Javelin

Thanks a lot Gary and Keith. So big update this time. I came to the point where I had to make a test to see for the height/depth of that dredge pipe and position of the ship. First the ship, she wasn't finished yet, but far enough to go for that test: Then the test. SB part went in quite well. The stones I put on some positions on the bottom are a bit annoying and risky for paint damage, but I can live with it. I rotated the bottle so the piece would be on the edge between glass and sand layer. Then PS piece was a bit of a surprise. The aft gantry was rotated and passed well, the forward one, which I didn't deem a problem, appeared to be very much of a problem. In fact as bad as the aft one when I did a dry fit. Filing it off wasn't an option, it would be too much filing, down to the hole where the cable should pass. As you can see, the ropes are attached through the lifting eyes. So I cut off the gantry, quite a risky cut, but it succeeded. I continued my test without the gantries. Once in, I dry fitted both pieces together and passed the ropes through the holes in the tool. I then hoisted the ship up to see where the dredge pipe and the hull were. It seems my measurements and assumed position were quite good, the pipe can be used more or less in its end position down. So I'll slightly lift it with the wires to the gantries to keep some tension on those during the resin pour. I learned a few lessons from this test as well, one was that I had the ropes on the aft crossed. That means that when I tried to slack the aft rope, it was stuck under the other rope and didn't want to slack unless I slacked the other one first. I'll need to cross them differently I guess. You can also see two pieces of brass wire on the tool outside of the bottle. I installed those hoping to use them as bollards to hold the ropes. This was not a good idea, in the end I settled on masking tape to hold the rope ends on the bottle. Since the tool wasn't fixed in position yet, it first tried to rotate upside down. I used some tape to hold it in place. It did "twist" a bit in the bottle, but I decided I kind of like the ship to be slightly angled compared to the centerline of the bottle. After learning those lessons I separated the halves again and used the ropes to retrieve the pieces from the bottle. I then finished the ship, only things remaining are some "wires" between the bow connection and a winch on PS and between the gantries and the dredge pipe. Once those are done, I will insert both halves inside the bottle and connect them. The epoxy hasn't arrived yet, so it might be a while before I can continue. The bottom is rather dark, so I'll be using a light blue color for the epoxy.

Made some serious progress, eventhough I wasn't expecting to finish it by my next departure. Somewhere I do see a light at the end of the tunnel. So now it's time to detail and to start test fitting to see if all that detailing will even fit through the neck. On the top left of this picture you see a small "measuring stick" on the hull. This one has the height of the rescue boat davit. Luckily it fits, so I can build and attach that davit on the hull. Then it was time for the "tool" and suspension test. It only existed in my imagination and I've thought of several iterations to improve it, but so far it seems ok the way it is. I thought I wouldn't have enough moment to actually tilt it to an upright position, but it works quite fine to adapt the trim and list of the vessel. In the bottle it will be hanging a lot closer to the tool, so I'll do that as well to avoid any surprises. It's quite a tight squeeze in the bottle. The idea is to insert both halves with the ropes through the eyes, but ropes fixed outside of the bottle. Then connect the hull halves together. Then attach one end of each rope to the tool by a knot and get the other end through the hole in the tool and going out the bottle. This gives me 3 ropes out of the bottle to work with. I tried with both ends loose, but that makes 6 ropes and it makes a mess. Further tests will follow during the detailing process. As there really is no room for error once it's in the bottle.

