dvm27

Scratch building is chock full of learning experiences. Hopefully you are using PVA glue which is easily debonded with isopropyl alcohol. May I suggest you prepare a test scarph joint with your tissue paper then debond it with PVA. I'm suggesting this because some papers I tried actually created a black mess during the debonding process and ruined the piece. Of course if you are planning to build a perfect, error free model this is not a concern but I buy my alcohol by the gallons. Also test the finish you propose to use to make sure it doesn't make the tissue paper bleed. Finally, I have found that using thicker tissue paper results in a weaker joint. Perforating the tissue paper prior to gluing the mating segment seems to help this. As well make sure to use treenails or brass fastening to reinforce these joints.
 
You're off to a great start!

Scratch building is chock full of learning experiences. Hopefully you are using PVA glue which is easily debonded with isopropyl alcohol. May I suggest you prepare a test scarph joint with your tissue paper then debond it with PVA. I'm suggesting this because some papers I tried actually created a black mess during the debonding process and ruined the piece. Of course if you are planning to build a perfect, error free model this is not a concern but I buy my alcohol by the gallons. Also test the finish you propose to use to make sure it doesn't make the tissue paper bleed. Finally, I have found that using thicker tissue paper results in a weaker joint. Perforating the tissue paper prior to gluing the mating segment seems to help this. As well make sure to use treenails or brass fastening to reinforce these joints.
 
You're off to a great start!

Many thanks, Greg. I must admit I hadn't given any consideration to either of those points about the tissue paper so I am glad you raised those questions! I did some further tests today and I'm pleased to say that the tissue paper I have seems to be colourfast - I didn't have any problems with it either in debonding a join with isotropy alcohol or with adding a coating of wipe on poly, so it looks as though I was lucky 😀

Scratch building is chock full of learning experiences. Hopefully you are using PVA glue which is easily debonded with isopropyl alcohol. May I suggest you prepare a test scarph joint with your tissue paper then debond it with PVA. I'm suggesting this because some papers I tried actually created a black mess during the debonding process and ruined the piece. Of course if you are planning to build a perfect, error free model this is not a concern but I buy my alcohol by the gallons. Also test the finish you propose to use to make sure it doesn't make the tissue paper bleed. Finally, I have found that using thicker tissue paper results in a weaker joint. Perforating the tissue paper prior to gluing the mating segment seems to help this. As well make sure to use treenails or brass fastening to reinforce these joints.
 
You're off to a great start!

Scratch building is chock full of learning experiences. Hopefully you are using PVA glue which is easily debonded with isopropyl alcohol. May I suggest you prepare a test scarph joint with your tissue paper then debond it with PVA. I'm suggesting this because some papers I tried actually created a black mess during the debonding process and ruined the piece. Of course if you are planning to build a perfect, error free model this is not a concern but I buy my alcohol by the gallons. Also test the finish you propose to use to make sure it doesn't make the tissue paper bleed. Finally, I have found that using thicker tissue paper results in a weaker joint. Perforating the tissue paper prior to gluing the mating segment seems to help this. As well make sure to use treenails or brass fastening to reinforce these joints.
 
You're off to a great start!

Scratch building is chock full of learning experiences. Hopefully you are using PVA glue which is easily debonded with isopropyl alcohol. May I suggest you prepare a test scarph joint with your tissue paper then debond it with PVA. I'm suggesting this because some papers I tried actually created a black mess during the debonding process and ruined the piece. Of course if you are planning to build a perfect, error free model this is not a concern but I buy my alcohol by the gallons. Also test the finish you propose to use to make sure it doesn't make the tissue paper bleed. Finally, I have found that using thicker tissue paper results in a weaker joint. Perforating the tissue paper prior to gluing the mating segment seems to help this. As well make sure to use treenails or brass fastening to reinforce these joints.
 
You're off to a great start!

Scratch building is chock full of learning experiences. Hopefully you are using PVA glue which is easily debonded with isopropyl alcohol. May I suggest you prepare a test scarph joint with your tissue paper then debond it with PVA. I'm suggesting this because some papers I tried actually created a black mess during the debonding process and ruined the piece. Of course if you are planning to build a perfect, error free model this is not a concern but I buy my alcohol by the gallons. Also test the finish you propose to use to make sure it doesn't make the tissue paper bleed. Finally, I have found that using thicker tissue paper results in a weaker joint. Perforating the tissue paper prior to gluing the mating segment seems to help this. As well make sure to use treenails or brass fastening to reinforce these joints.
 
You're off to a great start!

