Mike Y

Now there are two fresh logs of 74! Quite a thing to follow! Thanks for sharing the details, experience and methods. Your build logs are very educating, I learned a lot from them. Planning to learn even more from this one! Also, considering the size of your models, I am really curious how they look in the interior. They are as big as a table, how do you manage to find a place for the display?

Yes, the IKEA table BEKANT is great, I still love it as on the first day I bought it Note that IKEA sells the electrical frame separately as well, so you can put any solid tabletop on it, and not being limited to the default office-style top. Just a few corrections: 1) The one with cranking mechanism have a much cheaper frame and wobbles too much for our purposes, I think. Could be good enough for drawings or tools, or if you do not mind the wobble. The electrical (bekant) is very stable and the wobble is close to non-existing, so it can be used as a main workbench. 2) The electrical one (BEKANT) has a continuous adjustment, not just 2 or 3 positions. There are two buttons - up and down - that allow to adjust it to any position between min and max. Just hold the button, table moves, release it when you are in the desired position. It is roughly 5-7sec from the lowest to the highest position.

I was also planning to make a boat of this style (one side fully planked, one in bare frames), following the similar style of the model. But now I see it implemented in your model - and it indeed looks great! Thanks for confirmation!

Looking forward for the photoshoot of the finished model! It is a true marvel, accuracy and colours are incredible.

Looks great!

Your speed is impressive! How many hours per week do you spend on the model?

That was too quick! What are the plans for the next project? Or you would take the display case build first?

Chuck, this is such a shame! I truly feel sorry for what happened with your designs. Quite some russians are stuck in the anti-american soviet mindset, where screwing up a westerner is not a problem, maybe even a good thing. Just give it 25-35 years, the problem will disappear naturally.. Not sure if it was an optimistic statement or not

The blocks look amazing! What is that chuck on your Proxxon mill? And a few curiously looking milling bits that you used for that blocks Do you mind sharing s link to them?

The frames are soo thin! Eagerly waiting for the hull fairing part

If you do not use any finish - how do you avoid fingerprints that sometimes tend to leave darker (oliy/greasy) spots on the wood? That natural look is awesome, but is it possible to maintain for a long time?

Bob, the model looks great! I can't imagine building that many frames, you ended up with a bery sweet hull after all! Is there a build log? Can't find it in your signature

Ordered few times from them - no problems, quick service, even in english!

Thank you, some good finds there!

This is a true dream shop. Congratulations! Now looking forward to see the build log of a model from the shop!

Yes, it is not StewMac, that is why I was giving a link to avoid confusion. But should have been more clear. Well, for all the good purchases I did recently, there should be a bad one as well!

Got this tool today: http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/132022884833?_trksid=p2060353.m2749.l2649&ssPageName=STRK%3AMEBIDX%3AIT Do not buy it. The height adjustment is crap, it floats by itself due to the vibration, so you need to carefully hold the height adjustment knobs. That makes the depth not very accurate, if that is important.

Aha, thanks! Yes, you are right, that could be a good plane in the middle!

Well, I am not only using it on a model scale, it is mostly intended for something between real woodworking and model scale. This photo should give an idea, block plane for scale. There are two choices because I already have a block plane, and buying something similarly sized is not reasonable. So jack plane that can also be good for jointing the boards along the grain (cross grain low angle block plane is good and big enough). On the other end, I have no troubles jointing it with block plane and a straight edge.

Ok, now I feel it is a right place to ask I have a Veritas low angle block plane, and looking for something to flatten small boards. There are two options: 1) buy an optional tote and a knob for the block plane (such thing exists! See http://www.leevalley.com/us/wood/page.aspx?p=41715&cat=1,41182,48942 ) 2) Buy a veritas low angle jack plane and an additional 38 degree blade (for smoothing). Keep in mind it is a bevel up blade, so angles sum up. Second option is quite expensive though.. Block plane path is cheaper, but it only has 25deg blade. I can do scraping for smoothing, though. Ok the other hand, my boards are typically as long as the jack plane, or even shorter - so the jack could be be too large for my purposes. But could be used for jointing due to its length... So far using a block plane and a shooting board for jointing. Would appreciate some thoughts from a more experienced craftsman here!

