Matrim

Hi,   Thanks for those likes.
 
I’ve been busy working away on the smaller items that fit around the decks, there are a lot of them and they take a surprising amount of time given their size. There are too many to show the making of them individually but you’ll probably notice them around the deck without them being mentioned.
 
I’ll show you the pin rails and you’ll perhaps understand the time it takes on this model of what is normally a quick and simple task.
 
There are thirteen pin rails with a total of 68 belaying pins, each pin has its own brass roller in its brass housing mounted on a shelf below the main rail.
 
As you can see in the plan the roller mount should be first nailed onto the rail then the roller can be fitted with a pin. Here’s catch 22 if you do it this way you can’t fit the roller pins because the other rollers get in the way and you don’t have enough room, it looks simple on the plan but in reality it isn’t. Now if you pin the roller into its mount first you then can’t nail the mount to its shelf. My solution was to use a length of wire and thread all of the rollers with mounts onto the wire like a bead necklace then cut them to the right length for each rail, bend them to suit the shelf curve an attach using thick cyno. I find brass doesn’t hold well when glued so if I’d glued them on singly I think that I would have had issues of them coming off during rigging, but glueing them on strips I think that their combined strength will be sufficient.
 
I’ve also been fitting a lot of the small items that I’ve made to the fore deck and it’s starting to look very busy, in a good way, I’m surprised at just how good its starting to look, I’ll get a good photo session in when it’s sunny, the metallic nature of the brass shows up much better in natural light than in my work area, I’ll post these pics quite soon.
 
Ken

Hi,  Again thanks for those likes.
 
The build continues apace, I feel that real progress is now being made as the deck fittings are starting to give it real character, I’m now very enthusiastic and look forward to each time I can get to it to continue.
 
I have now finished the waist deck cabin and a couple more hatches and skylights. These were a project of their own, they took a bit of time but presented no issues. The walls were made up from ply which was then added to as per the plans. There weren’t enough brass portholes supplied in the kit so for the skylights I used small brass rings, with all the other stuff going on I think I’ll get away with them. I painted it, again using Humbrol enamel then fitted it in place. Lots of pictures this time.
 
Ken
 

Hi,     The next little project was to make and fit the two column radar structure that sits behind the quarter deck house. It was made up from dowels with sanded to shape tops and joined using strips, finished off with some brass wire to support the radar dish. I brush painted it with Caldercraft occre acrylic, before putting on some doors. I like this paint and the colour is perfect so I’ll be using this for some deck fittings and the masting
 
Ken
 

Hello to those following my build, and again thanks for your likes.
 
I have now finished the stern house ( or whatever it’s called )
 
It was made up initially from pre cut ply sides which were then covered with mahogany strips. I then used the same strip wood cut up to make the panelling. I added the skirting, made the upper detailed items from the plan, I added the rails and ladders then I glazed the windows before adding a coat of poly. Job done.
 
I’ve attached a few photos for you to see.
 
Ken

Hi,    Just to keep you interested, here’s pictures of some of the smaller detailed deck items that I’ve been making for later placement.  They are some pin rails, the training guns and the small cranes. I think that they came out well and along with all the other stuff will look good on the deck.
 
Ken
 
 

Hi,  Again thanks for your likes.
 
I’ve been putting in the hours on the build over the last few days and have got quite a bit done. The powered winch, the funnel structure and a few deck fittings were made up and fitted in place. I took quite a few photos as I built them up but unfortunately deleted them before I had downloaded them, a senior moment, so I only have the finished items to show. I’ll try and do better, as I used to say to my teachers.
 
I made the winch platform then worked out how to assemble the many metal parts. This looked simple on the plan but caused much head scratching, like those silly impossible puzzles you got for Xmas. I wanted the individual parts to have contrast with each other rather than just brass or plain black, more detail gets noticed that way so I blackened each part differently and got the effect that I wanted, I then assembled them. Again to get contrast rather than leave the platform a deck colour I stained it light teak.
 
Next was the funnel assembly. The funnel was a very nice brass one with a separate brass piece as the head, I left the funnel brass as that’s my theme but again for contrast I blackened the head. There are four sets of brass rings around the funnel and these are held in place with eyelets. Gluing the eyelets into the thin sided funnel wasn’t a good option so I glued a wooden dowel inside to give them more of a hold, I could also cut off the dowel and that would leave a good substantial area for fixing later. The funnel housing is made up from brass sheet, I first made up the housing to the correct size from a block of wood then glued the exterior brass sheet to that before finally fixing the funnel to it.
 
