Aussie048

Huh, almost to forget chimney !!!
 

 
And finaly, all content of after deck ready for mounting
 

 
A lot, when you put them together.
 
Some color corrections, and mounting can start

Time to move on
 
Last detail for aft deck - bell. This bell does not exist in present stage, but it exist on C-plans, and I want it badly. ( "details overloading strategy")
 
Considering dimensions in scale is only 5x5 mm, after several attempts I concluded that I just can not make real bell 2mm dia, and decided to make something which will look as a bell from airplane
 

 

 

 
Frame is made from allmighty telephony Cu wire, and bell is drop of gold acrylic paint applied with toothpick top, dot by dot
 
So, last aft-deck detail is finished, and next move is to glue and fix aft-deck content on place with some corrections.
 
Then I'll move to main deck

Thank you very much Patrick,
 
as the two staircasess (forecastle access) were too short , I took some raw etched patterns, clipped them to length, folded the sides and the stairs, and soldered my own side rails on made from 0,5 mm wire. Hight is now 34 mm instead of 27 mm
 
Nils
 

 
 

And here are the finished binnacles placed in position but not glued down yet. I forgot to mention that for the base I glued a square piece of mahogany sheet to the bottom that I sanded at an angle. I also filed the underside to simulate the four feet at the corners.
 

 

 

 
Overall I was very happy with the mill and how these turned out. You can also see in those pictures that I have started adding all of the eyebolts to the deck that will be needed for the rigging.

Thanks Frank and popeye, and for all the likes. I am a bit hesitant to keep showing my pedestrian work after seeing the other Constitution build logs in progress now, especially Ken and David's, but they are all looking really good. I wish I had started this one after them, but over 2 years into this I am not stopping now.
 
I finished up the ladders by adding some rope hand rails, using some large eye bolts I had for the stanchions.
 

 

 

 
I also made the binnacles which house the compasses. I made the bases from some mahogany strips that I had left over from a previous build. These were not thick enough to make a square base big enough for the binnacles so I made them in four pieces, using my new tool/toy that I bought for myself as kind of a birthday present.
 

 
This is the Proxxon hobby mill, and this seemed the perfect little mini project to try it out on. I first milled the recesses for each of the eight faces of the two binnacles, using an end mill bit that was just wide enough. After the faces were milled I attempted to square off the corners of the recesses with limited success.
 

 

 
The bases were made with four pieces that each had a 45 degree angle milled into the back of them. To mill that angle, I used the dividing head I also bought with the mill, squaring up the strip then tilting the strip 45 degrees in each direction and milling off the material in the back, again with the end mill bit, but using the side of the bit.
 

 

 
I then glued four pieces together for each base, and sanded them to final shape after the glue dried. They are no where near perfect but they do look so much better than my first attempt, which was to cut thin strips of mahogany and glue them to the sides of a square basswood plug.
 

 
For the tops I did use square basswood that fit the bases. I put some tape on the table of my disk sander at 75 degrees, and used it as a guide to sand in the four faces of the simulated brass top. I then sliced these off the strip and fit them to the bases. I glued in a piece of wire as a holder and painted three of the faces with copper metallic paint (I didn't have brass paint or I would have used it), and painted the window face black. I thought about putting plastic over this face but it didn't look good so I left it off. I had also tried wrapping the whole top in thin brass sheet, but the edges just made it look bad, so I went with paint. I made two vents by making thin slices of some brass tubing that I topped with some thin brass sheet. Pictures of the finished binnacles are in the next post.
 
 

Thanks for the likes all. With all the crazy time at work this week, I did manage to get some therapeutic time in the shop. I glued the new bow pin rail in place and added the belaying pins.
 

 
I also glued the baffle plate that I punched from copper sheet to the galley stack. I glued two pieces of wire to the sides of the stack, touched up the paint, and glued the stack into the hole in the deck. It is hard to see in the pictures but if you look really closely to the third picture you can just see the wire.
 

 

 

 
I then made three ladders. One will go in the open hatch I left aft of the open waist, and the other two will go in the open waist openings at the bow. I first made a jig for the table saw from some scrap plywood and basswood strips. There is a thin strip of wood on its side in a slot that sticks out a bit from the plywood base, and a slot for the saw blade that is the distance between steps from it.
 

 

 
I used it to cut a slot, then place that slot over the raised piece to cut the next slot, until I had seven slots in each side. I have two boards as guides for the ladder sides, at the same angle but in opposite directions for the two different sides. Here are the results:
 

 
I then glued strips into the slots for the steps, sanded the ladders and gave them one coat of oak stain.
 

 
I will give them another coat of oak stain and add hand rails and ropes before gluing them into the openings. Next up are the binnacles.

Thanks so much Jim, and the rest of the likes.
 
I finished installed the belaying pin racks. They are all held to the bulwarks with wood glue and wire pins that are CA glued into the pin rails and bulwarks.
 

