cookster

Thanks all! Tom, if you haven't already check out Bob Riddoch's Conny build. There are several Conny builds on this site that are wonderful, but Bob's is the only one I've seen that started at the beginning. I'm sure there are others (don't want to offend anybody) His work is awesome, it's what convinced me to give this a try. Good luck!

This is how I formed the top plank at the bow bulwark. I soaked it, then carefully bent it to shape around a styrene tube, clamped it and left in place to dry. It did take 2 attempts to get this, the first plank collapsed.

And that brings me where I am today. Planking the outer hull above the plankshear. Bob Hunt recommended cutting each piece to length, but i decided against that. It's easier (for me) to install them long, then come back and trim down. A little careful sanding and they look good. A note on sanding tools, I ordered some sanding sticks but they haven't arrived yet, so in a pinch I used fingernail files (the kind with dual grits) to sand the edges down and it works fine. I'm sure I'm not the first person to do this, but it works! Trimmed and edge sanded (not the hull side yet) And if you're noticing bits of white around the model, I used styrene as shims here and there. Either my bulkheads weren't perfect, or I got them a little out of alignment (more than likely) so when I faired the bulwarks there were low and high spots here and there. So I used .010 and .020 styrene strips to build up the low spots. Not what I wanted to have happen. I wanted everything to line up perfectly - ala Bob Riddoch, but that didn't happen. But at least the finished planking will look straight (I hope!) and no one will see the shims I had to install!

I lost the pics (deleted, oops!) of making the stern blocks and such, but here theu are installed and sanded (but I doubt all the way) I need to take more pics of the rear bulwark area planked. You can kind of see it here: The inner buiwarks are planked. The gun ports on the port side framed and cut out.

Once I started installing the cross beams in the bulkheads and tried to attach temporary battens across the back of the bulkheads, it was apparent something wasn't right. The fins of the outer bulkheads were at the wrong angle, and too short. Beveling at bullkhead R caused some of it this, but not all I don't think. The only solution I could come with was to add material to back of the fins and remove material from the front, on both outer bulkheads. This would get the profile of the fins to line up with the center bulkheads. I only faired the bulkwarks side, the hull side will be done later. I'm not certain this was the right thing to do, but at least it got the transom flat. Maybe if I tried to put the curve in the transom the outer bulkheads would've fit better.

Installed the stern bulkheads into the dados. The outer bulkhead frames were a pain. After reading the practicum several times, placing the bulkheads, removing, replacing, looking, thinking they're OK only to decide they weren't, I came to the same conclusion as Bob Hunt. There's no way these things will fit like you think they should. So, I just put them in the best location I could come up with and will work the rest out as I go. I beveled the bottom and bulkhead edge to fit without gaps, and that may have been part of the problem. I made a template from the plans to help line things up as best I could. The markings are on the bulkhead side so you really can't see them here. Outer bulkheads in place

Okay, continuing to rebuild log: Working on the stern transom block. Since the block should be 11/32" thick according to the practicum, and the supplied block is 1/2", I used this to my advantage and cut dados (grooves) in the block instead of reducing the thickness of the entire block. These dados are for the transom bulkheads. I took care cutting the dados to make sure the tops of the bulkheads lined up with the top of bulkhead R as Bob stressed was critical. I cut the outer rabbets for the transom sides wider than needed so I'd have room to fit them. I can shim later if I need to. The dados look out of square in the top pic but they are square to the bulkhead. This must be an optical illusion from how I was holding the camera. You're probably noticing the bulkheads are not fared much yet, I decided to do most of this after they were installed thinking I'd get more accurate results. Since this pic was taken I've started fairing them in and it's not been too difficult.

A few pics of the starboard waterway and plankshear.

Waterway: I think this is my best work on the model yet... I started making the forward waterway. Back to almost bulkhead C the curve is very extreme, so I decided to make a glue up for this section instead of trying to find wide stock for this. I did not go all the way to bulkhead "E" as Bob Hunt suggested, I just decided this how I wanted to do it. If the long waterway piece comes up short, which I think I will, I'll just scarf in another piece. Starting to shape the waterway... You can see the scarf joint I cut for the long waterway section to join into. I made sure to cut the scarf oriented so the pressure of the bend would press into the joint and keep it tight. Hard to explain, and no good pic of this... Fits nice at the bowsprit

My plank bending jig. The inner piece prevents clamps from gouging into the face of the strip. With basswood this is easy to do.

