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wefalck

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Everything posted by wefalck

  1. I think my great-grandfather and my grand-aunt would have commended you on the leatherwork - they ran a glove-factory (until they had to give in to the Asian competition). Very neat.
  2. Seems that the Chines make quite reasonable ones at a reasonable price - some of my colleagues have been quite impressed. This offer is from NL, but it originates in China. It bit of searching on ebay should turn up an offer closer to home: https://www.ebay.de/itm/Dental-Labor-Marathon-Micromotor-35K-rpm-Zahntechnik-Straight-Contra-Handstück/121242068474
  3. I think the question was what to do with the lines that attach to the sails, if the sails are unbent. Those lines that attach to the lower corners of square sails are often hooked together, forming a sort of triangle in mid-air. Clew-lines have a figure-of-eight knot made into their end and let run up to the block, ready to be re-attached to the cringles in the foot of the sail, when it is bent.
  4. Can't comment on Baltimore-Clippers, but in general nibs and hooks are cut in a way so as not to get sharp angles. More or less 90° angles are preferred, because they are safer to caulk.
  5. That's the trouble of working at such a large scale: you can/have to represent all the details, but things are only an eighth of size ... 😏 Good job on the 'leathering' !
  6. A foot control is a good idea for any power-tool in the workshop. I run all my machines off foot-switches, of the momentary kind, i.e. when you lift the foot, the current is interrupted immediately. Keeps your hands free for the work and if something goes wrong, you just lift your foot from the pedal. As I have it in front of the transformer for hand-held tools, it also saves energy, as the transformer is not running all the time.
  7. Yes, got a couple of those Barraquer needle holders somehow secondhand for a fraction of the price in the ebay-offers. Mine, unfortunately are not lockable, but one can improvise a lock by sliding an oval ring over them. One has to keep an eye open for those chirurgical and particularly ophtalimic surgery instruments. Have also micro-scissors of different sizes from that realm and they come to good use in rigging.
  8. I love this metal-work, looks like the real cast thing ! One thing that occurred to me: the open end of the shackles looks a bit wide, which results in the shackled being pulled in an oblique direction to the bolt; in real life this could result in the bolt being bent, so that one cannot unshackle it anymore ...
  9. For put squares (or hexagons) onto the end of round material, there is the classical solution watchmakers use (for the watch winding stems), the 'double roller filing rest'. Here is a picture from the Internet (as I didn't have a picture of mine to hand): Source: http://www.myford-lathes.com/ The above is shop-made, but in the old days watchmakers lathes came with them. You also need a way to index the headstock of the lathe (an indexing plate was integrated into the pulley of watchmakers lathes). A more artisanl way is to find a pin-vise with a square nut, hold the nut down onto the work-table and try to hold the file as horizontal as you can while filing. It is a good idea to use a file with a 'safe-edge' for this, i.e. a file that does not have teeth on the narrow side. I have done dozens of square and hexagonal (with a hexagonal nutted pin-vice) like this, before I had a lathe.
  10. I am making 'ropes' on my ropewalk from fly-tying thread. The the finest (16/0) gives a rope of about 0.04 mm diameter. This thread is available in many different colours, e.g. silvery grey for steel-wire, black, and beige. Check out the building-log for my Zuiderzee-Botter, where I used these ropes. They can be stiffened with clear varnish - better than using glue, because the varnish can be softened with the appropriate solvent (not acrylic varnish !). The rope coils etc. on the botter-model are shaped with varnish. Such rope would be an alternative to the twisted wire in the method described above.
  11. Though a tempting idea, you will find sooner or later that combination machines are a pain, at least for those who regularly use the machines. Often one has to perform turning and milling operations on the same part, which means that you have to break down one set up for the sake of another. With time you will get fed up by this, because you not only have to reconfigure the machine, but also to adjust it etc. Such machines are good for emergency repairs or such, say on a ship, where you wouldn't need a full-blown workshop.
