FlyingFish

Tremendous work Michael; the accuracy of your work is very inspiring!

Hey Bitao7697 - this is just wonderful! I'm just amazed by your great accuracy and ability - what engineering - thank you for inspiring me! Just spent a day on my workshop and I cannot bring myself to photograph my very poor efforts now! It's great to see your skills in so many disciplines - you are a master craftsman no doubt. Looking forward very much to following your build.

Have the frames true to within 1mm at the sheer, rabbet and at each waterline. Some adjustment needs and a couple rebuilt. Getting a sense of the shape of the hull now. May remake the jig to simplify it and allow more room to add the floors ribs and ribbands. Next step is to fair the edges of the frames. It's only at this stage that I feel I have a set of plans that are accurate to the original.

Thanks Michael, as a bit of a newcomer to all this, so will I!

Made a start on a building jig. . Not sure how this will work, but will adapt as I go along. Looks a bit of a mess at this stage. The deadrise area of the frames is not yet cut to shape - a great deal of work to do on fairing the frames! The design will allow me to whip out a frame fairly easily when needed, and trying to allow space to get my hands in and around the work.

Great progress, and some great skills demonstrated here!

Need some tiny chisels to cut out the rib pockets. Found some 2 1/2" masonry nails and fashioned a mini set; 3.5mm 2.5mm and 2mm. Will make handles from an old drum stick. Need to cook a pizza so I can harden the steel again.

Getting on towards the framing now. Rough cut outs with deadrise to be faired after fitting. Couldn't resist seeing what a loose fit looked like. Need to make a simple framing rig to square them up yet. Next steps will be to finalise the rabbet line at the deadrise amidships, then cut rib pockets before fitting and fairing the frames properly.

Most metal suppliers will sell the channel, for example: https://www.metals4u.co.uk/materials/aluminium/aluminium-channel/100719-p which yu cut and tap to size, these are 3mm. and the thumb screws https://www.accu.co.uk/en/plastic-thumb-screws/427329-SFTR-M3-30-N

Aluminium 12 mm & 19mm channel and thumb screw head bolts. Cheap 'n cheerful.

So back to the plans, and here is where I'd like your advice friends. I had planned to cut the rabbet and rib pockets next, and if you look at the plans in post #12 you'll see that I was to cut the rabbet straight from aft to stern - skeg built I think it is called. However, the more I research Orca, I think she was planked built down to 2/3rd of the way aft then skeg built to the transom. Here's a half model (not mine) to illustrate what I mean: So I need a different rabbet line to achieve this, more like this one: ...and looking forward... If we have a look again at the great photo that jlt13th send me (see post #5) I think there is evidence that this is how Orca's hull was planked. If so I have some adjustments to make. Be interested in the thoughts of any of you more familiar with this type of boat. [Credits to Walt Burrows Photography from whose wonderful website this images of John's Bay Boat Co. came.]

Well it's been some time since the last post. Domestic tasks (ripping out and installing a bathroom and adding insulation to my loft space) plus numbingly cold temperatures in the workshop have delayed the work, but also I have had to rethink the plans a little - more of that later. Firstly a day or two exploring steam bending ribs for Orca. The method I aim replicate is to put up temporary frames and ribbands, as shown in the drawing. The ribs are steamed and jammed into the pocket sockets on the keel or hook and then ‘walked up’ (literally) into place and clamped. For tight curves, the ribs are split for the top half to reduce stress. The difference in radius of the two halves shows in this picture of the rib being clamped at the sheer. A short video of this can be found here; The ribs for this boat, the ‘Never Better’ are 1 ½” x 2 ½” white oak and seem quite small when you look at the size of the boat, but the 1 ½ “thick carvel white cedar planking outside makes a sturdy hull. I suppose I could plank over temporary frames, then add the ribs, as one might do with a lapstrake dingy, but wanted to try the ‘proper’ way. For the test I tried 3mm x 5mm first then 2mm x 3.5mm ribs in part-seasoned field maple (sycamore), seasoned white oak; seasoned tulip (I think this is American poplar) and green Ash all available from my timber stock (well my firewood pile in fact). I tried to get the most straight grained sections, which was made easier by splitting some of the billets before dimensioning. This 40 year old Dewalt 100 16” bandsaw can prepare stock with a freshly sharpened 6 tpi blade with remarkable accuracy. I have a little Delta bandsaw with a sharp 24tpi blade and a ‘floating fence’ as I call it rips hardwood into fine strips when needed. I hand plane the stock after each cut so that at least one side of the plank is smooth, but the other only needs a light 240 grit sanding after that. I keep reading about the wonderful little US table saws lots of you own, but hell’s bells - the shipping and tax puts them out of reach for me. I cut the strips to size in width and depth but overlong and let them boil in water for a few minutes. Her indoors was not too pleased that I used a frying pan for this, but I think I got away with it. I made a very simple test jig deep enough for 2 ribs at a time with a slightly tighter radius to allow for spring back. I prepared enough ribs to allow for some breakages and fiddled with the best method for bending them into place to relieve the stress, using a shaped former, as shown. Of the four woods I tried the maple won hands down. The oak and the ash are too coarse grained for this small size, but I was very pleased with the maple, which not only bent well, but when dried was strong. The tulip as a close runner up. Whether the ribs can be ‘finger-walked’ into place on the model without a former is yet to be seen! The ribbands are removed sequentially as carvel planking progresses from the keel up, and the frames removed after that. One concern I had for such small strips was how to hold them in place on the ribbands, as drilling and pinning would weaken them too much. I’m working on some custom mini clamps to hold them in place. The carvel planking which will be edge set and glued and pinned to the ribs will eventually create a very strong hull, I hope.

