Javelin

I'm also surprised you don't get many comments (but also guilty of not frequently making any 🫣). Makes you probably the most underestimated modeller of this board! Definately considering your pace of construction. Great job on those stern decorations! I'm with Steve on that coppering as well, very sharp result.

Thanks for all the praise, it really is too much coming from builders like yourselves! It's all a bit crooked and far from the sharp level of modelling you mostly display! Unfortunately not much progress was made. It's not a real builder's block, since I'm still working on it, but priorities have shifted a bit and for this kind of detailing I need long stretches of time in which I can fully concentrate. Those long stretches of free time are missing at the moment. However some progress is made wherever I can. Not in the pictures, but I did also start making that railing on the portside forecastle to eventually finish that area of the vessel. This basically involves drilling the fairleads, adding stanchions and going from forward to aft, it only takes about 15 minutes for each, so I can do that when time is short. However, the main activities in the past weeks were those little stairs/platforms. Each pump dome has a platform with a stair: Here you see tank 1. The stair on the vapour dome (forward, rectangular thing) still needs feet. Particular to these areas is that the tank dome are part of the tank and the tank is independent from the vessel structure. It basically sits inside on supports, but is not welded to the vessel. All this is done because of course the tank shrinks quite a lot when it is cooled down from ambient temperature to the low cargo temperatures. Underneath the skirts around those tank domes is a big rubber connection to keep the space around the tank air/gas tight. All this means that the tank dome comes down when the tank shrinks and comes back up when the tank is heated up, so there can not be any fixed/welded connection between the vessel and that tank. The stairs between the main deck and the tank dome are therefore fully resting on the main deck. Hence the need for these platforms and legs. A logical thing when you think about it, but very often still mistakes are made in shipyards where they do connect things like that... And as @Jim Lad rightfully mentions, those catwalks are also complicated. I've made steady progress on the most complicated part. A constant sequence of fitting, adjusting, fitting again, etc. In general I build them this way to get some rigidity in it. Two flat lines are used (in this case the side of a heavy battery and the steel ruler) and a small weight (in this case a sharpening stone) to push the grating into the glue. I use multiple sections of grating to keep the, often bent, plastic L-shaped parallel, while I glue the first piece of grating. Afterwards I make my way forward. The intersections are chosen to create maximum strength in the direction I want it, be it longitudinal or transversal. As long as it's not complete, it's wobbly, so I use the cardboard template to test fit it. It's a very delicate fit, since I don't have anything to really hold it in place. It's not only longitudinal or transversal fitting, but also rotation, I need those catwalks to be parallel to the centerline as well. And since it's extremely light, it shifts off the supports the moment I touch it. That said, the main part is done. It's now "self supporting". As you can see the forward edge is not finished yet. Next step is now measuring and finishing the aft edge, where it connects to the existing catwalk. When that is done, she's "fixed" in the longitudinal direction and I can cut the forward part to length and finish it. It also needs 3 additional smaller platforms that lead to stairs, those will follow afterwards to make sure they are resting on their supports. After that it needs railing and that is a very time consuming part. I also noticed I'm going to be short of PE stanchions for my railing... And probably by a LOT. As a last note, you also see that complicated bended pipe (unpainted) that I needed to make. That was a rather impossible part to bend in one piece, so I had to build it up out of several pieces. Still not fixed though. There's another, easier one, towards the back, but it's not in the picture.

The aft part seems to be bolted on and has the same shade as the hub, so I assume it's also brass (blades also seem bolted with their base to the hub). The forward shaft clearly has a different shade, I'd guess steel, but I'm not too familiar with that age in shipbuilding.

Actually nowadays they are painted matt black by colreg regulation. The reason is that it shouldn't reflect the colour of the light at all, simply because the light would then be visible from unwanted angles (in case of sidelight that would be from angles too much astern). That said, I believe that only came into use in 1970 or later, so for Lula I guess it's really up to you. In any case this thread is great to follow, so much detail on such a small model. She really looks the part!

