Mike Y

Thanks Druxey and Alan! Sometimes a little nudge is all we need Toni, it feels similar to pear or box when it comes to hardness, definitely not soft. Holds an edge pretty well, but despite a clean geometrical shape the edge blurs visually due to the grain of the wood. But definitely an interesting wood to have in your palette. Will report in a couple of months on the way it ages!

Experimenting with different woods for the Pillars in the Hold. Thought it might be a good opportunity to use Pink Ivory that I had in the stash for some reason. It is a very beautiful wood with pink shavings, indeed! A simple jig really helps to hold these tiny pieces when shaping. Scraping is a great way to get a smooth surface with a clean edge! Completed test pieces. The one with a tenon was finished with Osmo Polyx and the one on the left (with no tenon) has no finish. For colour comparison I made a photo on top of some pear parts (one finished and one - a rough sheet cutoff) Pink Ivory has a clearly pronounced grain resembling walnut, clearly out of scale. Though pillars in the hold definitely have a rough life I might still go with it, it might add an interesting accent deep in inside the hull when viewed from the side: As most of such woods it would likely loose its beautiful colour when exposed to UV, and would likely become brown-ish. I left these test pieces exposed on the table and will check them in a couple of months. Does anyone have any experience with this wood? What do think on the colour? I don't want my model to look like a clown car, but a bit of variety might not hurt

Tools update time! A friend printed some vacuum adapters for me The one for the planer works like a charm! Using the model from Oliver (see https://modelshipworld.com/topic/36705-suction-adapter-for-the-proxxon-dh40-for-download) Table saw received an update as well, the factory design is squeezing all the air through a narrow opening, generating a whistling noise louder than the actual saw. Now the opening is opened up, so the air can flow freely with a nice wind noise Link to the model: https://www.thingiverse.com/thing:4742157 Since I was short on space - decided to make the adapter removable, on magnets. To improve the connection a groove should be machined. It was impossible to clamp that soft plastic part on the lathe, it was just sliding out of the chuck So I milled it on the rotary table. A single flute mill makes a dramatic difference - the dual flute quickly jams with a blob of melted plastic, while a single flute cuts clear separated chips (that are light, fly all over the place and get stuck to everything, argh). The resulting performance is not as great as on the planer, some dust still escapes, but it is still a great improvement comparing to the default adapter. Can absolutely recommend both upgrades, especially the planer!

This definitely looks repairable (replacing only these particular frames), Isopropyl Alcohol is a common solution - it dissolves the glue and then evaporates without leaving a trace, allowing you to replace the parts without going for a full rebuild! Hope to see you back in this log after a well deserved break 😊

Nah, I just borrowed a phone selfie stick / tripod contraption from my teenage daughter and used a "photo timer" feature on the phone It is an essential item for her, how would you do some outdoor selfies and group photos otherwise?

Read some advices elsewhere on MSW on "3 inches from each side", but please learn from my mistakes - make a cardboard mockup in real size, put it on the future display location, etc. Trying to understand your display case dimensions from a CAD model or theoretical calculations is a path to failure, don't ask me how I know (my "aquarium" is 1.5x larger than envisioned )

Ok, the modelling block is over, decided to ignore that dip and make a normal straight lower deck like on all the other ships: Remaining beams are cut out of boxwood. Cutting curved blanks really makes a big difference, I extracted 10 planks from the same width of a sheet instead of the previous 6. They are rough from the bandsaw, but milling setup takes care of it, and the result are nice and smooth beams Marking beam locations was a bit nerve-wracking. Pencil was not precise enough when working on such angle, but a marking knife is perfect for that job. Taking a lot of care to not scratch anything around... Finally! I can go back to building instead of overthinking

Thank you both. Druxey, I tried imagining it in 3d (also using Swan and Pandora 3d drawings to help imagining it), and still can't imagine the dip being in place there. I'm likely reading too much into the plans. According to Hahn's book (Ships of American Revolution) the proposed alterations were implemented in reality, and the ship went into British service with all of them in place. Would not doubt his research, definitely not the can of archived worms that I want to open His book does not mention anything on the lower deck details, they were omitted entirely from his model.

Officer quarters are on the "second floor", right above the dotted line. So this modification actually makes their cabins smaller while increasing the headroom below, in the hold. The "step" is around the area with ladders that get down to the hold. Of course I can just remove that extra beam and continue the deck in straight and fair line, like so. But it feels wrong to just "fix" any weird quirk you find on your ship. Strong feeling that I am just misreading the plans and it has a purpose, but I can't find any similarities with similar vessels of that period...

Thanks a lot for the ideas! After looking into Swan's and others layouts the rectangles are now solved - these should be the Fish Room hatches. The only mystery remaining is that step down between two adjacent beams (marked with a question mark in my previous post). It does not look like a sloppiness of a draftsman, he could have easily continued the dotted line to join the "proposed alternation" with the rest of the deck. But he kept those separate on purpose...

Patience paid off! Warm welcome back, enjoy re-learning some forgotten skills The model aged nicely, like the way boxwood deck structure looks like. It got some tan!

Thanks a lot, Oliver! Printed it and can confirm that it works great, even better than expected! I could not find any chips escaping the suction, let allone any fine dust 😊 and no weird noises, the air flows straight and the adapter is very very quiet, you can feel the whole system breathing properly. I increased the dust port height to fit the rubber Proxxon adapter a bit better. Otherwise no modifications were required. Nevermind the rough look when printed with a large nozzle, some construction fairing putty on the inside help with a smooth airflow. Thanks for sharing it with the community!

It is time to understand the internals of the ship's lower deck... And it is not easy, even after spending hours with the drawings (both Hahn and NMM archive plans) and my beloved TFFM books. Would really appreciate help from the audience 🤓 Some conventions of the Admiralty drafts are elusive for me, hopefully make sense for colleagues with research experience. Brief background: after the capture the ship was surveyed and slightly modified, and I am building the post-modified, Beaver's Prize version of the ship. The relevant bit: "Lower decks were altered to provide more space" The aft section of the lower deck raises a lot of questions.. Here are Hahn's plans reflecting the original ship, note the strange step in the run of the lower deck. I guess it was done to improve the headroom in the officer cabins? Is that really common? Looks like a hack But once I started looking in the Admiralty drawings from NMM (ZAZ4296 and ZAZ4297) the picture got even more complicated: (the modifications are in dotted lines, that's what I am aiming for). 1) That strange step is still there, but the very next beam is raising the floor back, so it looks like a trap designed to make people trip? Why not just continue the deck in a straight and fair line? 2) Additional beams are added and the deck continues further aft, making the Breadroom significantly smaller. I guess the "additional space" was not for provisions, but for officers, makes sense 3) Btw, what are these highlighted sections on the deck draft? Are these gratings, or scuttles, or ladder ways? Here are two plans aligned: And the last one - what are these two rectangles? Meanwhile I keep cutting some wood while trying to avoid a modelling block because of these puzzles And surely there would be more of those going forward...

I can only imagine how satisfying the fairing would be! There is some real beauty hiding underneath these rough sanded parts 😊

Thanks for the feedback and thoughts! Brad, I will aim for some contrast indeed, do not like the bland look of monotone models where all elements are done in the same wood shade. At the same time not likely to paint anything, except some black wales and railings. Giampieroricci's Pegasus is a great example of that - a couple of contrasting wood tones, black trim. Potentially planking above the wales would be slightly darker (light pear?) than the one below (boxwood). The trickiest part is that the visual taste would evolve over years of the build, so a style that I decide on now might get ugly by the time the model is completed..