Greg Davis
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Everything posted by Greg Davis
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First - thanks for all the support that you have been giving me! Over the past couple of days, I have been able to plank the bow and stern faces. I'll take care of the bolts and finish sanding later. It looks like this week the main activity will be working on planking the sides.
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Slowly but surely the planking continues. As of today, there are 4 more strakes that will be challenging to get in place. After that the final planks and stealers should go in quickly and hull smoothing will commence. To learn more about the ship, I ordered a copy of: The Voyage of the 'Why Not?' in the Antarctic: The Journal of The Second French South Polar Expedition, 1908-1910 by Jean Charcot. The first paragraph of the introduction indicated that the exterior had armor-plates and thick galvanized iron sheeting. From what I can gather from the MSW forums, iron sheeting seems to be a challenge to reproduce and is often replaced with brass or copper. Thus, I feel safe to go with my original idea of coppering below the water line for this model to represent metal. This will cover the un-scale like planking below the waterline.
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Today was nice here - 70 degrees - and I was really sore from moving huge rocks yesterday, so I got the day off from 'chores'! That gave me the chance to sit outside and finish the basic exterior fairing of the dredger's hull. This was done with 100 grit sandpaper. After the bow and stern areas are planked the sides (and bottom) will get a bit more smoothing with a finer grit. I also made up the 1.5mm material needed bow and stern planking. The first (bottom) stake - front and back - has been attached. The next five strakes are straightforward. The one that follows needs to have 2 lights / windows cut in and the last (top) strake takes on the camber of the deck.
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Jim - This type of jig is often used in model ship construction - it just seems that others are not using such for their dredger and / or Emma Berry models. I think that for any framed models I work on, A jig will be a necessity! (And I find no shame it that.) Greg
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Keith - I agree, it turned out to be a better experience than I had expected. Time permitting, I will get back to some sail making for Britannia later this year. However, that is about 5th in the modeling cue right now.
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Today I released the hull from the jig I have been using - its really satisfying to see the work done so far sitting freely on a table! The structure feels quite stout already, but I will feel even better once the bow and stern faces are tied by the exterior planking. One of the sheer clamps is in place, the other will go on later this evening or tomorrow. Milling the dovetail recesses for the deck beams went well - I think I spent close to 6 hours in total for the work.
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The America kit provided plans and material for the sails (as it does for Le Pourquoi-Pas?) but I thought the fabric was too heavy, so I eventually got some sail cloth from Model Expo to make the sails. I also tried a number of different threads - weight and color - before all the sewing took place. It took me more than a few days to sew all the lines and reinforcements. Then more work for the reef points! These are the first sails that I have made for a model. I was probably close on 10 years between when I made and rigged the model before I got up the nerve to make the sail set. In fact, it was suppose to be practice before I made a set of sails for my model of Britannia. Still not sure when I will attend to that project - it carries so much sail.
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Keith The Constructo plans show that on each side there are 17 belaying pins along the rails midship between the fore and main masts, and 6 cleats near the mizzen mast (3 before and 3 after). The belaying plan indicates the use of of these for braces. I really have no idea how realistic the provided belaying plan is - most likely it is simplified / standardized for kit usage. Also, the provided plans do not show the shroud pin racks. The way the hull wood finishes is one of the things that attracts me to Constructo (and some other European) models. While the models are a bit short on detail and some features are clearly out of scale, the overall presentation often looks nice to me. For example, here's a picture of America that I made from a Constructo kit: All the best, Greg
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I've finished planking the port side of the ship today. Now I will turn my attention to the last dozen or so strakes needed on the starboard side. Then the big sanding job commences! At this point I am planning to copper the ship under the water line. I will most likely paint the topsides and leave the intervening region with a natural finish.
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Going back to an earlier comment about the availability of this model; I was looking at Ages of Sail website today and notices that they advertise that the this Constructo model of Le Pourqui-Pas? is available / in stock and are selling it for $279.99.
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I went ahead and milled some wood for the sheer clamps and made the scarf joints for each. Here are a couple of pictures - one of a joint and the other showing the dry fitting of the clamps. Next I will mark and cut the dovetail notches for all of the deck ledges.
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I think my brain was turned off when thinking about the grain direction. Assuming that it is most likely that there is failure along the grain, then the best choice would be the grain running diagonally between the pieces being joined. I guess in this manner if there is a split, there would still be sub pieces of the knee forming a joint. Whereas if the grain radiated from the corner of the two pieces being joined, then there is the possibility that the knee would split radiating out of the corner resulting in one piece of the knee contented to each side of the joint, yet with now no (or little) material connecting / bracing the joint. ☹️
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I agree and will give that a try for the remaining knees that are visible on and above the deck. However, if I do so should the grain radiate from the corner or should it form hypotenuses with the sides, i.e., create a bunch of triangular shapes? Also, I don't have any compass cherry to use for this task. In the meantime, the four corner knees are installed and bolted. Also, I have installed the two knees that join the keelson to the bow and stern structures. Once these two knees are bolted, I will move to the next step. I think there is a choice of two different routes at this point: begin planking the exterior or installing the sheer clamps. Assuming that I am reading plans correctly, the order of (exterior) planking that makes most sense is 1. bow and stern faces 2. sides 3. bottom 4. doubling of the planking below the water line 5. the wale - but this isn't to be done until the deck has been planked So, I could go ahead and at least plank the bow and stern faces. The sides would then need to get their final fairing before moving on. It is right here that I think installing the sheer clamps first would be a good move. The clamps would give additional stability to the upper portions of the frames for the fairing process. In fact, it might be a smart move to put in the sheer clamps and then fit the uprights for the wheel gantries. This way, the uprights, which have lower portion shaped as a frame could be faired to fit nicely between the sheer clamps, side strakes, and curved carlings. I hope I'm not thinking out loud too much here! I think that I just may have convinced myself that the sheer strakes should be the next (sub)project.
