Jaager

This product system may be a solution: Modern Masters AM203-04 Metal Effects Primer , 4-Ounce Modern Masters ME149-06 Reactive Metallic Copper Modern Masters PA901-04 Aging Solution Green Modern Masters PA902-04 Aging Solution Blue Patina, 4-Ounce there is a comment on Amazon about it having been used on plastic.

I made a simple one that worked for some Holly, but It was nowhere close to being a spec based kiln. 1" foil faced sheathing cut up to make a 4 sided box. The end pieces were Home Depot craft 1" Styrofoam. It was in a wall shelf, so it was just a push fit. Heat source - 200-300 Watts of incand. light bulbs. The bulbs ought not to get close to the foam or touch the wood. I only had wire clamp bulb fixtures, but next time I would get ceramic fixtures - I used a computer muffin fan for exhaust of water vapor. The loose fit was the air intake. There are low cost probe moisture meters and I used a battery thermometer that saved the highest temp. It was in my garage, so the temp was affected by ambient. I did not want to cook the Holly, I just wanted the temp to be higher than what Blue Mold would like. I was in no hurry to season it, but that mold invades quickly. It was already too late for the stock that came out of my cousin's wood pile, But unlike what mold did to some Apple I stored incorrectly (oatmeal instead of wood in structure) infected Holly is still sound. It is just not white. But my cousin's Holly is yellowish anyway. Like Apple, Plum is going to have sugar in its transported water. My take home lesson from the long ago Apple experience = slow seasoning of 6-8" logs will have problems from mold as well as being prone to splitting - especially if the cut ends and branch cuts are not completely sealed. I was in my early 20's and had never seen a bandsaw, much less know what one was for.

Any fruit wood is usually an excellent choice. The best time to harvest is usually when the tree is dormant. It will probably be harder that Cherry, close the Apple - which is King. For hull planking, you will have to see the actual planks re: the color and uniformity. But for anything else, fittings, furniture, catheads, beams, etc. it will be excellent. The harvesting technique has been covered in this form several times. The short list is: seal the ends - old paint will serve do it ASAP debark - insect larvae that bore live there. Drawknives were designed for this but freehand bandsaw is less actual work, but can cost more wood Get it into billets soonest if you can. A free standing bandsaw is the more efficient tool to do this. Sticker - good ventilation and air circulation - in a covered location or an atic Access to a kiln gets the seasoned wood more quickly. Air drying = 1 year per inch in thickness.

An 1826 contract for two US navy corvettes specifies that deck planks be Heart Pine 40 feet long. Those primeval Pines were still tall and straight. My thinking is this would be the outside limit for any component. The hull planking was a lot less heroic in length. A good ball park length would be 20 to 25 feet long.

I suspect That Ebony is the subject of more misleading substitution than is Boxwood. In any case, there is not the profit or social status with ship models as there is with guitars as far as the decoration. My bias suggests that using one of the Ebony group on a kit upgrade is like doing a high class upgrade in a trailer park. The quality is evident, but the environment makes the effort a misplaced one. For a substitute, Holly is appropriate, but the Wood Database lists other species that accept dyes. This is a situation where slang shorthand can lead to misunderstandings. A stain - the noun - is a form of semi transparent paint - surface only. It is pore filling and this makes the product a problem with PVA bonding. Actual black paint may as well be used. To stain - the verb - includes the use of the semi transparent paint and also the effect of a dye. Wood dyes are available from wood working vendors - there are two types - alcohol and water. The alcohol does not raise the grain, It also does not penetrate as deeply as water based dyes. For black, I would think that two treatments should work, with a sanding step after the first treatment to repair the raised grain. The dye can be used on the loose plank and it will PVA bond as well as if it were not treated. I have it in mind to try a technique used by a traditional Carolina furniture makes (PBS). He dissolved a steel wool pad in a quart of vinegar (5% acetic acid) . He then wet pieces of Maple with a solution of tannic acid and sanded /scraped the raised grain and then coated it with the iron acetate solution. The effect was a dense black.