Scratch building is chock full of learning experiences. Hopefully you are using PVA glue which is easily debonded with isopropyl alcohol. May I suggest you prepare a test scarph joint with your tissue paper then debond it with PVA. I'm suggesting this because some papers I tried actually created a black mess during the debonding process and ruined the piece. Of course if you are planning to build a perfect, error free model this is not a concern but I buy my alcohol by the gallons. Also test the finish you propose to use to make sure it doesn't make the tissue paper bleed. Finally, I have found that using thicker tissue paper results in a weaker joint. Perforating the tissue paper prior to gluing the mating segment seems to help this. As well make sure to use treenails or brass fastening to reinforce these joints.
 
You're off to a great start!

Once again, Thank You for your kind comments !
 

Again, real life including (business) travels got in the way of progress on this project. In addition, while I was having dinner in a restaurant together with colleagues, suddenly some ‘floaters’ appeared in one eye. I went immediately to the eye-doctor, who checked my eyes thoroughly. Luckily the floaters are harmless, but annoying signs of age. No retina-detachment or something else serious. Apparently, they can spontaneously disappear or the brain sort of ignores them after a while – keep fingers crossed. For the moment they are quite bothering, when working on really small things … so on to the ensign.
 
************************************
 
The Imperial German Navy Ensign

This ensign was first conceived for the navy of the North-German Alliance (Norddeutscher Bund) in 1867, bringing together the colours of the dominant powers, namely Prussia (black-white) and the Hanseatic City States, Hamburg, Bremen und Lübeck (red-white). The design obviously was inspired by the British White Ensign and makes reference to various medieval symbols, such as the cross of the Teutonic Order, and the more recent Iron Cross from the Napoleonic War. After the proclamation of the 2nd Empire on 18 January 1871, this ensign became also the ensign of the Imperial German Navy and remained it until the end of the Empire in 1919. There have been, however, some smaller modifications over the years, thus the eagle was somewhat modified and in 1902 the arms of the cross were made heavier in order to avoid confusion at distance with the White Ensign of the Royal Navy.
Overall, it is rather complex design to reproduce purely manually. First, I had to find a correct image for the ensign, as it looked in about 1878 and was lucky, as the Internet furnished a digital image of sufficient size and resolution. The idea was to print it on both sides of very thin paper (the kind that was used in the old days for carbon copies on type-writer, of which I kept a small supply). Such paper, however, does not feed well through the laser-printer and aligning for double-sided printing is practically impossible. Therefore, I resorted to so-called transfer-sheets. These are a kind of waxed paper that is used to transfer laser-printouts to T-shirts, mugs and such things. Laser-printer toner is basically carbon-black mixed with some plastics powder. It can be remelted with a heat-source, such as an ironing-iron and thus transferred to another substrate. I also experimented with overhead-sheets, but the results were not as good. 

Printing layout for the ensign (as it would appear on the transfer sheet)
 
In a first step, the red stripe in the flag was eliminated from the image in Photoshop, as it would print grey otherwise. The ensign was then scaled to the right size on the basis of some trial-and-error, as the laser-printer prints a few percent undersize. I then added reference marks some distance from the image and duplicated this for mirroring. Several of these left-right-pairs were arranged on an A4-sheet and then printed onto the transfer-sheet using the highest quality print setting.

Preparing the pouch for double-sided toner-transfer to the ensign-blank
 
Using the best matching pair, I made a small pouch (as you would do for the masks, when producing photo-etched parts), aligning the images against each other for a perfect match on an illuminated board (they can be bought for a few €/£/US$ on ebay et al. and are powered through a USB-charger). An oversized strip of the thin paper was slipped in between and everything taped down onto a piece of thick cardboard.
I pressed down an ironing-iron set to the lowest temperature onto the package, which made the toner firmly stick to the paper and no residues left on the transfer-paper. And voilà, a double-sided printed flag with a very detailed eagle etc.

The toner is (almost) completely transferred to the ensign-blank
 
In the next step the missing red stripe was added using red acrylic paint. I also added colour to the legs and beak of the Imperial Eagle, to the Imperial Insignia and the crown using yellow-ochre acrylic paint. If one has a colour laser-printer this step would not be necessary.
The flag was cut out exactly to size, except for the rear, where it was left a tad longer to provide for a hollow ‘seam’ into which a thread with two loops at the end was laid The seam was glued down with some diluted white glue. This area also needed a bit of touch-up afterwards with black acrylic paint.
 
