Argaen Lok

Okay, short chapter 6 is done. I read the directions and was having a difficult time understanding the instructions. I knew what the intent was by looking at the pics in the manual and the drawings, but I just couldn't picture what the author was trying to convey. So, I ventured a bit on my own, fully understanding the intent of the final work. I warn you; this one is a bit pic heavy as I describe what I did. The results are 95% the same, I just took a different path. That's one nice thing about building wood models; there is always a little wiggle room to venture on your own yet achieve the same results. I will also add that I am very pleased that I always keep the leftover strips of wood from my previous builds. One never knows what will be needed down the road. For some reason, this kit seems a little short on wood. Or perhaps it's just me. but this work is all done with scraps. I started out by gluing together two 5/32 x 1/16 scrap pieces of wood so it would line up with the side of the transom. I then added two glued pieces of 1/4 x 1/16 under the first piece. Realizing that the design more or less wants you to step down from the full width of the transom to the side of the ship. Then I sanded those down. Then I added a 3/16 x 1/16 piece in the middle so the cap would come over the top and sit on top of this piece. This way the cap would have the step down to the side of the hull. And then sanded that down so it curved down and ran smoothly into the bottom piece. Next was the cap work. I must say, I was a bit disappointed that this piece of wood did not come with the kit. Luckly for me, I had left overs from other builds and had what was needed. This cap piece is the same thickness as the instructions call out. So, I cut out the wood and soaked it in hot water. I used a triangle shaped file to add creases to the underside of the cap so I could start the bending process. Much like a described previously when bending the planking under and up the stern. Once I got the creases in, I used a large rubber band and wrapped it around the first step of bending the cap. Sorry, no pics of that, but the cap was NOT fully bent at this stage. I let that soak in the hot water for 5 minutes and then added a smaller rubber band and let it soak in the now warm water for 5 minutes. I did NOT cut the cap in half like the instructions said. I wanted to try and make it one piece. if it snapped, I had enough scrap left over to start again and then cut it in half. Luckily, I was successful. Then I laid the cap over the transom and rubber banded it down overnight. Note how I made the cap longer than it needed to be. This would allow me to cut the cap down to fit over and rest/shelf on that middle side piece I described earlier. And my results. Like I said above, this was my own journey, but I wanted to explain it here just in case anyone else seeing this, and was confused by the instructions, could have an alternative path to achieve the same results. Yes, I also added the wood nails to the stern since I figured it wasn't made out of a single large piece of wood. Nothing in the instructions like the sides, about that.

Started chapter 6, the stern work. I did cut the planks to fit right to the sides of the gun Wales. I know that you won't see that little bit once the inside Wales are done, but I'll know if I didn't fit it all the way. Luckily, the planking fit perfectly under, around and over the top of the gun ports; no notching needed. Did a little sanding, shaping and then painted. Not too tough. The hard stuff is next. I put the arrow in here because I wanted to call out the most difficult parts of sanding the stern down to the required 1/8 -3/32 thickness. I went with the1/8 thickness because 3/32 just seemed too thin. But the caution here is trying to shape the angled bottom of the stern posts, under the cannon ports, to all be the same size. Yeah, it's easy to sand down the large back stern face, but sanding down to stern posts at they angle back is tough. Maybe it's because I messed up the sanding and created a valley in those posts. So, I used a straight edge exacto knife, kind of looked like a chisel, and hand sanded the parts. The other difficult part was sanding the newly added planking right there in in the corner near the gun Wales. Hand sanded those too. And when I say hand sand, I mean squeezing my finger into the corner with sandpaper. But I got it all sanded to be smooth and equal. I'm sure I must have messed up those angled stern posts when I accidently sanded in a valley. So, A WORD OF CAUTION DOWN THERE. Guess we'll see just how bad I messed up once I cut the hole for the rudder. Fingers crossed.