Hi Glen, thanks, but nothing of those steps will remain in the end... The sand will cover all. I have now glued the bottle to the base and applied the first coat of acrylic-sand mixture. The advantage of this mixture is that it sticks well and can be shaped. When mixed with epoxy, the sand flows much more and can't be shaped into hills etc. This was a couple of days ago, now it has dried and the sand has darkened a lot. I'll be adding another layer of this mixture to blend things in a bit more. It's now a very stable set-up. I've "glued" the bottle itself to the wooden stands using pure acrylic gel as well. It won't be rotating on the stand. I've made some serious advances on the ship as well. The discharge line on deck has now been finished. Not sure if I'll put the dredge valves on it. I do have a prototype, so I'll see. I've also mounted the hydraulic cylinders that open and close the bottom doors and the small wooden decks are also painted brown now. That gantry on PS, yellow-green thing, is way too angled, so I'll tear it off and try to get it straightened. Biggest items remaining now are the lifeboat and rescue boat and the catwalk over the hopper (including 2 yellow-green containers. It also needs life rafts The second crane is ready, but can't be easily dry fitted, so it's not visible in the above pics. It needs a support near the bridge, but I still need to see if I mount it on the crane jib (not preferred, will be more difficult to mount the crane inside the bottle that way) or on the accommodation block, depends on whether it will pass the bottle neck when mounted on the accommodation block.

Yes, the reason is simply power. Capstans have more space to allow more people to push, certainly a double capstan. A windlass is restricted by its horizontal positioning. So if you need to pull more weight and have more space, a capstan is your choice. Smaller vessels have lighter weights to lift and are often limited in deck space, so windlasses come in handy. As Phil mentioned, for even smaller vessels it could be done by tackles. I suppose some of it is simply related to time frame, some of it by the accepted limits of human power.

I eventually opted to lower the base and mount the brackets on a base plate with a random rounded shape. I then built up several layers of 3mm ply to cover most of the gap between the base plate and bottle in a stepped fashion. After mounting the base plate, I made a paper template, outlined the bottom layer by striking a pencil point around the contour. I then drew in the next layer, cut and transferred the outline to wood. The next layer I did in the same way. All is glued with PVA now, so I can start applying sand to the bottle. With @Glen McGuire doing his nameplate, I figured out I completely forgot about that with this low set-up. I'll need to fix that somehow. First thought is to make some kind of debris sticking out of the sandy base with the details on them, slightly to the right of the whole thing in order not to disturb the view on the dredger. In the meanwhile I also mixed new yellow-green and painted all ready parts in that color. She's starts to look like a DEME dredger now. The discharge pipe on deck is also in progress and caused some headache (of course!) Bending the pipe itself wasn't such an issue, it was mostly that styrene piece at the bow that was the issue. The one I built when I was onboard was too short and the angle of the drilled hole for the pipe was not good. In the end I rebuilt that piece 4 times before I was happy with it. More parts are ready, but this is more or less where I ended up this morning. Most of it is still dry fitted of course. Finishing the bridge windows now so I can glue those parts together as well. I will still add some detail to the masts later on.

Apart from the excellent build itself, the display is very nicely balanced and puts the ships nicely on center stage. Congratulations on a perfect build. I vote for a complete battle of Trafalgar in a bottle for the next build. Admit it, the only way you're going to top this is by having at least 4 ships fighting in a bottle!

I'm following for a while and marvel at your tiny detail work, yet in all my excitement I forget to react!! Great job Keith, certainly at that scale it's not easy to achieve what you intend to! Love that tiny boiler and the overall crisp finish of your model.

Thanks Keith, All in all I didn't have to invent too many ways to handle or assemble things up till now. I'm now completing all items that need to be painted yellow-green. The other parts are all nearly finished in paint. I will still try to add some red touches to add some color (and because they are truly there on the real ship). After measuring and building of those last details, I decided it was time to connect the dredge pipe to the PS hull part. Still need to adjust the height of that piece, but it's the original piece that was removed in the first place. This means the sides of the hole where the dredge pipe protrudes are matching for a good closing of that hull. You can also see the bulwark is already painted white and you can also see the rudder and anchor supporting structure. The pipe will be in the way for painting that hull, but it had to be mounted to paint that hull properly. In the meanwhile I'm also busy with the supporting of the bottle itself. I'm not planning on turning that bottle around too much when the vessel is inside, so I better fix that sand on the outside of the bottle first. I don't want to rely solely on that acrylic gel-sand mixture to hold the bottle, so I decided to make some wooden supports first. I'll add a longitudinal beam between the two as well. I'll glue them to the bottle with acrylic gel and cover them in sand later on. Not sure if I'll go for a central support only, or if I make those supports lower and then spread the sand in a wider base... And here you can see the bottle neck and tilted sand bed.