I’ve fixed these and the wheelhouse into place on the deck. I have made up a few deck fittings as well as the wheelhouse ladders and put these into place.
 
 
Ken
 

Hi,  Thanks again for your likes on my build.
 
As you know I was unhappy with what Panart wanted me to use as a canopy for the wheelhouse. I decided that I would make up my own frame and use acetate sheet to glaze the individual windows. I used a mixture of the kit photo etch brass for the top and sides and some brass strip for the rest, soldering them together. The outcome was successful but was far from easy. My soldering skills are very basic and leave a lot to be desired. It looked easy but in the end it took about four hours to solder together. Making up a 3D structure with many differing angles by eye proved a challenge, with many solder, de-solder, re-solder and swear moments, it was only with the help of my wife’s extra pair of hands that I managed. It was messy and needed a great deal of filing to get a decent finish, it was worth the effort. You can see the difference with the kit version from the photos.
 
On reflection it would have been easier to make a wooden mock up and use that to rest the pieces against as you solder, you would end up with the correct shape and fit first go, hind sight is wonderful.
 
Ken
 
 

Hi,  Just a small post. I just couldn't resist putting on the stern decoration piece. It is a detailed casting made from a soft metal which molded easily to the hull shape, I nailed it on. It put a smile on my face, a couple of minutes work for a noticeable improvement.
 
Ken
 

Hi,   Again thanks for the many likes and comments on my build, as I’ve said they are encouraging.
 
Here we go on to something that I’ve been looking forward to making, the wheelhouse. It’s one of the main detailed features on the deck and it gives me the chance to see how my brass and mahogany theme looks. 
 
Whilst the plans looked simple enough I found them hard to follow. All the detail and measurements were present but because they were spread out over three sheets like a mad woman’s diary and not shown to scale they were confusing, many of the small parts that were made up were not shown where they actually went.
 
In spite of that the wheelhouse turned out better looking than I had expected, I put quite a bit of work and thought into it and I’m rather pleased with myself. I’ve shown the process in pictures as I think that this explains better than words.
 
The glass canopy is another issue. A moulded acetate plastic one is supplied, with photo etch pieces meant to be stuck to the outside to look like the frame, that’s always going to end up messy. The moulded piece is misshapen, the wrong size with rounded and not defined edges, I’ve seen better jelly moulds.  I think that I will have to make my own so watch this space.
 
Ken
 

Hi,    The build continues at a good pace. Today’s post shows some of the smaller projects that I’ve made up whilst waiting for paint/glue to dry, they include some hatches, waist lockers, deck storage units, skylights etc.
 
I’ve shown my start on the wheelhouse, I’ll continue showing this soon, I’ve done more of it but I haven’t sorted the photos out yet, it’s coming out better than expected
 
Ken
 

I've been 'stealing' space on other threads a bit too often lately so it's time offer up info on my scratch build project. I used to own a full size Fisher 34 motorsailer  1986 model  and decided last year that it was time to make a 1/12th size copy. I thought it would take about 6 months to build!  I bought the plywood for the keel and frames  in September last year. The new launch date is  about April 2021. I have come to accept that this build is a sort of 'labour of love'.   I have built a  many different model aircraft and sailplanes through the years but only one or two motorboats in my early teens (55 years ago!)  The build of the Fisher was going a bit slow in the winter/spring so to have a yacht for the summer I built a Krick Comtesse  (mostly ABS plastic !) in the spring and launched that in July.
It would take some time to post a build-blog backdated to sept 2019 and not many will be interested in such a long-winded process so to begin with I will only post a few early photos and a few later photos of the build.  I live in Norway so there's a bit of time difference to many of the other members on this site. 
Regards, George

Good Day
 
I bought a height adjustable table, put it together and mounted the building board. It's lowest is 60cm (2ft) and highest 123cm (4ft). Why did I not get one of these long ago, as the say - you need to crawl before you can walk. First photo is the lowest to the highest. The table will now move to my small build room from the garage until my new place is built.