Overworked724, Glad I could spark your interest. I did put wood filler in some of the dips and smallish gaps before I sanded. I did pull down and print a coppering guideline from this site, and it did mention putting on a lacquer of some sort to help seal the wood for a better adhesion of the copper. But I need to sit down and read it better before the coppering process. Going to review some of the other Syren sites for advise. So, the water line is next and then the stern work. I also want to put a little additional glue at the corner of the planks and the ribs on the inside of the ship. Just to shore up the strength of the hull a bit.

Work finished on the starboard side of the kit. Not much to say that I didn't say for the port side. But I'll say this, by the time I was done planking, I was so ready to be done planking. You might think that one plank looks like it's sunk lower than the other planks but it's just a different coloring of the wood. Anyways. Time to mark the water line and paint it. I think once I'm done with this chapter, I might take a few days off to decompress from this planking. I definitely get anxiety from planking.

Happy to say that I am officially half way done planking. Yep, just finished sanding the port side hull. Took about a month to put on all 26 of these planks. According to the instructions, I should have only used 23 planks but I ended up using 26. Not sure if my calculations were off or I put my planks tighter than the instructions figured. Hope I have enough wood left over to do the other side of the hull and the deck. Gonna be close. I did run into some issues while planking. Probably self-induced but a bother nevertheless. I have seen in other build logs some of the same issues I had, which ended up being a weird tear drop shaped hole in the hull right in the middle. Yep, I got it too. I also developed an issue up in the bow. The instructions said to taper the front of each plant, up at the hull to about 3/32 and you should be able to plank the entire hull. Nope, didn't work for me in the slightes. Actually, it got quite ugly up at the bow as you will see in the pic. But once I got everything fitted and sanded, in the end, it all worked out good. See the pics below. You can see in this Pic, I developed that tear drop planking issue. I ended up filling in the middle planks in order to get the upper and lower planks lined up again. Took a little head scratching and anxiety to get it right. I figured it out. Here's that hole in the bow that I was talking about. Tapering each bow part of the plank to 3/32 just didn't work as the instructions said it would, at least for me, and as you can see in the pic above, some of the planks started getting kind of ugly. And I ended up creating this hole. Again, great anxiety but I worked on it, and was able to close it up. I was really not happy with myself. In the pics below, you'll see that I got everything worked out and sanded and it all came out pretty good. If you can zoom in on the sanded pics, you can see how I fixed my self induced problems. I was also able to get the stern planks bent into shape and glued pretty well. I was pleased with the way it came out. I was at least able to do one thing correct.

Forgot to add the work I do for the wood bending at the stern. I soak the wood in hot water and after a few minutes, I use my thumb nail and index finger to pinch a crease on the inside of the wood so that it bends up into the stern. I'll have finished pics of the process once I'm done planking this side of the model.

Still working on the hull planking. My least favorite part of the build. As per the instructions, I'm trying to file the front of the planks down to 3/32 but it's still not working well. The tough part is, you shouldn't sand down just the top of the bottom of the plank, but I think you should sand both the top and the bottom to 3/32. The instructions were not clear on that. I started sanding just a top or bottom but it seemed to be causing alignment issues with subsequent planks. So now I'm doing top and bottom and tapering out to the D-rib. But I still think it's not going to work right. I'm pretty sure I'm going to have to do a bit of my own planking to get it done. The instructions also talked about plank creep. I think, if you remove the glue that squeezes out between planks and at the open bottom of the planks, the creep should not happen. So what you see in the pic below is just before I cleaned off the glue. Sorry for the blurry pic. I was holding the plant and ship with one hand and trying to take a pic with the other. cou And then at the bow you of course have to cut the plant to fit into the bow and I also sand down the inside of the plank so it fits into the slot I created when you put the false keel together. See three pics below. hope these pics help.

Yes sir, 0.025 pin vice drill bit. I did some test drills with a few different size drills before settling on this size. I'm not sure where the 0.55 comes from as that might actually be bigger than the wood width itself. I don't know the exact date these instructions were written so I don't know what scaled bits the writer was referencing. Always my advice, do testing on scrap pieces before settling on anything.

Nope, no pre-stain. Just put it straight on. After I did some test stains on some scrap pieces first.