The ensign before adding the colours
 
Draping the flag is best done or least pre-arranged on the flag-staff. The paper was slightly wetted and the flag laid into diagonal folds in alternate directions. Toothpicks ensured that they became folds and not creases, which would be unnatural. Such a large ensign (2.9 m x 4.96 m) would fully unfold only in a moderate breeze and not in the light wind assumed in the scenic setting. So it flaps lazily in the wind, which I tried to reproduce.

The completed ensign
 
To the thus prepared ensign the halliard was attached as a loop. This loop was taken over the top of the flag-staff and a tiny laser-cut paper disc glued on as truck. There was no way to cross-drill the staff for the halliard. The halliard was belayed on the clamp. With this the assembly is ready for installation on the boat. But I will not hoist the ensign before the crew is on board. The recruitment process is still on-going …

Ensign wetted and shaped
 
Sorry, this was a rather lengthy essay on just and ensign, but the idea was to describe in detail, how to arrive on a reasonably realistic looking flag at such as small scale.
 
The ensign attached to the flagstaff
 
To be continued ....

The mast cap has two openings: a round one for the topmast and a square one for the lower mast head.  There are four eyebolts that extend all the way through the mast cap.  I raided my scrap box for a contrasting color piece of wood.  Both openings were made with a regular drill.  The square opening was then shaped with a chisel and the round one was enlarged with sandpaper wrapped around a dowel.  It will not be installed until much later.

 
Although it also will not be installed for a while, I made the topmast next.  The dimensions of the topmast are determined by the diameter of the lower mast.  The lower end of topmast is 7/10 the diameter of the mast and the upper end is 11/20.  This will be a stub topmast as the actual length of this mast would be 8” on the model.  Its shape is more complicated than the lower mast.  The lowest section (the block) is octagonal, the next section is (the heel) square, followed by another octagonal section.  The upper part of the topmast is round, tapering as it goes to the head.  There are three openings in the mast; the middle one is for the fid (the rectangular peg which prevents the mast from falling between the trestle trees) and the other two are for sheaves.  The kit will contain a template for the topmast.

 
Starting with a ¼” square dowel, I marked out the mast for the various transition points.  Using the 7:10:7 ratio for determining the corners of the octagon, I drew the lines for those two  sections.  The mast taper begins at the end of the upper octagon.  The blue line is the centerline and the red lines are the corners of the octagons.  Just as was done for the main mast, I taped off the square section to protect it from errant chisel cuts.  The pictures shows a completed topmast above a square dowel.  There is extra wood on the top and bottom of the dowel for ease of handling.

 
I used a saw to cut a shallow groove between the octagonal and square areas on the corners of the square section (circled area).  This transition should stay sharp.  The lower octagonal section was shaped with a sanding stick.


The upper octagon and round area were both shaped as octagons, without any taper.


Another piece of tape was used to protect the upper octagon and the upper part of the mast was rounded and tapered. 
After removing the tape, the transition between the octagonal and round sections and between the square and upper octagonal sections were smoothed.
Making the holes for two sheaves and the fid was next.  The upper and lower sheave openings are in the octagonal sections and are 90 degrees to each other and 45 degrees to the fid hole.  The dimensions for the fid opening are one-third the mast diameter high and one-quarter the mast diameter wide, in this case 3” x 2.5”.  The opening was formed from multiple drill holes, squared off with a #11 blade.  The fid was made slightly smaller than the size of the opening and long enough to span the trestle trees.
 
The sheave openings are 8” long and 1.5” wide.  I simulated the sheaves on this model.   These were trickier to drill accurately because they are on angled faces.  Here is how I made them.  The sheave opening was marked on both sides of the mast.  I put the mast in a vise, clamping it in the upper octagonal area, just above the sheave opening.   A small hole was drilled near the top and bottom of the sheave opening but I did not drill completely through the mast.  The mast was repositioned in the vise and the holes on the other side were drilled.  The holes on each side were enlarged to the correct width of the opening.  I did this slowly, working a little bit on one side and then switching to the other side.  The holes eventually met.  Then, using a #11 blade, a shallow groove representing the sheave was formed between the two holes and the “sheave” was painted.   The final step was to cut off the excess wood at the top and bottom of the topmast and apply a finish.


This is how it looked installed. 


 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 

Hi Everyone,
 
Look what arrived today! The entire shipment is due at the warehouse Monday so hopefully we’ll be shipping orders by mid next week!
 
Enjoy the weekend!
 
Mike
 
 

The planking is finished & I've spent a few hours sanding. This planking method (strip planking at scale) was visually messy, so it's very nice to see the hull lines start to become more visible. Although the nature of strip planks (being parallel sided), the planking lines throw the optics of the shape off a bit, as the line of the planks towards the keel don't bear much relation to the hull shape....the planking just follows the ones above with no tapering.
 
