ChadB

Greg, your model is fantastic and took me down memory lane! I was a SPY radar tech on the USS Barry (DDG52), so many of your photos bring back lots of memories. Fun fact- those SPY arrays are made up of a thousand or so small porcelain windows that are covered in RTV. When you go through a hail storm lots of them break and you get to spend a day in port on a ladder replacing them!  -Chad

Greg, your model is fantastic and took me down memory lane! I was a SPY radar tech on the USS Barry (DDG52), so many of your photos bring back lots of memories. Fun fact- those SPY arrays are made up of a thousand or so small porcelain windows that are covered in RTV. When you go through a hail storm lots of them break and you get to spend a day in port on a ladder replacing them!  -Chad

...and with that it was done. I then ventured into my first somewhat -bigger woodworking foray and making a case. I was surprised (and have continually been) at how robust the Byrnes table saw is at cutting bigger stock. I made the case out of Peruvian Walnut which is a fairly soft for a hardwood (and very porous) and finished it with a french polish which is a total pain in the *** but looks beautiful. The base is curly maple with an ebony and rosewood inlay, and the model was mounted on two turned brass pedestals. As i just mentioned in my comment to Derek I really wish I had the forethought like him to install mounting hardware way back in the beginning, the problem being that my cross section kept listing because of the cannons on one side. It ended up taking epoxy to get it to sit right and now the Triton will never be leaving it's stand!



 
And that's that! It was a fun (and glacially slow) build, but I couldn't be happier with the final product. Every day for the last couple years my wife and kids walk by my Triton cross section, stop, stare in awe, and never fail to exclaim something like "Wow, Dad- that is amazing!"  Just kidding- none of them care and the only time they mention it is when we need to move it to put up the Christmas Tree.... but to me it was the journey. Everyone is going to have their own outlook on modeling, but I hope if you are starting this project that you don't take the mindset of this being a throwaway project that leads to something bigger- enjoy the ride and do the best you can. Personally, when I'm old and my hands don't work anymore I'd like to look back on this hobby and have built maybe a handful of incredible models that I know I put all my effort into and will be kept in the family than a houseful of models that I blew through and my kids toss in the trash the day after I die. Enjoy the ride and make sawdust!   -Chad

Carriages 
 
Carriages were cut from bloodwood and wheels turned from boxwood I believe. It was pretty straightforward using the plans, although you can see where I needed to wrap the front axles with black construction paper because I sanded it down too much. This actually helped keep them from rolling around. Once they were assembled the blackened cannons were mounted.
 


 
After that they were installed on the model and rigged!
 

-Chad

...and with that it was done. I then ventured into my first somewhat -bigger woodworking foray and making a case. I was surprised (and have continually been) at how robust the Byrnes table saw is at cutting bigger stock. I made the case out of Peruvian Walnut which is a fairly soft for a hardwood (and very porous) and finished it with a french polish which is a total pain in the *** but looks beautiful. The base is curly maple with an ebony and rosewood inlay, and the model was mounted on two turned brass pedestals. As i just mentioned in my comment to Derek I really wish I had the forethought like him to install mounting hardware way back in the beginning, the problem being that my cross section kept listing because of the cannons on one side. It ended up taking epoxy to get it to sit right and now the Triton will never be leaving it's stand!



 
And that's that! It was a fun (and glacially slow) build, but I couldn't be happier with the final product. Every day for the last couple years my wife and kids walk by my Triton cross section, stop, stare in awe, and never fail to exclaim something like "Wow, Dad- that is amazing!"  Just kidding- none of them care and the only time they mention it is when we need to move it to put up the Christmas Tree.... but to me it was the journey. Everyone is going to have their own outlook on modeling, but I hope if you are starting this project that you don't take the mindset of this being a throwaway project that leads to something bigger- enjoy the ride and do the best you can. Personally, when I'm old and my hands don't work anymore I'd like to look back on this hobby and have built maybe a handful of incredible models that I know I put all my effort into and will be kept in the family than a houseful of models that I blew through and my kids toss in the trash the day after I die. Enjoy the ride and make sawdust!   -Chad

Bitts, Mast, and Pump Installation
Alright-the "well, mast, and pump mod" is essentially complete.It turned out take more time researching and planning than to actually make everything, but I'm pretty happy with the results. The mast and pumps will be set aside until the deck is planked and the chance for destroying anything has been minimized, but they all fit nicely together. The bitts have been installed and hopefully will stay in one piece while my fat fingers work around them. Here's a photo of them installed (and dusty...)

