JacquesCousteau

I haven't yet figured out the cant frames, and still need to find longer bolts for the jig, but I've made progress in another area. After some consideration, I decided to buy a small, rechargeable rototool similar to the one @Glen McGuirementioned. I was able to get it going today and found it to be extremely useful. While I previously could sand one part in about 30 minutes, I can now sand ten or more in that time. The parts will still need a final sanding by hand for smoothness, but this still significantly sped up what has to be one of the most tedious parts of modeling. For that, I'm very happy. The tool itself is very simple--you press the power button to cycle through 5 speeds or hold it down to turn it off--and I can see some ways it could be better. It gets a little warm after extended use, which is a good sign to take a break, and the button placement at the back end makes it slightly awkward to turn it off while using. It's definitely not very powerful, although that's not really a problem for what I've been doing--I would hate to accidentally over-sand and ruin a piece. So far I've only used the sanding drum, but it comes with a number of other parts as well. I'm curious to see how the mini saw blade works, although I doubt it will work very well on anything but the thinnest wood. I'm also thinking about making some sort of stand from mdf or something to better hold it steady for a consistent sanding angle. All told, there are certainly much better tools out there, and for all I know this one's going to break tomorrow, but for about 14 dollars, I'm quite happy with what I got and it's already helping quite a bit with this project.

I think the Internet Archive's borrowing period is just for an hour, so it might be available again soon. Beyond the plan, the written description on the accompanying pages can be useful as well. While you can certainly go for it, this may be a bit of a tricky hull to plank given the overhanging stern. I suspect that the kit planks are not quite to scale in terms of width--you may be able to count planks from a photo to figure out the proper width. If you're going the tapered strip route, instead of cutting spiled planks directly from a wider sheet, you'd probably need thinner strips than the kit includes anyway in order to better edge bend them. Looking forward to seeing how you decide to go about it!

It's also available for short-term loan online through the Internet Archive (a fantastic source for books, btw).

Looking forward to following along! If you're looking for inspiration, I'd second the recommendation to have a look at the relevant section of Chapelle. Another potential source would be to look for old photos. While I haven't found many of the Muscongus Bay centerboard sloop, there are quite a few photos of Friendship Sloops, which were deeper-hulled but otherwise quite similar vessels. There are a lot of photos of these--mostly as yachts, but a few as fishing vessels--here, for example: https://penobscotmarinemuseum.historyit.com/search-interfaces/search/digital-collection/0/1/1/1?rq[0]=8639&ip=1

Excellent job, it turned out really well! I've been very happy with the rope I've bought from Ropes of Scale, they have a wide range of colors and sizes. I've used it for my Canoa de Rancho and Lancha Chilota builds (although I haven't yet rigged the latter). I've also bought rope from Syren Ship Model Co., which looks to be excellent as well, although I haven't had a chance to use it yet.

Very nice work, those photos of the entire hull show how it's really coming together! Given that it's a waterline model, will you be leaving the bottom open or covering it in?

Thanks, I never would have thought of it on my own. This site is such an excellent resource, I'm amazed by the ingenuity that so many display and very grateful to those who take the time to share their methods.

Thanks, @Jim Lad! A little more progress. I wasn't thrilled with how my flat brass strip thimbles turned out, as they don't have any sort of groove and thus don't really look right. Searching for ideas that could be done with the tools and materials I already have, I saw this post about making thimbles from doubled wire: I thought it was worth a try. It was very simple. First, you fold and double up a little bit of wire: Then you roll it into a loop, trim it, and add a drop of superglue to secure it. The doubled wire creates a small groove. Then it's a simple matter of painting it (note: you'd need to solder if you're planning on blackening rather than painting). The groove is subtle, and its not a huge difference, but I think it was worth it. The thimbles will be stored for now, to be added to the stay and shrouds once I know how long they need to be taking the turnbuckles and hooks into account. Besides that, I also added the peak halyard block (no photos as it's the same process as previous blocks). I also added temporary rigging with a bit of sewing thread to the peak halyard and jib halyard. It's not remotely in scale, but it helps me get a better sense of how the final rigging will go, while also keeping everything together. Meanwhile, I'm procrastinating on making the rudder hinges. I had trouble with these on the Canoa de Rancho build, and in hindsight wish I had gotten less space between the rudder and transom. Making those tight turns in the brass strip is still tricky for me. I should probably try making a simple jig with scrap wood and tiny nails or something...

Congratulations, very nicely done!

Very cool! I have vague memories of having seen the Alma over a decade ago, although at the time my interest was more drawn to the larger ships in the museum. What a missed opportunity! Noting the curved sides of this model, I feel like it looks a little less like the Alma, which has very straight sides, and a bit closer to the Robbie Hunter, plans of which are in Chapelle's National Watercraft Collection book. Although I don't know how the scale would match up. Another source you may want to look into is Roger Olmstead's "Scow Schooners of San Francisco Bay". It may be available as an interlibrary loan. I know there are a few articles on scow schooners available from the Nautical Research Journal, too.

Thanks, all! It's great to know that I inadvertently made something more accurate than I thought, how often does THAT happen?

