DocBlake

Thanks, guys! Good luck in retirement!

Except for the mast partners the lower deck framing is complete. I wiped it down with mineral spirits to give you an idea of how the finished product will look. I'm planning holly for the decking and bloodwood for the spirketing. The hatch coamings will be bloodwood and the grating boxwood. Next is the waterways and spirketing, then the chain pumps and hatches.

Yes. His PT-187 won gold for his division, best paint and best of show.

Don’t feel bad. We all have them. And some are real doozies! The windlass will cover, but I agree with a dowel up to the level of the sub deck and then fit in little pieces of decking to match your planking pattern, to camouflage the boo boo!

I don’t like to blow my own horn much, but both my Battle Station and my 17th Century Naval Cannon won silver awards in scratch built categories at Manitowoc. It was fun to be involved and meet so many great people!

Hi Patrick! Thanks for the kind words, and congratulations to you, again! Great job on Sultana! I get a lot of my wood locally at a hardwood distributor called Kettle Moraine Hardwoods. Swiss pear and boxwood are sourced from the internet. I have a full size shop in addition to my miniature shop so I mill all my own wood.

Very nice, Ken. Glad to see you back at your build,

Congratulations on your gold medal and your “Best Novice Builder” award at the Manitowoc contest. Well done, Patrick!

Thanks so much, guys! Shipshaper: We’ll miss you in Manitowoc! Yes, I will be bringing the Battle Station to the show and contest.

Every time any one mentions Vanda-Lay Industries I have to smile! George Constanza used the alias "Art Vandalay" when he wanted to be anonymous, and "Vandalay Industries" when he needed a fictious employer. "Seinfeld" was hilarious!😄

Thanks, guys! In thinking about things, I realized that the hatch with the ladder to the gun deck would need a railing of some sort to keep the sailors from falling below deck and breaking their necks. I also realized that in bad weather or heavy seas, this hatch, like the others on deck, would need to be "battened down". The easiest solution was a rope line strung through removable stanchions, probably made of cast iron. I added the rope line to the coaming. I'm not sure if it's historically accurate, but it makes sense to me!

Thanks, guys! I'm getting close to done. I installed the upper deck, pinned and glued the cannon and rigged it. Then I added the various gun accessories. The only task left is to place stanchions with a guard rope around the ladder passageway.

Awesome videos! Thanks, guys!

This Model Airways Sopwith Camel kit arrived today! I picked it up on sale from Model Expo and plan to build it in the background as I work on my other projects My interest in aviation goes back to my childhood. When my friends were building model cars, I was always more interested in aircraft and ships. That interest stayed with me as I grew older. In the 1990's I was introduced to MicroSoft's Flight Simulator and I was hooked. I spent hours flying simulated aircraft on my computer, and finally started designing airplanes for the platform - both the visual model as well as the flight characteristics. I specialized in WWII propeller driven aircraft, single and multi engine and designed more than 20 individual planes, some in multiple liveries. The coolest thing that happened to me was an email I received from an Army Air Corps pilot in WWII who flew B-29 bombers in the Pacific. He told me that my B-29 simulation, modeled after the "Enola Gay" flew exactly like the real thing! That made my month! In my late 40's I decided I would learn to fly, and I ended up passing my check ride 4 days before my 50th birthday! I had my Private Pilot's License! I don't fly anymore, for a variety of reasons, but I still love aviation. I have about 600 hours in my log book in Cessna 172's, and I even have 1/2 hr. logged as Pilot in Command of an Army Air Corps T-6 Texan. I did some aerobatic flying with an instructer: loops, barrel rolls etc. Great fun! So I'll start this build and keep it running in the background. It should be interesting! Thanks for looking in.

Thanks, everyone, and for the "likes". I decided to rig the guns, run out and ready to fire. Here is how the gun deck appears.