BLACK VIKING

Lovely work OC love the exhaust. 
Martyn

Lovely work OC love the exhaust. 
Martyn

Bit more progress  -  the other exhaust was built and painted  then glued in place, then I glued down the top cover.
 
OC.

Lovely work OC love the exhaust. 
Martyn

Lovely work OC love the exhaust. 
Martyn

I have built Two Constitutions the first was the Mamoli kit and the other was the Model Shipways kit
 
I have built a number of the Constructo kits including: Mayflower, Bounty, Pandora, San Mateo & King of the Mississippi paddle wheeler and the Cutty Sark.
 
I also built the America which was a Leclur kit and the Bluenose which was another Model Shipways kit.
 
I have built the Mamoli L'Orenoque
 
These are a few others. 

Not true.  John Bratten's dissertation on the Philadelphia indicates 2 bar shot were found on the Philly, one was in the 12 pounder at the time of sinking.
 

 
Bratten's full dissertation can be found here.
https://nautarch.tamu.edu/Theses/abstracts/bratten.html
 

Thanks Edward, You should also look at Mark's CH-53 build,  
 
When I opened this build it was for two reasons. One to mark my personal 50 year anniversary for the year I spent in Hueys by commemorating it with the build and possibly sharing some memories of what life was like back then. In addition I originally hoped that people from everywhere and all backgrounds would chip in with personal memories of their life of 50 years ago from whatever part of the world they may have been at the time. Vietnam was almost a unique American experience and even then only directly affected a very small portion of the nation in all. We have heard from a few Vets of course and the personal accounts and attempts at explanation without need to apologize or being criticized. But unfortunately it seems that the stories of those who were away those years of 1965-1975 have not been matched by by the vast majority of people who came of age at home instead of halfway around the world in a place they had never heard of. To me, those stories are just as interesting as you feel ours are. We will never know what it was like to come of age uninterrupted by someone else's agenda, and living a totally alien life.     

Good day everyone  hope all are well,     I decided to do a bit more this afternoon  as the weather was pants  with light rain  so no sitting in the back patio,  so  I decided to work on one of the exhaust manifolds  - this is built up using four sections,   after assembly  I painted the insides of the exhausts flat black  then I made up a bronzy type colour by mixing flat black/flat alum  and red ocre,   then after drying  with my friend  "Harold hairdryer"  I glued it in place iniside the forward bulkhead, then I dry fitted the engine comp cover.
 
OC.

Good evening all   hope your all in good health,      right then  I did  another hour on the spit,  firstly  I fitted the two ailerons  straight forward  procedure, then I fitted the wing tips  - again glued straight on with no fuss,  what amazes me is the scale cord  thiness  of the wings  just like the real thing.
 
OC.

I  thought about  building it with everything flush  but thought it would be more interesting with  things drooped.
 
This pic off the net shows a powerd down spit with stabs drooped and some movement of the rudder.
 
OC.

Am organising getting this from the US

Hi all,
 
Whilst in the last stages of building my Zulu from Vanguard Models, I took the opportunity to start the Fifie and get this finishing in good time so Chris can use my photos and text for the instruction book. I took a look at this kit last week, here. This will be another abridged build as I need to get the model done as quickly as I can, but you'll certainly get the gist from my photos. Whilst the Zulu was a nice simple model, this one is actually slightly simply, with a more regular hull with no sheer at the stern. The stern rake is quite shallow.
 
Like Zulu, the Fifie comes with engraved bevel lines. These are only a rough guide, but definitely saves time later by getting rid of some waste material now. I used my Dremel on 9000rpm for this.


 
 
The bulkheads are now slotted to the false keel and once the glue is set, the square insert that supports the end of the aft mast, is fitted, followed by the inner frame platform. The platform must be fitted with the 'TOP FORWARD' engraving at the top....and you guessed it, forward also! 

 
 
The fish hatch side walls are now installed. These have different length tabs and can only fit one way. Zero way to get this wrong!

 
 
Before fitting the deck, I use a sanding stick to level the top of the bulkheads at bow and stern, so they are in line with the sheer. The deck is now popped into place without glue. The outer edges lock underneath the upper bulkhead tabs. I now use glue to brush into the joints from underneath.


 
 
The hull on this is very easy and quick to fair, with the infilled blocks taking the brunt of the sanding rework. 

