Mike Y

Daria is back after the summer, yay! The modelling sessions were rare, but enjoyable nevertheless. We learned how to taper flat surfaces: Fine fitting is easier now, she can do it alone: My clamps were quite handy when laminating the stem, it is tapered so you can't just clamp it between two pieces of glass, and veneer bends with moisture. First time using marking knife for precise trimming of veneer pieces so they fit each other: And her favourite photo: Also learned how to use a chisel in gentle pairing motions. Keeping a consistent angle is hard! And a few last pieces were done completely without me, she did everything from masking to fitting and gluing: But clamping a long piece with a masking tape is more fun if you do it together Hope we'll finish the stem soon!

Before installing any more planks, started drawing the reference lines using tick strips. I should have done that before installing the limber strake, but I really wanted to cut some wood to resume modelling.. I am still happy with my flexible jig, that allows working with model in any direction. Very handy for such jobs, allows resting the hand instead of using it suspended. Now it's time to face some sloppiness that I made when fairing the hull. The exposed side got a lot of love, while the other side had a lot of areas that are not properly faired. "Not a big deal, I will plank this anyway", said stupid me a few years ago... Some areas are easy to fix (just adding a thin strip to bridge the gap): But some are bad, and are located in tricky areas. So I spent a few hours with tiny chisels and riffler files to level cant frames. Luckily no need for a nice finish, since planks will hide all the dents. But it is a very delicate task to avoid scratching everything around. Some masking tape and care is necessary. Note to self, and hopefully somebody will avoid the same mistake: spend extra time fairing everything, especially tight areas. Use a strip of wood to check the smooth run, your eye will deceive you. Any hour saved on fairing phase means you borrow that time and will spend 5x fairing it in situ. Damaging something while doing it. So now everything is lined up, but the close-ups around the stern are brutal Most of it will get hidden though. I assumed equal plank width when lining up, but of course they will have different thickness. It is good to have guide marks anyway! So now it's time to start planking, and hopefully avoid too many redos. Really worried about sloppy fairing biting me down the road, will see. Will try to counter it with creative sanding. In worst case scenario - will use a full set of carlings & ledges when making the deck, so nobody will see the mistakes

As a user of an adjustable table with the motor, I adjust it all the time... Different operations require different distance, and instead of bending to the table - I can just adjust the table a bit. Also working while standing is more convenient sometimes. I have the IKEA electric table, model name BEKANT. Works great, with very little wobble (heavy table top helps as well). The least wobbly of all the desks I tried. Note that they sell it with or without table top, so you can buy the base itself, and mount some thicker table top, more suitable for modelling other than office work. IKEA have some hardwood tops that are pretty cheap as well. But I would not dare using a hammer / mullet on that table, since that might damage the mechanisms inside the telescopic legs. The hand-cranked desk they have (model name SKARSTA) is built much cheaper and lighter, it is less stable and have a considerable wobble. I see that they have released a new line - IDÅSEN. A bit more expensive, only one size, different construction. Haven't tried it yet, just spotted on the website. I have it for probably 5 years. Once some electrics broke, it simply stopped working. IKEA mailed me a few replacement parts and then delivered a new table, no questions asked.. Not sure if they have the same level of service in US though. After that replacement, it worked with no issues. I guess some early versions had their faults (I bought it the same year it was released), but hope they fixed them now. Here is the final setup I ended up with. The combination of an inset vise + pegs allows me to quickly fix the model and work on it without holding. Note that the table is lifted to some sort of mid position here. Making fine continuous adjustments is very neat, I would not recommend to have a table that you can only adjust rarely to some fixed positions.

Here is the video from the wreck, it is really surprisingly intact:

I am pretty much a milling newbie, but I had a very good experience with Proxxon cutters that they recommend for their MF70 mill. Used them primarily for hardwoods, sometimes plastics or brass, from small precision joints to cutting long grooves. They leave a nice finish, both on the side and in the bottom, really cutting the wood instead of scratching it like some other types of cutters. All other cutters that I have are waaay worse (dremel, etc). Of course, I guess some industrial grade cutters would be better, but at a price around 20 dollars for a set of 3 the proxxon ones are a good start. Now I only use these (except when I need some special shapes), they are still sharp as new, and I haven't broke a single bit so far. Very noob friendly!

Small correction: Arkowood changed the website to https://www.arkowood-lossburg.de/ To moderators: could you please edit the first post to adjust the URL? Thanks!

Thanks everybody! We are fully settled in the apartment and had a series of housewarming parties, kid birthdays, vacations and other offtopic activities. I finally got some time to resume modelling. The longer the pause is, the harder it is to resume. Especially since I am facing is an internal planking, which is a tricky thing if you want it to be neat. And not all mistakes could be hidden by sanding, since a lot of planks have different thickness. D-oh! Clamping jig to the table is very convenient, I am glad I added a vice to make it possible, can recommend! First boxwood pieces on the model! Future limber streaks. Planing during a sunset is very relaxing. Made a mill fixture to route a rabbet into that boards. It works, but the cut is not very smooth. Overall, this boxwood tends to chip a bit when you mill it freehand of when you scrape it. That is unusual after pear that scrapes smooth. So I need to rely more on files and planes, using scraping for finishing touches, not for shaping I haven't faired the internal part of the hull in delicate areas, so now I am repaying that debt by fairing it now, trying not to scratch the keelson. And hey, it's 21st century, moving pictures are a thing! Frames are scratched with a diamond file to improve glue adhesion and break down the surface patina layer. Final fit is checked with a test plank next to it. Of course, the bottom of the plank is shaped to follow the curvature, and underside edges are broken to simplify the fit with the next plank. After the glue-up, some final blending is done with fine sandpaper and scraping: And the end result is "hoorray, I installed the first plank in a few years" Now it's just a matter of adding the rest of the planks. It's so great to be back!

