Gabek

I haven’t been working on my models much but I sure am playing with my resin printer! I went to Heroforge to create some more poses for figures and have been playing with scaling.  
 
My rendition of a bosun with a rope's end. The knife is too chunky…I may file it down.

 
Bosun, midshipman, and two seamen in 1/96. Printed in grey and white with one primed figure to show details better:


My lieutenant “Number One" in 1/48 and 1/96:
 

 

I totally agree that a figure on a model looks great.  Here's my 1/50 Swift (Artesania Latina) with 1/48 "Number One” giving orders. 
 


 

Number One and Mini Number One and my 1/96 HMS Triton cross-section in progress.

 
Lastly, I drafted up iron ballast with the broad arrow in Fusion 360 and printed them in singles and in gangs at 1/96.  Not painted yet but I had to them check out on the Triton.  Many more to be added, but I can produce them fairly quickly:
 
 


 
Clear skies and sharp tools!
- Gabe

Good question! I've had a lot of practice…I've been painting miniatures for close to 50 years.  This is where my Warhammer hobby comes in handy.

A good, pointed brush and good acrylic paints that are slightly thinned allow you to paint with light touches.  Using the side of the brush lets you paint raised features without touching the background. After painting base colours you can use washes, inks or contrast paints which settle in low areas to give you shading effects and a better three-dimensional look.  There are tons of "how to" videos on YouTube.  If you want, I can list a few.
 
Clear skies!
Gabe
 

I have the Anycubic Photon. It takes up the same space as a blender. I use a tupperware pickle strainer full of isobutyl alcohol to clean the parts. After cleaning I have a UV Spotlight that shines down on a lazy susan which I can spin to move the object. The total space is maybe 3 feet by 2 feet. I HIGHLY recommend getting a 3D SLA printer to make even routine parts.

That's an amazing website. Here's a link to their website.

Welcome back.  Retirement is a transition and needs some time to sort out.   Been there, still sorting.....  Looking good on the model.   I hope you'll be able to continue.

Wow, another couple of years has passed! I’m still waiting for all that free time that retirement was supposed to give me…
 
So, after two years I first had to figure out where I left off and get my brain back in the game of solving the riddle of my "micro Titan" (thanks Ray a.k.a ziled68 for the name!).  After a day of reading all my past logs and advice from you folks I came to a couple decisions:  
I will need to finish the hold first: all building, painting and add-ons before building the deck. build the deck in place and not as a single unit off the model.   One decision I still can’t seem to make yet is to build the well like Ainars Apalais' incredible example.  The shot locker is the sticky point…it would impinge on the space under the main hatch. (Funny thing:  I've been thinking about this for two years and one of the things that occurred to me was to build a cutaway main mast…and I see that Ainars did exactly that! 👏🏼)
 
So, I set aside building the mess deck and started on pillars:
 
I cut some 3.3mm square stock from birch and, after cutting to length, I used a knife to chamfer the middle 80% of the corners.  I based this on Anatomy of the Ship: The Frigate Diana and a photo of the hold of HMS Trincomalee.  



 
Pillars in these ships were put in place with square tenons but  I opted to use registration pins. So, I marked the centres on the ends of the pillars and drilled holes for brass wire. I the marked out where on the keelson the pillars were centred and drilled a corresponding hole. It didn’t take long to cut short lengths of brass wire and dry fit the pillars. I need to do some more preparations in the hold before I glue these in place. 
 


 
And may I introduce “Number One” - a figurine I designed on Heroforge.com and printed at 1/96 scale on my Elegoo Mars resin printer. (Another reason I haven’t been building the Triton. I'll be posting about this in another topic shortly.) 
 
Good to be back in the shipyard! 

Progress is slow, but is moving forward!   I think Ive complained broadly about this but work onsite has geared back up to five-days-a-week so my time at the bench has dwindled significantly.  Add to that Fall family activities and well, things slow down.   We also bought a camper, so getting all that sorted out and clearing a space on the property to park it has taken quite a lot of my weekends over the last couple months.  
 
Anyhow..   since my last post Ive gotten all the gun deck framing completed and started in on the hanging knees.   
 

I have to say that the hanging knees are one my least favorite activities.  For whatever reason, working though shaping all ten really had my hands ache.  Happy with them for now, but as with my lower deck knee's they are subject to later perspective and could get rejected.  

After those, and cutting and shaping the gun deck waterways (which Ive decided to redo), I jumped into the hatchway framing.   This I thoroughly enjoyed.   Really any extended use of my Byrnes saw is just a joy.   All the notching and cutting was done on the saw. 