After my little foray in the SIB theme, it's time to get back to this one. I had a few options, I guess I want for the most logical one and that is going forward from where I left off. So this is the area I'll be concentrating on for now. A cardboard template of the catwalk in that area is fitted to check out for size and fitting. Slight adjustments are required to let each part fit. However first I'll need to do that details on the lower levels inside the catwalk area. I'll probably destroy that catwalk if I'd put it on first. So you can see that white, unpainted structure with stair, that's one of the pieces that still needed to be made. That set me off on a whole series of small stairs. Basically each tank dome has a small 4-step stair to the main deck, so I started making all those first. This jig is about as old as the model itself, not perfect, but still good enough. It also allows to adjust angles for the different stairs etc. And the first ones are there. The one connected to the platform is a bit too flat, the angle isn't correct, so I'll change it by a steeper one. And the additional details required on the tank dome are the instrumentation box, cabling between the two pumps (similar to the aft tank dome) and the handrail. For the instrumentation box I needed to make the legs. To get it firmly on that deck, the legs are drilled into the deck before gluing. First I made a template based on the box bottom itself. I drilled 4 holes to fit the corners of the box. I then used that template to drill the holes in the deck. I then cut the legs to length, glued them to the box and used the template again to get them straight, so they'll fit in the holes in the deck later on. So here you see the glued legs to the box in the template. Hopefully it'll fit nicely in the deck now.

That's not a very true assumption, rope rarely, depending on the lay of it, has a tendency to coil up round. It generally depends on the lay, direction of coiling and simply the motion that is made during coiling that would define the shape of it. I must admit this is looking more like a coil that was made vertically, hanging and then laid down afterwards rather than a coil that was made straight on deck. But honestly... if that's the only question we can pose, he's doing a great job. And that's what this is! Great work all around, astonishing work and VERY Tiny blocks indeed!

Not sure if this will work, but plenty of plans of that ship on the Dutch national archives. Jacob Van Heemskerck

I think I'll make a half-hearted attempt at 4 frames of a ship and then go to Glen in despair and ask him to finish it for me 😁. I know, the starting point here was by no means half hearted, but if Glen can do it better, why make the effort...😆. Joking aside, regardsless of some historical accuracy issues (perhaps), you're doing a marvellous job here!

I kind of regret you're finished. She was a pleasure to follow and came out beautiful! Love the way you did the sails, brings an extra dimension to the build. I'm sure you learned a lot of things and will use those lessons in the next build.

Seems indeed the shop in Bruges (not Brussels, very insulting for Bruges 😋), is called Hobby Neverland, while the manufacturer is Neverland Hobby....

You are talking about a shop near Bruges. I've been there in the past. It's a shop, as far as I know they don't produce anything and are therefore different from the manufacturer Bruce is enquiring about.

I saw most of your updates by the posting on the main page, but seem to have missed quite something now. Finally following this topic, better late than never I guess. Great job on Lula, she looks very realistic. Having some gaps left and right is good in this case. She was pre industrial mass-production and therefore likely to be less sharp and crisp as anything built later on. Hope you didn't get hurt too bad from that fall...

That's a brilliant stand! Never seen this before, so quite original and beautifully executed. (the ship as well)

Although I don't have stands for my models, I'd look for supports for curtain rails of the rod type? Old brass versions of those. Perhaps modify them a bit.

YES PLEASE! A dredger would be fantastic! However, first Lula. A gorgeous piece of work and a great example of combining materials to reach an overall complicated appearance! True scratchbuilding. I can't imagine, but do hope, to be building such sharp and intricate details at your age.

Paint for the upper hull and coppering for the bottom.

Forgot to mention, thanks for asking. Plank on Bulkhead, I won't be trying my luck too much.

