Rik Thistle

Gunther, Basically there is a flexible 'gasket' between each plank to stop water ingress so some swelling or shrinkage shouldn't be a problem because they handle it in the design/construction. Ah, OK, that makes sense. Thanks. Richard

Terry, Currently using Coreldraw X7 for drafting ship plans. If I ever get in to scratch builds (and I would like to, eventually) then maybe...but at the moment £700 = two good ship kits ... however one day I'll maybe have to bite the CAD bullet. There were also some comments earlier on about investing in CAD training...so perhaps I should consider joining a CAD club or do night school to get a feel for CAD first. Anyway, thank you for the comments. Richard

I miss seeing the draughtman's dance: doing a few lines, standing back to review the work, stepping forward to fix or add to it. 😉 I did that dance for a few years. Then we moved to a more compact room and were supplied with draughtsman's chairs...but you can't work an A0 sized drawing from a seating position so we always ended up standing at the drawing board and then turning round and sitting at the design desk. And of course, I was younger then and standing for hours was not a chore. 3 or 4 companies and a number of job changes later, I retired early, and just at the time they were clearing out the 'old' drawing office...so a number of draughtsman's chairs were up for grabs...and I got one. It's been in my shed for years and I wouldn't swap it for any other chair...it's a masterpiece of functional design...robust, comfortable, stable, height adjustable, a ring to put the feet on etc...wonderful. Richard

Rick, Thanks for the feedback. The closest thing I can think of to a "one size fits all" package would be Solidworks. I have tried many of the "usual suspects"; Delftship, Autocad, Revit, Solid Edge (for more than a year), Rhino, and Catia. On cost/benefit basis, I have found Solidworks beats them all, hands down. Being retired, I can't justify the cost of Solidworks (£7k-£10k ?) but it does look very competent. And, as you mentioned, it takes a fair commitment in 'time' to get up to speed on such software. I'll maybe have to lower my sights and just keep my eyes open. I have tried SketchUp and FreeCAD but none seemed to match my main need for 2D draughting. 3D is a 'nice to have' but not essential at this time. Richard

Seasons greetings. Health. Wealth. Happiness And to you and your's all also. Although I was aware of the Arctic Convoys I never really knew about them. So I have just spent a bit of time on Wikipedia reading up on them.... strategically very important events and very brave people involved. I found out there were a number of books written and a film made. I will try to find out where this film is available.... https://www.prlib.ru/en/news/684563 Richard Edit: I found this film ... https://www.amazon.co.uk/PQ-17-Arctic-Convoy-Disaster/dp/B00JAI29AM ...it's Clarkson commentating but I think he knows when to be serious.

Bob, That's six inches of grain to shrink tangentially and even at a rate of movement of one percent, you are getting close to a sixteenth of an inch, which would be a quite noticeable crack in a model's topsides. Yes, that does make me stop and think. Useful info, thanks. As a non-sailor but ex-engineer how do full sized wooden boats and ships cope with that movement....pumps? Richard

I was trained in traditional draughting at school and later to the BS 308 draughting standard (now superseded by BS 8888). It used 0.7mm lines for object features and 0.3mm lines for dimension leader lines etc...those different line thicknesses made it easy to 'read' engineering drawings. I keep promising myself I will learn 2D/3D CAD but my heart just isn't in it. I have a desk mounting, Rotring A2 draughting board and all the instruments necessary to quickly and accurately sketch up scale drawings of most things I need to draw. I think one of the main reasons CAD draughting is dominant is that it forms a cost effective part of the digital manufacturing chain, the same chain that is replacing expensive humans at each stage. Other small, but not insignificant benefits of CAD draughting is that A0 drawing storage and A0 printing is no longer required. And 'copies' of drawings can be sent in a second rather than days. I have tried CAD packages but the learning curve seems too steep. If anyone can recommend a cheap, one-size-fits-all package that is easy to learn and suitable for mechanical engineering, ship plans and 3D printing I would be grateful 🙂 Richard

I hope you find many, many more items to add to keep the build going for another year or two 🙂 Great work, Richard

I've got the blue Lowes in my shed for small work, and the yellow Stanley in my study. The Stanley is the one to go for because of it's flexibility and reasonable build quality. The ball joint on mine (bought 7 yrs ago) was tight and rough so I took some Emery cloth to the ball and that fixed it. The Stanley comes with plastic soft jaws and the metal jaws have a groove running the length of the jaw and also a groove at right angles to the first in the centre of the jaw...both grooves are very useful for gripping cylindrical objects. It clamps quickly onto a desk surface (....the Stanley clamping surfaces are plastic covered to protect the desk). For £20 the Stanley is good value ... https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/product/B001HBS0I0/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1 Richard