Last thing for this update was the installation of the bitts.   I left the gallows for later though do have a dummy placed in the picture.   I need to look back over TFFM for some ideas on shaping the gallows.  
 

All frames completed, with only one redo.
 
So far pretty pleased.  I added the cross-members and marked out the center line of each and built a frame mounting jig which Ill feature later.    Ive done a rough sanding and have begun marking out treenail locations and starting drilling them out.  Im waiting for a draw plate from Model Machines, so until that arrives I think Ive gone as far as Im able at the moment.  



 
 

Building Jig.  
 
In the last few days I set about creating a building jig similar to other previous builders.  I had thought there might be an available cross section Jig plan in the Triton downloads section as there is one for the full POF Triton build, but came up short.   I experimented with trying to cut down a full size jig plan to create a cross section plan, but discovered there are a number of differences between the full build and the cross section, despite being both 1:48 scale sets of drawings.   In the end I created my drawing as Im sure others have done, and went to work.   
 
If anyone would like to use my drawing for their own work, I'll attach it here.   If printed at 100% on standard letter copy paper it should be accurate.   Be careful to check the lines against those of the provided drawings to be sure it is scaled and printed correctly.   
 
Triton Jig Plan_1-48_Justin P.pdf
 
Having never done this before, I did sort of invent my own process which may or may not be like how others have approached this.   I wound up using a 1/4" rough ply for the top and a 1/2" rough ply for bottom.   I bought a sheet of 2' x 2' of each and sanded an area marked out exactly to the dimensions of the printed drawing (8.5 x 11" copy paper).   I used a plain Elmers glue stick to apply the sheets.   In order to really prevent the paper deforming at this scale you really need to glue out the ply instead of the sheet - the reverse of what you might do when gluing assembly parts.   I had drawn guide lines on the ply to help with laying down the sheet of paper and help ensure that I have properly glued the entire area.  

Using my full-size table saw I then ripped down the two sheets of ply along the edge of the copy paper.   This gave me two sheets exactly 8.5 x 11" with a duplicate and well-aligned drawing mounted to each.    

I then drew in registration marks to each board edge marking the keel and the center frame.  This was important as there was a 1-2mm of difference in the alignment, so by using the registration marks I could clamp them together just right and drill the post holes so that when assembled all the lines would be true and aligned to one another top to bottom. I drilled those holes at exactly 3/8" and used 8" x 3/8" all-thread for the posts.   This provided a very secure fit, and along with the washers and nuts created a very rigid structure. 



I used a jig saw to cut out the meat of the top board interior and then a coping saw and files to finish the cut.   I then used a combination of squares and the provided drawings to make all the necessary checks.   
 

I had set this drawing up so the the distance between the top of the bottom board and top of the top board came out to exactly the distance between the floor of the keel and the upper Deck Beam Clamp mark.   Incidentally, this turns out to be roughly the same as the indicated height for the full POF jig plan.   


After that I positioned the keel in a jig mounted to the bottom board.  The jig itself is complete and ready for frames. 

As for frames, Im still working out all the steps of my process.   Trial and error, but Im close.   My drill press/drum sander setup is finally put together and is working well.   I had intended on using a 2" diameter drum but had trouble getting it to center properly causing it to wobble intolerabely.  The 1" drum works perfectly though.   Ive gotten all the components of my first "test" frame cut out and ready for a final fitting at the joints.   This step is hand work, so will proceed much more slowly to get it right.   Hard to know what the tolerances are and how falling on either side of those tolerances will effect the end result...  
 

Right: Fresh off band saw, ready for sanding.  Left: After sanding on the drum.  
 

Two halves of a single frame ready for final assembly.
 

Hello some progress - gun deck is almost done..

Good to see you back! I'm looking forward to the next installments. 

Wow, another couple of years has passed! I’m still waiting for all that free time that retirement was supposed to give me…
 
So, after two years I first had to figure out where I left off and get my brain back in the game of solving the riddle of my "micro Titan" (thanks Ray a.k.a ziled68 for the name!).  After a day of reading all my past logs and advice from you folks I came to a couple decisions:  
I will need to finish the hold first: all building, painting and add-ons before building the deck. build the deck in place and not as a single unit off the model.   One decision I still can’t seem to make yet is to build the well like Ainars Apalais' incredible example.  The shot locker is the sticky point…it would impinge on the space under the main hatch. (Funny thing:  I've been thinking about this for two years and one of the things that occurred to me was to build a cutaway main mast…and I see that Ainars did exactly that! 👏🏼)
 
So, I set aside building the mess deck and started on pillars:
 
I cut some 3.3mm square stock from birch and, after cutting to length, I used a knife to chamfer the middle 80% of the corners.  I based this on Anatomy of the Ship: The Frigate Diana and a photo of the hold of HMS Trincomalee.  



