Elia

Hi all

After spending some time cutting the internal bulkheads, I've now made a start on the internal accommodation; namely the main saloon amidships. It may not look like much yet, but hopefully it'll all come together into a very presentable interior.

I've also included a photo of the deck, which may look terribly unfinished! Rest assured that I've deliberately decided to leave the majority of the deck unplanked to allow the interior to be seen.

Hope you enjoy the photos and have a great week!

Cheers

Patrick

Great work Patrick! I fell in love with the Rainbow the first time I saw this classic photo. It just oozes speed and grace!
 

Time for another update.
 
I've reach what is, for me, a real milestone - the last planking batten is ready to be removed, which will leave the hull clear for the final strakes of planking to be laid.
 
John
 

 

 

 
 

Ed your comment made me laugh out loud.
 
I liked the way you fabricated the gudgeons the shot of cutting them made me wince a bit though.
 
Michael

Young America - extreme clipper 1853
Part 107 – Lower Hull Work
 
I finally finished the hull planking this week and got some other tasks well along.  The first picture shows the full extent of the planking on the port side – as yet unpainted..
 

 
The deck is still masked for painting the white inside bulwarks.  That work is now also finished and the installation of the painted waterways can proceed.
 
The next picture shows some of the seemingly endless task of treenailing the planking.
 

 
This work, too, is now complete on both sides of the hull.  The picture also shows work on the rudder gudgeons.  These were made by first silver soldering a tube into a groove in a sheet of .032” brass.  The rough gudgeons were then ripped off on the circular saw as shown below.
 

 
The .032” brass – about 2 ½” at 1:72 – is too thick for the straps, but allowed the thick area at the hinge to be shaped.  The 6” wide straps were then bent and filed back to about 1” thick.  The next picture shows the bottom four installed using small brass nails.
 

 
The 16” aft face or the stern post is notched to receive the 6” wide gudgeons.  These were aligned when being fitted by a stiff, straight rod through the holes.  The end of the rod will mark the final center of the round helm opening – which must be on the hinge centerline.
 
The next picture shows the gudgeons on the starboard side. 
 

 
The top one will be installed after this side is painted.  Some of the lowest rows of “yellow metal” sheathing have been installed around the gudgeon.  This will be the only gudgeon requiring this, since this is the lowest of the planking at the stern.  The top of sheathing line – parallel and slightly above the load waterline - can be seen in this picture.  There will be several rows of sheathing.  The top row will be on the straight, horizontal sheathing line.  The strakes below will follow the planking shear and “gore” into this top strake. 
 
The brass plates were cut from .002” brass.  The nailing pattern was embossed into the plates used an embossing device.  The picture below shows the nail pattern being drilled in a wood block to make this.
 

 
The thickness of the block was sized carefully to allow small steel nails to be inserted from the underside.  The tips protrude just enough to impart the pattern when stamped as shown below.
 

 
Stamping these plates is almost as thrilling as treenailing.  Fortunately there are only about a half-dozen rows. A close up of the first few stamped plates is shown in the last photo.
 

 
After the pine stamping block “breaks in” the dimples become more regular.  These are like little cheese graters.  They are fastened with contact cement – another enjoyable task.  After making and installing 3700 of these my Victory model, I swore I wouldn’t do this again – but that was in 1978.
  
Ed

The bearding line was drawn on the fore edge of the rudder and cut in with a chisel.  The advantage of the 4-part rudder blade is apparent here.  The junction between the port and starboard halves of the rudder make an easily followed line.  The width of the bearding is narrower at the bottom and gradually increases towards the top of the rudder.  The bearding stops below the mortise for the tiller.
 

 

 
The rudder was positioned and the locations for the gudgeons were marked out.  The recesses for the pintles were drawn and then cut out, leaving a little extra wood for final positioning later.
 

 

 
The width of the rudder is the same thickness as the stern post and tapers top to bottom.  I took measurements off the sternpost and drew them into the pintle recesses for easy reference.  The taper was sanded.  I had taken the sole plate off earlier but have temporarily replaced it so one can see the amount of wood removed.
 
Next comes cutting the mortise for the tiller and then the dreaded metalwork.
 

Very neatly done, Toni. I believe that in real life the rudder sole was higher and angled a bit to ensure it wouldn't snag if the ship touched ground. Your call, of course.

Get well soon!
 
Cheers
 
Elia

Thank you all for your interest and good words.
 
Michael, I hope that the deck will remains the same after the coating protection.
 