Thank you for warm comments from both of us (Daria included). We had a nice bonding time reading them together. Will keep up the progress

Mark, thanks for the advice! It is an interesting idea. Though this grain does not bother me so much, because the whole model has an out-of-scale grain, it is part of it style Transom is not an exception. SpyGlass: interesting, it is very well dyed then - the wood is black over its entire thickness (which is like 0.5-0.7mm though), and it is pretty hard. Not sure if dyes can do that with this grain direction. There should be some areas of incomplete penetration then. Also, it behaves similar to ebony when you scrape it - you get small particles instead of chips. All my limited experience with ebony shows the same picture. But I agree, the grain looks unusual. Can be a different type of ebony, or maybe branches vs trunks? Though the veneer sheet used here is 10-15cm wide, hard to find a branch that thick (ebony trees are pretty thin, afaik).

I like the "view port" that you left in the transom, great idea!

Nice build! Milling adds quite a lot of precision to it!

Nice progress! Hope you will get hooked to the hobby, it is very addictive

Thanks all for the comments and likes! Yes, we are using respirator masks when sanding (for some reason it was off on that photo, but it is mostly on), plus a vaccuum cleaner is always on to suck the fine dust right away. Working in a living room teaches you the dust hygiene pretty quickly, dealing with a fine sawdust everywhere is not a pleasant thing. And it is good for Daria to think about dust and lungs from early age, she is putting the mask herself now, I do not need to ask. The ebony veneer is reeeeally thin, so we are thinking twice before doing any sanding of scraping on it. It is too thin to sand away that grain, so will leave it like this.

The apartment move is over, so we are finally back to modelling! Hull sanding took a while, and it was a big lesson about patience and persistence. To make sure that planks would not start peeling off - we used plenty of glue. Maybe too much, it took forever to get it out using a nylon dremel brush (did not want to apply any moisture to that fiddly planks, they are very sensible to it): Before sanding: After: There are some gaps visible, probably due to wood shrinkage. But we liked the process, good teamwork And she loves making something smooth, even though it is hard to keep going without breaks. I trimmed the plank ends, it was too risky to let Daria do it - they can chip out, it is easy to scratch the transom with a scalpel, etc. A mistake in this area would be hard to fix. But the result is ok. I am not sure what I think about this ebony, not very familiar with the way it sands and scrapes, kind of course and shiny at the same time.

Very nice! Any progress photos?

They look like bones of a mythical animal!

I use the same method as Amalio, same nylon brushes (discovered it by accident), and it works great! Especially on half-dried glue. It is just much faster and simpler than water. But water works better in tight areas, for sure. Especially water plus scraping with some xacto blade.

No more confusion caused by many models built in parallel. Let's hope this one will turn out great! The start is pretty good anyways. Is that still your french pear? Looks very neat!

How come none of you broke off the keel accidentally when clamping a model like this? Should be very careful, can't sand or apply any force to the model when it is clamped this way - what is the real use for them? Proper clamp/jig should really hold the front end the back part of a hull as well...

Thanks everybody for the feedback about clamps! The log was a bit silent for a while, but for a good reason. Me and Admiral finally found a good apartment worth the upgrade (larger, pretty new, pretty good neighbourhood, good school right across the street, etc), so we were busy selling the previous one, settling in a new one, etc. We moved in around Christmas, but the todo list was pretty long. So plenty of home-remodeling instead of shipbuilding Now 90% of all the renovation stuff is done, and we managed not to go crazy while doing it. Moving the display case was tricky, it is not really designed for the ease of mounting. Here it is, protected by some sofa cushions: But it survived the move pretty well, and found its new place next to a "french balcony" (don't worry, there is a real balcony on the other side): And I got a nice corner for my modelling area, super prime spot! Admiral got a whole room for her knitting hobby, so she is satisfied with the arrangement. The downside of having a lot of windows is not having enough wall area to mount shelves. Though all frequently used tools fit that single shelf pretty well. To hide the rest, I took some space in the storage area in the hall, which is pretty close by: And some tools are stored in the shelves under the display case. So I hope to finish the renovation todolist in a month or so, and get back to sawdust making!

As usual, love your colour tones!

Can I have a highres version for a wallpaper? A real inspiration!

It might be also explained (partially) by a mix of Dutch and Swedish shipbuilding traditions - Vasa was built by a mixed team of workers, with some weird things like mixed up dimensions (there was an Amsterdam foot and Stockholm foot back then, and they were not the same). There were few rulers found inside the hull, referencing different measurement systems. Fred Hocker's book is a nice read, if one is interested... Not just the planking is off, but gunports barely line up, shifted randomly to fit the frames around them, one side is higher than the other, etc. This is a very rare artefact of human sloppiness, since I doubt that "just dig the scrap pile" was a method proudly documented for later generations.

Hej Erik! Glad to see more POF builders from Nordics, have a good Christmas! Looking forward for some build pictures hope your wood dealer is good!

That should be fun! Love your logs, very informative