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keelhauled

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Everything posted by keelhauled

  1. keelhauled
    Nenad, As to your brush problems- The acrylic additive helps. But I've found Kolinsky Sable to be the best answer. I use these in my part-time profession, when I'm painting commissioned oil portraits. I use these brushes to paint the eyes, nose and mouth. Although I use these brushes for oil painting, they work fine with acrylics. Just make sure that you don't paint for more than a few minutes with the acrylics before rinsing the brush. Also never dip more than the tip into the paint (very important). The fibers are from the tip of the weasel's tail and naturally all curve towards each other forming a sharp tip. The finest brushes come from Russia. They are very expensive in the US, but worth the price if you really need a brush that stays sharp and doesn't have brush lines. Also Never, Never, cut natural brush hairs. Each hair comes to a microscopic point which allows them to form a point in unison. If you trim the brush they will never come to that point again. If you have issues, clean the brush thoroughly with soapy water, by placing the soap in the palm of your hand with water flowing over the soap and move the brush over the soap like if it were paint and you were trying to load your brush. Then remove the soap and move the brush over the palm of your hand as if you were trying to paint it. Do this many times. Whatever you do, don't hold the brush upside down and squirt water into it - this drives wet paint up into the barrel of the brush and ruins it as well as weakens the glue and swells the wood handle. After the brush is clean you can put baby oil in the palm of your hand and allow the brush to soak it up. This will help if your brush needs natural oils back into the bristles (you can also use hair conditioner). This method will also work with dried paint on the brush. I've recovered paint brushes with both dried oil and acrylic paints. Marc
  2. keelhauled
    very cool!!
  3. keelhauled
    stunning stern!
  4. keelhauled
    Nenad, I love keeping up with your build and your creativity. Hope the strike ends soon. I know it will cut into your ship building time, but I am sure that it causes unnecessary stress for you. I wish all the best for you and your family for the holiday! Marc
  5. keelhauled
    looking wonderful! It looks like we make our dead-eyes using the same method We are doing well. Unfortunately, I've been on travel for the past month or so. I plan on being in the workshop this weekend!! (Admiral's Mother will be spending the holidays with us. I want to make sure that they have quality time together.
  6. keelhauled
    Looking good. Very exciting!!
  7. keelhauled
    Beautiful work!! both your paintings and the stern decoration! Always amazed at your work
  8. keelhauled
    Nenad, I kind of like the idea of the CS with the Vic's guns. Think how much faster and sporty the VIC would look with the CS' sails! We've got to talk Bob into stepping out of the box. He's already venturing into the dark side of scratch building! Marc
  9. keelhauled
    Looks like I'm late to the party! Nice build so far. At this time I think my next build is the Victory. I already bought the large Mamoli version 10 years ago. At the time I thought that I could bang the Cutty out in 3 or 4 years - HA, HA, HA! What a fool I was. Maybe I'll go scratch built like you. Look forward to seeing your progression. By the way, don't get the Cutty's pieces and the Victory's mixed. Then again, I might make two very interesting ships! Marc
  10. keelhauled
    like the approach to the star of India! very creative!!
  11. keelhauled
    Nenad, Thanks for the tutorial. Also thanks for exposing me to that forum. I wasn't familiar with it. Lots of good information! Marc
  12. keelhauled
    Back working on the stirrups and foot ropes. Nothing exciting to photo yet. Hopefully I get enough time this weekend to finish the foot ropes for either the main or the fore mast - I've been working back and forth from the bottom up on those two. Not sure why I didn't include the Mizzen on the rotation. Poor mizzen yards all left out until the end. That is the problem with repetitive rigging, lots of work and nothing much to show for it. Also I mounted the name on the stern. Still have a few areas that need a little detail painted on the stern. Marc
  13. keelhauled
    Grant, I'm enjoying the show and look forward to more insights from the dark side! Great work!
  14. keelhauled
    Thanks Bob, The feelings are mutual!! I really appreciate your support! Marc
  15. keelhauled
    Nenad, Wonderful work! I'm amazed that your are able to make all of those loops in the wire. That would be a good tutorial! Although I agree that I wouldn't make it movable, I do think that the hinges were a great detail. You drive me to work towards making a better model! Keep up the wonderful work! Marc
  16. keelhauled