Sanding sealer is for use on open pore species, such as Oak, Hickory, Ash, Walnut. The pore and grain structure places them in the category of woods that scale in an undesirable way and are not appropriate for our uses. The desired species do not need their pores filled and there is no need for a sanding sealer type product. The material itself tends to leave a layer that is too thick for scale uses.

Devildog, You may have more resources than you realize. The Washington Ship Model Society is based in northern Virginia. Between it and the local woodworkers guild and the local schools, you may have access to the use of the necessary machinery to produce your own stock. Not far from you - in Elkwood, VA is C.P.Johnson Lumber - with excellent prices on Hard Maple, Black Cherry, Yellow Poplar, Yellow Birch their inventory is out of the two exotics that I would consider = Yellow Heart (Pau Amarillo) and Granadillo (Macacauba). The other domestics have unuseful grain characteristics.

Shellac is as close to being a 'universal' primer as can be had. It is available as flakes and already in solution. The flakes are for when a clear finish is the goal and no darkening of the wood is desired. The solvent is alcohol. Super Blonde is close to being water clear, but the solubility in alcohol is about 1/2 that of Garnet. If a paint is going over it, it is easier to just purchase is premixed and dilute it. The first coat should a half strength concentration . The hows and whys of using shellac have been discussed more than once in this forum. Bob Cleek has done the best job of explaining, It is a very old and times tested material so it has old measures - pounds cut - which is pounds of flakes per gallon of alcohol. I think garnet is 10 lbs cut for saturation which rounds out to being a 10% solution. Battery operated small scales are not expensive, so it is easy to weigh out 10 gm and qs to 100 ml with shellac thinner or 5 gm of super blonde and qs it to 100 ml with shellac thinner.

It is always associated with a spar and an attached yard and sail jutting out over the bow. Do a mock up and determine what sort of staying lines and retaining structure is needed to make this sail functional. Determine if it would require an active human presence at the fore end to handle the sail. This could clear up the function and just how large and strong it would have to be. It is near impossible to forget how it all evolved over the next 1500 years but the bare minimum is likely to be close.

The core of your problem is due to the species of wood that was supplied, If your objective is to assemble the craft using the supplied materials, fight on. If your objective is to develop skills and progress to more complex subjects, use this as an opportunity to slip in a bit of scratch building experience. Replace the supplied wood with a species that will hold up to what is being asked of it.

Hank, Starfoam is how coworkers who were from eastern KY pronounced Styrofoam. (The patient water glasses at our VAMC were actually beaded starfoam cups.) A door with hinges at the top - to seal the storage cubby. When I imagined this solution, I envisioned the opening as being pentagonal - and thought that two half doors would do the job - but it looks like you finished it to be rectangular, so one will do. A loop of bungee cord for a handle - a gaff hook to pull it open and place the loop in the hook that keeps it open. American Science & Surplus has a tube of 29 plain donut magnets for $6.00. They are strong enough to keep a seal if paired and 4 or 5 sites are used. The only downside is the spam catalogs - but the paper is the right stuff for starting a fireplace log.

Hank, I would give serious thought to using a sheet of 2" Starfoam (E.KY) insulation. It probably only comes as 4x8. One sheet may get you a double layer. Hinge it along the top edge. A long pole can keep it open or a distal hook in the ceiling and a loop with the sheet. It may require 1/4" ply to hold the hinges. It is porous enough for PVA to hold it all together. LiquidNails also works. Weather stripping along the border and strong magnets at few points to hold it all closed tight.

Some of the old books about how-to model ships suggest dry pigments (Japan?) I wonder if the dry or oils are minerals and the acrylics are organic? The chemical industry started with the synthesis of organic pigments. But complex organic molecules are much more subject oxidation than minerals, some of which may already be oxides. As a practical matter on the subject of the desirability of using archival materials, although I completely agree with you, I suspect that the issue will soon prove to be a moot one. We have already passed an inflection point and show no indications of having the will to do what is necessary to avoid generating one or two more.

I believe that the Physics involved would require sideways movement with both fixed guns and guns that recoil. The amount of movement and if it was enough to be observed is another factor altogether. The greater mass of the ship and the resistance of the water suggest that when the equations are run, the number would be a small one. Today, with our tech, a real number could be measured. It might be mm or cm but the force has to go somewhere. If it were localized at the points of attachment to the side of the ship, it would be just compression of a small volume of wood that absorbed these forces. The body of the ship is a series of interlocking components that were built to transfer and diffuse these significant forces.