The mast was turned from hard maple and the front fish and fillings were made from the same and finished with wipe-on poly. The woolding hoops were made from boxwood and finished the same way. I tried to make them out of cherry for a bit more color contrast, but boxwood turned out to be the only wood I had on hand that would allow me to sand the rings down that thin and not break in my hand The bands are all blackened metal and covered with a clear enamel and the woolding is line that has been rubbed with flat black paint. The pumps are made of indian laurel and finished with tung oil, and the plans for them came from TFFM. The handles are made of apple for a bit of color difference, which apparently didn't happen since they look identical. The metal band around the top is blackened metal and were an absolute pain in the butt to attach. I'm just hoping they'll stay on...

It's tough to see in the above photo, but there's a small dowel between the wedges on the mast that will keep it in place. I may do the same thing to the pumps, but haven't decided yet. The gun deck planking should keep the port-side one in place, but I'll need something if I don't plank around the "open sided" one. Anyway-here's the "finished" product...

Well Mod Pt 2
 
OK, so I finished the upper well and Greg was right-fitting louvers was definitely not a breeze. That being said, it wasn't TOO incredibly hard-just took a lot of thinking thru and the problems I did run into were all self-inflicted. My two main sources for this were TFFM (again..) and Gary's Alfred build (again...). The upper well consists of essentially a room that is fitted with louvers on all sides (ventilation?), stanchions on the corners, and a door for access. The first and hardest step was making the stanchions, which included the slits that the louvers would sit in. If all the slits didn't match up, then the louvers would be crooked and probably look bad-so that was the first fear to conquer. This was overcome by cutting all the slits at one time into stock that was cut purposely long. The stock was all put together with the ends glued to scrap to keep it together thru the process..

I then set up the tablesaw, which is just setting the angle and using some scrap as an extension. The fence was used to keep the scrap extension from sliding around...

Now the slit cutting can be done essentially the same way as most how-to's on making grating, but for some reason that totally slipped my mind until I was all done (this seems to happen a lot to me..). I just lined up the stock for the first cut (with the blade set to about 1mm height), then moved the stock fort he next cut by lining up the previous cut to a mark on the tablesaw. Essentially I eyeballed it. I got lucky, but I don't think I'd try my luck multiple times...

After the first cuts, it was necessary to turn the stock pieces to the proper alignment for the next cuts if needed. I'm not the sharpest tool in the toolbox, so a good diagram came in handy for this step. Matter of fact, one of the best things I've started doing is keeping a notebook with notes on stuff I come across or ideas...

Once I decided what direction everything needed to go and that the cuts would be correct (I honestly sat there for about 20 mins trying to figure this out..) things were aligned and put together the same way..

That finished all the cuts. The effort put into making things were aligned payed off when the louvers all fit nicely. Fitting them was fairly easy, although the thickness took some playing around with. Too thick and they won't fit, too thin and the whole thing loses any semblance of sturdiness..

Next up was the door. I figured I'd try to make an actual working scale door, so I started with a sheet of really thin brass and cut the pieces needed. A pin was put through smaller pieces and glued in, so the whole thing kind of works like the pintles and gudgeons of the rudder. I wish I could explain better, but I'm not really up on my door hardware lingo. I think the photos will explain it best..

The door itself was pretty standard and both sides can be seen in the following photos of it installed. It's a bit different than what was explained in TFFM, but I'll admit a bit of artistic licence here (pay no attention to my terrible blackening skills)..

Everything installed (sorry for the yellowness-I'm still frustrated by these damn energy saving flourescent lighbulbs..)


 
And now into the doldrums of knees, beam arms, carlings, and ledges...ugh. -Chad

Gun Deck Beams and Stanchions
Ok-time for an update. I'm actually falling behind in my updates, which is a welcome feeling since it means things have been picking up steam. I tackled the lower deck stanchions, which was my first time using a lathe. I actually bought a Taig lathe bit by bit between 6-12 months ago and it just sat waiting for it's first cameo, which ended up being later than expected .
Before I got into the stanchions, I decided to tackle the upper deck beams. I noticed after making the first deck beams that there was a bit of discoloration from the soaking-nothing terrible and only noticeable if you are looking for it-but I thought I'd avoid that and cut them out with the camber. For whatever reason I was scared to death to do this but It was much easier than I expected and my now preferred way of doing it. My first step was to create a jig that would would give me 4 uniform deck beams. The first step was to create two pieces of wood that would have the top camber of the beam.
Before sanding....

Then they were lined up so the bottoms would be even and holes were drilled in each side. I used bamboo dowels to keep them even while I sanded down the top camber. I actually did one piece first, then the second, but it would have made more sense to do them at the same time.
Dowelled, one side sanded...
xxpicxx
I then used one of the jig sides made above to trace and cut "blanks" for the deck beams.
Blanks...


