Mike Y

Cracked the reason. My brass was covered with a layer of something transparent, for a nice shiny look.

Brushed it away with a metal disk brush, to expose a bare brass. Now it blackens immediately, as expected! Awesome!

Got it, will experiment with cleaning/sanding/vinegar before blackening. Thanks!

Thanks Dan!

Maybe I should not dilute the blackening agent then?

After 10min, parts were not black at all. Fist sign of blackness appeared after 30min or so.

Blackening liquid arrived (Birchwood Casey), but the first blackening was an epic fail

Blackening just falls off, it do not stick at all. I cant take a piece with fingers or tweetzer, the black patina just sticks to fingers, thats it:

What has go wrong?

My workflow was:

1) put brass parts into acetone for 30min to degrease

2) rinse with water

3) put into blackening liquid diluted with water 1:8

4) wait for 30-60min

5) Actually blackening stopped after 30min, so I added a bit more liquid, maybe it ended up close to 1:6 ratio.

6) removed after 2 hours in liquid

7) rinsed with water

8) left to dry overnight.

Maybe I should use another ratio? Or use distilled water instead of tap one? Or?

Would appreciate any hints!

We should be also careful with comparing that, measurement standards could be different (internal/external could be messed up, for example)

Thanks druxey! It is a big relief, then I can look on similar ships of that period, ignoring their geographical origin (I'm not a historical correctness maniac anyway )

Probably the most efficient way would be to remove all frames, and glue them again using some jig to guarantee a proper alignment. I did a jig with lego bricks, some people use card templates, or evenly sized spacers, etc. It's very hard to do a proper alignment without a jig.

Also, it may sound obvious, but not mentioned in a manual. Shape the inner edge of the plank with a file, to have a better contact between planks, to avoid gaps.

No shaping, there most probably would be a gap:

Shaped planks, no gaps:

P.S.: and, again, do not count on sanding to level your hull and hide planking mistakes. It is purely cosmetic, in that build planks are too thin to be significantly sanded. 

P.P.S.: good luck, and just start it!

Mike -  I thought about using the bulkheads as a "frame" by clamping the planking to them.

BUT,  doesn't that risk getting enough moisture into the bulkheads (from the wet planking strip) to risk warping/swelling?

 

You wipe off all excess water when you pull the soaked plank from the water. So it would be just damp, but not dripping wet.

I had no problems with getting moisture into the bulkheads. 

However, you will need lots of small clamps. There was a nice topic somewhere, about making a simple clamps from a paper clips. Looks like this, and very handy:

But always put a small pieces of scrap wood or card between clamp and plank, basswood is so soft that it would be smashed otherwise.

P.S.: don't overthink it, just get started! There are spare planks in the kit, you have a room for a mistake, especially if you use a glue that could be dissolved with water or alcohol. Planks are attached incorrectly? Not a big deal, tear them away, glue again. I used PVA-style glue, just add a water, glue joint is getting weak, you remove the plank and reuse it again.

The basswood strips from the kit are soft after 10sec soaking in a boiled water. You can bend them with a bare hands, or clamp, etc. 

Just don't glue a wet strip, it will shrink when dried, so you will end up with gaps. 

I usually used a slow technique - soak the plank, pre-bend with fingers, clamp it to the frames to have the same shape as needed, leave it overnight to try, next evening - glue that planks, and soak and fit next pair.

As a result, you glue just 2 planks per day (one on each side), but bending is easy, plank is perfectly fitted when try.

Amazing! Is there a video?

How do you control her? Rotating the masts? 

Matti, with your skills, have you thought about actually making a mast from a multiple pieces, like on a real ship? 

Now it's a true engineering approach!

The future deck clamps (red arrows on a first photo) woud be removed later, or they would carry some weight?

Floyd, it would be even better! Looking forward for photos in your log

Installed oar locks. Their crisp edges a bit in contrast with a smooth hull. I tried to smooth them, but on that scale I can't make it accurately. So let's call it a feature

While making a photos saw how innacurate is the twart moulding... I should have make it from boxwood, but. I had no boxwood back then... And it is deeply in a boat structure, can't find a way to replace twarts without traces.

Well, I will blame that drunk rowers, who was trying to hide contraband in that mouldings!

Congrats on a new tools!

Nice model, that contrast of dark hull and very bright deck looks interesting!

Would be nice to leave a short info - why exactly this book is good

Reading a short description on Amazon give no info about a book content. Blah blah, something about shipmodels, aha, ok, clear

Thanks everybody!

Dave, please keep in mind that I did some things not according to instructions, original Chuck's pinnace will look a bit different. It is all about individual preferences...

Floyd, will start it right after pinnace, but on a slower speed, since it is summer

Prepared all metal parts. Manual suggests to use black paper, but it looks so-so, will use blackened brass instead.

Imitation of bolts is done by bumping it with a dull nail.

Waiting for a blackening liquid to arrive...

Rest of the day was spent on oars. Tricky little things, if you don't have a lathe.

I turned them from a square boxwood stock, holding it with bare fingers. Even on a minimum speed it was hard, now I don't have a fingerprints on a few fingers anymore

When painted, they look cute (no poly yet, will be better after a coat of poly):

Today worked on oar locks. There is a mismatch between photo in instructions and the ship plans, preferred version from plans.

Inspired by Remco build log, decided to switch to "treat every detail as a model" philosophy and no sanding, make things good straight away, do not count on sanding to hide mistakes. And - want to make a tiny thing - make a jig first!

Now I wonder how to apply poly to that tiny pieces... And ideas?

Remco, thanks a lot for a detailed explanation! Will practice that methods

Wow, it is a perfect match! That is what I was looking for.

Indeed, nuts and bolts are for "anatomy of the ship" series and TFFM books, but this one is more historical and high level.

Many thanks!

Is there some good book focusing on ships from engineering point of view, and describing the evolution of a construction process, shipyards? What were the challenges, how the requirements were changing? How the planning phase looked like, what were the engineering methods to calculate characteristics of a future ship when it's just a batch of blueprints? Etc etc  etc..

I saw some small remarks about construction and design process when it comes to a particular ship. But looking on a more general overview, not looking on a specific vessel, but more on the development of shipbuilding industry, from engineering point of view.

Slowly starting a pleasuring preparation for the next build, which would be in that period.

Looks like internet is not a good source for that...

Main question is - how different was the design of British warships (taking famous Swan class as an example), versus similar sized and armed ships in US, like Confederacy?  Main point of interest is not a gun setup or things like that (they are pretty well documented for each ship), but more the internal structure, layout of rooms inside the ship, etc. 

Can I assume that they were very similar (because, probably, shipbuilding expertise was already quite globalized at that times)? Or they were different, and it's better to study US ship construction separately?

The only book I have is Hahn, "Ships of the American Revolution"... And it kind of ignores that question, assuming it's not a big deal. Which makes sense, since Hahn was more of an artist, and cared about "historical correctness" only to certain extent.

Would appreciate any hints, links, experience!

Also, what is your technology for making such an accurate joints of deck beams? Like on that photo: http://modelshipworld.com/uploads/monthly_12_2013/post-20-0-91612300-1385926869.jpeg

Please pardon me for such a flood of questions, but just really can't stop looking on that pictures again and again.. You raised a bar to the sky! The "treat every part as a small model" approach is genius! It's all about the process, does not matter if a build will take 10 years, but if it is _that_ quality..