Mark, I think this is a lot more involved. If the projectile was frozen in place and the charge ignited, the gun would not move. It would be a bomb and if it remained intact, a pressurized vessel. The force of the recoil is equal to the mass of the projectile times the gas expansion velocity squared (while the projectile is in the system). The rate of gas generation - the gas pressure - has a more significant effect on the projectile. Recoil or no recoil, the gas pressure in the chamber does not change. Flames coming out of the mouth of the cannon before the projectile = a poor fit and much loss of pressure pushing it. Flames coming out long after the projectile has left = slow and inefficient generation of gas, gas that is pushing against atmosphere instead of a solid.

There is more movement than that in the visible range. The atoms are what is actually being subjected to the force. I think that a segment about an F86 in Korea demonstrates some of the forces. There was something like 6 or 8 50cal mounted in the nose. A first generation pilot said that they had to be careful when chasing a MIG, not to fire too soon. Firing the guns slowed the F86 down enough that the MIG could pull away. The shipboard cannon would impart rearward force on the side of the ship. If the structure held, that force would be transferred to the whole ship. The ship would move backward. It might be difficult to measure and it might not be significant, but I suspect that in a stern chase, a fixed gun firing would widen the gap between two ships enough to matter.

Mark, I suspect that the reasoning behind fixed guns is specious. I remember all those pesky force vector lines from Physics. I believe that the reverse direction force would be at the point of attachment of the gun to the ship. Very little was probably redirected to the back of the projectile. This does not mean that the time frame for the development of tactics for the use of guns at sea was any different. What was believed to be true the determining factor. The later method of allowing recoil and the dispersion of the reverse force over multiple points of attachment probably saved wear and tear on the body of the vessel. Another thought: at the point of combustion, the force is spherical. Would not some of the compression of the atoms of the breech be converted to heat?

A machinist square?

This discussion has me wondering a bit more about scale effect as it applies to color. I am wondering if @ 1:600 the black would look better if it were actually a very dark grey. If it is an Atlantic Ocean vessel, just a slight hint of green in the dark grey?

India ink is very small particles in water - maybe graphite? - carbon anyway. When I was a pup, a drop on a microscope slide was a method of displaying brownian motion. It is essentially a dye. It penetrated porous surfaces and stays behind when the water dries. Plastic (your type -styrene) has no pores. The ink is just a dirt layer on the surface. There is no chemical reaction involved. Paint involves a chemical reaction. Your clear finish also involves a chemical reaction. From your description - a speculation: the carbon particles suspend in the water solvent of the poly finish and interfere with the polymerization reaction. It may never dry or if dry the incomplete reaction may leave mostly poly monomers which are essentially just another dirt layer. In this case, the product is named after a reaction that does not occur, so it is nor poly at all.

D., If you have not already done so, I suggest that you read the pinned post just above this one: For Beginners -- A Cautionary Tale May your attendance here be long and rewarding.

John, Your diagrams in post #1 and post #4 are quick and dirty POB kit shortcuts . The final appearance would be essentially the same as actual practice. But what you show is very different from actual practice. The actual waterway is a thick and wide timber, with 5 surfaces in cross section. It butts against the inside face of the top timbers. It has a slope or bevel on the top inside corner. The kit saves itself lot of work by calling a triangular strip of wood - the waterway. It is just the bevel of the waterway. The margin plank ( and the waterway ) sat on a mortise/notch cut into the top of the deck beams. The margin plank(s) are about twice thickness of the deck planks. They add strength at the side and lock the waterway in place. On the surface, none of this is seen. The kit uses deck planking as the margin plank. I hope your drawing is not to scale. The margin plank needs to be wide enough to take the nibs. The deck planks should be 10" wide at the maximum. A smaller ship may only have one strake of margin planking? The spirketting as a sort of inside wale. It provides strength and is also subject to stress from the forward cannon trucks. It actually sits on the waterway and reaches the underside of the gun port sills. The inside bulwark planking starts above the spirketting and is maybe about one half the thickness. In Gary's post #3, the four strakes of top and butt are on the main (gun) deck of a frigate. They lay under the monster size guns. I can imagine the on recoil that those guns may hop as well as jerk on the rope springs and ring bolts at the spirketting. Planks with added thickness and interlocked joinery for the stress there. I doubt that is detail would apply to Lady Nelson.