    Nenad, I think you should try sculpting. Nothing to loose and based on what I've seen of your build you'll do an awesome job, better than my attempt! As far as the detail, you're correct that the more detail you put into the model, the more opportunities you see to create more detail. I think that it's hard to find the balance. I've considered redoing several areas, but I don't want to end up rebuilding two thirds of the ship. I'd rather move on to another ship and use what I've learned. Bob, thanks for the feedback! I used Elmer's stain-able wood filler. The pre-carved surface is fairly rough and gritty, but underneath it will be smooth. I didn't do anything to the jewelers screwdriver. Looking back, I should have sharpened them. Also when I looked back at the bow, I noticed that I was able to make more detailed work in the fine scrolls with a thinner layer. I didn't notice this until I had already hardened the stern, so I couldn't go back. However, if you make it too thin It may crack or break. Grant, thanks again for the encouragement. And yes, I am glad that I went down this path. Costarn, I'm not familiar with that kit. However, I don't think that it matter's who manufactured the kit. Bob, Nenad, Grant, and myself have built most of our ships from scratch, tossing aside the kit provided materials as we've become more sure of our building skills. You should look at Grant's build. He even made the blocks! The next kit parts that I'm throwing away and rebuilding are the ships wheel and windlass.
  17. keelhauled
    Thanks Brian!!! Here's a couple of photos of it with a coat of paint. Still needs some clean up and the robin's egg blue of the band and inside of the circular trim. Also not sure what to do with the Star of India ornament. I tried Sculpy with no success. I also have to add the name and town. I saved them from the stern brass that i tore off. thanks Marc
  18. keelhauled
    Looking good!!! It's amazing how many ring bolts there are. It reminds me that I need to go back and take a look at my hull. I think that i have them all, but your post makes me think I might have missed some around the bow. Hopefully the strike will end soon and in a positive way. Take care, marc
  19. keelhauled
    So here is my work on the stern The original stern with the kit ornamentation. I removed the brass ornamentation that came with the kit. I then had to scrape and sand the stern removing the superglue I then coated the stern with wood filler and left 24 hrs. I then started carving the ornamentation with jewelers screw drivers. I've been meaning to by micro chisels, but I can't seem to fork out the $60 to $100 for them. Here I'm almost finihed. By the way I did some hardening test. The wood glue needs some strength added. I tried coating with elmers and superglue. The Elmer's wood glue hardened the surface, but you could still go back and carve into it. The super glue seemed to penetrate deeper and made the wood filler hard as a rock. You can't go back and change it without breaking it.. I think both slightly softened the detail - The Elmer's more than the CA.
  20. keelhauled
    Looking good!! I'm glad your enjoying your build. That's what hobbies are all about!
  21. keelhauled
    thanks Grant and Nenad. Both of you guys made major changes and rework on your builds. Mine is truly nothing compared to what you did. But it always is a moment of pause when you know that you are going to destroy what exists and there is no going back. But so far I've always been happier with the replacement than the original. Nenad, I haven't decided how I'm going to sculpt or carve the decoration. I think that I'd rather carve the parts. I feel like I have more control. There is a shop that has carving wood nearby. I've also carved from a mixture of resin and wood filler that worked well. That's how I did the bow. Trouble is I can't remember what resin I used. The resin made the wood filler like concrete after I was done carving. I might also use sculpy. I saw someone on this site using it for a figure head. I tried it for making figures and wasn't impressed, but I was told that there are different versions of the product depending upon the size and detail that you want to work with. I'm definitely going to do some tests off the ship. I hope to work on it this weekend!! Marc
  22. keelhauled
    In the spirit of Grant Dale and his courage to tear off the stern decoration of his Victory, I decided to tear off the stern decoration of my Cutty. Although my work is much, much, much less then his was. I simply removed the stern decoration. I was never truly happy with it and since I carved the bow decoration I thought that the brass decoration on the stern looked mismatched. So tonight, I took a micro chisel and pried the decoration loose. The mess of hard CA was more of an issue to remove. I tried wire wheels, but they didn't help. I tried to chisel the stuff off, but it wasn't very clean or effective. I ended up using drywall sandpaper in the end. This paper actually worked really well. In the process of removing the boomkin chain, I broke a few links, so I'll have to make that repair. No big deal. I'll post some photos tomorrow. The next question is which version of the stern decoration to use. Campbells, the latest restoration, the 1872 photo? cutty in Austrailia? The restored Cutty? I'm thinking that the 1872 is probably most reflects the original carving. It is also less complicated than the latest restoration. to be quite honest, I doubt that my skill will resolve the level of detail that it would matter any way. I imagine that it will be a crude approximation at best.
  23. keelhauled
    Thanks Bob, The pump was made from different diameters of bass and copper tubing. The handle was brass wire. I cut the pieces to length and soldered and then painted in enamel. It's not exact, but I think that it is much better than what the kit offered.
  24. keelhauled
    Nice work Bob! Glad your feeling better and back to building! Nenad, your recipe sounds good. I think that I'll give it a try. Marc
  25. keelhauled
    Thanks Nenad!!

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