 

 
I used Blue Jackets Brass Brown on the brass belaying pins and they came out pretty nice. I used a 10:1 dilution with distilled water and let them sit in it for about 30 minutes, then rinsed them in water.
 

 
When they dry I will add them to the pin racks.

To continue with the pin rails, I added wire pins to the back of the rails to provide a more secure attachment with the bulwarks. I sure don't want any of these pulling away during rigging. I used a pin vise and a very small drill bit for the holes, then CA glued a piece of wire into the holes. To attach these to the hull, I made a small jig for each one from some scrap wood. I used slight pressure to indent the scrap with the locations of the holes for the rail, then drilled holes for the wire.
 

 
I fit the rail to the scrap wood then centered the rail between the gun ports. The scrap wood provided a consistent distance for the pin rail from the underside of the cap rail. I then removed the pin rail from the scrap and drilled through the holes in the scrap into the bulwarks. Sorry I have no picture of that process, but I didn't have enough hands. Here are all the starboard aft pin rails dry fit.
 

 
I then removed them one at a time and used wood glue on the backs of the rails and CA on the pins and put them back into place, with a clothes pin to clamp them while they dried.
 

 
I think these will be pretty secure. I have to blacken the belaying pins for the rails and add them later. I am going to try some brass brown for the pins instead of brass black. I have tried it before and the brass still looked black, but I am going to try more dilution this time.
 
 

Thanks John, George Richard and Popeye, and for others who hit the like button.
 
Before tackling the capstan I have a few other things I want to do, starting with the pin rails. The supplied belaying pins are OK but are a bit too long, so I will snip off about a mm or so from the bottoms. I made a simple jig out of a piece of wood with a hole to put the pin in and the right amount sticking out the other end to snip off. I am using the XY table on the drill press for the rails. I drill the holes for a few rails at a time using the whole span of the vise.
 

 
I am staining them with two coats of oak stain. Here are the rails that will go aft of the open waist.
 

 
I am going to put two pieces of thin wire into the back of each one to give them more support in the bulwarks.

The last month has been in fits and starts. I made all the blocks to rig the cannons out of boxwood. Here is a shot of the smallest blocks. these are the single two mm blocks. Most of this work was done with the mill followed by shaping in the block tumbler.
 

 
Next I started working on the hooks. After a number of different attempts at bending hooks that a 1) liked and 2) was extensible to 200 hooks, I decided to use photo etching to make them. I have completed the artwork but am waiting on some supplies for the process.
 
I also had a setback on the rigging lines. I pulled the Byrnes ropewalk out to make the left hand breeching lines and found the control unit shorted out. Jim was very responsive and hopefully I will have the new control unit within the next few days.
 
Since rigging was at a standstill, I moved on to the anchors. I used ⅛" brass plate to make these. I drew up the plans in DeltaCAD and printed them at scale. The pattern was glued to the face of the brass and taped over with clear packing tape. The tape acts as a lubricant during the cutting process.
 
This shows the anchor ready to be cut out.
 

 
Here is the anchor roughly cut out on the bandsaw.

 
I used a combination of the Dremel tool, hand files, and disk sanders to smooth and shape the rough anchor. Once satisfied, I used the power buffer to polish the anchor prior to attaching the flukes.
 
The flukes were cut from thinner plate and roughly shaped. These were clipped into position with paste flux in the joint. The photo below shows this ready to solder. You can see the small pieces of solder cut and laying on each side of the joint.
 
Once I was satisfied that everything was in it's proper position, I hit the joint with the micro torch. This only required seconds to heat the joint enough for the solder to flow into the joint.

 
Then it was back to the files to clean up the joint and do a final polish on the power buffer.
 
Here is the anchor ready for the stock.
 

 
The stocks were cut out of walnut with the halves glued together around the shaft. Once glued, the final shaping was done and banding added with black rope. I still have to make the rings, but the preponderance of the work on the anchors is done.
 

 

I have been focused on the stern framing this week. Rather than box it in solidly I wanted to frame it like it might have been done. Since none of this actually survived on the wreck, this framing is conjecture. We know there were no cant frames in the stern so everything aft of the fashion frame are counter timbers. There are two gun ports out the stern which need framing.
I first worked up a method for framing which was straight forward. Given the speed which this ship was built, they did not go for complexity when simplicity would do. 

The first task was to design the sternmost deck beam. This beam is notched into both the fashion frame and the outermost counter timbers. I cut this with the camber the deck would have and used the top of this as the guide for mounting it to the ship. The inboard profile provided the height this beam should have on the centerline. Once this was established it was a simple process to use the gantry frame to align the beam and clamp it in place for glue up.

I started lofting the counter timbers using the inboard profile. Then once I had that I cut two counter timbers to mount either side of the sternpost deadwood. These provided the planes needed to cut the other timbers. Since the stern of the ship is flat I had to maintain the angle of the counter timbers above the main deck beam. Below the beam the angle would change allowing the timber to meet the fashion frame.

