GGibson

Well, I did purchase the mill after the drill press, but it is also my belief that, although it's entirely possible to use the mill as a drill press, using the top hand wheel on the mill to lower the drill bit into the wood or brass or whatever your object is, would be a bit more tedious (lots of spinning!) than pulling the handle down... boom.

Not sure if this is answering your question, Salty, but if you place your mouse over the person's name and click, you go to their profile page. From there, you can see on their Activity tab the pages they have recently been active in and can go to those pages. The other thing I have done is saved multiple pages of Model Ship World in my browser's Favorites tab for people that I am following on specific builds (either ongoing or finished), so I can go directly to their build log.

I have both the Proxxon TBM115 drill press and the Proxxon MF70 micro mill, both with the X-Y table, and love them both. Used them extensively when I was building my Bluenose, and they are both quality machines.

Great USSCM info, Jon. Thanks for sharing! I do like the looks of the screw barrel version. I don't recall your discussion of carronade choices, though, yet, on your build log. My obvious question is... where did you get the screw-barrel carronades?!? 😆👍 I'm trying to recall without looking up to verify to avoid making a fool of myself (easily done, however), but I recall a 38mm length at this 76.8 scale, but don't remember if that was for the cannons or carronades. 🤷‍♀️

Seems like decent looking carronades has been an issue with everyone, Peter... Ugghhh... But, a great looking eagle! Hats off to Clement! 🤠👍

Excellent work, Unegawahya! The skylight and brass rail look sharp.

Hey Tim! Congratulations on your Bluenose completion! The sails look awesome, and your nameplate design is unique and is a nice addition. Great work, sir! The Bluenose really is a beautiful ship to build and I, too, had a lot of fun building it. Again, fantastic work, Tim!

OK, James... So, I did the logical thing in order to check this... I logged out and back into this MSW website. I guess I need to keep a more accurate list of account logins, because the MSW login is, in fact, my screen name. <gulp> My apologies for thinking otherwise... I have updated my fancy "master list", accordingly.

Really don't have a whole lot to update on this Santa Maria build, but with about 20 additional pictures of my "progress" waiting for disposition, I figured I'd provide another post. I continue to be a bit "underwhelmed" by this Pavel Nikitin kit but am trying to work through the hurdles as they arise. I am finding, however, that many of the same issues a couple of YouTube builders ran into in their build are appearing in this build, as well. And Pavel's comment about incompetent builders on one of those builders page still aggravates me. Pavel is, however, posting his own build log on YouTube. However, with what appears to be several build logs in the works at one time, his Santa Maria posts are pretty infrequent. With all that said, I continue to move on and treat the hurdles as best I can as challenges. I will certainly face similar challenges whenever I begin my Constitution build, so... I need to get used to it, right?? 🤷‍♀️😆 Wow, haven't posted an update in over a month! Guess the Thanksgiving and Christmas holidays and all the preparation and distractions had a bit of an effect on my shipyard time this month! I had begun working on the hull planking and had completed the lower halves of both the port and starboard sides. Now to work on the top halves. You will recall that these Pavel Nikitin planks come already pre-cut and pre-shaped, so these seemed to come together fairly well. I had a few issues with the top planks on both sides not quite reaching the tops of the bulkheads. So, some sanding was required in the center, main deck areas, and we were a full plank short in the poop deck area, so I added a strip with some available wood strips I had from previous builds. I had mentioned in a previous post that all of Pavel's pre-made parts have some type of "part number" assigned to it so you can find the part in the sheets of material and you can (hopefully) see how the part is placed on the ship in the pictorial instructions. One of the issues that I discovered, then, was that the hull planking part #'s were visible on the inside. Others had commented that they were concerned that too much sanding of those part numbers would make the hull planks too thin. Anyways, I am hoping that with the stain I will be applying to the hull (both inner and outer sides) will cover the part numbers and that the inside bulwark rails would also help cover. Working on the forecastle deck next. The kit has you put together a framing jig to assist with the forecastle deck construction, but it was actually more of a hinderance, so I scrapped it and worked on building the deck base without it. The kit comes with a finite pre-determined number of forecastle deck side panels. From the diagrams, it appeared that these panel pieces were to be placed vertically, although they were cut at a bit of a diagonal. Either way we placed them, they still came up short in filling each of the three sides, so I secured them vertically and, again, filled the empty spaces with extra available wood. The kit's provided 3-piece top rail was not fitting well, either, so I decided to shape my own top rail using some available basswood sheet. I worked on shaping it, as well as placing the kit-supplied forecastle decking. I've given it all a couple of coats of the deck stain, and will probably put another coat or two on it before affixing it to the rest of the ship. Speaking of affixing to the ship, the instructions have us placing six (6) timber braces under the poop deck. However, as other builders have also acknowledged, those timber braces, although identified with part numbers to be found on one of the wood sheets, were not included on the sheets. So, using my new Byrnes saw I acquired several months ago, I milled six new 3/4"-square timbers. Excited to find new ways to use the saw! The poop deck doesn't set perfectly on top of the timbers, so that will be our next challenge to conquer. Thanks again for the reads and likes.