Bowsprit: In this pic you can kind'a see where I modified the mortise for the bowsprit. Instead of leaving it square to the bulkhead as cut, I angled it to match the angle of the bowsprit with a #11 blade. This way I can cut the tenon square to the the bowsprit which will be MUCH easier! The dark color on the bowsprit tenon is pencil lead. I rubbed pencil lead on the tenon, then slid it in the mortise to see where the tight spots were. The pencil lead will rub off on the high spots. Chamferring the corners of the tenon also helps a lot. Once I had the bow support piece fit, I glued on 2 temporary blocks to hold it together when I cut it in half. Then I cut it in half, leaving the temporary blocks whole, and glued it in place. In the pic it looks like one wide piece, but it's really 2 about 1/4" apart.

This is my method for making the support piece at the bow for the knight/timber heads. Instead of making 2 pieces and trying to fumble with fitting them, I made one piece out of some plywood I had. It fits snugly against bulkhead A and the keel (once the notch is cut). This makes fitting and tweaking the entire bow section much less clumsy. Once everything is made and fitted I'll cut the piece in half. I also glued supports to the front side of bulkhead A and the keel for the piece to rest and glue onto. This will be much stronger than just a butt joint. The supports on bulkhead A have .010 styrene shims on them, that's what the white pieces are. For the notches (mortises) in the top of the bow filler blocks, since this is not seen I decided to glue on supports instead of cutting the mortises. This way I could fit everything nice and snug and not have to deal with cutting mortises. A real pain at full size, much worse in miniature! This meant I had to adjust the length of the knight/timberheads, but that wasn't a big deal to me. I made some 1/8 x 1/8 stock out of the 1/8 basswood sheets the bulkheads were from.

Making the bow filler blocks. Cut out one side of the block. Stick the 2 pieces back together with double sided tape. Cut the other side and make this. Stick that back together with more dbl sided tape, cut out the last profile, then have this. And sand away! The block on the left has been sanded a little I think. The patterns you see in white material are made from index cards. I also have some 8 1/2 x11 cardstock I cut and use for patterns. Works much better than plain paper. On several patterns latter in the build I actually cut out the full size plan and ran through the copier using cardstock, worked like a champ! .

In this pic you can see the keel splice plate between bulkheads L and M I also wanted to add filler blocks between the bulkheads. I used a square to align the bulkheads. I left a small gap between bulkheads so I could insert toothpicks as wedges to square up each bulkhead to the keel. You can see more of this in a later pic. The keel stiffener is also visible here.

Ok, let's start reloading this puppy.... I'm using Bob Hunt's practicum, but I am modifying some things as I go. Since this is my first wooden ship build, it's an invaluable guide to me. I also have Chuck's Syren and the build guide he wrote for it is outstanding, so with both guides I believe I can do this. I've never been one to start small and work my way up so why start now! Started as everyone does with the keel. When building the keel I didn't use simple butt joints. I notched out 1 side of each keel half to accept a splice plate, glued it on, and after drying glued to the next section. This made for a much stronger joint with no splice plate sitting on top of the butt joint (to interfere with the bulkheads). The picture doesn't show this that well, but you can see the rectangular piece for the middle section below the keel before gluing on. The front section still needs to be notched for this to fit. The dark lines on the rear section is the splice plate already glued on, ready for the middle section to slide into it. I thought I had taken more pictures of this, but I didn't. Gluing in the bulkheads. And yes some of the keel sections between bulkheads broke off so had to glue them back on. I wanted to strengthen the keel against side flex so I a cut a notch in each bulkhead (on one side only) for a stiffener which screws to the keel. This stiffener is to keep the keel straight. Once the bulkheads are installed the stiffener will be glued and screwed to the keel. I don't have a good pic anymore of this but you can see the stiffener in this later pic.

Got it Tripp, Thanks!

Ah, I see I screwed up the title of the build log. Guess now I can't edit it. So Sorry mods! Please correct and I'll do better next time!

Well, guess I need to recreate my build log since the site died. I started my build around Christmas 2012 and worked as much as I could up until early February. Just now getting back to building and was checking the site when I found out it had died! I will begin reloading as soon as I can. Here's current progress: Cookster