Finally got to the tree nail portion of the instructions. I've never done this before, so I was a bit anxious and a bit excited. Pin drilled 480 holes of 0.025 diameter drill bit! Yeah, had to stop a few times to shake the cramp out of my thumb using that pin vice. I used Dap plastic wood, wood filler, even though the instructions said to use Elmers. Which I couldn't find. But given the age of the instructions, I'm not surprised. The Dap is a water-based silica wood filler. As you can see in the pics below, the natural wood color really matched the wood used for the model. I was a bit concerned, after I sanded it, that due to the color closeness, the staining process would show no difference in color and thus I wouldn't be able to see the work I did. But I'm happy to say that there was enough of a difference in the color that it is seen but not over the top. I also did not use the stain the instructions recommended. When I did a test stain on some scrap wood using the color recommended, it looked horrible, so I went with Varathane summer oak. I think I got the "Ochre" look pretty close. Not the same as painting, but it's stain. The two are much different. Hope this helps you in your build.

I'm enjoying this kit as well. Doing a few things I've never done on other kits. Guess I'm building my skill level. I don't know about you, but I'll be entering unchartered territory when I start putting the copper on. Never did that before.

It's been a while since I posted. Been busy moving forward and some personal issues. But here is an update. Honestly, not a lot to talk about at this point. Simply follow the instructions as they are printed. Keep the planks straight and don't let them waver down the line. This is even more important as the planks begin coming into the stern area. I've already put in some extra pieces to make sure the planks stay straight. These bottom planks will get sanded once I finish the rest of the planking process. No need to do it now anyways. You will note that now that I've put in the double plank, you will now start to cut them as they would on the real ship. Remember, the planks underneath are a single piece of wood.

I keep moving forward. Thought I'd add this one post while working on the planking. Not sure if others to this, but I have found that as the ribs start angling down to the keel, right where that angling starts, that if I bevel the top inside of the plank, that it fits better against the previous wood plank. But that's just me. Thought I'd share.

Making progress. Got the exterior gunwales completed. The cannon port Jib definitely helped. Still had to do a little square filing, but not a ton. Then a little overall sanding to even everything up. Looks like my planking lined up better than I had hoped. Happy with that. I really don't have much wisdom to pass along in these steps. Simply follow the instructions. and the sides with the slight edge on each cannon port to allow for the port doors to close well.

Well, I can't take credit for the idea, it came from redshadowrider. My jig is not as pretty as his, he's far more professional than I am, but the concept was the same.

Started the wall work around the ports. I created a jig, (Idea from another builder) to put in the gun ports with a 1/32 frames so as to make the cannon ports the appropriate size and take a lot of the guess work out. I think the most difficult plank was the ones at the bottom of the gun ports because not only did you have to notch out the gun ports but also the oar ports. That one plank was definitely the most difficult. Following are the pics with the jigs, the plank notching and sanding. I know you see a large nail file in one pic, but I didn't use it. I ended up using my smaller metal jeweler files. Let me know if you have any questions.

Decided to post this work a bit earlier as this chapter is very crucial to the model. Got the ports painted red. I did the Batton lines marked, then I used my plank holder clips to hold the batton in place as I tried to fit on the 7 gunwal planks. I think I nailed it as the 7 boards fit right to the top of the ribs as they should. Either I got luckier than I should be or the building skills are coming back after my hiatus.

Okay, next chapter done. This chapter was a bit shorter than others but no less important. The manual said to be careful not to break the stern posts, so I was very careful. Ended up breaking the glue lines of the cannon ports twice. Luckily, they were clean breaks, and I was able to super glue them back into place. I was pleasantly surprised I was able to make the stern posts actually line up. I usually don't have that kind of skill or luck. LOL Then there are the two cannon ports. This was probably the most difficult part according to the instructions, and I would agree. Had to use a combination of my large nail files and my smaller jeweler files. It was during this step that I broke two different tops of the cannon ports. But like I said, they broke at the glue line with no wood damage, so it was a simple glue back into place. I do suggest taking your time here, it is difficult to hold the ship framing and file these extra stern pieces as they are. I put two pieces of scrap wood in from my Niagara build here. I see some people used a piece of wood to fill in the entire back. Instructions say either is fine. I see some people built the stern piece detached and then put it in place, but I don't think you can add these extra pieces of wood until the stern is in place. So take your time.