Yes, it is. Just taken from a different angle but mounted in a newer (?) base. The different angle may give another take on the routing of the ropes, but it's not a high res pic. Richard

Another pic here .... from https://www.authenticireland.com/blog/aberdeen-aberdeen-prettiest-town/ ...scroll down almost half way. Now set in a larger base. Richard

Erik, Congrats on the successful team presentation, and getting back to the shipyard for the festive period. BF 1479 is looking very neat and (in my imagination) keen to get a catch on board ;-) Richard

Hi Glenn, I did say that the fix to be balanced with it looking 'acceptable' 😉 ... but you're right ... it can be a head scratcher sometimes trying to figure out how best to correct a mistake... but I enjoy solving puzzles, so it's another good aspect of modelling. As I learn more about modelling I'm growing my list of ways to fix 'instructions misunderstandings'. Happy days. Cheers, Richard

Dave, A member on here kindly advised me that putting the nail through a scrap piece of wood (say, planking off-cut) first, then tapping the nail (plus scrap) into the plank/bulkhead was a good way of making it easy to extract the nails once the PVA glue had set. The scrap keeps the nail head about 1mm or so (scrap thickness) above the glued plank so it is easy to jam a lever into the scrap and extract the nails. The scrap also spreads the clamping load over a wider area than the nail head as the glue dries. Richard

Probably still plenty of thickness to fill, sand, and repaint the hull. Since posting, I've sanded the white paint back a bit and added some filler. And repainted - it's now looking not too bad. Nice job on the Wales, remove and replace is a way of life for me... 🙂 Yes, 'fixing' becomes part of the build process... ie realising I've messed up and, once I get over the 'doh!' moment, enjoying figuring out the least painful fix balanced with it looking acceptable. Richard

Yeah, it would need to be quite light as you say. But I suspect there must be a steel beam of sorts running down the length of it to stop it breaking it's back when being moved. Then build everything around the beam. I wonder if it was a shipyard apprentices' project or maybe trainee naval architects? The fact that it is being refurbished in a naval shipyard give me the impression it was originally made to a decent standard. Richard

Hi all, Work continues on Flirt - two steps forward, one step back....due to someone not reading the instructions properly. Below - Clearing out the holes in the bulwarks after the internal planking was fitted. The Banggood 'dremel' is really quite useful, and it's rechargeable battery lasts an acceptable amount of time. The internal planking needs a little bit of 'filling' plus a bit of touchup paint. And hacking out the gunhole ports with a scalpel blade and then a needle file to smooth the sides off. Yes, the stain (now difficult to see after major clean up) above the wales looks like someone has mistakenly glued the wales above the pencil marks rather than 'up to' the pencil marks. Also, I couldn't find the 3mm x 1 mm wood so used some walnut I had in the 'stores'. Below - Keel being glued into position. The toothpicks are wedges to make sure the keel lies centrally. Yup, there is a handy gap (don't ask) between the keel and the garboard planks for the toothpicks to dig in to...filler later removed those gaps. Filler is great stuff 😉 The MDF Pegs for aligning the keel parts are necked at their ends... so I couldn't get them to slide on to the keel parts. Not sure what I was doing wrong here? Wales painted black, and a bit of general tidying up done. Below - Marking the waterline with my home made marker. Note the bulldog clip, bottom right on the keel to stop the hull sliding about in the base. Hull painted white. Gaps showing between the planks. They look worse than they actually are, but I may add a touch of filler and repaint, or more likely hand paint in the gaps at a later date. I don't mind the planks showing since it indicates what the structure is but the gaps mustn't be too obvious. Whilst the white paint dries, the rail and timber posts were painted black. There are a lot of small parts that need painting black, yellow etc. Below- After getting fed up continually digging in to the Flirt box for wood/brass sheets I decided to lay them all out my home made drawing holder/work platform. A Banggood Christmas tree has been added because...well, it's that time of year. Nope, I'm not on a commission from Banggood 😉 I think that's all for this post. Flirt seems to be progressing very slowly. The hull planking did take quite a bit of time and I lost a bit of momentum, but I guess it's not a race. Catch you all soon, Richard