Corners I got after several attempts. I first tried to laminate.
The thickness of the finished slats is 1.25 mm. When bent in several layers, very thin wood,  it is badly looked or cracked. I cut it out from pieces of wood and manually processed. No dark art only work and repetition
The pictures show cutting only for example, now I  cutting the  bad  tree  
 

 

 

 
Finishing with power tools and hand
 

 
Matija

Matija,
 
That deck planking looks fantastic. The nibbing is very neat and I love the full length king plank with all of those strakes nibbed into it. And deck furniture adds to it all. Super nice!
 
Cheers
 
Elia

Thanks Mike, I'm glad if I could help a little.. I hope that I will in the future be of help.       Thanks Michael, I have seen your masterpiece Maria ... You are unsurpassed, congratulations.   Thanks to everyone else for the kind comments and likes - Mark, Druxey, Patrick, Leo,...   Work on the deck is nearing its completion but still slow going.   While the adhesive dries I started working on the deck furniture                             Matija

Thanks all for your very kind compliments and likes!
 
So time to get back inside the hull. All beams were cut to size previously and here they are test fitted with all the lower deck details temporary in  place. I'm not too pleased how the upper well discolored overtime. In the beginning I have used minwax  and it made the wood a bit greenish. I also need to check the dimensions of the louvers as they look a bit thick to my eye compared to the other details. Ah well I'll just make an other one in due time. 
 
 

 

 

 
Before I proceed to install the carlings and ledges I made the hammock battens, al bit of mass production as there are quite a few to be made of different sizes. Preliminary shape (the last bit is in front of the pile af battens) was made on the table saw and then the battens were cut to size and further refined using files and sandpaper. The drilling and installing of the tiny bolts (0,3 mm) took some time. The last step was to bend the longer battens to conform with the curving of the deck beams. The outer bolts will be installed when the battens are fixed permanently in place and will help to pin the battens to the deck beams.
 

 

 

 
 
Port side has been done starboard side is still in the clamping jig ...
 

 
 
 
 
Remco

Thanks all.
 
David B, well the thing is I'm building Admiralty style so as I'm not adding any more planking it looks like the straps are underneath the planking. But if you  look closer you can see small shims I used to compensate for the lack of planking on the lower two gudgeons.
 

 
Remco

After being inspired by Remco's build, I have decided that this is the perfect time to start building the rudder,  The blade consists of two pieces which are tabled together.  The top of the rudder is different on Atalanta than on other Swan class ships.  The top of the rudder is stepped and the metal work is more complex.
 

 
I followed the suggestion in TFFM and split the blade in the midline to form the joints.  The tabling was marked out and the mortises were cut on the Preac and cleaned up with a chisel.  The same black paper I used on the keel and stem was used to line all of the joints.  As you can see, the two sides of the blade are mirror images of each other.  
 

 
The two halves were then glued together and the backing piece and sole piece were applied, again using black paper to simulate felt.  The plan showed the bottom of the sole piece extending all the way to the baseline.  I will shave that back a bit once the final height of the rudder is determined.
 

 
 

Ed this link on the old marine site shows the cover on the gears and the plates covering the openings on the crankcase. They are different engines but the same model, there seem to have been quite a few innovations and modifications to these engines, sort of reminds me of some of the dressing up that the hod rod cars seem to have.
 
Druxey, thanks I followed the same design as the miniature 00x90  taps that I purchased from Walthers the  model railroad suppliers. the same tap that was in the pin chuck. I used the hockey puck tap holder when I cut the thread. by making the tap first it was not difficult to then by trial and error get the mating part to fit nicely.
 
Steve the taps are the easy part the dies are a different story. having a screw cutting lathe is the key, I just wish i had the quick change gearbox for the Myford instead of having to change the set up by hand following one of the three different plans that are in the set up diagrams.
 
thanks for all the likes
 
Michael

John I know I'm completely bonkers.
 
Steve what kind of lathe do you have?
 
Screw cutting is easy if you unplug the machine and are using brass or free machining steel.
 
here is a bit of SBS of union building. I used the dremel with a small stone to add some relief to the tap. By locking the rotation of the quill and clamping the dremel in the vice I was able to take very small cuts by indexing in the grinding stone and raising and lowering the tap in the quill because the depth of the amount of threads in the union I did not need to make the relief very long. this really helped to make the threading more smooth.
 

 
threading the blank nut
 

 
threaded 3/32 deep"
 

 
filing the flats
 

 
polished ready to part off
 

 
male part threaded and bored 3/32"
 

 
parted off onto the shank end of the #42 drill(.093) I used the drill as a support because the wall thickness is around .010"
 

 
the two halves are sweated to their respective pipes. and threaded together
 

 
uncoupled
 

 
thank you for all the likes, I lost count so thank you for that.
 
