JacquesCousteau

It's coming along well, and good job on repairing the stern! I had a similar concern about the blue interior being too much on my Juana y José cross-section. Like you said, I found that adding the thwarts and other parts in the interior really helped, and the color scheme looked much more balanced by the end.

Good luck with the keel! Is there a reason you made a new build log, though?

Thanks for the support! Work continues to be extremely hectic, so I have made very little progress--but still something. Bit by bit, I've finished the two lower layers of thatching. This was a slow process, but I think it worked out overall. The line of the thread is pretty wobbly, and there are some glue blobs, but all of that will be covered up by the upper layer of thatching. I think I'll use the same method to make the upper layer. Once again, any imperfections at the top will be covered up--this time by a strip of cloth running along the top of the thatching. I expect it to take a while, again, to make the upper layers. I've also begun prepping the rancho for attachment to the hull. I drilled a small hole in the rancho's feet: Then, I placed the rancho in the correct position on the hull, and pushed a needle through the holes to mark where to drill in the rail. After that, it was pretty straightforward to drill out the holes in the rail. I'll have to tidy up some of the pushout after rancho is attached, but it's not too bad. The holes are tiny. I still need to scrape away the paint at the glue locations. The rancho will still be a bit fragile, but much more stable with a combination of wire pins and glue than with glue alone. I'm now deciding whether to attach the rancho first, or to glue the thatching in place first. It'll be easier to glue the thatching to the framework off the hull. However, due to the curve of the rail, the thatching will be propped a bit off the framework at the bottom. I'm worried that trying to bend it up to take the curve after already gluing it into place might be difficult and could break the glue bond. Another option may be to add the wire pins to the framework feet so that I can get the best of both worlds--gluing and clamping the thatching to the framework off the model, then using the pins to put the framework in place on the hull while it dries.

Nice job on the stand, I'm looking forward to following along! Do the instructions say to mark the waterline so early on in the build because you'll be using it as a guide to attach a part? As for a waterline marker, if you search the site for "waterline" you'll see a lot of methods that people have set up waterline markers that may inspire you.

Nice job on the cabin, the build's really coming together well!

Looks like a great start! I'm very interested in seeing how it turns out with the boxwood/contrasting wood hull.

Thank you for your helpful comments! I'll definitely fair the stern more before adding the counter, and I'll have to try some emory boards. @VTHokiEE, your half-hull turned out great and your log has been helpful for thinking about the build. @CiscoH, your sloop looks fantastic. If you do the NRG half-hull, do you think you'd use holly again? I think part of the reason I've been so slow with sanding is that the plywood dust seems to set off my allergies more than basswood has. Wearing a mask and sweeping up immediately after sanding helps, but sanding indoors still gets dust everywhere. Hopefully the weather warms up enough soon that I'll be able to sand on my balcony instead.

Things have been extremely busy around here, and I have not been able to make nearly as much progress as I would have liked on the half-hull. Fairing continues, very slowly. Here's my current progress. The B frame still protrudes too much, despite a great deal of sanding. I've ended up needing to build up the C and E frames, and may need to build up the D frame a little as well. Beyond that, the bow and stern have also both given me some trouble. The bluff bow is requiring quite a bit of shaping. I've had difficulties with using battens to test fairness here, as the battens keep breaking around the sharp curve. That said, I think I'm getting there at the bow. The stern is another story. The dense stack of frames there has some really major differences in height between frames. As can be seen, some of the frames are low enough that they've barely been touched by the sandpaper. Parts will need to be filled in with some fairly large pieces of scrap basswood. I'm also still not really sure when to add the counter--I think I'm at about the point where it can be added, but maybe the stern needs to be more faired first? If anyone has any advice on fairing, or has noticed anything that I'm doing wrong in the photos, I'm all ears! I'd love to move on to the next step and actually start planking, but I know a poorly-faired hull will cause all sorts of problems later.

Welcome!

Good job on the planking and oars! A lot of builds have had similar issues with the planks pinching in at the bow and/or stern due to clamping, and checking other build logs might provide some suggestions. You may be able to dampen the planks and bend them out a bit. As for the frames not touching the planks, on my build I found it helpful to use bobby pins to hold the planks against the frames. Looking forward to seeing how it turns out!

