No Idea

That looks great 👍 The transition is very smooth and much better than the step that I arrived at - top job

Very well found my friend - I’m going to leave mine as it is as breaking those shiplap planks out would destroy them all. At least your ship will be spot on 👍

Hi Tobias - I think that you are right and I completely missed that! I have just had a look at Adrians book and he has missed this point as well. It will be interesting to see what Gerard says but either way I think that using these planks to help the transition would look very nice.

Albert your work is truly inspirational - Its not just that - its the way you have your workshop and how you approach your work - fantastic

I've been trying to figure out how best to make the windows as they are a parallelogram in shape but also all of the parts are angled to suit the angle of the stern. I tried a few mock ups using separate parts but they really did not go well at all. So I thought that the best way was to try and mill them out of a single piece. So I marked them up to roughly match the drawing Then I set the required angle and using a 1mm mill bit I cut the windows out. The result actually isn't too bad - sorry about the poor quality pictures and I just balanced it into the ship to give a rough idea of how it looked. One down although it needs tiding up and one to go. I can then complete the window frames and plank the inside to tidy it all up. Mark

So moving forward I have now fitted the stern timbers and generally tidied the stern up. I'm really pleased with the way it looks and I think it's fairly symmetrical too. But as with everything it seems with ship building, I soon discovered that the very rear beam that I fitted maybe 2 years ago is 2mm too low. It's not a problem but it will need a filler piece on the top fitted at some point. I also found that my location of the counter timbers was not as good as it could have been as the windows did not exactly line up with them. Again it's not a problem but I do have to make some extra pieces to hide these errors. The stern windows were my next task - The drawings more hint at their design rather than give a detailed instruction. As such I did what I always do and contacted Gerard Delacroix and asked his opinion. He advised me that their parallelogram shape on the outside followed through to the inside windows. He also went above and beyond and sent me a drawing of how they should look - cheers mate 👍 So to keep the shape I made a couple of false windows to set the window frames. I really want this part of the ship to look correct hence all of the questions and effort. Below you can see the false window in place whist the frame sets. The cheeks of the window frames also require some extra timber but thats ok and I'll sort that out too. I have decided to have them closed but I'm going to make them as best I can anyway. Here's a picture of both windows with the top and bottom parts of the frames in place. So the next jobs are to complete the window cheeks and work out how to make the windows so that they look as near to the drawings as I can. Thanks all for the very nice comments - Mark

Such nice work 👍. If you want to see if you are filing the surfaces flat - just get a pencil and scribble all over the surface. Then file again and see if the marks are removed. This worked for me - keep the updates coming!

Hi - No sorry I didn’t take any but I achieved the bead by making a scraper out of an old blade. You are right though about working against the grain the wood is difficult to cut

I that case you could use either - as for the choice of ply you need a well made and bonded ply. Just have a look at the edge of the ply you may buy; it should be solid without voids or crumbly layers

Are you going to paint the hull or leave it as wood?

Hi All I've had some more time so I've been getting on with the stern. I decided to go with the curved planks that I had previously made but I did break off the top two planks and replace them. It was really easy to do and I just reused my jig to make this happen. Moving forward there is a carved moulding which goes around the stern. It's quite basic compared to many ships which was a bonus for me as I have never tried to make anything like this before. So as per usual I made a photocopy template and cut out the basic shape. And now the fun started - Using a mixture of scrapers and chisels I went ahead and tried to replicate how it should look. I'm no carver thats for sure and I could not replicate the very fine detail but I gave it a go. This is pretty much as good as it gets from me so I decided to use this first version. Hopefully my carving will improve as I learn this skill more. Next was to mill out the windows - I wanted to use the mill so that I could get the shape as correct as possible. However they could easily be cut out using a fret saw and files. The two parts now glued together - I'm going to fit this part to the counter timbers tomorrow and as long as nothing splits when I bend it all should be OK. If not I'll have a rethink on how to approach this part of the ship. Thanks for all of the comments - Mark

Well..............Its had a bid. I feel sorry for the buyer as they could import a brand new saw into the UK for £750 including taxes and shipping