Grant, Carl, Brian - thank you! Oops, I made a typo in the link. Corrected it, now it should work.

Thanks for the encouragement! We are reading all comments together, and it really makes her surprised that some People From All Over The World are watching her progress Progress was really slow, but for a good reason - we were busy with lots of other activities. From now on, most of the photos are described by Daria, and I am my few cents where necessary: Daria: here I am cleaning up the glue with dremel, so we will be able to glue some other parts on it My comment: making sure that using proper safety gear is a habit and not something "weird". That was easy, since at the moment she wants to be like a dad, and if dad wears safety glasses and respirator - then she will do it as well Of course the fit is not good, the respirator is basically useless if it does not fit the face properly, so I am not doing any dusty work when she is around. Daria: we steamed the hull sides with boiling water so they could be bent. We do everything without mistakes (trying to) Daria: I am building a city here, myself, without any help. My dad gave me a lot of small wood pieces. There is a man in this city, a kite, and one butterfly. This city is imaginary. It also has a trampoline, airport and few small ships. That ships sail by themselves, they know where to go. Daria: here we are gluing the right side of the hull and then we clamp it. Clamping was very tricky! Daria: we will build a box, I will help as well. I already used a hand plane to smoothen the wood plank! I selected the most interesting parts of the planks - one looked like butterfly, one like sun, and another one like a squirrel tail! My comment: I was really pleased that she got the idea of a wood figure, and prefers some interesting parts ("sun", "butterfly" and "squirrel") instead of just a smooth part of the plank without any figure. My previous epoxy fill was not very good, lots of bubbles, so I am redoing it properly this time, using torch to quickly get rid of all bubbles. So there would be a delay again - this time to make a jewellery box, exactly like I did for my wife (photos are here: http://imgur.com/a/7fNCc ), but smaller. I promised, now need to deliver

Spent the last few weekends procrastinating, working on a workbench improvements. It all started with a problem of fixing wooden boards to the table. Clamps are not really good enough, especially if you start planing. But any sort of bench vice is too ugly for the living room, and there is a door to the kid room right next to the table - so it is not convenient to have a large handle. And then I discovered Veritas inset vice. Yes, that was perfect for the purpose! Nice, elegant, small handle. To install it, a large mortise needs to be made in the table top. Started with drilling away most of the material. The rest was removed with a router bit and dremel. Routing freehand is super scary! But works: Then a small "frame" was made with a miniature router plane and a block plane: I severely underestimated the efforts required to make a mortise with the tools I have. It took too many hours and too much dust Since my table top is not thick enough (not enough wood left under the mortise) I reinforced it with thick plywood located under the vice, fixed to the table top with glue and lots of thick dowels: Done! It is flush with the surface (I even made it 1mm below the surface), and the handle is unlikely to be a problem even on a way to the kid room: When used, bench dog (hand made) is inserted into a hole, and a small jaw is inserted into the vice: Uses are many. Starting from fixing the model in a jig (very little pressure is required, so I do not think the jig or hull will deform): Ending with planing the wood. This beautiful walnut board with epoxy-filled cracks was waiting for the vice to be planed. Finally done!

Thanks for the tip! Read it a bit too late, just finished routing freehand, which is terrbile Will buy one soon, nice tool!

Semi-offtopic. Finished the jewelry box, the build log is here if somebody is interested: http://imgur.com/a/7fNCc That was an interesting practice, took longer than expected. Totally new skill of turning a non-square non-flat warped piece of wood and making it square, flat and parallel on all sides. Jointing and planing, something not frequently used in the ship modelling! Also, my standard way of "cutting an oversized part and sanding it to shape later on" does not work on that scale, so there were much more careful calculations and cutting to final dimensions from the first attempt. Well, maybe shaving 0.5mm from some risky pieces with the block plane.. First time I used OSMO Polyx (http://www.osmouk.com/sitechapter.cfm?chapter=82&page=247) as a wood finish. It is surprisingly good - dries fast, easy to apply, the end result is really strong. Will test it on a small scale, might be a good finish for the model. Anybody has an experience with OSMO as a ship modelling finish?