Pete38

I finished gluing up the last of the 9 frames.  I used Weldbond so I'll give the most recently completed frames a couple of days to dry before rough handling.  The frames will require minimal trimming and shimming in a few spots to conform to the plans.  Once that's done, I'll rough sand the frames to match the plans and start to glue and dowel then to the keel. It took one week to enlarge the plans, glue up the individual futtock on to the billets, cut them out and glue them together.  I used double sided tape to hold the appropriate futtocks to the plans and glued the second layer to the first. taped down layer.  I put a piece of plywood weighted with big food cans to weight down the plywood until they dried.   The beer is to celebrate!  It's a Hofbrau Maibock.

Geert, I had the same question in my build log. All the replies I got were they are about 3 feet long with a hole drilled at the ends for lifting out. So I scaled my accordingly. Turned out looking nice so that is what I went with.
 
Go to page 9 on my log and scroll down to about post #170 and you can read the replies.
 
Hope this helps

Welcome to the build, 1:24 scale will make a nice big model. Looking forward to more

Glad I could be of some little help, your build log is coming along great, looking forward to more.

Thanks, Eddie.
 
Milestone!  The first frame is glued up.  I'll finish all nine before rough sanding them.

SKID BEAMS AND THOSE LITTLE BITS AT THE TOP

I then glued the brackets to the knees with quick-drying epoxy using the pins previously mentioned. I held the skid beams in the brackets (to ensure alignment), and, when the brackets had dried, glued in the skid beams.

By the way, you'll note that I'm leaving all the wood unstained and unpainted. This is quite deliberate, as I rather like the plain look. However, I have used my home-made varnish (mineral spirits, polyurethane varnish, linseed oil) to coat all the wood parts. I may have to give a second coat (some of the pictures show the patchiness), but I'm showing it in the current state.


I added a sheer rail to the top of the rearmost frame but remain dissatisfied with the look of it. I’ll remain dissatisfied because I’m not going to change it!





I’ll have a think about mounting it on a board, but as we may be selling our house soon, am not sure when I’ll be able to do it.

Tony

ENTRY STEPS AND FENDERS

Now that I’m used to making a moulding, I cut the shapes for the steps in a hacksaw blade and made the long outline of the entry steps.

After cutting the length, I shaped the sides first by cutting down with a fine saw, then using the saw cut as a base to file away the upper and lower edges of the steps.



The fenders were then cut out but I cursed the fact that I had added the sheer rail as cutting the spaces out for the fenders really was fairly tricky.



Tony

GANGWAY

I thought the best way to make the gangway would be to make the entire section separately and then lay it on top of the knees. The tricky part would be to make the curved sections in the middle – which I did by making a template for these.



I then used templates to shape the gangway planks



The key to the structure is the first long gangway plank, which, when glued to the longer section of the gangway edge, provides the reference for the remainder of the planking and the edges.


The parts were then all glued together and the edges of the gangway sanded with the Proxxon sanding machine.


Tony

I laid out the futtocks for frame #1 on the billets.  There are 11 parts per double frame and 9 frames in all.  I'll glue up frame #1 today and cut out frame #2 also.

Thanks, Jörgen, that's very nice of you. But you should have a look at some of the other Triton builds which are very much better done. All the same, these models are beautiful, and, oddly, even my wife uses that word when she sees it from time to time. Part of the reason for doing this kind of modelling is, of course, to enjoy and appreciate the beauty of these ships internally and externally.
Tony

I'm restarting this build.  Mike Shanks and I have been planning on doing a joint projet:  POF "Hannah" in 1/24 scale...the whole ship.  Not sure about rigging yet.  I think the Triton cross section will be good practice for that build.  I cut out and surfaced the blanks of hard maple I'll use for the frames.  The maple is 3/8" thick, giving a final double frame thickness of 3/4".  The footprint of the cross section at this scale is huge:  9-7/8" X 14-1/2"!  The photo shows the plans for frame 2 compared to a midship's frame of "Fair American" at 1/48 scale.  I'm also planning a building jig.  The jig in the photo is one of the popular "2 level" jigs used for the cross section, but it takes into account that the plan view profile of the model is not a rectangle.  The bulwarks curve slightly.  The profile of the sides of the jig (marked by the arrows are clearly curved.  Does anyone have a good way to lay out this curve accurately?  There is no plan view of the framing in the plans.

Hi,
 
today reached a point of no return, the frames are in place...

with the help of the jig and the spacers it was easier then I was expecting. Still had to redo some of the frames in order to align them properly (that is where I am now...)

I played around with patterns of the treenails to fix the frames against the keel...
 

 
The pattern on frame B seems better but from what I read it was only adopted after 1811 (Sappings System?, can anyone confirm this) and the one on frame C was the one in practice between 1710-1811.
Next is the gunport lintels and sills then sanding, lots of sanding...
 