I think it was a good call to change the base. The big piece of wood probably would have taken too much attention and make the bottle disappear. The new base looks awesome and will make people focus on the ships (and whirlpool!)

Great build so far. However I was wondering about the aft part/stern. The balsa? fillers make sense, but how is this faired with the hull planking? Love that wood tone on the outer layer. A pitty to paint it.

Thanks Keith, The question is not whether I can put those details on, but rather if I want to spend the time on it and whether it's worth the effort, considering the bottle distortion she'll face afterwards. I also used to mix the glossy moss green paint with colourles matt paint to get rid of the gloss, but since she'll be going in a nice glossy bottle, I guess this isn't necessary in this case. Kids back to school from today, so more time to continue. Yesterday I added the steel bar guides for the anchors. Due to her odd bow shape, she needs extensions on the hull to keep the anchors clear of that huge bulb. I build those from copper wire. She also has a riverine/streamer anchor, which they occasionally use in bad weather when picking up the floating line to stay in place. Depends on the dredge operator if he wants to use that one or not. This anchor also has those spacers to keep the anchor from getting stuck underneath the hull. The aft anchor does have a steel wire rope instead of chain (not that it matters that much on my model). The hull is now technically ready for paint. I've also primed the superstructures in order to paint them white after. White doesn't cover well and contrasts from pencil/marker lines are very difficult to hide. The primer takes care of that. And I finally tackled the other thing that I was ignoring, the platform on the PS. I finally cut it off and tested if the deck would fit. It makes a pretty big difference and leave some room to add more detail. Of course I still need that platform, so I fixed that platform to the hull piece. I first glued a smaller plate to have some contact surface to the sloped wall as essentially the platform needs to be at the same level as the deck piece (brown primer in below picture). I also added tiny stiffeners (0.2mm copper wire) to keep that platform level. I also added the two spreader pipes that diffuse the dredged material in the hopper from the top. These pipes I cut at the exact width of the hopper opening, so that they help to position the (brown) deck when I put it in place in the bottle. The seam is unfortunate, but necessary. The platform also has a different colour (gratings) on the real vessel, so in the end there really is a separation. And the overview to make things clear. Numbers 1 are the extensions for the anchors. Number 2 is the platform I'm talking about. Here is is standing free without the brown deck attached. You can also see the painted suction pipe and an effort to match the hull yellow-green. It looked ok during mixing, but I think I'll add more yellow to make it slightly lighter. After finishing the lower accommodation block and painting part of the "brown" deck in moss green, I'll attach the lower accommodation block to that deck. Then I can finally add the dredge line and perhaps valves. At the same time, when I finish the bridge level, I'll be able to glue it to the lower bridge level and that part will be ready.

Yes they did, it's called a Cutter Suction Dredger: it walks on the spuds, at the same time it eats by cutting and dredging and it poops by discharging the dredge waste through the floating line at the stern! So we'll call them "dredging cows" now. @Keith Black, Haven't tried the varnish trick yet, but that might help. Time fore another experiment I guess. I did however prime the surfaces before with spray primer, also that didn't work... As for the cloud, I made a set-up today to see where we are and I'm not that unhappy with that cloud. Mind you I remeasured the bottle with the sand bottom in today. It gave me much less space than anticipated, but this set-up with the eraser below the hull is pretty accurate in dimensions. Still a lot of work to do though. I've been aching to start painting it, but since there is still a lot of detailing to do, I decided to continue building first. It's also freezing outside, so spray primer isn't a good plan for the time being. As you can see, she has also received the propulsion tunnels, I think I'll leave them empty. A propeller is possible, but nobody will ever notice, certainly not when I mount the rudders behind it. First I'll paint the dredge pipe, then mount it, close the hull and paint the hull. Once that's done I'll continue on the deck. I believe turning the gantry is possible, but to keep it in place is still a question mark. And for size