  12. It is dead easy and quite cheap to find copper wire down to 0.05 mm and molybdenum wire down to 0.03 mm diameter on ebay - bought recently a whole batch from various Chines sources. They often deliver within a few days, at least here in Europe. wires.co.uk also sells pre-tinned copper wire that might come handy here. Not as cheap as simple copper wire.
  13. To elaborate a bit: - take copper or molybdenum (easy to find on ebay and stiffer than copper) wires of appropriate diameter and twist to lengths together, this is your (wire) rope; drill two holes of the distance of the blocks into a waste piece of wood and insert two pins of the diameter of your blocks; wind the wire rope you made around them to simulate the tackle - one end will begin at the lower block and the other end will run across the rollers on the davit; take the wire off the jig and stick paper roundels at the appropriate place to simulate the blocks; for double blocks you would actually need three roundels each; the top block will also need a short piece of wire or a loop attached to the davit; you can now attach the whole assembly to the davit.
  14. Do you have a copy of Lloyd McCaffery's book 'Shipbuilding in Miniature' ? He describes, together with a picture, how he constructs such tackles from twisted wire. The rope made from wire is shaped around a rig and paper discs representing blocks are glued to the sides. The whole thing than forms a more or less rigid assembly that is installed at the desired place.
  15. Interesting design and mechanically quite complex for something installed on the deck of a ship. The design seems to be somehow inspired by the steam-pump design for fire-engines, which had to be very compact. The cross-head there slides in frame perpendicular to the piston rod. I wondering whether the elaborate cams drive two-stage pumps: suction pumps become very ineffective say above 7 m or so; by dividing the height over which the water is to be lifted into two stages, you can achieve greater lifting heights. The cams would help timing the movements of the pistons. Just some wild ideas ...
  16. Nice solution indeed, it looks much more ship-shape now 👍
  17. Some sort of wooden bolsters left and right atop the holes might do the job. Isn't there any respective information on the prototype ?
  18. That would make it even worse, the two stream systems would mix in a chaotic way ...
  19. Perhaps you can post a picture of your problem ? Using a jig, as Pat suggested, is a good idea. One then can stabilise the assembled tackle with clear varnish and install it as a unit.
  20. I am not commenting on the workmanship, it speaks for itself ... However, something looks odd to me - I am sure it is according to the plans, namely that there is a screw-well in front of the rudder, while this seems to be twin-screwed vessel. Such a screw-well would cause a lot of turbulences and cross-flows in front the rudder. Is there any rationale, why this was designed that way ? One explanation, I could think of myself is that improves the turning capability - for the same reason tugs had cut large openings cut into the 'dead-wood' in front of the screw. Any thoughts on this ?
  21. Cute little model to come 👍 Just wondering, why you tore out the bulkheads in areas where they would not be visible anyway ? As others commented already, it is a pity that most of the internal structure put in later will be hidden.
  22. That's Dutch style, the setting-up of the forestay. However, I had exactly the same thought as 'druxey'. The Dutch drill(ed) holes through the stem (which is normally then wider at the top as for those of other nations), which is akin to a fixed dead-eye. I don't comment on the quality of the work, it speaks for itself ...
  23. Both, the sail-plan as well as the underwater body have centres of gravity that shift with the ship heeling and the number and position of sails. As all sailors know, you can change a ships tendency to turn into the wind or away from it by adding or taking away sails at different positions of the rig. This is why certain sails may not be set under certain conditions. Also, on a square-rigged ship certain sails under certain conditions will blanket other sails. In fact, they would not be of use or even detrimental due to increased turbulence and friction. Thus, you often see the main-sail being clewed up or furled in order to not blanket the fore-sail.
  24. A bottom speed of 8000 rpm seems to me also way to fast for brass. I would think 4000 rpm should be the maximum. For wood and two- or single-lip-endmills the 8000 rpm would be ok. Just wondering, whether the bearings on the spindle are actually rated for such high rpms ?
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