The stern photos show the excess hull near the transom - that planking needs to be cut away - as the hull has the sweep down from the upper deck to the height of the transom. Photo below shows that gently curved line of that transition.

 
I'll do a bit more sanding & then start on the keel & outer stem pieces. Also the infill piece that will turn the square cutaway at the stern into the curved propeller cutaway. 
 
They are a fat boat.....

 

 

 

 
plus this for comparison:

 
thanks

Hello,
my finger is so far useable again and so I finished today the bulwark.



 

Thank you for saying...
 
I am trying to set aside time regularly to make a little progress.
 
Continuing with the center line fittings below deck, the WELL was next up.   This is a relatively simple structure.  The four sides are laser cut and etched.  You need to do just a few things before you glue up the four sides.  
 
First...make sure the fore and aft sides sit nicely on the keel.  Once you adjust them as needed,  you can cut the four upright columns to length.   How do you determine the length of these.  The two aft columns are shorter.  These are simply cut to fit under the next deck beam.  No  big deal.   The two columns on the fore side of the well are different and taller.   These two columns are cut so the tops are flush with the TOP of the gun deck beams or carlings.
You will have an opportunity to sand these shorter so dont over sand them initially.

Assembling the well is straight forward after you glue the columns to the port starboard sides of the well ahead of time as shown above.   You can also use some scrap tiny strips of wood to make the toggle handles for the access door.  Then just glue them on.   They are clearly shown on the plans.
 

With the four sides glued up and square...test it on your model.   After any minor tweaks you can glue it position permanently.
 

 
Then the next few gun deck beams, carlings and ledges were taken care of.   Eventually you will get to the beams where the capstan step needs to be built along the center line.  So you will need to stop and assemble the capstan step.   I glued those appropriate deck beams in position so I had a reference point to test fit the step periodically.  The step is also laser cut for you and has a recessed circle in the center.   This will accept the heel of the capstan drum...eventually.
 
The step is bolted to two columns that are set on top of  keel.   These two columns are 1/8" x 1/8" strips just like the other support columns under the beams.   Hopefully you havent forgotten to add any up until now.   They are all shown on the plans.  
 
You must cut the two columns to fit under their respective gun deck beams.   Now you have to determine where along those beams the capstan step will be placed.   You can use the plans of course but it is doubtful it will match your model perfectly.  Mine didnt.   So just understand that the capstan step is slightly higher the lower aft platform and it is level.   Because you know this you can mark the columns for the height of the capstan step with the columns "snug" fit temporarily in position.
 
When I was comfortable that I had the proper height worked out, I was ready to glue it in position.  But first I had to add the simulated bolts on the capstan step.   I used 25 lb black fishing line to simulate these.  And yes the photo shows the step upside down so you can see the hole for the drum.   But rest assured it will be glued in position right-side up!!
 

The capstan step in position...and the carlings added afterwards.
 

And some other views...of the gun deck up to this point with the ledges completed.
 

 


Almost to the other side of the gun deck.  But next up are all of the cabins on the aft lower platform.   Onward and upward as they say!!
 
 
 

Wonderful - simply stunning.
If, now I have retired, I take up international burglary for a pastime, your house (and those fellows Siggi and Archjofo in Germany and Giampieroricci in Italy to name a few) is one I plan to visit. Would you be very kind and send me your address and a list of any days you will be away on holiday?
Many thanks
Fred

Thank you Andy and John.
 
I spent a few hours today completing the rudder (excluding finishes).
 
The shaft is 0.16" diameter while the plate is .04" thick. I therefore needed to machine slots in the the cladding 0.08" radius by  0.06" deep. See blue arrows on next photo. I also cut the plate along the line of the shaft removing a .016" wide strip.
 

The brass pieces were then assembled on the cladding and glued in place using CA glue.


The other side of the gladding was then glued in place forming a brass sandwich.


The rudder is fitted with anodes. All the anodes on Cangarda are of the same flat plate type.  I drilled the holes for later anode attachment.

To get the taper sanding of the cladding symmetrical I employed a flat sheet of aluminium oxide paper and a bulldog clip.

The bulldog clip is holding the front of the rudder clear of the sandpaper and at a constant angle while the taper is sanded. The bulldog clip spring is hard enough to resist the abrasion of the oxide paper. The taper on the front edge of the rudder was formed in a similar manner.



My plan is to get on to the planking next. I expect it to be a long job so if you want to skip it I suggest you rejoin in about 2 months.
 