Well basically what Glen was saying, it should represent a cloud of sediment being stirred up behind the draghead. Good you think it's fluffy, cause it's not... By immersing it in epoxy it collapses like a wet rag, but by stretching and shaping it during curing, it gets hard in that shape. That means it won't collapse when I pour the resin later on. I plan to glue it to the draghead before insertion. I'll make a test to see if I like it. The lighter shade might make it more visible I guess. Unfortunately that can't be done. In reality it's either dredging or discharging. The rainbowing is done stationary and dredging can't be done stationary... You did make me think about a rainbow from the bottle cap though 🤪 As for the gantry thing, I might try to rotate it 90° backwards together with its base and rotate it back sideways when the hull is inside. Will need to check if this is physically possible though, it's kind of tiny and I don't want it to fall off inside that bottle.

Thanks Glen, but then you do build 3 or 4 ships by the time I start 1... Not a great amount of work done. Mostly detailing and preparing for paint now. First half will fit, not too much space for anything extra though. Although it exactly matches the drawings in size, it does appear larger than I expected by looking at that paper template... On the brighter side, that does mean more color in that bottle and she will catch more attention that way. But then it's also time to get an idea of the size of the elephant in the room... Taking off a bit of length of that gantry isn't going to solve it... Moving it lower or higher doesn't solve it either. Only when lowered to extreme and unusable height, it will fit through. Guess that planning wasn't too good after all. The point is of course that the drawings I have are not with the deployed dredge pipe, so they don't show the gantries when extended. The forward, shorter one, does fit without a problem. So I'd only need to solve the aft one. As you can also see, I've been putting some moss green paint on it. Still a crappy paint. I hate to use it, but it'll have to do. Another 10 layers to go before it finally covers I guess. Tried about everything with that paint to make it cover, nothing works. Diluted with water, airbrushed, brushed by hand, always the same result. The pigment clogs together and the paint doesn't cover. Even the parts without pigment have a tendency to leave a surface uncovered. In the lower left corner you see that brownish fluffy thing. That's the epoxied cotton wool. Not very sharp, but do you think I should add it behind that draghead on the bottom or better to leave it out (or make something new)? In the meanwhile I'm also completing that dredge pipe. I'll need to install it in the hull in order to finally close that hull and paint it. There's going to be some extra detailing on that head as well.

It's not the radioactive resin from AK, but the dark earth... That's the reason I was asking about that before. I've been mixing acrylic with sand to create bottoms in the past and then poured epoxy over it. On 2 occasions it started making bubbles very late in the curing process, which then got those bubbles stuck inside the epoxy due to the low viscosity of the curing resin. I believe acrylic gel reacts with epoxy. In my latest attempt I'm mixing sand with epoxy to pour the bottom, this also would get any air bubbles between the sand grains stuck inside that epoxy layer when hardened. High temperature/sun affects epoxy curing, but it's not something that starts it. Too hot and the thing will start to go really bad, too cold and the chain reaction of the two components will slow down and stop. It cures by a chemical reaction, that reaction creates heat, which then creates a good temperature for the surrounding molecules to react. When that heat is taken away by the surrounding environment which is too cold, it stops that reaction. If it's too hot around it, the reaction will go really fast, so the heat created by the reaction itself can not get away and builds up till very hot temperatures, creating a boiling effect. To get a proper curing you need the good quantities of the components (weight wise), properly mixed and be in the good temperature range. Another thing you need to check is whether the epoxy is suitable for the thickness you're trying to pour, again related to getting rid of the exothermic heat by having enough contact with the environment. However, considering it didn't harden only on that contact surface, I guess it did react to the acrylic. On the other side, the heat you encountered might be caused by overheating in the sun and perhaps melting something on that contact surface with the bottom? It's also an area far away from any contact with the environment in all directions, so perhaps it couldn't release the heat? Not sure how to solve that though... Is the upper part contact surface still really liquid? Or is there some kind of reaction going on? Opening it up might have helped to get rid of the heat and let the curing proceed. Fingers crossed!