The last image was for fun!

As far as I can see, it was rare to put a mast on a lobster boat / cruiser, although there was at least one other in Menemsha harbour during the filming of Jaws, as shown here: They obviously wanted a shark lookout mast to go with the story, and must have taken it from a boat nearby. I think it was shaped from oval to rounded from above lookout spar, these pics might help:

No problem. You may find this easier than pausing the film... https://movie-screencaps.com/jaws-1975/53/

This one shows it getting round at the top, but is from Orca II - assume this was the same as Orca I.. (Mind your toes...!)

Your shots are from two different models (although the first of Eric Hollander's boat shows the fantastic detail he modelled). The original was not the same. Some thoughts from my research on this which may help... The mast is an addition to Warlock (the original Orca) by the production team, so is probably taken from another boat, and possibly shortened. It was oval, not round, roughly 6" by 8" at the base, and not tapered, although it looks as if it gets rounder at the top. If you are using Pat Tritle's plan, he has the mast some way from the pilot house, whereas the original was against the aft wall, and strapped to the pilot house roof. There are lots of details of the mast from the movie, most consistent, but the lights shown here below Quint's feet were only seen in some shots, so maybe for filming. As you'll read from my blog it is possible the mast was offset from the centreline; (count the deck planks) which presents a bit of a dilemma for the modeller!

Thanks Darryl, good luck with your 1:87 model - any pics? And thanks for all the thumbs ups guys. It is amazing how many different creations have flowed from the interest in Jaws - here is a similar design from the same site https://www.artstation.com/artwork/8kZ3O The 'variations of interpretation' make creating an accurate depiction painstaking work - some models have a hard chine, some soft; some like Magnus's have obvious errors like the steps into the pilot house, or the mast positioned away from the wheelhouse etc. One of the challenges is to get to know the original well enough to be able to pick out the accurate depictions. I imagine many of us can become a bit obsessive about detail, but for me the detective work to chase down of the facts and true dimensions makes it more rewarding. I have spent many many hours trawling through the photographs, facebook sites of other builders restorers of lookalikes etc. What else is lockdown for?🙂 As a newcomer to this forum I've already had so much help and advice; if only I'd had this help years ago I am sure I would have been a better maker. Youngsters don't know how lucky they are!

For those interested in following the design and planning of this build, I am currently trying to use Delftship to import offsets and create a line drawing with faired frames here:

Well - what a great response! Thank you Terry for the time you have taken with this - I'm emboldened to give it another go, and see what I can do. I think the terminology used in DS is a considerable barrier to new users, and can't see the logic of the developer here. Now I see what they are after I can make some progress. I'll also try the second methodology you advise; although I had no drawings at all (the boat is Orca from Jaws, build log just started), so one reason for using DS is to fair the hull and adjust the station frames before cutting out. A steep learning curve indeed, but I don't mind that at all, and your tutorial is most helpful. Thanks too for the offer to advise with problems!

I have been trying the learn how to fill in a table of offsets to import into Delftship for a lobster boat build. A quick question to those of you familiar with Free Defltship imports - I cannot for the life of me understand what exactly to measure to complete the 'aft contour' and 'forward contour' data shown in the attached. Nor do I understand what to use as the 'origin'. I've been through the Delftware forum, but can find only other confused threads. Any help or advice greatly appreciated!

Great progress, and very tidy lines! How did you make your barrels?

On the more practical side, still looking for a steam-bendable timber for making the ribs, which will have to follow quite a sharp curve at the after end of the boat. Toyed with simply cutting these bends with the scroll saw, but hey that would be cheating! Maybe a greener timber? So went up to my log pile and selected a 4-month seasoned length of field maple: The easy bit... The hard bit.... The cardiovascular bit... and finally the satisfying bit... No, I don't have the machinery to do this easier - my shop is 16 ft by 8ft, (I consider myself very lucky to have a dedicated space to work in) and so I manage with hand tools mostly. Also the spirit of 'Bruce' the shark got me and drew blood in the form of a Stanley knife to the finger last week... something I haven't done since childhood. Some DIY patching up saved a visit to the ER. Hope this build is not haunted! Next posts hopefully will feature a lines plan from Delfship (maybe...), and I will set out the frames and test the maple for steam bending.

....So the next step has been back to the drawing board, starting with a check of the positions of waterlines and stations, and the drafting of a new set of sections at each station: I don't have any knowledge of CAD or suchlike, but I have created a table of offsets from these sections as a means of getting my head around the process. This really was a good exercise, and cleared the fog a little. As I am building using metric measurements I also converted the table into feet inches and fractions as means of double checking dimensions from others plans. I found a very handy online scale ruler calculator here: https://www.ginifab.com/feeds/cm_to_inch/architect_imperial_scale_ruler.html which can be printed out to scale. This was helpful for me as 1:20 scale is not generally used in the imperial world, and is not found on imperial scale rulers. I have also considered inputting the waterline data into Delftship via a .txt file so that I could print out a line plan, but currently stuggling to get my head around the terminology required. Delftship refers to the 'origin' when measuring offsets, without making is clear if this is the base of the keel or some other index. Still working on that....!