Hugo

Tony, your cannons look great.  One has to remember that macro is not our friend and usually no one ever gets that close.    Excellent work on the frapping.

THE GUNS AND THEIR RIGGING

I’m still not ready to show what I’ve done with the gangway knees, as I need to finish talking about the guns.

First, the turning and the blackening. I haven’t quite achieved the level of finish others seem to manage, but for now I’m reasonably happy, and won’t be doing any more until I do another model.

As an aside, I should mention that lots of photographic stores still receive film for processing. My local photo shop has lots of film canisters that they just throw away. So I go down from time to time to collect a handful. They’re great for fluids and sawdust (which I use for filler).

I was even able to blacken my guns in film canisters as they are just the right size.
 




Preparing the capsquares was fun. I have already shown the initial preparation of the capsquares in the previous posting. Here I show how I managed to place the rearmost loop.





Although I made a capsquare eyebolt, I couldn’t find chain small enough to make the key with its chain. Perhaps I’ll do that another time.




“IT IS FUTILE TO DO WITH MORE THINGS THAT WHICH CAN BE DONE WITH FEWER”

I reckon William of Ockham (the one born in 1287) must have been a ship modeller, because the phrase above was one he used. He was following many others (probably also ship modellers) who used the same idea in a variety of guises.

The reason I remembered this phrase was when I came to prepare the gun tackles. At first I used a variety of strops and thimbles, rigging them fully, but every time when it came to frapping them for stowage the result was lumpy. I eventually, and step by step, reduced the rigging by dropping the thimbles, then dropping the pieces that wouldn’t be seen after frapping.



Having decided that, the first thing to do was to find out how far apart the blocks for each tackle should be.

This involved rigging the guns in a rough fashion to their loops in the hull and drawing them tightly to the sides.



In order that the frapping should be as smooth as possible, I then stripped a piece of bamboo through a drawplate till it was 1mm diameter and glued it between the shortened stropping ropes.



The second block was then added and the ropes glued to the bamboo strip.





I could then rig the guns to the bulwarks. You’ll note that luckily for me the deficiencies in my turning of the cannon are well hidden by the gunports!



So I’ll now be continuing with the gangway knees.

Tony

Finally finished the frames... I have the jig to assemble them ready (I built something similar to ChadB's.
one question: is there a proper place for the spacers? 
I will post some pictures tomorrow 

The case is finished and carefully pulled over the model, sealing in the model for forever (I hope).  Now I just need to find the time to take it to my Dad who lives 3 hours away.  I'm sure he will love it (he has no clue that I am going to give it to him).  Anyways, here are the pics.....

Thank you so much for the comments and likes. 
 
Christian, there are plans for a POB full build of the Triton; but that will be a while before I start it.  I currently have a piece of Castello Boxwood that is acclimating to the climate in Texas which I will mill down and use for the Triton full build.  I also need to find some Holly and order a Byrnes tables saw and thickness sander.  In the mean time I am going to put together the Model Shipways 18th Century Longboat kit.  It's still a toss up on whether to start the Model Shipways Confederacy kit or the Lumberyard's US Frigate Raleigh kit (Harold Hahn plans and milled lumber from the Lumberyard).  Decisions, decisions.......
 
Tony, it may seem like it was fast, but I started this build in 2014, then had to take a break to finish up school and for 3 surgeries for carpal and cupital tunnel.  Once I was able to start it back up (after earning my degree) I really wanted to get it finished.
 
Now to go finish the case and get the model ready to give to my Dad.

Beautiful work on the cross section and a nice build log. A model to be proud of.

Beautiful work on the cross section and a nice build log. A model to be proud of.

Beautiful work on the cross section and a nice build log. A model to be proud of.

The cross section is finished.  I made the crutches from brass square stock and painted them black and then installed them on the gangways.  I then installed the gangways on the cross section along with the ladders.  Put a coat of wipe on poly on and attached it to the base with three short pieces of 1/16" brass rod.  I also made a case to go over the model.  The base and case is made from pine.  I have apply cherry stain to the base and I will also stain the case with cherry.  The case will be attached to the base with some 1/16" brass rod to keep it from sliding around.  Anyways, here are the pictures.  I will post some of the case once that is completed.

Bookmark this page, really nice tutorial on how to. Will be real nice to reference back to this if I ever get to this point on my build. Great job. Thanks so much for all the information and how to in your build log.

That's very nice of you Pete. But your own build seems to be getting along just beautifully and, dare I say it, much neater than mine!
 
Tony

Not only the build log, also the model is coming along great. Nice progress

Glad I could be of some little help, your build log is coming along great, looking forward to more.