brunnels

Per our PM's I'll take this beauty.

Two of the last major additions that I wanted to add that weren't part of the Occre plans were better hammocks, and gangway steps on the hull. Spent the last few nights working on the hammocks. I used some sail cloth that I bought online, which was hard to work with as the cloth seemed to unravel faster than I could work with it, plus the gap in the railing to place the cloth was only about 1mm wide, so it was very hard to work with until I decided to open the railing up a bit with a chisel. Not the best, probably larger than they should be for scale, and I know I added way too many of them, but I am happy with the result with how frustrating it was to add them. After the hammocks I added up the gangway steps on the hull.

Spent the last week working on deck furnishings, all these attachments to the deck are deceptive with how much time they take to complete. Also looking at these pictures makes me just want to pick up a touch up brush, its crazy how a camera points out so many imperfections that you can't see with the eye. Got the chain wrapped around the windlass after I spent nearly an hour looking on the ground for one of the chain pipe outlets I dropped. I even saw exactly where the piece landed, but by the time I got on my knees to grab it the piece it had been sucked up by the small parts black hole. Main jeer bits, water pumps and main hatchway. Skylights and companion ways. Boat mounts And that takes me up to how the ship currently sits. Just a few more items for the deck, I need to figure out how I want to rig the stowed cannons, start making the hammocks, then the ships boats. After that then Its time for the masts and rigging.

Lol, there is a reason I am an accountant and not a grammar teacher.

Couple more items completed. Forward deck hatches. Deep sea sounding wench. Does anyone know if they stored the rope on the wench, or just attached it when in use? Instructions don't show any rope on the wench, and its hard to find any images of deep sea wenches of the period. I think it would look good with some rope wrapped around the drum.

Looks great, fantastic work.

Been working a lot on all the deck fixtures which means lots of painting and brass blackening of tiny parts. Poop deck hardware, azimuth compass, and hand railing. Windlass painted and glued in place. I'm going to have to figure out what to do for the windlass handles, i formed up the brass rod to exactly match the kits template and they turned out not to be long enough, I tried to reform them to work but they just looked way to mangled up and I wasn't happy with them. The one material that Occre seems to be stingy with on this kit is the brass rod, so I am either going to have to order some more or find an alternative solution. Spent a while saturday night trying to rig up the carronade to somewhat match up how it is in the AOTS book. It doesn't look great and the blocks look way out of scale, but it's way better than just the single rope the kit instructions called for. Sunday I finally decided to tackle the deadeyes, these took the better part of the day to install but weren't nearly as difficult as I was expecting.

That thought has crossed my mind, I haven't put together any of the ships boats yet, so I'm not sure if that would be beyond my current skill level at the moment.

Few updates, been working on all the deck furnishings the last few days. It takes way longer than I was expecting to get all these little pieces put together and painted and I have only just begun on them. Ships wheel and ladders, still cleaning up the CA glue mess I made while struggling to glue down the wheel. Pin rails, I really need to get a drill press or something, because the hobby pin drill took forever on these. Poop deck hardware and mounts for the 28ft whaleboats that the kit doesn't include. Might have to see if anyone sells anything close to a 28ft whaleboat in this scale. Forecastle hardware, I glued on the carronade mount and not two seconds after i glued it something looked off and i realized i forgot to install the hardware hooks on the mount so i quickly pried it off before the CA glue got too hard, but you can see the remaining residue.

I found a little hobby saw blade attachment for my razor blade made tasks like cutting the cannon ports way easier. They will need to be cut open a couple more times during the planking. This is what I use. https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B08SQQHD9M/ref=ppx_yo_dt_b_search_asin_title?ie=UTF8&psc=1

I don't think CA Glue will hold the bent wood on the first planking. You are going to want use PVA glue and either nail it down or clamp it down. I personally used Titebond PVA glue and the nails that were included in the kit and it worked great.

Got a few more items checked off over the past few weekdays. Got the port doors painted, hinges installed and glued onto the ship. Those little hinges were not an easy item to deal with, I really wish the kits would have given extras as they are insanely hard to hold onto and work with, and very easy to lose if you drop one. Copper plated the rudder, and installed it on the boat. Painted and glued on a strip of timber for a false keel. Installed the channels Started on the first pieces that go on the deck. Happy to get to this stage as it feels like a bunch of mini projects. I started with the two storage lockers at the rear, I used the spare port door hinges from the port doors that were planked over, I wasn't a fan of the instructions way of simulating hinges with cut pieces of brass rod. The red bulwarks have a really weird color tone in these pics for some reason.

Occre seems to have fantastic customer service from what i have seen. Have you checked if your kit came with enough extra timber to replank? My Occre beagle came with quite a bit of extra wood, almost enough to plank the boat again.

Thanks, that is what I already have and use and it is great. The AL Chopper was a gift, I am trying to be polite and find some use out of it with better blades.