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Yesterday I set up some wood to make the side strake knees. There is one straight side on the knee - where it attaches to the bow or stern structure. I pre-beveled the stock to match the angle of the bow and stern and then attached the knee patterns to align with the bevel. I also cut out an additional pair of knees should I need an extra. After cutting the blanks out, decided on the following order of work: shape the long edge to match the side strake, shape the inner bevel, mark and drill holes for bolts, attach knee to model, and install bolts. I have complete one so far: On to the next ones!
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Another 120+ holes drilled and filled with copper wire - the side strakes are bolted. There are now over 1000 'bolts' on the model. Now its time to prepare some 5 mm thick stock for the four corner knees that hold the side stakes together. I find myself reviewing the plans almost daily and visualizing the next construction steps - hopefully everything is going together in an appropriate order.
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Over the past couple of weeks, I have completed planking the top half of the starboard side to match what had been shown for the port side. I am now working the rest of the way down the port side before returning to the starboard side. The work is going well and you can see that I have chosen to plank over the opening for the screw / propeller at this time. The provided instruction suggest stopping the planks at the start of the opening and then adding short planks at the end. I hope that I can get a smoother hull contour by not having the planking break. So after all the hull smoothing is completed, then I will open the space again.
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Keith - I hope that you share your work on the Heller kit, I for one would be interested in seeing what it looks like and how it goes together. Greg
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Today, I was able to drill and then insert / smooth the 'bolts' that hold the curved carlings to the frames. As I used on the three other carlings the bolts are 24 GA copper wire. I am really glad to have these two curved carlings completed - they were a bit of a test for me! Next I will 'bolt' the side strakes and then will be set to create the knees that join the side strakes.
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Thanks! They are glued in place now. Tomorrow, I hope to start drilling holes for the 120, or so, fasteners that go through the curved carlings and the side strakes.
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The second curved carling is done and of a matching quality to the first one. There is a final bit of milling that I will do before attachment - space for a dozen additional timbers need to be cut through the outer edge of the carlings. These twelve timbers are the ones that extend above the deck and will ultimately support the dredging mechanisms.
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I may have a keeper! Here are a couple of pictures of the port curved carling - one near the bow and one near the stern. Like in previous attempts a cardboard pattern was made to determine the curved shape needed near the frames. After cutting material to this shape, I found that I could refine the shape slightly using the side strake as guidance. This time I then marked and milled the recesses for the frames along the side of the vessel. These recesses where milled at 30 degrees to approximate the curvature of the frames near the floors. The sections that extend through the frames to the back edge of the carling where then milled to 22.5 to match the contours on the plans. After this was completed, I milled recesses so the carling would fit over the floors. The inside edge was then cut on a scroll saw so the carling would be 7.5mm wide throughout. Minimal additional fitting was done with files and then a bit of surface sanding was done to bring the project to its current status. I won't attach the piece until the starboard carling is made. If I am able to make the starboard carling significantly better, then I will give the port side another go. But if they are similar in quality, I will likely move ahead and fasten both.
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Approximately half of the port planking is completed. The planks crossing the center plane of the ship will need to be cut in order to receive the corresponding starboard planks. Then the lower half followed with a lot of sanding - hopefully outside if the weather holds longer than it takes me to do the planking. The darker wood used for the hull planking is sapele and I've read that inhaling sapele dust, like mahogany dust, can have some ill effects. Earlier this year experienced how sanding mahogany without a mask / enough ventilation can lead to nose bleeds. I'm now trying my best to do hull sanding with these types of wood outdoors. I'm pretty sure I've still got 4 - 6 weeks where I can spend time sanding outdoors before it gets too cold here!
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Thanks for the support! I'm hopeful with the current attempt with the carling and should know the outcome in a couple of days. If it goes poorly again, there is plenty more wood to work with. It's interesting that I feel no remorse tossing a piece during this build. In fact, at times it actually feels pretty good. This is quite a difference from some kit builds where I have spent more (frustrating) time than I should have trying to make a supplied piece fit instead of just fashioning a replacement. I guess here, with the dredger, it is about doing everything as correct as my skills allow. Where in the kits there is an expectation that pieces should fit sooner than later.
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Topside planking is complete now. It went well with the exception that one of the strips provided for the process was not useable - it had been torn up in the milling process. Unfortunately, there were no extra strips of the type needed provided and I had none of the needed dimensions either. The planking is 2mm thick - I ended up laminating two pieces of 1.5mm material together and then reducing the thickness back to 2mm. It turned out fine, but it would have been nice not to have taken the detour. Time to get out the rest of the hull planking material and really hoping there is enough to do the job!
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