Hi James! Happy to see MSW making important improvements to an already-awesome service! Congrats on your collective success! After reading your message above, I looked at my master list of account logins that I keep and, only being a member here for the past 2-3 years now, it appears according to my list that I keep, my current MSW login is my email address. Is it possible that for the "veteran" subscribers, their login was set as their username but for us "youngsters", ours has always been our email address? I have had my login auto-populated, so I haven't paid much attention to what my login is whenever I have to re-open the website. Appreciate what you all do! Thanks! Carry on...!

Almost posted this comment in the Shore Leave - "What Did You Receive Today?" section, but then saw, almost eight years-to-the-day later, where Kurt Van Dahm had the above post regarding this book, so decided to add my comment here. In preparing for my Constitution build, I have been researching and reading numerous past and existing build logs here on MSW. One of those completed build logs I've been reading is by @xken, Ken Foran. And in one of the posts in his extensively detailed Constitution build log thread was mention of his Model Building with Brass book. So... I had to have it! This one is a 2nd Edition, copyright 2018. As someone who has struggled a bit in the soldering world, I am really looking forward to reading Ken's book and learning as much as I can. For as well as Ken has described his techniques in his Constitution build log, I have no doubt that, even after reading this book once, it will be pulled off the shelf multiple times after as a continued reference for working with brass in this ship building hobby. Thanks, Ken!

Looks good, Mustafa! The reason I was asking was because, in my recent work on researching other build logs like yours, I had just read on xken's (Ken Foran's) Constitution build log that he had used a black ink dot from an old-school Bic pen to create the bolt mark. So, sounds like you have a very similar solution! Amazing work you gentlemen continue to do! So lucky that I have such great tutorials to follow. You are appreciated!

These are looking really sharp, Mustafa! Great work and very consistent. How are you filling the bolt holes? Anxious to see how you will create the trunnions, as well. (See how much I have learned about cannons and carronades in the past few months?!? 🤣) The wooden trucks will look great at this scale and being under the carriages, they will look realistic. Awesome work, sir!

Looks like a good plan, Jon! And how many of these will be on the deck? Whew! Watching with great interest! 👍🏆

Excellent production line, Mustafa! Nice looking carriage units. Yes, my Proxxon mill will get plenty of work once I get to my Constitution! Happy Holidays to you gentlemen, as well. You've been great as I've been watching your progress.

Thanks for that info, Mustafa! I may have missed your explanation earlier, but what type of wood are you using for these carriages? Excited to see the final shaping and, of course, how they will look painted. 👍

Well, crap! Hate to hear that! And I just bought their 0.2-1.1mm package. Granted, they were only $5.57 for the package (maybe that was an indication of quality?!?), but sorry to hear they won't work for the intended purpose. Did the RPM speed have an effect on that, Jon? Could you slow down the drill speed and they'd do better? I've got a bunch of the Gyros, as well, and have found that they are great for the pin vise, but the bits do wander when I put them in the Proxxon drill press. Well, like I said at the outset... crap! EDIT: I've saved vossiewulf's link to my "favorites" just in case... 🤷‍♂️🤣

Nice work, Mustafa! I may need to refer back to this chart if I try something like this on my Proxxon! They will sand out to nicely curved carriage sides. I assume you used the smallest 1.00mm milling cutter?

Thanks for your input, Gregory! The Malco blade you linked is one of them that I ordered. Also, I have a different sheet of wood that I'll run through the saw tomorrow. Not sure why I didn't just think of doing that right away. Appreciate your advice, vossiewulf! It is a Byrnes saw and I thought Jim designed his saw with a slight variance, but I will check if that is an issue, as well as checking the blade. Thanks!

Well, I may have just answered my own question... I was doing some additional reading here on MSW and found a thread from 2019 regarding the Thurston company closing. The "brand-new" blade I referred to in my previous post is a Thurston blade. Perhaps in the five years it was sitting around a warehouse, it lost its edge one way or another. In everything I have read, either here or on other saw blade websites, blade sharpness (or the lack thereof) seems to always be the #1 blame for burning. So... I ordered some new additional blades from Malco Saw Co, which was also highly recommended. We'll see if that makes a difference. Still interested in hearing from experienced woodchoppers if the cherry wood itself or the way it is cut contributes to any of that burning. Thanks again...

Sweet! Nice friend! Excellent work! 🏆

I have a 1/8" thick cherry board and I am cutting it into short 7/32" strips, so that I end up with a 1/8" x 7/32" piece. I am using a 0.028" slitting blade on my table saw, and the cut edges are burning while being cut. Is cherry wood susceptible to this? It is a brand-new blade, so it's not a dull blade issue. Any advice or remedies on preventing the burning? Thanks!

Carriage looks good, Mustafa! Will be interested in seeing what your final design/shape looks like. Sharp looking carronades, as well. Nice detail for that scale in brass. Where did you get your carronades?

Looks good, Mustafa! I'm not a regular router user, but I would think there would be some variation of bead or ogee-shaped bits that would be close to what you are attempting. Otherwise, your mill is doing great work! A little sanding on that curve would shape it nicely.

Yay! Great to hear that they are working for you with brass. Now I'll need to order some for my shipyard. 👍