 
Then back to the jig. One of the two cambered sides is glued to a base, and two screws are used to tighten the sides together with a blank in between. If all goes well the blanks should be pretty close to what's needed and only a bit needs to be sanded down.

Jig with a blank

Once the top camber was done, I drew out the bottom camber. I made this little job because I am to cheap to spend 15 bucks on a decent compass

I then cut out most of the extra and made this little jig on the drill press to get the bottom camber. A piece of wood was set the correct distance from the sanding drum and the deck beams were run thru.

This little process gave me some great deck beams. A quick look at the leveling and they were all spot on, so I think I'll be sticking with this process in the future. As for the stanchions, I wish I could explain it well, but I definitely don't feel qualified enough to accurately describe anything that went on with my lathe-I just know I spent most of the first few hours bracing for the inevitable splintered piece of wood to hurtle thru face and disfigure me for life. Luckily that never happened. The only real advice on making stanchions I can give is that the Dockyard chisels I bought to do the notches in the deck beams were priceless. The center column was done easily with the lathe tooling, but the rounded ends were all done by hand. The only photo I took of the process shows how I marked the important divisions in the stanchion-where it goes from straight to donut-shaped, and where it goes from donut-shaped to the chambered of square ends. This helped keep everything the same size. I cut them from longer stock and cut the ends on both sides to the right sides afterwards.

The stanchions were doweled into the deck beams and the deck to keep them secure, and had small pieces of deck planking placed under them on the "open" side for correct height..

The last deck beam is just dry fitted at this point, as the upper well has to be added and supports the beam.

Looking good Derek! Interesting idea using the soldering iron on the edges of the boards!   
 
Chad

Looking good Derek! Interesting idea using the soldering iron on the edges of the boards!   
 
Chad

Looking good Derek! Interesting idea using the soldering iron on the edges of the boards!   
 
Chad

...and with that it was done. I then ventured into my first somewhat -bigger woodworking foray and making a case. I was surprised (and have continually been) at how robust the Byrnes table saw is at cutting bigger stock. I made the case out of Peruvian Walnut which is a fairly soft for a hardwood (and very porous) and finished it with a french polish which is a total pain in the *** but looks beautiful. The base is curly maple with an ebony and rosewood inlay, and the model was mounted on two turned brass pedestals. As i just mentioned in my comment to Derek I really wish I had the forethought like him to install mounting hardware way back in the beginning, the problem being that my cross section kept listing because of the cannons on one side. It ended up taking epoxy to get it to sit right and now the Triton will never be leaving it's stand!



 
And that's that! It was a fun (and glacially slow) build, but I couldn't be happier with the final product. Every day for the last couple years my wife and kids walk by my Triton cross section, stop, stare in awe, and never fail to exclaim something like "Wow, Dad- that is amazing!"  Just kidding- none of them care and the only time they mention it is when we need to move it to put up the Christmas Tree.... but to me it was the journey. Everyone is going to have their own outlook on modeling, but I hope if you are starting this project that you don't take the mindset of this being a throwaway project that leads to something bigger- enjoy the ride and do the best you can. Personally, when I'm old and my hands don't work anymore I'd like to look back on this hobby and have built maybe a handful of incredible models that I know I put all my effort into and will be kept in the family than a houseful of models that I blew through and my kids toss in the trash the day after I die. Enjoy the ride and make sawdust!   -Chad

Thanks all! I hope it helps out future newcomers to the cross section and scratch building!
 
Chad

Thanks all! I hope it helps out future newcomers to the cross section and scratch building!
 
Chad

Thanks all! I hope it helps out future newcomers to the cross section and scratch building!
 
Chad

That's a beautiful model. I enjoyed your build log.

Great log, and a very impressive model! Love the wood selection and colours, finish, well, everything!
Looks fantastic when finished and in the case, you definitely have a really good taste!
It was a pleasure to read, and I definitely picked up few useful methods. Thank you!

Thanks for posting this build.  The case and final presentation look really nice.  Something to be proud of.

Chad a project, case and all extremely well done! Anyone who spins in the MSW orbit cares! I don't know how old the children are but I find it puzzling that "younger folk" can' seem to relate to exquisite work of this nature. When I was a kid I marveled at this sort of thing. I was inspired even then. Your reflections are dead on though.
Joe

I was great seeing this one again, Chad. Thanks for re-posting it.