Between an exceptionally hectic time at work and a bit of travel, I haven't been able to spend much time on the build, but I was finally able to get back to it and make a little progress. The thatching is very slow to make. Following Eberhardt's suggestion, I've been using some thread to string together small bundles of thatching material. Any gaps will be covered by gluing individual pieces after the thatching's on the rancho framework, and the thread will also be covered by the second layer so it's more for structure than for show. It's slow going, but seems to be working so far. That said, I realized that this layer of thatching is turning out a bit thicker than my previous attempt, so I'm a bit concerned about how well the overlapping layer will glue on to the first. I also added extra wood to the "feet" of the rancho framework, so that there will be a sturdier gluing surface when I attach it to the rail. From photos, I haven't really been able to figure out how the actual rancho was attached to the hull. I'm considering trying to drill small holes in each foot and the rail in order to use a peg or bit of wire for a stronger connection than just glue. It's a bit tricky, though--the feet are quite small, and the rail isn't very thick so any hole will have to go all the way through it and will be visible. Given how slow going the rancho is, I also wanted to work on some other aspects of the build. The rudder will have to wait until I make a stand, so no progress there yet. Instead, though, I was intrigued by a recent post on Chuck Passaro's Speedwell build about making and attaching metal rings. Rather than place the split ring in an eyebolt to attach it to the deck/hatch, which ultimately looks out of scale, he just crimps a bit of thinner wire around the split ring and uses that. For a better explanation, see post 599 of 7 February in his build log: Some photos show a pair of similar rings at the sides of the canoa's foredeck, so I thought I would try something similar. I don't have the thinner wire yet (it's on the way), but thought I could at least do a test on a piece of scrap. The first attempt (right) didn't turn out very well, as the hole was a bit too small and the loop protrudes too much, but the second attempt (left) turned out much better. The test also alerted me to the fact that this wire's black coating chips easily--I'll have to be a lot more careful with the actual rings. Finally, I thought I'd note that, while poking around the library, I came across more information about small, flat-bottomed Spanish river and lake vessels. José Manuel Matés Luque's brief "Flat Bottomed Boats in Spain: The Forgotten Fleet," was published in Ships and Maritime Landscapes: Proceedings of the Thirteenth International Symposium on Boat and Ship Archeology, Amsterdam 2012, Eds. Jerzy Gawronski, André van Holk, and Joost Schokkenbroek (Barkhuis, 2017). Among other vessels, I was particularly struck by the offset frames on the vessel below, from the Tablas de Damiel region (a wetland roughly between Toledo and Jaén). It's different in a number of ways from the Canoa de Rancho, but perhaps is suggestive of some of its design ancestry.

Great start, looking forward to seeing how this turns out!

The build is looking great! A 28-ft whaleboat could be fun to scratch-build.

Nice job!

Very nicely done, the whole fleet looks great! Out of curiosity, how would you compare it to building the Nisha?

Welcome!

Congratulations, looks great!

Just a brief update. As other logs have noted, the frames require quite a bit of fairing, and I've been working on it a bit at a time. It's neither the most exciting work, nor the most interesting to photograph, but I definitely want to get it right. I've been using 150-grit sanding sticks, and for a time just a sheet of 100 grit sandpaper in order to sand some areas that need a lot removed. I still have a lot to go. As can be seen by the char, some of the frames have barely been sanded, and I will probably have to build them up a bit. Other frames, especially B, were very prominent and have been reduced by quite a bit. The bow takes a lot of work to fair because a ton of material has to be removed, but (so far, at least) it hasn't been complicated. The stern is a different story. The idea behind having so many frames there is to provide a lot of surface area for a complex shape, but it requires a lot of sanding. It's also tricky to get without accidentally sanding the aft edge of Frame H, which the instructions warn against doing because the counter will be placed there (and presumably faired afterward? The instructions are not clear on this). In any case, I still have a lot of sanding ahead of me. I can see why people like using dremels for this!

Congratulations, that looks great!

Brief update: I've remade the rancho framework. This time, it extends all the way to the edges of the rail. I also simplified the interior vertical supports--they're just a 1/16-inch square strip of basswood, instead of a larger part with notches as on the first one--and added more supports than on the first one. Next, to re-do the thatching, this time making sure to wrap the string around it to better keep it together. Unlike the previous attempt, I won't be assembling it on double-side tape backing this time, as the thatching material didn't really stick at all to the tape so it wasn't all that helpful in aligning things.

Thanks, @wefalck @Paul Le Wol @AJohnson @GrandpaPhil @yvesvidal @mtaylor and everyone else for the kind words and likes! It was a very fun build, and it almost makes me wonder why there aren't more cross-sections of fishing vessels out there--a fishing schooner could be a very interesting cross-section to make. I'll undoubtedly be making another cross-section at some point in the future, and maybe a full build of the Juana y José as well, although at the moment I seem to have collected a lot of plans and kits and need to work on finishing what I've already started before beginning new builds.