As the title says, I'm preparing for a first wooden ship and decided to go for a scratch build. The odd reason perhaps, is that I'm used to build from scratch and want to see where it goes. I find it easier to toss one of my builds in the bin rather than a 30% finished (expensive) kit. Now while preparing I've been gathering a lot of info here on thicknesses and types of wood, but I do have to take in account what I have available to me. The basic question is: Do I use ply or MDF for the frames and keel? I've seen some opting for MDF because it holds pushpins better, but that's just one argument. And second question, my main store has poplar and birch ply, so if I'm to use ply, which one would be better suitable? I'm preparing a document with sequence of construction and needed materials, so I can make an order list for the first phase. As mentioned before, if the hull fails, there's no need to purchase equipment for masts, fittings and rigging, which is not an option if you bought a kit... (considering my past experience and wealth of information here, I'm rather confident I can make it work, or I wouldn't start it in the first place 😄)

Hi @Glen McGuire, we don't really use much piping like that onboard, most of it bolted or welded. Bolted flanges maked things easy to remove for repair or replacement. There are not many things that survive long on a dredging vessel. I've somewhat settled on the US M53 or M54 aerial depth charge for the name card. Why? Well, because I have good drawings of it and the beam/length ratio is good for writing the name of the ship and scale on it without becoming too large and overwhelming compared to the ship and rest of the base. I'm thinking about partially covering in sand or weathering it differently.

Gorgeous piece of work. I agree to all of the above! Looking forward to your next project!

So they're calling you an Apprentice now... I wonder what the Masters' works look like then?! That crack makes me bit sad. Looks a bit like you made the model and inserted it through the bottom, gluing the cracked part in, together with the ship. Nowadays anybody can photoshop the crack away and state it's a "before" picture 🤪. In all honesty, I really am sad and can't imagine this happening to one of my builds. I hope it's not the result of differing temperature expansion factors between the epoxy and the bottle (perhaps in combination with a small impact?). That said, the Jenny does look awesome. Love those sails!

Takes a gas carrier guy to think of such things ;). Changing atmosphere in gas tanks is done in the same way, except that those pipes are fixed of course. @Glen McGuire, I didn't put too much pattern in those waves since I knew it would shrink that much. In this scale, the shrinkage of the gel is actually an advantage. Time to finish this up, there really weren't that many manipulations to do anymore. As mentioned yesterday, shouldn't forget to pass the unicaenis through the bow connection before inserting, otherwise it would get really hard to pass it inside that bottle. There was a slight bend in the main part, with either the accommodation or the aft end wanting to come up. So eventually I glued the forward part first and had to get creative to hold the aft part down while the glue was setting. What are you looking at? Well the aft end of the tweezers is resting on a cup, while the bottle is resting on the center of the tweezers in way of the bottle neck and the open end of the tweezers is pushing down the aft end of the main deck on both sides using the weight of the bottle... I'm not good at holding such a position manually for longer periods of time, I'd probably crush the model or release too early! Hence this idea to let gravity do the work. After some testing when still outside the bottle, I found out that mounting that bridge without knocking the forward crane boom off its support was quite hard. So I decided to glue that boom quite well to its support and I also found out the correct way to mount the bridge to avoid getting stuck on that support. Luckily my ideas worked out the way they were supposed to. And the last action was adding a dab of glue to that bow connection, pulling the unicaenis tights and eventually cutting off the unicaenis inside the bottle. I don't like shiny bottle caps, certainly not with this kind of working vessels (shiny on a vessel like that means it's probably damaged). So I decided to make the cap white. I wanted to put the logo of the vessel on the cap, but apparently that ship doesn't have a particular logo. Here are some pictures taken from below the surface, where you can see that light breaking effect. Together with her predecessor. I don't have time to make a name card etc. I'm currently thinking of making a partially submerged bomb in the sand below the bottle, with the scale and name written on its side. Not too large, not too small. Not entirely sure though. A basic piece of wood seems too easy...

Now that's dexterity and patience! Great job so far Phil!

