JacquesCousteau

Very nice work, the window is a great touch of realism. I wonder if a thin sliver of basswood could serve as trim to cover the gaps you mentioned?

@Stubby and @Kenchington, it will definitely be a bit of a challenge. Scribing the deck could work, but I haven't been very satisfied with my previous attempts at scribing. I'm planning on using 1/32-inch thick material for the deck planking. I'm not too worried about slightly raising the hull by an inch (at full scale), as there are a lot of hull forms for Muscongus sloops--notably, the hull of the Ranger seems a bit deeper than the Chapelle drawing the kit is based on. If I need to, I think I can also slightly raise the cabin sides and coaming. That said, I'm going to test fit first and see of it looks bad. If I does, I can use my mini plane to thin the deck planking down to 1/64-inch or so. It will certainly be an experiment!

Thanks, @Rick310, @Paul Le Wol, @Keith Black, @Kenchington, @wefalck, @Stubby, and all those who have checked in with likes and page views! @Kenchington and @wefalck, I agree that evidence seems to show that the mast was round where it left the deck. I hadn't considered that a round opening would be less prone to leaking than a square one, but it makes sense. Interestingly, the lancha chilota (my last build) did have a squared off mast at the deck, so I approached this build with that in mind. Unfortunately I already squared the mast step and accidentally made it a bit large, so I'll need to figure out how to build it back up a little. Which is tricky with the hull already planked in. @Stubby, I decided to leave the deck off so I could remove the visible bulkheads from the cockpit and add frames after planking. This left the bulkheads a little flimsy for fairing, so I added a bunch of internal supports. I'll be planking over the kit-supplied deck, so it's not the end of the world if the hull planking doesn't fully join up exactly with the side of the deck. I had to take into account the thickness of the deck while setting up my planking runs and the width of the sheer strake. Even taking that into account, I'll be making the sheer plank a bit excessively high and sanding it down once the deck is in place.

Very nice work, I like how you've handled the cabin! What program did you use to come up with the paint scheme? Is it just ms paint? I don't have a good sense of color, so I would love to be able to check possible color schemes before painting.

Thanks, @Stubby, I enjoy research about as much as building! And thanks, @Keith Black, for the pump examples! More work on planking. I've been able to get a little better at lining up the top line of the plank joints. One issue I've had is that, due to the different plank widths and strake lines of my model compared to the kit design, I haven't been able to use much of the kit-designed prespiled planks. It feels like a real waste--it's a great feature of the kit, but it doesn't really work if you go with lapstrake planking. So I was happy that, for the next strake, which is the one below the sheer strake, I realized that I could make it from the kit-supplied sheer strake, which for whatever reason was slightly too short to work as the sheer strake on mine. (Maybe my transom extends a little farther aft than it should? Or I screwed up something in the scan and laser cut process?) It's a lot wider than the normal planks, so I could spile from it, as seen below. At this point, there's very little bulkhead to clamp to, so I've had to be a bit creative with rubber bands. I now just have the sheer strake left to add. I feel like, for a vessel of this size, it would probably be best to make it from a single piece, although I'm not looking forward to the complex gluing process that will entail. I'm pleased with the lapstrake planking so far. Before painting, I think I'll add a coat of shellac to help seal and strengthen the wood so I can touch up any stringy/ragged visible edges. Elsewhere, I've begun work on the rudder and mast. The mast is made from two layers of basswood, which mitigates against the relative weakness of basswood as a mast. Before I round off the mast, I need to decide whether it should be round all the way through, or squared-off at the deck. My initial thought was that, on an unstayed mast, a square cross section low down would keep it from spinning around. I began cutting the mast step partners square, but accidentally made them bigger than they should be, so it doesn't quite fit like it should and I'll need to take care when I step the mast. Moreover, it looks like Chapelle's plan shows a round mast at the deck, so maybe I should just round it all. I'm also trying to figure out whether to use brass rod or wood for the rudder shaft.

Very cool project, looking forward to following along!

Very nice work!

The issue is also discussed in Bryan Woods' build log:

I couldn't remember how I did it on mine, so went looking. I don't discuss it in my build log, but there's a photo in the post linked below showing what looks like your second/middle option.

Looking forward to following along! I'm curious to see how the birch plywood is. Your understanding of the beveled planks is correct.

Very nice work!

This post is about paper modeling rather than wood, but it may be helpful. Basically, to figure out the bulkhead shapes, you need to take the forms given in the section drawing and mirror them (as the section drawing shows the aft half of the hull at left and the fore half at right). For the central spine, the bulkhead slots would be located at the section lines (the vertical lines running through the side view). The spine would look more or less like the side view, but it would only extend up as far as the lowest deck you're modeling, and you'd have to decide whether it will include the keel/stem/sternpost or if that will be added separately. The NRG has a useful drawing on interpreting lines drawings that may be helpful: https://thenrg.org/articles/interpreting-line-drawings I'd recommend checking out scratch build logs to get a sense of the process.

Thanks, @wefalck, @Paul Le Wol, and @Kenchington for sharing your insights! I think I will go with a very simple pump handle, as even the stowed lever looks like it takes up too much space for a small cockpit. As for the pump design, it seems like I have several plausible options, so I'll have to think some more about what would look best and be feasible to model. Thanks again! If you had asked me three years ago for my thoughts on late-nineteenth century workboat bilge pump design, I would have looked at you like a crazy person. Now I feel like I'm starting to learn enough to actually have some thoughts on the topic (although there's still a lot more that could be learned).

Welcome! Very nice work on the Beagle (despite the kit's issues). I hope you'll do a build log for your next model!

Nice work and good repair!