Thank you for your comments and the likes received, always much appreciated.
 
The waterway has been made and the first planks have found their place on the deck. As Mark already mentioned in his build log, this is a bit tricky because they are twisted and have changing angles. Make decorative strips, measure the height and mark them with the help of tape.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Thank you for your visit and see you soon.

I diverted from the steps in TFFM to build the knee of the head.  I will work on fairing this piece to the stem and then put it away for safekeeping until the fore cants and hawse timbers have been installed.  It still needs to be tapered in both directions and the slot for the gammoning cleaned up a bit.
 
I used druxey's recommendation of painting the edges of the joints brown before gluing.  I like the way it turned out.  I am expecting some powdered brown pigments from the Amazon guy today that I will try mixing with glue going forward.
 
Adam
 

More Sail progress on the Fair American:
I was able to sew several more sails in the last few weeks. The Main Topsail had a lot of cringles to do with the bolt rope, but I got it done.

Cringles have turned out well, just very tedious.

Another one was the Main Course, the biggest sail. This took some time. Again, I didn't add Buntline bands or Middle bands: I'm happy with the detail I've done on the sails thus far.

Repeating the cringle technique again: Sew through the rope itself....

Then loop around and through near the same spot....

Through that loop for a knot....

...and pull tight. Again, not sure of the best technique, but I feel this is a nice secure way of making the cringle.

Another detail I'm adding is the Reef Points - the little dangling ropes from each reef band. There's two per piece of canvas, so I'll follow that from Steel's.  

I'm using the same sewing thread I've been using. Anything else is too out-of-scale looking to me, and I've got lots of it. Now how to attach it so they don't fall out?
I decided to make a two-knot design, at the end of the thread. Making the knots as close together as I could. That way, they'll hold each other from falling out fore or aft from the sail - I hope.

I'd push the needle through the reef band, until I got to the first knot. Then gently popped just one through, until the fore knot was against the reef band. Then I trimmed the thread just above the lower band, to look like how Steel's drawing shows. 

On the aft side, I just trimmed the thread above the knot. 

There's a lot of these!  As I went along, obviously they didn't hang very satisfactorily. They tend to cris-cross each other, looking messy. Straightening them by hand really didn't help. 

But for this Main Topsail, I just got them all done and trimmed. Phew!
Now to help them look dangled, I blotted a small amount of diluted white glue  over the thread with a small brush, then pressed it down to help it 'tack'.  It sort of worked, but not completely (forgot to take picture of the tacked reef points). 

 
I'm almost half done all the sails. The reef points will take time on all the bands too, but I'm making progress.
We'll see how many I complete by next update, but I'm on vacation next week in Cancun so I doubt I'll do much until I'm back and more sunburned.
 
Have a great week!
 
- Jason -
 
 
 

Hi ☺️
 
 last photos before putting the glass on the model

Continuation: Equipment of the mizzen topgallant yard – Vergue de perruche 
After a short creative break, we continue with the equipment of the mizzen topgallant yard. The equipment and rigging elements basically correspond to those of the fore topgallant yard, but again with correspondingly smaller dimensions. The mizzen topgallant tye is also equipped with a hook. At around 4 mm long, this is even smaller than the hook for the tye of the fore topgallant yard. Of course, the eye splice couldn't be missing either. With a rope with a diameter of 0.35 mm (2x3 Japanese silk thread - rope in the original ø 17 mm) this is a difficult matter, but after some practice it is definitely doable. It just looks better and corresponds to the original design.
As already described several times, I use an injection needle as a hollow spike for splicing, with a diameter of 0.8 mm for the thin ropes.

 
In the next picture you can see the mizzen topgallant tye with the double strop and the thimble already tied on to guide the simple clueline.

 
Sequel follows …

It was mentioned earlier that it's best to sand pieces prior to removing the from the billets. The way I do it is with a sanding block. I use 180 the 320 grit sandpaper. It's self-adhesive. It is also handy for finish sanding completed pieces like the stem. I usually use Minwax wipe on poly. My local store was out but they did have Watco satin wipe on poly. I've used other Watco products and liked them so I gave it a try. It's a little thicker than the Minwax but covers nice and looks the same.
 


 
Next I'll start working on the keel. Oh this is fun!

The channels:

I was fortunate enough to have visited the Museum just before it closed. I felt it was one of the best museums I have ever visited. Had the same thought about the Science Museum in England in the late 70's. At least I am fortunate to be so close to the Annapolis Museum where ship models take center stage thanks to a generous grant from an earlier class.

Good morning.