 
 
The pear bulwarks are 1mm thick with engravings to identify where they belong. No way you'll easily bend these around the bow without some assistance. Both front and rear of the bulwarks are soaked in hot water for about 15 to 20 mins and the excess moisture towelled off. These are then fitted to the hull with no glue, and clamps to secure them until they are completely dry. 


 
 
I could get away with a couple of lime planks that didn't need tapering, but after that, all planks working down from the bulwarks, were tapered. 




 
 
Working up from the garboard plank, I allowed the planks to more or less follow their natural flow, and then infilled with stealers.



 
 
I always take my time with first sanding so I know the second layer will flow nicely.


 
 
 
Back to the cave for more work!
 

I finished my first RC scratch built square rigger HMS Harrier a couple of years back and although I'm very happy with the result always considered her something of a practice run for the command that everyone wants - a frigate.   Check out Harrier in action on video.
 
With the current pandemic making the full sized sailing dinghy I was hoping to start this year look just that - hopeful - there's no time like the present to start the frigate. 
 
She's relatively cheap, being cobbled up from old floor boards and ply with the only realtively expensive bits being servos. She'll be easy to break into storeable stages if the world comes to rights and the financial situation lets me build a real boat, and also a bit of a challenge that should take at least a couple of years. 
 
So, which frigate? I love the the Artois class like HMS Diana as per the fine examples built by the likes of Jason and Barbossa on MSW but as a 38 gun vessel it's 146ft on the gun deck and getting quite large for transport at a 1.2m hull in 1/36 scale.  Also, while the rest ofthe Anatomy of the Ship book is very detailed, the lines needed to reproduce a hull shape in my copy are not very detailed.
 
The Enterprise class is a bit smaller at 120ft with all the attributes of a frigate and has the advantage of being repesented in some detailed orignal ship plans in Greenwhich's National Martime Museum;
 

 
 
There are some very colourful contemporary paintings done by Jospeh Marshall as part of a series of ship models to stoke Geroge III's interest in the navy;  He dubbed the ship Enterprize, interchanging the Z with an S as was common at the time but most records of the time and modern scholarship have her as Enterprise.
 

 

 
The clincher is a very detailed set of plans from Polish model company Shipyard, which also does smaller scale card models of Enterprise and her sister ship Cleopatra.
 

 
The Shipyard plans cover everything from hull and deck layouts through fitout including guns, boats, masts and spars in a variety of scales ranging from 24,72, 96,192 etc depending on size.  The bit where it falls down are the carvings and decorations, which appear speculative at best and include a lion figurehead more suitable for a ship of the early 1700s.
 
The idea for this build is to try to combine the best of the modern plans for a fairly accurate sailing model, with the contemporary plans and paintings to give the full bling of a Georgian vessel. While it's a little uncertain whether a vessel in service would have carried full freizework and decoration, I've always wanted to try my hand at it and the goal is something that looks like a contemporary ship model that can be sailed. As such, the ship will be one of the class, and generally correct for the period but with some speculation on decoration depending which vessel I end up depicting. 
GIven the diverse sources it'll be a model of a painting of a ship model, so I think that'll give me a bit of latitude.
We'll see how close I get to the goal of a big 1770s Navy Board model you can drop in the lake. 
 
A little about the Enterprise class:
 
A sixth rate Designed by John WIlliams in 1770, the first five of this class were ordered for the Falklands Islands emergency. 
Fox, Syren, Surprise and Enterprise and Acteon were launched from the early 1770s through to 1775. Another 15 vessels followed in 76-78 and another seven in 82-83 with solid quarter deck bulkheads.
They saw service during the Revolutionary War, with many Enterprises active on the American station against US privateers, at the relief of Gibralter, in the Mediterranean, Caribbean, including at the battle of the Saintes, around the North Sea and French coasts and even the battle of Cuddalore in the Indian Ocean. They were active ships, with losses to weather and enemy action that reflected this, although some limped through as troop ships or on harbour duty until late in the Napoleonic wars. 
 
Length on gundeck: 120ft
Breadth: 33ft 9 inches
Crew: 200
Initial armament: Upper deck: 24 x 9lbers, Quarter deck: 4x3lbers.
By 1780 the quarter deck armament was 4x6lbers plus 4 18lb carronades and another two on the forecastle. 
 