Michael
 
 
 
 
 

Shipwrights,
 
A little more progress on Arethusa - masts and spars.  I've completed the basic shaping of the lower masts, upper masts, and the booms.  In this photo, top to bottom, are the main mast, the fore mast, the main topmast, the fore topmast, the main boom, the fore boom, and the jumbo boom.  Note the scale on the bottom of the green cutting mat in inches.  The grid squares are 0.5 inches per side.  The main and fore masts are just slightly greater in diameter than 3/8 inch.  All were formed from square stock bass wood stock.

This closer in photo shows the peculiar shaping of Gloucester schooner spars.  While circular in cross section, they are decidedly not axisymmetric.  The edge of the spar adjacent the sail is straight.  The opposing side is tapered.  The maximum diameter occurs 2/3 distance from the jaws (at the mast) to the tip.  My spars shown still contain a little excess material at each end of the spar.  They are shown with their jaw ends to the right in the picture.

 
[these were taken with my camera phone - quickie photos on the dining table]
 
Cheers,
 
Elia

This evening I had to give the union a run.
First order was to set up the change gears on the Myford lathe to cut 80 threads per inch, then did some test cuts with a freshly ground cutter on some brass.
 
then turned down some 1/4 inch drill rod to .138" which is the size of the major diameter of a #6 machine screw then turning everything by hand(I unplugged the lathe) and taking .001" cuts threaded the shaft, polished it up with a leather strop. Hardened and tempered it then ground three flats with the diamond stone.
 

 
next I turned up the brass nut, and threaded it after the threading was done the clearance hole wad drilled through and then it was parted off.
 

 
Next the male part was threaded and tested with the tapped nut and  .0005" reduction threading cuts until the nut wound on to the thread easily.
 

 
The male part was then parted off and slipped onto the end of some 3/32 tube.
 

 
A couple of tiny refinements and it will work just fine.
 
michael
 
 

Bob This site has a number of specialty taps and dies, pricey but good quality I suspect, I am always concerned about ensuring that my taps and dies are of the best quality, I have found sometimes that the cheaper ones are not ground threads and have a tendency to tear the material a bit even with good cutting fluids. since I am only cutting one or two and in brass i might just thread-cut some 1/8th inch drill rod and make a small tap and thread up some brass rod at the same time. then they will match.
 
Michael

would this work? http://www.amazon.com/Speed-Outside-Diameter-Special-Pitch/dp/B00OZ6B8JC

The testing of various ways of dealing with the small fittings is now completed for the most part,
 

 
and the final model parts in scale are coming together well. That said I am contemplating the false union at the junction with the cylinder and wondering if I can actually make one that works as a real union. Cutting a thread on some 1/8th diameter is not a problem usually the standard thread in imperial being a 5x40 the only problem is that at this scale that is an extremely coarse thread.
 
The elements are now in scale and the tubing is 3/32.
 

 

 

 
I am thinking that if I can make a thread cutter that will cut say 5x80 then that would be a much better size for the union, the concern that I have is if the whole lot were soldered together then separating the cylinder from the crankcase would be problematic, because there would be too much piping hanging off the cylinder and therefore easy to damage. In making the union actually work like a union it eliminates that problem.
 
The saga continues.
 
Thanks to all who are following along and commenting, providing useful tips, and for the likes.
 
I am happy that some of the methods I am using are useful to some of you. it is the least I can do for all the knowledge I have gained from you all who share your methods and tips.
 
Michael
 
 

Thank Row and others who likes.  
 
The deck is nearing the end, here are some photos:
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
Regards, Matija.

Lawrence, Pete, thanks for the good words.
 
I’ve been working on cabin details.  A little stain, cabinet doors, laminate on the tops and a stove in the lined alcove.  I made the stove out of brass.  Sorry I should have taken pictures of the stove before I cleaned and painted it.  Next I need to find some 1:48 scale vinyl for the mattresses.  Then I can move on to the cockpit.  More later.
 
Bob
 

 

 

 

 
 

Hi everyone and thanks for all the Likes and comments.  As you can see from the photos below, I've started on the deck's framework.  As I intend to fully detail the interior of Rainbow's hull, it's important that as much of it can be viewed and enjoyed.  For this reason, the deck will be left open and unplanked.  
 
Progress is steady, yet slow.  No need to rush things; besides, I'm finding it too enjoyable to rush.
 
I hope you enjoy the photos so far.
 
All the best
 
Patrick

Beautiful work, Ed. I have to admit that seeing the painted surfaces was somewhat disconcerting at first as I admire all your work, from the stanchion extensions of the frames, the the planking and treenails (or fasteners). But that stern scrollwork and painting is so very sharp. I (like so many) look forward to your next installment.
 
Cheers
 
Elia