...and with that it was done. I then ventured into my first somewhat -bigger woodworking foray and making a case. I was surprised (and have continually been) at how robust the Byrnes table saw is at cutting bigger stock. I made the case out of Peruvian Walnut which is a fairly soft for a hardwood (and very porous) and finished it with a french polish which is a total pain in the *** but looks beautiful. The base is curly maple with an ebony and rosewood inlay, and the model was mounted on two turned brass pedestals. As i just mentioned in my comment to Derek I really wish I had the forethought like him to install mounting hardware way back in the beginning, the problem being that my cross section kept listing because of the cannons on one side. It ended up taking epoxy to get it to sit right and now the Triton will never be leaving it's stand!



 
And that's that! It was a fun (and glacially slow) build, but I couldn't be happier with the final product. Every day for the last couple years my wife and kids walk by my Triton cross section, stop, stare in awe, and never fail to exclaim something like "Wow, Dad- that is amazing!"  Just kidding- none of them care and the only time they mention it is when we need to move it to put up the Christmas Tree.... but to me it was the journey. Everyone is going to have their own outlook on modeling, but I hope if you are starting this project that you don't take the mindset of this being a throwaway project that leads to something bigger- enjoy the ride and do the best you can. Personally, when I'm old and my hands don't work anymore I'd like to look back on this hobby and have built maybe a handful of incredible models that I know I put all my effort into and will be kept in the family than a houseful of models that I blew through and my kids toss in the trash the day after I die. Enjoy the ride and make sawdust!   -Chad

Railings, Catwalks,
 
Well, it's been a while (again), but some work has taken place and hopefully I can put this baby to bed over the next month or so. It's funny how, as a parent, you think you'll get more free time as your kids get older, but it generally seems to be the opposite that happens. Oh well-they're only young once and soon enough they'll be rolling their eyes at me!
So the first thing I took care of was the railings. I've had them made for quite some time, but was hesitant to install them until I figured out how to cover the exposed section on the rearmost frame. It's been bugging me for quite some time and finally stumbled upon one of the Triton drawings that gave me a clue.  I took a little artistic license and came up with this (this and rails were made of Indian laurel)...

 
Once that was done, it was time to start on the brackets. The two problems I encountered while making these were cutting thicker brass sheets, blackening them. I used something a bit thicker to add a bit of structural integrity, but didn't feel like sitting there scoring a strip for a half hour (cutting made it curl and bend toward the cutting side). The solution was scoring the strip on the edge of the sheet to the right width a few times with an exacto and a ruler, then bending it off with a pair of cheap welding pliers from harbor freight. Now, they're cheap for a reason- I needed to file the edges so I didn't mar the brass, but after that worked well. I think at some point I'll cut up some thin rubber strips and glue them into the jaws. Finally I just gave a quick file to cut side of the brass strip and that was that. I decided to solder the brackets, which was a pain without a set of helping hands- so i'd suggest one of those little bases with the alligator clips on them to avoid frustration with this. The second problem was blackening. This thread pretty much sums up my ineptitude without going into it here. The short story is I stink at getting Blacken-It to work and ended up painting them. I wanted to stay away from paint, but the finish with the powder black model RR paint I used looks fantastic. I ended up painting over the bands on the mast also because it looked so good.
Next were the catwalks. i wanted to make them off the model so I could caulk them the same way as the deck. If I did it by laying the planking on the brackets, I was pretty sure I would ham-fist it and break something. The challenge is finding a way to make a gap between planks from end to end but still have it all connected without seeing. The answer ended up being using a slitting blade to add a very small batten to the back. I started with the three long planks and added the battens where the the brackets would be It would be tough to see anyway, but just in case...). Unfortunately I sometimes lack foresight and forgot about the rest of the planks to follow, which is why in the second photo you can see all the other battens. Once the three long planks were battened, I made the next plank and slit them, then added the batten, then rinse-and-repeat fro the next two planks. When it was all done it was waxed, then caulked the same way as the decks (done in maple).
battened, pre-caulking..

back side showing battens...

caulked..

I actually made the edging (Indian laurel) first, so that was probably a bit "cart-before-the-horse," but pretty straight forward. They're made of three pieces then glued together. It's worth noting that I probably gave myself the second "best' cut with an exacto blade (brand new, even!) during this step. I'm glad my wife is a nurse and was able to get me to stop hopping around like a little girl, but was quickly followed by a stern look and a declaration of my future demise from my tools. Moral of the story-be careful.