Good Morning Kate;
 
It looks to me like what is called an 'open heart', which is used to set up the lower end of one of the principal stays of a sailing ship, with a lanyard (a length of rope passed repeatedly through each of a pair of hearts, placed end to end, and about 3 feet apart) The two metal loops of one heart would have been fastened to the end of the stay, and those of the other heart would be fixed to a firm anchorage point. The lanyard was used to pull it all taut, and could be adjusted if necessary.
 
The stays were large diameter ropes which ran down and forwards from the top of the masts, to a fixed point on or near the deck or bowsprit. I believe that open hearts were also sometimes used to set up the bowsprit shrouds in some merchant vessels. 
 
I am not fully qualified to comment on the date, but I would suspect it to be of either 19th century date, or early 20th.
 
All the best,
 
Mark P
 
 

I'd seen some 1850's era ships pictured to be the in San Francisco harbor.  Many appear to have a substantial number of gun ports ... but no guns.

Might it have been a tactic to paint the familiar white stripe, with areas denoting gun ports ... but really not having guns?  Just to scare off pirates perhaps?

Anyone know?  I did not find anything in an online search on this.
 

Good Evening Kevin;
 
Yes, it was common practice for merchant vessels to imitate the Navy paint scheme; as you surmise, this was indeed to discourage predators of all types. 
 
All the best,
 
Mark P

Greetings, been working on the Tamiya kit for a good long while and I've a question that I can't find an answer for (my google-fu is usually strong, but I'm floundering here).
 
I have the Pontos wood deck for Yamato and it came with a nice set of dry-transfer decals, but for the life of me I can not figure what these markings that are applied to the deck are.
 
Anyone have an idea?
 
Much appreciate any help!

Today I have started the build in earnest.
 
First task was to dry fit the hull parts. Everything went together without any issues and the Yamato is going to be a big model.

 
There are two parts which are warped however. One is one of the base plates which can be rectified when the bulkheads are glued and pinned in place.

 
The other part is keel of stern part. I will probably have have to straighten this piece before it is fitted in place.

 
I fixed the bridge misalignment issue. This turned out to be an easy task as I was able to file a little bit off the locating pins.

 
I also looked at the first big gun. There are a couple of minor issues that needs to be addressed. The first one is the wooden based plate is a tad to big and a couple of the edges need to be trimmed.

 
The second issue is one of the two range finders does not fit in the slot provided so will require a bit of filing to sort that out.

First problem encountered. There is a slight alignment issue with the bridge assembly due to position of the locator pins. It is only a fraction out but it does not look right as the right side is lower than the left. I have a few different options in mind to sort this out which I will experiment with.
 

Today I worked on installing the hanger deck and associated supports. The task turned out to be much simpler than I was expecting.
 
I printed out a picture of the hanger support arrangement and positioned it under the deck and used that as a guide to add the various hanger deck support pieces.

 
The hanger deck will require some additional filler / glue as can be seen below.

 
The hanger deck grills have been dry fitted at this stage as then need to be removed and painted Iron Grey before they are glued in place.

A filing rest basically consists of two (normally hardened) rollers that can adjusted in height. Opinions diverge, as to whether the roller should be placed outside the workpiece or the workpiece in between them. I think both ways work. Here is a more or less random example from the WWW:
Here a guy makes such a filing rest for his Taig-lathe: http://www.deansphotographica.com/machining/projects/filingrest/filingrest.html
The design probably could be simplified and adapted to the Unimat. You either need a bridge between the two bars or make it as an attachment for the cross-slide. There is one available commercially for the Sherline, but the price is indiscently exaggerated.
 

 
The height is adjusted by a nut and a locking nut:
 

 
You then also need a kind of brake or stop for the headstock spindle. There are many different ways for doing this ...
 
 
 
 

Thanks Steven
 
The fore top is only 2mm smaller in diameter than the main top.
This really doesn't look good and the conversion is now underway.
 
These are the "charms" of scratch building a model without plans, haha.

Thanks Chris.
 

 
It is useful to take a photo now and then. And then take a good look at it
I see that the mast top of the fore mast is actually a bit too big. So I'm going to rebuild this top a bit smaller.
Better now than later 

Slow progress 
 
Further finishing the 2 mastops.

 
Added these 

 
Now I have to make 80 small planks (40 for each masttop) . None of them are identical.

 
And add more knees.

 
Work in progress 

 
Thanks for following
 

Patrick, there is plenty of space for a lot more ship models.

I've found that drilling the holes before shaping (or at least before cutting the deadeyes apart) reduces the chance of splitting.