Whilst reading 'USS Bonhomme Richard on Fire' https://modelshipworld.com/topic/25040-uss-bonhomme-richard-on-fire/?tab=comments#comment-776194 ...I ended up on 'VIDEO: Navy Restoring Unique Parade Float Based on WWII Battleship USS Alabama' ... https://news.usni.org/2020/12/16/video-navy-restoring-unique-parade-float-based-on-wwii-battleship-uss-alabama ....now that is a large model! Was the model made in an actual Naval shipyard...I can see it is being refurbished in Norfolk Naval Shipyard? Is it made mostly of wood, or sheet steel? Richard

B.E., I'm not too sure about the intricate workings of the capstan but I think there would be a pawl system on it. Sailing Drifters is a good read, so many snippets about life in a fishing community around the turn of the century, even down to the cost of a pint of ale! I have now bought the sister volume on Sailing Trawlers. Thanks for the reply. Sailing Drifters is an amazing read. The author certainly put his heart in to it. Reading it though is not that easy, as you hinted a little while back, since March just jumps straight in with all the technical jargon of the time - and being a noobie there are numerous paragraphs where it may as well have been written in a foreign language. However, there is a Glossary at the back that I am flicking back and forth to. I'll be sad when Muirneag leaves the shipyard...maybe she'll come back in a few months for a refit? Regards, Richard

For me it's upgrade from Dremel to a decent flex shaft tool. Good suggestion. The Dremel body is very heavy and bulky for fine, light work. The flexible drive (coupled with the mini hand tightend chuck) makes the Dremel cutter/drill/sander bit on the end so much easier to manipulate. It may be wiser to get: A gift certificate to a special tool vendor: This is the ideal solution since your father won't know what tools he really needs until the need arises. The suggested books do look good though as do the quality tools. A book might be a good supplementary gift though since he can read it in the 'family' areas and start 'did you know that....' conversations 🙂 Richard

Schooner iced up. A stunning painting yet scary at the same time. Another one of my favourites 🙂 Richard Edit: I see the icebergs have arrived...now it's even colder!

Muirneag is looking very sweet. Just thinking aloud.....So the steam capstan is used to pull the sail tight at the front rather than lift the weight of the sail straight up the mast. I guess it's easier and more accessible for the crew to lift the sail straight up, but a greater strain on the human body to attempt to try to generate enough force to get the sail nice and tight at the front....hence the use of the capstan? Is there a 'slipping clutch' arrangement on the capstan to stop it generating too much force, or did the crew rely on experience to 'know' when the ropes were tight enough and then turn off the power to the capstan? Amazing how they quickly used 'new' technologies to make life on board more efficient. And then they later used capstans for hauling in the nets, AFAIK. Slowly getting in to March's Sailing Drifters...it's a very good story apart from being a deep insight into the history and workings of these boats. Regards, Richard

Yeah, the more I look at Ian's pics the more puzzling it is .... on pg4 http://www.ianlawrencemodels.com/wipmaid4.html ....about 1/4 of the way scrolled down, there are two pics (identified by a row of storage trays at the top of the pics -1st pic BP078, BP079 etc , 2nd pic BO337 etc). The first pic shows there is a rope from the end of the yard to a block attached (seemingly*) to the ratline. But in the second pic the rope appears to go down to the deck....there doesn't seem to be any ropes going to the ratline. Is it an optical illusion caused by the angle the pics are taken at? *looking at the tension in the rope I'd have thought the ratline would have bulged out towards the yard end? The mysteries of ship building 😉 Richard

Hi gthursby, Edit: I should have first pointed you towards the seven or so builds already on MSW ... https://modelshipworld.com/search/?q=scottish maid&quick=1 ...apologies. ------------------------- I wonder if these pics of an AL Scottish Maid model can help ... http://www.ianlawrencemodels.com/maid.html ...and his build log ... http://www.ianlawrencemodels.com/wipmaid4.html You might be able to zoom in on some of the pics showing routing for the yard rigging. The line extending to the shroud looks like a drawing error, but I'm not a ship modelling expert. There are many others on this website that can give more informed advice. My AL Dallas build had different rigging and no shrouds but the yards were controlled via blocks. Generally, I found the draughtsmanship on the AL Dallas plans to be very good, even though some of the important details were not that obvious on first inspection, but they were still there. Regards, Richard

Glenn, Your decking layout and the sharpness of it's detail is to be much admired. Richard