To install them, I wrestled with what to do with the "open" side of the model-I didn't want a full catwalk, but I also wanted to make it's presence known. I settled on only the edging, which i really like the look of. I'm still not sure if I'll do guns on that side, but if I do it will give a full view of them.
Other than that-the mast has been secured, so the "well-mod" is officially completed, and added the ringbolts for the gun tackle. So really it's only ladders and guns now...let's see if i can get in under 5 years

17. Finishing the Hold Planking, Cutting Limber Boards, and Cutting out Gunport Sills and Lintels
 
. I finished up the hold planking with one side fully planked and the other just thick stuff as to show off frames. All the planking was pretty straightforward, but I was a little worried about making sure my treenails were in nice straight lines. It's one of those things I've tried to do to the best of my ability since mediocre results would stick out like a sore thumb. 
I started with this little jig which was a small piece of scrap with a block on either end that will let it fit over all the frames and stay in place. I marked on the scrap the positions of each treenail so it could be marked  on the frames.  *Sorry about the photos. I'm actually a little embarassed to be showing them because of the horrible white balance. My kitchen table has been my headquarters over the winter and the lighting overhead is the new  energy-saving flourescents      Once I had marks across each frame, I connected the dots..      Once the lines were drawn, I drew perpendicular lines to make sure they would be even across the frames also, which left me with small crosses at the points that needed drilling..      I started drilling the holes using a pinvise but it took forever, so I switched over to my small rechargeable Dremel which worked well. I went through and used a pn to start a hole so the drill had somewhere to start. All treenails were done with cherry and I used a 1mm hole for the thick stuff and a 1/2 mm hole for all the rest..      Once that was done I wanted to finish up my limberboards. I had opened a thread a while back in the general discussion about it and came to the conclusion that they would be 3 feet long with openings on either side to pry them out. So scaled down gave me 3/4 inch long sections with half circles drilled out on each end. I already had the long continuous limberboard shaped, so it was just a matter of cutting and drilling. I started by cutting the lengths, then setting up this little jig to make sure the half circles lined up. Two boards were put in and lined up so the drill bit would fall directly between the two. Any small adjustments were made  with a file..      Overall a simple task once thought out. I will glue in place eventually and there will be small pieces to cover the ends. I don't know if they were actually staggered like this, but I really like the look.     And then just last night I finally built up the courage to cut out the slots for the gunport sills and lintels. I don't know why this scared me so much, but it ended up being incredibly easy. I think it was actually seeing Grant,s method of cutting out the slots in the floors on Dokondr's build log that really made it easy- thanks Grant! Everything was already marked, so I just used a jeweler's saw to make a few horizontal cuts and break out the pieces with an exacto knife.        So that's it so far. Next up I believe I'll finally tackle the wales! -Chad

...and with that it was done. I then ventured into my first somewhat -bigger woodworking foray and making a case. I was surprised (and have continually been) at how robust the Byrnes table saw is at cutting bigger stock. I made the case out of Peruvian Walnut which is a fairly soft for a hardwood (and very porous) and finished it with a french polish which is a total pain in the *** but looks beautiful. The base is curly maple with an ebony and rosewood inlay, and the model was mounted on two turned brass pedestals. As i just mentioned in my comment to Derek I really wish I had the forethought like him to install mounting hardware way back in the beginning, the problem being that my cross section kept listing because of the cannons on one side. It ended up taking epoxy to get it to sit right and now the Triton will never be leaving it's stand!



 
And that's that! It was a fun (and glacially slow) build, but I couldn't be happier with the final product. Every day for the last couple years my wife and kids walk by my Triton cross section, stop, stare in awe, and never fail to exclaim something like "Wow, Dad- that is amazing!"  Just kidding- none of them care and the only time they mention it is when we need to move it to put up the Christmas Tree.... but to me it was the journey. Everyone is going to have their own outlook on modeling, but I hope if you are starting this project that you don't take the mindset of this being a throwaway project that leads to something bigger- enjoy the ride and do the best you can. Personally, when I'm old and my hands don't work anymore I'd like to look back on this hobby and have built maybe a handful of incredible models that I know I put all my effort into and will be kept in the family than a houseful of models that I blew through and my kids toss in the trash the day after I die. Enjoy the ride and make sawdust!   -Chad

Cannons
Turning the cannons started with a drawing that was way more intricate than it probably needed to be (but resulted in a nice finished product). My guess is I was stalling as long as possible before I HAD to use the lather and actually turn them.
 

I came up with this wacky setup to measure distances on the lathe, and although it worked I think I'll find a better way of doing it when the day comes to turn cannons again. 

Then it was just a matter of turning them. The first couple were scrapped but then it became a pretty easy process once you got it down. It was nice only having to have two really good ones.

 
 



Drilling out the trunnions was done with a simple little jig, although getting the offset requires them to be pretty snug so they don't try to turn.
 

-Chad