Hi Keith, on the home stretch now. For me the epoxy was something of a critical point. Everything past that should be easier. For this build I planned to make acrylic waves, so that was the next thing to do. The superstructure and rest of the vessel would complicate this if I did it later on. The main hurdle was of course getting around the hull and the pesky unicaenis, which I had to move around to stay out of the way of the paintbrush and other tools used for the acrylic gel application. The easy part first. I did most of this with an angled brush (I saw this trick from @Glen McGuire, but if I remember correctly he actually cut and glued the brush handle). I didn't cut and glue it since I was expecting to change the angle during application to get to all spots. This assumption was correct. Later on, when the angle became too steep, I actually had to cut the hair short to be able to pass the neck without getting all the gel stuck to the bottle neck... Further down the road the brush really became too short, so I took it with my long straight tweezers and used masking tape to keep it in place (you don't want to open the tweezers by accident, crashing the brush onto the ship or in the applied gel). Then came the drying process. I used the same method as I did for drying the acrylic-sand mixture on the Sea Installer build, using a long pipe connected to the air compressor to insert the fresh air in the back of the bottle and let the moist air escape through the neck around the tube. So when it looked hazy like above, I blew air into it untill the bottle was all clear of condensation again. Then I let it rest again and blew again until clear. As promised before, a picture with all blocks in sequence. So construction sequence will be from left to right on below pictures (or from aft to forward on the real ship). Due to the compressor and the thin coat of gel, it only too a few hours to dry the gel. So I started finalizing the ship. And that's where we are with this update. Hopefully complete tomorrow. The most difficult part will be the long part with superstructure in the front, since I don't really have a good hold on that one. I also shouldn't forget to pass the unicaenis through the bow connection before I put that block inside the bottle.

Thanks guys. So on to the pour. No use in leaving it hanging for a long time since I guess the ropes might slip. This has been one of my main concerns for this one. During the pour for the Spartacus build, I added the multicat Auxilia late in the process. When the resin was quite gelly. However the first thing I noticed was that it was sinking, even when the epoxy was already gel. When I pulled it back to the surface (it didn't go too deep), I noticed I really had to pull quite hard to get it out. So I believe it's the "creeping" effect of the gel actually pulling it down rather than simply the difference in densities. That's also the reason I took some strong ropes to hang Scheldt River up in this case. I really didn't want her to be partially sunk. Additionally when I was mixing, I noticed the density of Epoxy is way below that of water. Plastic floats on water, but the epoxy density really is about half that of water, so plastic does sink in epoxy, even without the creep effect sucking it down. For pouring I didn't want to use a hose, since it would be hitting the tool all the time with my clumsiness it would definitely result in the tool rotating and the ship dropping down.... Instead I thought of a slide, which also allowed me to control the outgoing flow better (to avoid the initial splash to end up on deck of the vessel). I used a cut-up cup to insert in the neck. I thought the regular down slide of the neck would be enough to avoid overflow, but it didn't. It was also a bit short, resulting in my pouring some resin on the tool (without consequences). Of course the last bits were tricky, since I really didn't have much allowance between too little or too much. The reflection/light bending gave some difficulty in correctly estimating it too. Looking from the neck would have been easier, but the slide was there of course. I was however well prepared with a big plastic covering the table and some rags stand-by to contain any spillage. In the end, what I learned is to use a longer slide and to give it more down slide and at least close the outside end to have less spill. I only removed the tool when the epoxy was fully cured for fear of seeing the ship being sucked down if it was still somewhat liquid (something I saw on that multicat as well, very late in the curing process). I use the leftovers of the resin to test if it is hardened and only then I try the epoxy in the bottle near the neck. This is to avoid having uncured epoxy on my testing tool, leaving a mark in the end product. What is quite obvious on the above picture is that the bottom disappeared... Somehow the light breaking on the bottle glass and resin, gives a certain light bending effect. Nothing of the sand-mixture bottom is visible unless you look from the top. Additionally when you look from slightly below the epoxy level you don't see the side of the underwater ship, but instead you start seeing the bottom of the vessel. I'll take pictures of that later on. The one remaining piece of masking tape is still holding the UniCaenis rope. The bottle is quite dirty from handling it, so it still needs some cleaning. One additional conclusion is that I didn't get bubbles during the curing process, so it indeed was that acrylic gel-sand mixture that created those.