Making a start
 
 
The shipyard plans were scaled up to 1/36 scale and details like framing station lines, fixtures for the ballast keel, ply deadwood, rough places for servos and battery and other details drawn in. The plans have station molds indicated, which were expanded to show the 12mm ply that will be used for framing.   
 
Some initial work on the masts is visible below.  More on that in the next post.
 

 
 
The Enterprise hull is roughly 1m on the deck, slightly bigger than Harrier at 80cm and has a much greater internal volume, which should hopefully make some of the fitout easier, although there are issues around internal access with a quarterdeck as well as the main deck. 
Rough overall length with bowsprit should be 1.6-1.7m, with the masts standing about that tall from the keel, although they will collapse for transport. It should fit in the family wagon, if not it'll have to go in my camping trailer, although my wife is asking where it'll fit in the garage already containing a car, canoe, kayak, the Harrier, kids' bikes, clothesline and my workbench and tools... 
 
 

Last beam done...

I've been using a rowing mirror supported on a "Tablet stand" with a flex neck and clamp base. Effective but wobbly and ugly.
Now with all this time on my hands I've made a much nicer replacement using the same mirror and tablet cradle and retaining the ball joint from the original. I was able to cut the ball joint from the flex shaft, centre drill it and turn a 5mm diameter nut to go into a pre-existing lateral hole in the ball. I cross drilled and tapped the nut to 3mm then turned a screw and washer to attach it all to the new spruce post which sits in the inwhale spaces so I can move it to wherever I want it.
 

 

I designed these structures to ensure the accuracy of installation. Of course, there will be some installation errors when we make them, so I will provide key dimensions and 1:1 drawings

Working on the ratlines for the topmast shrouds, next update may not be up for quite some time...
 

Please forgive me for how I jumped through the rig on this, but I needed to complete quickly, and finished she is!
 
The Zulu is a two-masted vessel, and the forward mast is supplied in square section walnut. This needs to be rounded off a little above deck height and then tapered to the required dimensions. I just use a simple sanding block for this purpose, and good quality 120 grit paper. I also make sure the end dimension is correct by checking against the mast top ring. These aren't glued on until the yards are in place as I just knew I'd struggle getting the parrels over them! Yard lift and Burton stay tackle. All tapered masts and yards etc. are given a couple of coats of polyurethane varnish, lightly sanding between coats.





 
 
I needed to dye the sails so opted for RIT dye. Several photos of such vessels showed different colour sails, so I opted for the closest I could. Dyeing was straightforward, and they were then rinsed until the water ran clear, and left to dry. The various rig lines were added, and the yards also secured to the mainsail and aft sail. 




 
 
No photos of rig for this, but from fitting the sails, it only took a few hours to fully rig. No standing rig at all, so all was done with natural coloured thread. Watch out for this kit being released soon!






 

Finished the running rigging. Over two years so far invested so far. Actually the model is 99% done. All that is left is to make the figurehead and then make a base for the model to stand on. Unfortunately I have to wait to get to the lumber mill to get a nice piece of wood to mount the ship on. 

3rd beam and provisory rails...

That door's almost finished. 
The roofs are in progress, the forecourt is done, the woodwork and windows in place!
There will remain the ageing, the gluing of the sundial and the tower doors.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The two "cow-catchers" are the last major things to fit to the loco before it's finished. Here are the pics of them :

The bars are all different angles and lengths, so I sorted them out and marked them before gluing them together :






The brake hose fittings :



All the front is now finished. Just a few rivets to re-glue and I can spray it with satin finish clear lacquer :






Now to build the tracks for the base.
 
Danny

Hi all
The tie fighter is finally finished. I opted to use humbrol Matt varnish as I did another test and it worked fine. Unfortunately grrrh the windows have completely misted up...😠
Anything I can do? Clean it carefully with white spirit maybe? I'll let the photos do the talking. The colours are a lot lighter than in real life. I had to use the flash just to see the details. I'll try again tomorrow in the middle of the day


Thanks for looking in.
Nick

Applied a wash of thinned artist's oils to all of the cockpit components. I wait about 30 minutes and remove the excess, and allow to dry. Once everything is fully dry I'll apply a matte coat and move on to drybrushing