It's been a little while, as I was traveling and then had a very hectic week and weekend, but I've made a bit more progress. When I left off, the boom had been made but was unpainted, and I had made a new spar for the gaff. I first painted the boom. Initially I wanted to have gray-white at both ends, but the thin gray I was using had a very hard time covering the primer I sprayed over the metal gooseneck at the fore end, so I ended up only adding gray at the aft end. On the gaff, I needed to fabricate jaws that would not just wrap around the mast, but curved upward. Most lancha photos that I've seen had upward-curving jaws, although a few had flat ones, but I think the curve looks nicer. An example is shown below; I particularly liked the "stepped" design of the aft end of the jaws. Source: https://www.flickr.com/photos/luchinmardones/5232587713/in/album-72157625422798225/ It took me a while to figure out how to best handle this. Rather than carve the jaws from a much thicker piece of wood, which seemed like it would be very challenging to get even, I decided to build them up from multiple layers of easily-cut 1/16‐inch basswood sheet. I made them a bit oversized, as seen below, in order to sand and file them into an even final shape. A lot of shaping later, and I had jaws I was happy with. I also added the eyebolt for the throat halyard block. Meanwhile, I wanted to replicate an example of a lancha where a small extension had been added to the end of the gaff, either to repair a damaged tip or as a post-hoc effort to change the sail shape slightly. (The photo, which is of the lancha Quenita, is shown in a few earlier posts). To do this, I cut the tip and a bit of scrap spar at a 45-degree angle and glued them together. I then drilled a hole between them and threaded a bit of wire through to strengthen the joint, shown below before trimming the wire: I then painted the tip and added a small lashing. Finally, I needed to add the connection point for the peak halyard block. On some lanchas this seemed to just be a rope, but on many it was a metal ring, apparently with a small eyebolt on it (see the photo of a real lancha shown above for an example). Given that I don't have a soldering iron, or know how to solder, I wouldn't be able to make a closed loop, and I didn't want to make something weak as there would be a bit of pressure on it. I decided to get creative and fake it, drilling an eyebolt directly into the spar, adding a ring around the spar, and disguising the joint with glue and then paint. I tested it on a bit of scrap spar cutoff--below, you can see that the ring and eyebolt are two separate pieces. And after painting (just with primer). I was happy with the results and decided to keep with this method for the gaff. Finally, I painted the gaff, dry-brushed a dash of "rust" around the metalwork, and sanded and scraped the spar for a weathered look. Finally, we can see the gaff resting on the boom (which is held up by temporary lifts). I think I should still add a dark wash over the gaff and boom to tone down the gray-white a bit, especially at the jaws. The photo also gives a sense of the size difference between the lancha and the canoa(s). I should note here that I'll need to remake the gooseneck pin, as my initial brass rod one proved too thick once painted to fit through the eyebolts. I also attempted to make a convincing forward hatch prop from some scrap alder. However, it looked bad, almost immediately fell into the hatch and took a lot of time to fish out, and then disappeared from my desk (maybe I threw it out on accident?) before I could take a photo. Ah well, the next one will be better.

Looks like a fun build! Adding a planked deck is a great idea, just don't forget to take into account the extra thickness/height when continuing with the build.

Thank you! Glad to hear you found my comments helpful, I'm looking forward to seeing how your own build progresses. Looking back on this build, I really quite like the kit and appreciate how it takes the time to teach an effective planking method, and builds into a great display, as well.

Excellent job, the finish looks great! And good call on the color for the carbon fiber sections.

Very nice work, the hull's coming along great!

Nice work! Interesting overhang on the front of the deckhouse roof.

Nice work! Taking your time with fairing the hull will definitely pay off later.

Nice job!

Hi Pablo, greetings from Mexico City. It doesn't look like Jerry has posted for a long time so I'm not sure if you'll get a response. There's a very detailed discussion of topsail schooner rigging at this thread: You also might look at the recommendations in this thread:

Very precise work! In the pucture showing the deck on the hull, are the bulkheads showing through the deck, or are the darker lines intentional?

Really fantastic job! To my eyes, at least, it still has plenty of quirkiness (in a good way). Hoping that all goes well for you!

Thanks, all! I think that cardboard templates may be the way to go, as I suspect that I'll have to fiddle with things a bit to get the angles right. I may also try Paul's suggestion once I'm back from traveling, really anything that gives me a better sense of how this fits together will be helpful.

As I'm traveling at the moment, there's been no chance to get a rotor tool, or to do much work other than slowly sand a few frame parts I was able to bring with me. The floor from frame 10, below, is sanded to about the proper size on the right side (leaving a little extra for fairing), but still needs sanding on the left. For the remaining frame parts, I think I'll try cutting a little closer to the line, as I've gotten more precise with the fretsaw and leaving about 1/32-inch extra instead of 1/16-inch extra would significantly reduce the amount of sanding I need to do. In any case, I've realized that I'm not totally sure of how to cut the ends of the foremost cant frames (a and b). The drawings are mostly pretty clear about how the frames connect to the keel pieces, even when they do so at odd angles--in the plan detail below, for instance, it's clear how cant frame c at right is beveled and sits on the keel. However, you can also see that the interior ends of cant frames a and b, which should be attached to the stempost and thus ought to have a complex bevel, have practically no details, with the lines just stopping in mid-space. This is especially the case for b, which is oddly squared off--at least a is angled to meet the stem in one plane. So, I may be missing something obvious, but it's totally unclear to me how I'm supposed to cut the ends. If I cut between the ends of the lines, the result would be a squared block that doesn't fit against the stem. I could cut there and then bevel the result to fit, but I'm not sure if that would result in a piece that fits the hull properly. One might assume that the line ends represent the longest sides of the bevel (e.g , the outboard side of the frame reaching lower on the stem), but if they actually represent the shorter sides (e.g., the inboard side of the frame), then cutting at the line ends would result in too short of a piece. Thinking about it some more, I think that what I'll need to do is to use other drawings of the hull structure to measure the distance from one tip of the cant frame piece to the other, and then use that to figure out where the frame should be cut--whether at the line ends, or if I'll need to extend the frame lines a bit following the same curve. I don't bring this up to be overly critical, as the planset still seems generally quite excellent, but to instead signal potential issues to other modelers. This is another issue where I can't help but feel that the plans could be a little clearer.

Very nice work on the pilot house. Sorry to hear about the medical issues, hope all goes well!