Spent the week on the bow and stern of the ship, both taking far longer and more challenging than I was expecting. I started the week planking the bow, the instructions showed the planking on the stern as vertical, but the AOTS book showed the planking was done horizontally. I'm starting to learn to double check all the Occre instructions to the AOTS book. I then added the boards that outlined the stern. This was probably the most frustrating part of this model I have done so far because the wood needed to be bent in two directions to match the lines of the stern piece. I snapped many pieces attempting to make it look good, but after spending a couple nights and getting very frustrated trying to make it look how I wanted, I decided my skill level wasn't up to my expectations for this step and decided to do the best I could with the shape, add a little wood filler, and move on. I then formed the brass rods into stern decorations. I wasn't a fan of the use of brass, and I spent some time trying to do this part with wood, but this was another step that my skill level wasn't good enough to make me happy, so I settled with the brass. I followed up the picture with some wood filler to fill in some of the gaps. Then some clean up and paint. Other side of the stern painted, also got the quarter galleries and boards on the quarter deck glued in place. Horn davits with holes drilled and hardware installed. Unfortunately one of the holes chipped while drilling out. I need to start pre-drilling, even for 1mm holes. Horn Davit's and flag staff mount installed. While pieces were drying on the stern I was also working on the bow. OH JOY, more brass to bend. And bow painted. My next task is to get all the port doors and hinges installed, and then maybe I can start on the furnishings on the deck.

Because one is new to the hobby and wasn't sure what the tool would be able to cut.

It never even occurred to me it was a razor blade from a single blade shaving razor. I'll look into the carpet blades.

This isn't going to be a review of this cutter, I'll do that in the review section. Not sure what these blades pictured below are called, but does anyone have any recommendations on blades that don't break with light use? This cutter came with about 5 extra blades and I have already gone through 2 of them and I have cut probably less than a dozen pieces using this tool. The first blade snapped on a piece of 4x4 sapelli, so I have stuck to cutting 2x5mm strips, after a handfull of them I glances at the blade and the new one was already chipping. First blade that broke after cutting a piece of 4x4mm sapelli Second blade after about a dozen pieces of 2x5mm basswood These are the blades the cutter uses, is there a name for this type?

Nice fix, there are a few laser cut plywood pieces they want you to bend on the Beagle and all of them make me nervous. Luckily planking isn't as high stakes as if you snap a plank you can just grab another, which isn't the case with laser cut plywood parts.

I managed to get quite a bit done on this ship this weekend. I finished up the copper plating with one strip of copper tape left, I like to say that was planned but it was pure luck. I decided to stop doing extra's that aren't in the plans and complete a few tasks from the instructions. First I cut painted and glued in place the hammock railing, the instructions call for a wood piece painted while to simulate the hammocks, but I am ommiting that piece with plans to fashion up the hammocks out of cloth later on. This step was kind of tricky to glue on because normally the rails would be glued to the fake hammock piece. I then added the pieces that form up the gang way entrances. Later on I will be fashioning up a set of gangway steps. After seeing @RobTBays excellent HMS Beagle build log, he points out that the AOTS plans show a water way. I decided to also add these to my Beagle for one to cover up some nasty past planking mistakes, and two I wanted to try out beveling some pieces at an angle. I beveled a few pieces of 2x2 at a 45 degree angle. Here is a test fitting. After a coat of shellac and glued in place. Back to the instructions, I started on the catheads. These took surprisingly longer to make than I had expected. Once I got the pieces of 4x4 cut and sanded down to the right size, I drilled 6 small holes in each, painted them with black paint and fitted the two holes in the sides with some blackened brass rings. The cathead openings in the bow of the ship needed quite a bit of filing to get the catheads to fit properly. I then added the pin rail which was painted with some American Walnut paint. I then capped it off with the bow railing also painted in American Walnut paint. I'm not sure if I like this paint color yet, but I will leave it be for the meantime as it's in a location that I can easily repaint if I chose so down the road. Next I started on the big stern piece. The piece needed some curvature to install flush, so I soaked it for about 10 minutes and heated it with a soldering iron and slowly formed it to the stern. I then glued and nailed it in place. Also you can see in the image my new Styrofoam dry dock. The Misses was watching me struggle with the crappy stand that the kit comes up with, and mentioned that I should cutout a stand from the big piece of Styrofoam I was using while coppering the ship. It was a fantastic idea that I was jealous that I had not thought of myself, and it turned out to be a very sturdy way to work on the boat. While the glue was drying on the stern piece I decided to start cutting out the railing in the location I will put the quarter galleys in. Here is where I have left off, but here is a couple full ship photo's to show off the coppering of the other side and show where I am currently at. Thanks for looking.

Wow, those doors look great, much better than what I have been able to come up with.

Thanks!! I will wait a bit before I varnish the copper then.

Amazing work, you scratch builders are on a different level.

Starboard side done except for capping it off at the keel and stern post. Once I researched where to start and where to end it was actually a pretty easygoing and relaxing process although time consuming. The material is very thin so it doesn't lay down quite as smooth as I was expecting, but I'm pretty happy with the result for my first time. I used up almost all my strips for the one side, so I guess its back to the foundry tonight to make some more. A question for the copper plating veterans of the hobby. I know the copper foil will darken naturally over time, but will it still darken under a varnish? I would like to let it darken a bit more than it is now, but If a layer of varnish on top prevents that then I will add varnish later down the line.

Its funny how when I started building this model I started thinking completely differently about how I could use random items around the house and in the tool box as tools for the model. One reason I love viewing build logs on this site is so I can see the creative ways everyone achieves a task.