This is straight out of my head, so no pictures. Most table saws that can do a rip cut that is other than 90 degree vertical - tilt the blade. The Byrnes saw holds the blade vertical and tilts the table - the right of the blade part of the table. Kurt and No Idea suggest that because of gravity and friction, the wood can move away from the blade -because it mostly rests on an angled surface. They mimic the standard table saw by tilting the blade, and making the accessory table horizontal. The rest of the saw goes with the blade. The saw comes on its own base. A heavy one. They place wedges under the base to angle it up. I would want a stop at the right side edge to keep the saw from sliding. My suggestion is more elaborate and only makes sense if a whole lot of beveled ripping is going to be done, and if several angles are involved. My picture: Lay a book flat on a table. Turn it so that the top of the book is facing you and the spine is on your right. Lift the front cover. Imagine a small version of the saw sitting on the top cover. The cover is lifted until the right side saw table accessory is horizontal. Use plywood to make the two book covers. Use a full size piano hinge as the book spine. There are holes in each corner of the saw base. Fix the saw base to the top piece of plywood. As heavy as the saw is, I think two pieces of 1/2" ply will be needed. The bottom needs to be wider than the top - enough beyond the hinge the the whole assembly does not flip sideways. The threaded rod and nut are not needed actually. A block of wood, square even will hold the top cover at the angle. A way to fix it in place would probably be a good idea.

If the object is to be able to get a precise and reproducible saw tilt and this will be done frequently with multiple possible angles being cut: Fix the machine to a two plywood sheet base. Lower is a 1/2" - 3/4" sheet. width 3" or more wider than saw base on each side. Upper is 1/4" sheet The right edge of upper sheet is at the right side of the saw base. The upper sheet is attached to the lower using a full size piano hinge. The left side is as far beyond the base of the saw as is needed to fix a a threaded rod and thumb screw or wingnut to raise that edge. There would probably need to be spacer pieces at the hinge and outer edges of the upper sheet that are a tad thicker than the thumb screw/wingnut. Someone really OCD could fix the angle gauge from a adjustable miter - or a stick with marks at the front right at the hinge. The down side is that it adds weight to an already hefty machine. A 1" rubber stopper fixed under each corner of the base will provide space for fingers to lift the machine, if it just rents bench space and lives on a shelf.

I did a Google search using: Blackfriars Light Oak Gloss Varnish Clicking on the company site link Their products are solvent based polyurethane varnish. There is no shortage of quality brands at your local builders supply mega store or a hardware store. The volume that you will need = you could probably return it after using what you need and it would pass as full. Not a suggestion for possible behavior. It is meant as an exaggeration. There are oil stains that mimic light Oak from several mfg from the same vendors. The surface area that you will be covering is small. Stain and finish as two steps instead of one, will not cost you all that much more time. I suspect that the original instructions are trying to save you money. It may save you money if you contact your local woodworkers guild - Someone there is likely to have leftover gloss polyurethane and left over light Oak stain. (Or a local cabinet maker.) I cannot resist an editorial. These are "unique" instructions for a scale model ship. Solvent based polyurethane produces a thick layer. It was great for my Walnut stained White Oak kitchen floor in KY. Not good practice on a scale model. It is a thick plastic layer. Gloss - is an out of scale finish on a scale model. I am guessing that this is an actual working motor craft that is intended actually float. This moves it to the toy category and that makes gloss appropriate. The exposure to water makes solvent based polyurethane and gloss appropriate. Because most Pear seems to be Swiss Pear - that is, it is steamed and therefore a darkish red and uniform in color, the Oak stain probably will only shift it to be a bit darker. Pear is a quality wood and unless using it where black is indicated, a clear finish is enough. It can be dyed black and it will stand in for Ebony.