I used the plans constantly to figure out things that were not written in the instructions.
  20. SkiBee
    Thanks for the input it was very helpful! I did use Testor’s Dullcote on both sides of the frieze as a protective coat, then I used my wife’s mod-podge (essentially water downed white glue) to glue the frieze to the boat. Both worked very well. Next, I made the hinges and mast retainer. I glued both with white glue but I was concerned about the mast retainer not being strong enough so I put some supper glue on as a overlay and fillet. I made it a little shiny but later I’ll spray the whole boat with a matte finish which should dull it. Then I made the pintles and glued them onto the rudder. I think I’m going to take a break from completing this boat and start the Model Shipways Norwegian Sailing Pram. It looks like the rigging is simpler and might be easier to learn about rigging and sails. My first build was the Model Shipways Lowell Grand Banks Dory by David Antscherl, which I’ve stated before was a fantastic first build. So I think the Pram will be a good learning tool also, back in a while.
  21. SkiBee
    Cap Rail: This was a challenge to try cut it to a form as close to the end product as possible, still ended up sanding to size quite and bit. Based on my poor cutting to size of the platforms I took more time. I should have tried a template to see if that had helped, but I was ok with the end product. Also, used filler to fill in the cap at the bow next to the stem, I wasn’t worried to much since it would get painted red. I painted the outside edge of the Cap Rail white but I covered it up when I painted the top of the rail red. Maybe, I will try tape off the top of the rail next time I paint the edge of the rail white. I took a little more time cutting the aft seats and they turned out better than the platforms. HELP NEEDED: 1. The instructions say to pre-spray the frieze with a ‘protective artist’s fixative’, does anybody of a recommendation of what to spray the frieze with? I was thinking of just waiting to the end of the build, since I like to spray all the wood with a Matte clear coat. 2. Does anyone have a recommendation on what should I use to glue the frieze to the hull with?
  22. SkiBee
    Ryland & VTHokiee, I ended up using "Elmer's Carpenter's Wood Filler" to fill the gaps since I have used it on larger projects and it sands, takes stain and paints well. Plus it comes in a small container. (VTHokiee, great school, I lived in Springfield, VA for ten years and had some great co-workers and neighbors that were Hokiee's) I installed the Floorboards and Platforms next, not the Cap Rail and frieze. I wanted to build the platforms and then stain the hull, floorboards and platforms all at the same time without the cap rail. There were gaps between the hull and the platforms, below was even a second attempt cutting them, I did use a template made from a file folder. I think I just need to take more time next time I cut something like this. I'm hoping that the thwarts and locker/seats will hide most of my sloppy work. I used the mixture of 50/50 Minwax Natural and Light Oak per the instructions, I did use Minwax pre-stain first. The results were not as rich of a hue while being very light as I hoped, I think that was the natural color of the basswood and the way it absorbs the stain compared to a hard wood. But I think it will look better once I paint the red on the cap rail and the white below the waterline. Next I painted the inside two top planks red. I was not happy about the coverage of the red paint over the stained basswood, it turned out quite dark after two coats. The red paint on the top of the frames was even darker due to the amount of stain they took, so I painted the top of the frames white then repainted them red. That turned out much better. On to the Cap Rail and Risers.
  23. SkiBee
    Does anyone have a recommendation on what to use to fill mistakes? I would like to stain the repair.
  24. SkiBee
    Planking the model: In general, the planking went well except two errors that I learned from. First, I laid down the garboard and shear planks and one additional plank next to them. Then I tried to determine the number of planks and started to adjust the width of the remaining planks. I followed the recommendations in this website on how to determine the width of the planks and installed the next three planks after trimming them to a reduced width, from bottom up. But as I tried to continue to determine the width I came to the conclusion I should have followed the instructions and started to lay down full width planks from top down. When I got to the point that a full plank would leave to small and irregular plank, I then cut down two planks to fill the gap. In the pictures you can see the final gap on the starboard side and if you look closely you can see the number of small planks that I installed prior. Second lesson learned, when clamping the planks down I indented the basswood plank on the forward end on both sides. Now I have to figure out what kind of putty I can use that will take a light stain, anybody have a recommendation.
  25. SkiBee
    I looked at Justin P’s build on this web site and decided to cut the fwd end of the garboard plank in a curve taper. Also, I tried to bend a second plank around a straight diagonal cut and it didn’t bend smoothly, so I went with the curve cut. Decided on a ¾ in. cut, after bending a plank on a small French curve, it seemed to be the smoothest curve length. It appeared to be a good choice as I continued to plank. I also used the small French curve as a jig to bend the remaining planks, worked grate! I knew I saved my old high school drafting tools for a reason and my old wood drafting pad has worked great as a mobile work table top.

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