If that’s true that’s amazing news 👍👍

Mike that is genius; what a great way of achieving your needs - even better you are only producing wood shavings instead of dust 👍

GrandpaPhil your ship is looking incredible - amazing work

Hi Alfred this is a really good question 👍 Planks are bevelled so that they contact their respective planks on each side tightly. If you put a plank onto a hull just get a square edged plank and butt it up against the one that is fitted. You will see that due to the curvature of the frames they will not meet tightly there will be a gap as they do not meet at 90 degrees. So bevelling is the art of making them meet correctly and the bevel does change as the strake goes from stem to stern. In practice though you will only need to be roughly right. I only bevel one edge but I may be the odd one out here. So working from the garboard plank upwards I would bevel the plank that meets it and leave the other edge square. I would then bevel the edge on the next plank that meets that one and so on. The very last strake of planks will have bevels on both sides. Also I always make the last strake of planks somewhere near the middle of the ship. So I start planks from the garboard upwards and also from the whale downwards and then meet in the middle. I hope this helps - Mark

A very brave decision - I did exactly the same as you and have not regretted it

Just a heads up- there is a table saw and thickness sander for sale in the UK. Nothing to do with me but I thought I’d let you all know

A very small update today - I'm back to work on Monday after a very nice week off Firstly the moulding below the stern timbers was made and fitted. This was my second attempt as the first one moved slightly whilst drying and left a small gap between it and the vault planking. Now I could have bodged / disguised / turned a bling eye to this but it just needed ripping off and another being made to replace it. What was left of the original moulding - I'm sure that I can make something else from it so it will go into my offcuts box. Now I'm not sure what this part of a ship is called but moving upwards I needed to make the stern timbers. The part which has the windows in? These planks are curved and I wanted to make them off of the model so that I can cut the window holes on the mill. So what I did was first was to just roughly edge bend some planks on a really simple jig. I use foil underneath as if the wet Castello touches steel which is the base it turns the wood black. I then made some vice jaws which matched the curvature on the drawings I then put all of the planks into a really simple jig and squeezed them all together with glue. I have ended up with what will hopefully be the planks that I will shape and use. If not I'll just make another one now that I have the jig. Thanks for all of the comments and questions - Mark

Hi Thunder and thanks for your comments 👍 That tool is a very old dremel router table. This was one of my very first tools and still use it occasionally. I pretty much stopped using it when I bought a spindle sander which is a lot easier to use than the dremel - Mark

Hi Max looks like a very nice build you are doing there and some of the frames especially the cant frames will be very tricky. I have never built cant frames like you are trying to achieve but I have learnt that each frame should flow into the ones next to it. I just look at what I've made and if I can see the flow of the frames its usually about right - great start; good luck and I'm following

A fantastic start to your new build and a very good choice of model too. I have been meaning to make some clamps such as yours for ages and I will before my next build. You have done this the right way around unlike me. Beautiful work and I think your gonna smash this so keep the updates coming and if its ok I'm following along

Thanks Justin 👍 Hopefully I'll have another update on the build soon

Thank you 👍 Thanks druxey - its good to be back building at last Hi Marc - good to hear from you and thanks

Thanks SaltyScot - My height gauge has become probably one of my most important bits of kit. All builds need a datum and mine is the very bottom of the keel. So I use this tool to check pretty much everything. They can be bought for less than $90 now but they don't have to be digital. I just wish that I had owned it at the beginning of the build. Hi Justin P - I'm fortunate that this is sometimes a team build. I have a book by Adrian Sorolla that explains the entire build of this little ship. I also have G. Delacroix who actually owns the monograph who is a member on here. He answers so many questions for me regarding this build which I would otherwise struggle with. I also have the 1000's of members of this forum that often put me right - so don't quit go build a ship Now I said that I was going to build a heavy duty keel clamp so I did - this is not going to be everyone's cup of tea but here's some pictures. Cheers to Toolmaker who encouraged me to share this. I've built in some room for growth as my next ship will be a little longer - all I can say is that it's completely over engineered and extremely strong Mark