 
Pillars in these ships were put in place with square tenons but  I opted to use registration pins. So, I marked the centres on the ends of the pillars and drilled holes for brass wire. I the marked out where on the keelson the pillars were centred and drilled a corresponding hole. It didn’t take long to cut short lengths of brass wire and dry fit the pillars. I need to do some more preparations in the hold before I glue these in place. 
 


 
And may I introduce “Number One” - a figurine I designed on Heroforge.com and printed at 1/96 scale on my Elegoo Mars resin printer. (Another reason I haven’t been building the Triton. I'll be posting about this in another topic shortly.) 
 
Good to be back in the shipyard! 

Wow, another couple of years has passed! I’m still waiting for all that free time that retirement was supposed to give me…
 
So, after two years I first had to figure out where I left off and get my brain back in the game of solving the riddle of my "micro Titan" (thanks Ray a.k.a ziled68 for the name!).  After a day of reading all my past logs and advice from you folks I came to a couple decisions:  
I will need to finish the hold first: all building, painting and add-ons before building the deck. build the deck in place and not as a single unit off the model.   One decision I still can’t seem to make yet is to build the well like Ainars Apalais' incredible example.  The shot locker is the sticky point…it would impinge on the space under the main hatch. (Funny thing:  I've been thinking about this for two years and one of the things that occurred to me was to build a cutaway main mast…and I see that Ainars did exactly that! 👏🏼)
 
So, I set aside building the mess deck and started on pillars:
 
I cut some 3.3mm square stock from birch and, after cutting to length, I used a knife to chamfer the middle 80% of the corners.  I based this on Anatomy of the Ship: The Frigate Diana and a photo of the hold of HMS Trincomalee.  



 
Pillars in these ships were put in place with square tenons but  I opted to use registration pins. So, I marked the centres on the ends of the pillars and drilled holes for brass wire. I the marked out where on the keelson the pillars were centred and drilled a corresponding hole. It didn’t take long to cut short lengths of brass wire and dry fit the pillars. I need to do some more preparations in the hold before I glue these in place. 
 


 
And may I introduce “Number One” - a figurine I designed on Heroforge.com and printed at 1/96 scale on my Elegoo Mars resin printer. (Another reason I haven’t been building the Triton. I'll be posting about this in another topic shortly.) 
 
Good to be back in the shipyard! 

Patience, perseverance and club member tips/techniques has paid off.
My first wooden ship model build was presented the BRONZE AWARD at the 2021 MIDWESTERN MODEL SHIPS CONTEST in Manitowoc by the Wisconsin Maritime Museum. Thanks guys.

Sanding the bowsprit to correct size with a hand drill.  Just lock drill on, then use course sand paper to taper. Measuring often
 

Got the rudder done, not perfect but did the best I could.  Forgot how patient you have to be in the hobby.  And correcting mistakes.
 

 
Got the helm glued on
 

Now starting on the Bowsprit.   Having a dremel has been a life saver. Especially with a ferrule that accepts .4 micro bits for eyebolts.

Wow...and I mean WOW.  This rehabilitation is coming along beautifully.  Painting is doing its job...that hull planking was the result of frustration trying to bend veneers to a complex 3d shape, which can't be done.  All your colour choices are fine.  Black and white are  covering up the "booboo's" nicely!
 
The lantern is exquisite! Please tell us how you made it.  I never thought of rigging one on the mast.  So, I started pouring through all my books and so far I could only find how they rigged a stern lantern on the mizzen top of a British frigate in Petersson's Rigging Period Ships.  I think you could try installing yours on the flag mast somehow if you wanted.
 
Keep on trucking!
- Gabe

 
 

Back from the cottage and I printed off a 1/96 version of my Hero Forge figure. It took only a few minutes to rescale the original in the Chitubox software that the Elegoo printer uses.  I did increase the resolution as well.  Now it’s more in line with my "micro" HMS Triton cross-section in progress (please pardon the jig I have currently attached).  Also, when I created the figure I didn’t pay attention to my options for the base, some of which would have been much easier to cut off when the time comes. 
 
I've got a few more software tools I'm going to explore to create more poses and ratings and get back to you folks.
 