Okay, finished the carronade and oar port framing. Took a bit longer than I expected but it's done. Got a lot of wood sanded and cut off the framing pieces. I don't have a lot of advice as I finished this chapter. My biggest advice is to read all the way through the chapter to make sure you know the dimensions of both ports. The instructions didn't give you those until almost the last paragraph. I also made a jig for each of the ports, so uniformity was met. Without further ado, here are the pics of my work. The instructions said to cut out this rib but I decided to cut and sand just enough so it would frame in the top of the oar port. The instructions want you to completely remove it and leave it free floating. I thought this would make for a stronger frame.

Okay, here's a warning! I thought my bulkheads were rather straight / perpendicular to the false keel, but apparently, three of my bulk heads are not. Not a big deal when putting in the top and bottoms of the gun ports. Buuuuuutt, when you are trying to make sure the gun ports line up across the ship from each other, while putting in the side walls of the guns, it makes a difference. So, I had to go back to the last properly lined up bulkhead and measure from there. Used the nice big prints to do the measuring. The instructions want you to cut out gun port sacrificially paper for this, but since those three didn't glue in properly, that trick wouldn't work. Took a little extra time to get both sides lined up; but I think I got it. Luckily it was only 3 bulkheads, but it still made for extra work. We'll have to see how the sweep ports line up next. So, I used a strip of wood that make up the gun port sides and basically eyeballed it. But only after careful measuring. Belts and suspenders. See pics below.

Okay, I said I would only post at the end of the chapters, but this first step took so long I thought I'd post some up to date pics. I've got the tops and bottoms of the gun ports glued in and sanded. Had a few issues in the sanding process. Like while I was sanding the insides and outsides, I accidently ended up sanding the tops of the ribs, which ended up putting divots in the ribs and I had to fill in my oopsies with some thin wood strips and sanded them down into shape. You will see the corrections in the second and last pics. I ran a piece of wood up and down the sides to make sure there was a smooth transition up and down the sides. I was a little upset with myself, but frankly it was an honest oops. So, this is where I am up to now. I also accidentally lost my book of instructions. I always kept the book sitting on top of my wood box of special X-acto knives just to the left side of my work bench. Then POOF... gone. Looked all over the place multiple times. Oh, I was so upset with myself. So, I panicked for a bit but got onto model expo's web site, found the Syren link and thank goodness, the instructions were in a pdf format for downloading. Boy did that save my BUTT!

I just took a measurement, and it looks like I got it correct. I wish the instructions were a little clearer on that when doing this step. Even though this is my third wood ship build, I'm still probably way too cautious. The Niagara I built didn't make me as nervous as this one is.

I have been following your build. Rather closely too. I like your work and appreciate your tips and experiences.

Never minds guys. I reread the instructions and read forward into chapter 4 about the batton line and now I understand it better. Moving forward.

Quick question on the batton line vs. sill wood. I've looked at two different WIP sites and see two different processes. So I need another explanation or clarification for putting in the sill wood. I saw one person seemed to put his sill touching with the batton wood. But for my build, that seemed too low according to the middle cut laser line on the wood that makes up the gun whalls (SP?) As seen in these first two pics. But when I read the instructions, or at least thought I read them correctly, it seemed that the top of the sill (SP?) should line up with the middle laser line and site at the same level as the rib that crosses over the FB board. As shown below. It would seem that the batton wood was really in place to make sure the ribs form a nice line for lining up the ribs and curvature for the hull. So which version is correct? I'm leaning towards the sill wood should line up with the middle laser line. When I hold a piece of wood where the top of the gun port would go, it seems to make the required 15/32 measured opening. Opinions / suggestions?