Paul Le Wol

Hi Glenn, thank you for the like and the encouragement. I am going to revisit the square tuck. If I can get it looking anywhere near as beautiful as yours, I will call it mission accomplished. Paul

Thank you to everyone for the likes. They are really appreciated. And Chuck, thank you for the comment. I have found that starting a build log makes you strive to do a better job than you might do if you thought that you were the only one that will see your efforts. I have let some things slide, but recently have become one with my Cheerful.

Hello all, I have been working on my Cheerful for about a month now. In the last couple of weeks I have been flip flopping on whether or not to start a build log. Decided to wait until it was planked to see if it was worthy of showing the world. So here I am thinking that it just made the cut. While I was waiting for my Alaskan Yellow Cedar Package from Modeler's Sawmill ( Joe did a beautiful job cutting the wood ) I assembled the former and bulkheads. . I used a piece of basswood for the rabbet strip which I don't think was a particularly good plan. It seems kind of spongey and and not up to the task. The blocks of wood between the bulkheads were added for strength when fairing and to take care of a tiny wow. They were cut from a piece of pine shoe molding picked up from Home Depot. The frames for the gun ports are also basswood. They didn't hold up so nice during fairing. Lots of shredding and feathering on the vertical pieces. My wood package arrived and I was off to the races. I followed the lead of other builders by running the planks right across the gun ports but unlike others, my cutting out the port skills were somewhat lacking. This is where I stray off the path of historical accuracy. The blocks were added to the tops of the stern frames for support when fairing. I decided at this time that I was not going have seats of ease. maybe just plank over the stern frames or have taller lockers. So the blocks were left installed and I never thinned down the outer stern frames. The thinning of the outer stern frames just seemed like something that I would mess up. Using Chuck's planking tutorials made everything so much easier and the planking was completed down to the bottom of the square tuck. One of the things I'm not sure about is which side of the plank is tapered. I laid the tapered side of the plank against the straight side of the previous strake. Or would it be better to lay the straight side of the plank against the tapered side of the previous strake? Or does it even matter? A small block of left over 1/4 inch plywood was glued behind the square tuck and a hole was drilled and tapped for a 4-40 machine screw. A small piece of plywood was used to hold the outer piece of the square tuck while fairing it to the hull after it was cut to width. The garboard and another strake were added and then I went back up to the bottom of the last belt and started planking back down five strakes. Then started at the bottom and planked back up. The last strake wasn't really all that hard to do. Just a lot of test fitting. Oops, just noticed something. I went back to the square tuck to finish the infill planks. Used a piece of 1/16 inch basswood to make a template but by the time it was shaped it didn't fit too badly. I thought about scoring it to simulate planking but it looked too fragile to survive. Painted it black to see what it would look like and pressed it into place without gluing, Going to live with it for a while. I didn't want to paint the counter. So that's where I'm at now. Lots of sanding to do and I think that I would like to thin down the bulwarks before completing the fancy stuff outside.......Paul

Hi Patrick and Haliburton, thank you both for your welcomes to MSW. I agree Haliburton , Dundas has a rich history of shipping, canals, and commerce. Interesting place.

Thank you for the welcome Alan. I will certainly look into the local clubs.

Thank you John. I hope everything is good down there. And I bet that your Dundas is just as nice as my Dundas. I can’t put my finger on it but there’s just something about Dundases ( if that’s a word )

Thanks for the welcome Mark. There certainly is a lot to check out here that’s for sure.

Hey guys, thanks very much for the welcome. It feels good to be here.

It’s been over 30 years since I built my model ships. Both were Billings Boats. One The Bohuslan and the other The Bluenose. That is way too long between builds. Recently I purchased a Cheerful package from Syren. Hoping to soon have some content to share with the community.