Clear skies!
- Gabe

Thanks for the replies.
With respect to figures - I have been investigating several online figure creators that allow you to download an .stl file for 3D printing. Most of these are geared toward fantasy and model railroad figures and kind of miss out on 18th and early 19th century maritime figures that I'm interested in.  I managed to make a "navy-like" officer in Hero Forge (heroforge.com).  The process is fairly straight forward - you  pick and choose pre-made bodies, parts, clothes, poses to assemble a figure.  You can customise the pose and, when you're ready, you pay $7.99 (US) to download the .stl file.  You can actually have them print the figure for you for $19.99.  They state it is roughly 1:48 scale. (25mm or 30mm). 

 
I bought the download (emailed to me in maybe 30 minutes) and opened it in ChituBox software (free) in order to create a file for my Elegoo Mars resin printer.  i added supports (easy) to make sure that the model prints correctly.

There are many types and colours of resins you can use for the printing. I purchased a standard grey UV-sensitive resin which must be cleaned in 100% ethanol/isopropanol and, since my workshop is next to my furnace, I quickly purchased a water-washable resin.  (Winter is coming and I don't want to wash parts in 100% alcohol outdoors when it's -25C!)  Here are the results using the two resins:

Back to the ChituBox software to scale that figure to 1/92.  I'll print that size shortly and get back to you folks.

Clear skies!
Gabe
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

We will have some news about scale 3D printed figures sometime in the next couple of months.

Hi.
I also have purchased a 3D Printer (Elegoo Mars pro. )
I have used the printer for Model making components (Not ship).
Hero Forge is by far the best Figurine shop I have seen. So many choices of kit. clothing. posture. and the list is endless.
With the Figurine's available I will be putting some on my Ships as well. And being scalable they will adapt to any model I build. 
 
Regards Antony.

This is exactly what I would like to do too. The quality of prints made with resin printers is way better than ones produced with machines using filaments. Also the cost of these printers begins to be acceptable.
But what is still prohibiting me to step on this path is the problem to learn to use a 3D design software so brilliantly that I could be able to produce something that I could be happy with.
I have a hobbyist's free version of Fusion 360 software which I have tried to learn, but still after a few month's practize I am still far from being able to design parts for ship models I would like to print.
So my question is, which software you guys are using to design your parts or crew members, and how have you learned to use it properly so that the quality of prints is acceptable?

Back from the cottage and I printed off a 1/96 version of my Hero Forge figure. It took only a few minutes to rescale the original in the Chitubox software that the Elegoo printer uses.  I did increase the resolution as well.  Now it’s more in line with my "micro" HMS Triton cross-section in progress (please pardon the jig I have currently attached).  Also, when I created the figure I didn’t pay attention to my options for the base, some of which would have been much easier to cut off when the time comes. 
 
I've got a few more software tools I'm going to explore to create more poses and ratings and get back to you folks.
 
Clear skies!
- Gabe

Thanks for the replies.
With respect to figures - I have been investigating several online figure creators that allow you to download an .stl file for 3D printing. Most of these are geared toward fantasy and model railroad figures and kind of miss out on 18th and early 19th century maritime figures that I'm interested in.  I managed to make a "navy-like" officer in Hero Forge (heroforge.com).  The process is fairly straight forward - you  pick and choose pre-made bodies, parts, clothes, poses to assemble a figure.  You can customise the pose and, when you're ready, you pay $7.99 (US) to download the .stl file.  You can actually have them print the figure for you for $19.99.  They state it is roughly 1:48 scale. (25mm or 30mm). 

 
I bought the download (emailed to me in maybe 30 minutes) and opened it in ChituBox software (free) in order to create a file for my Elegoo Mars resin printer.  i added supports (easy) to make sure that the model prints correctly.

There are many types and colours of resins you can use for the printing. I purchased a standard grey UV-sensitive resin which must be cleaned in 100% ethanol/isopropanol and, since my workshop is next to my furnace, I quickly purchased a water-washable resin.  (Winter is coming and I don't want to wash parts in 100% alcohol outdoors when it's -25C!)  Here are the results using the two resins:

Back to the ChituBox software to scale that figure to 1/92.  I'll print that size shortly and get back to you folks.

Clear skies!
Gabe
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Oh wow!  I just purchased an Elegoo Mars resin printer to do exactly what you are doing!  So glad that I found your post.  I'm having a blast testing out my printer and can't wait to create some crew, fabricate parts and make ornamentation for my models.  
Great job!
- Gabe