Shaping the topline was easier than I expected. First, I used a square to mark it. I started with a pencil, but changed to just marking it with an exacto blade, as it was more precise. Every frame needed to have something trimmed, some of them quite a bit, and none of them needed to be built up. As I mentioned, I found the plywood to crumble easily when cutting with an exacto blade, so originally I was going to just sand. This would have been quite a bit of sanding, though! Instead, I decided to try my razor saw. It worked perfectly and cut very cleanly, and the blade readily followed where I had earlier scored the frames. There were a few areas near the bow and stern where I needed to use a smaller blade. I was able to use the tiny exacto saw blade to cut there. In general, the plywood handled the sawing very well without any problems, and I soon had all the frames cut to the topline. Then I sanded, using a long, flexible sanding stick. It worked really well, except that the transom required quite a lot of sanding, so I ended up simply sawing along the mark there before cleaning it up with sandpaper. With that, the hull is ready for fairing.

I finished the framing. The bow was a little tricky, requiring extensive shaping in order to get the frames to follow the rabbet. I found that the plywood sands pretty well, but it tends to crumble when cut, which was a bit tricky to deal with. First I cut a notch for the 5a frame, then added it. Then a further frame that just sits on the stemson. The instructions said to add another piece ahead of it to run directly up to the rabbet, but I didn't have the space. As can be seen, I also ended up angling the spacer due to the serious curves in the hull form at the bow. The stern also required some shaping to match the rabbet. There was no space for a spacer between G and Ga. Instead, the spacer went between Ga and Gb. Finally I added H. I nearly had a heart attack (well, that's an exaggeration) when I noticed that the aft part of H is not supposed to be sanded, after I had already shaped it to match the rabbet. After looking at Toni Levine's log, I realized that the H frame should indeed be shaped to match the rabbet, it just shouldn't be sanded when you're fairing. In general I recommend reading other build logs alongside the instructions for complex areas like the stern. I was then able to glue the transom to the L-shaped piece and glue them in place with an angled spacer. The instructions and most build logs aren't very clear about how the transom is oriented, so here's another view of how I did mine. The key is that the curved end should be facing out, with the narrow part at the top. With framing complete, it's becoming clearer how the hull will look: Next up, to figure out the topline and then fair the frames.

I've finally wrapped up this build! I've discovered that I really enjoy having multiple builds going at once. If something is frustrating in one build. you can easily set it aside for a bit to work on something completely different. With the Canoa de Rancho's thatching turning out more difficult than anticipated, I decided to set it aside for a bit and knock out the cross-section. There were just a few last steps to complete the Juana y José. First, I glued the brass rods in place in the stand--previously they had been loose and frequently came off with the hull when I detached it. For now I will not be gluing the hull to the stand. The cross section is very light and sits well on the stand without gluing it, and detaching it makes it much easier to pack this all for transport. Second, I added the thole pins. I was going to paint these to match the thole pin supports, but decided to leave them natural as the contrast looked better. Then, after more sanding and scraping I finally got the exposed edges of the cut-off clear enough that I felt they were acceptable to leave natural. There may be a slight bluish tint in a few places, but I can live with it. I was going to paint the exposed edges a dull orange or perhaps an off-white, but I ultimately decided I liked the natural look better. I covered the end grain with matte varnish. Then, the mast. I hadn't been sure whether I wanted to keep the mast or not. I decided that, for now, I would keep it, but would leave it unglued so it can be removed for packing, or in case I later decided that I preferred it without the mast. So, I added the rounded tip to the top of the mast. I made this from a toothpick. I also did a bit more sanding to better taper the mast. I was going to leave the mast as-is, but decided, based on photos of a number of Spanish fishing vessels, to paint the tip. I went with a blue color. The first coat was too dark: So I lightened it and added another coat. The tip now matches the interior blue of the boat. I also took the chance to paint the pulley wheel and other details in the mast tip. Finally, I used painted card to make the curved metal loop that holds the mast to the thwart. The loop holds the mast in position, but is loose enough that it can be removed for transport. With that, the Juana y José is complete! I might add some felt or something to the bottom of the stand to keep it from slipping, but that would be it. Overall this build was a lot of fun and a great learning experience. I would highly recommend a cross section to anyone who is looking for a rewarding project but perhaps doesn't have the space, skills, and/or tools for a more complex full build. It allows you to build skills with things like deck furnishings, plank-on-frame construction, and planking a round-bilged hull, without needing to do a full build. And it takes up very little space, as can be seen by the comparison withthe mug at right in the photo below. I'm quite happy with this unique little build, and am looking forward to making more Spanish fishing boats like it in the future. Thanks to all those who followed along and offered support, too!

It's DecoArt DuraClear Polyurethane Matte Varnish. What sort of varnish would you recommend? I can't say I'm very familiar with varnishes, paints, and solvents.