I notched each of these for the beam. This provided the two points the timbers were attached to the hull. They were also attached to each other with carlings which stiffened them and framed in the gun ports. I planned on having four sets of counter timbers. I waited to cut the last set until the other sets were installed on the stern since the outer timbers were rather complex angles and would require extensive shaping to the hull.

Below are the first three sets of counter timbers. Notice the upper arms of each are the same. The angles change at the notch allowing them to hit the frame.
 

 
I found the easiest method for installing the timbers was to use a spring clip to attach a flat beam across the upper stern. This gave me a third point for the timber to be clipped to when installing. The brass bar clamps recommended by Wayne have come in very handy here!
 

 
The carlings were all glued in then sanded down to the ship's stern planes once the glue was dry.
Lastly, I trimmed the ends of the deck beam and prepared the outer counter timbers. These were notched to fit over the end of the deck beam. I left these to dry over night.

In preparation for trimming the counter timbers, I printed out the stern elevation. I also made note of the height of the center below the handrail.
 
With the stern elevation and the height of the timber tops on centerline it was a snap to set the gantry at the appropriate height and mark the tops of the two center timbers. Then I carefully placed a cut out of the stern elevation across the timbers using the centerline and the top line as the guides.

 
By placing the top of the cutout on my previous marks, then aligning the bottom with the center of the keel, I traced the outline on the other timbers. Then it was a matter of cutting and sanding the stern to the profile.
Once this was done, I did some final cleanup of the glue squeeze outs, then drilled the holes for the pinning and glued the brass into them with heavy CA. I trimmed these off and sanded smooth. I did one final faring of the stern with the frames then wiped the entire assembly with mineral oil to remove all dust. I touched up the keel assembly with stain where needed.

Now I will move forward with the remaining half frames.

Here are photos of the stern as it sits in the gantry.
 
 
 

Task was: Make casks to look real, just like casks, even from a "fast train passing" look, and let them have five ringa, and two of them, of course, to be equial
 
Starting with 7x7 mm molding saved from old Tehnididakta kit, careful cutting to shape - 7mm dia to base, and 5mm dia to top. Fine sanding
 

 
Planking with veneer strips 0,5-1mm arround, sanding
 

 
Base and top made from veneer, sanding to shape
 

 
And rings (rims) ... From laser printing paper 80gr. No other material in my ship yard agree to listen me !!!!
 
 

 
Nice details on top, hinges (simulated) and handdle
 

 
And after that all, painting.
 
I used transparent acrylic to allow plank structure to be seen clearly, and to simulate weathering.
 
Gold acrylic with drop of black, mixed with secret magic ingredient added to simulate metal shine, all covered with thin acrylic matt lacquer
 

 
Very very very satisfied with result
 
Cheers to you all, who pushing me over my limits !!!!

For my soul ... Ropes on buckets
 

Hand-hold rail done after two cracks and re-do works
 

Still playin' arround
 
Testing piece
 

Thank you Grant and Bob
I tried the paint route,didn't look right,so that idea aborted The issue is the massive difference in colour between the boxwood I use for carving and the box used for general construction and planking.
This is further complicated by the fact I am not prepared to carve every detail on the model,kit castings will be used where appropriate.
The plan is that everything was always going to be box and ebony,no other colours anywhere.I am prepared to make one exception and that is the decoration,so now I have tried my 'get out of jail card'.
The pic is of the carving with gilding paste applied.This stuff buffs up to a high sheen,does not obscure detail and does not have the metallic flakes prominent like paint.
This does present another problem in that you cannot cover it with Poly,even if you spray it on,it turns milky.This would mean doweling the carvings and fitting all the ornamentation when the hull and decks are complete and fitted out.
The pic really doesn't do it justice.The combination of iphone camera and a dark and dingy wet day don't help.
 
Kind Regards
 
Nigel

After shaping the bottom figure,I decided to relieve the back of the carving.This lended to a more 3d appearance allowing me to open up the area between the legs.
 
Since taking these pics,the carving has been separated from the stock and has had a thin coat of yellow ochre acrylic.The reasoning behind this is that the wood I use for carving is far too yellow for this model.The carving would not blend with other boxwood the hull is planked with. I hope that after applying a coat of poly it will blend better.If not,it is small enough to strip and try again to find a suitable method.If I get this right,it means I can use the cast wreaths around the gunports.These are good quality from a detail point of view and a better alternative to carving 22 identical ones!!
 
Kind Regards
 
Nigel

Thank you very much indeed Nigel
 
The upper character is now complete(well apart from the great lump of boxwood to be cut off later )
 
I have now started on roughing out the lower one.This one is crouched down with hands together
 
Kind Regards
 
Nigel

Thank you very much Don and Jason
 
The reason I chose epoxy in this instance Jason is two fold.Firstly,I couldn't guarantee a perfect fit to the inside of the planking.The epoxy fills gaps whereas pva does not.Secondly,epoxy sticks to ebony better than pva and I needed this joint to be as strong as possible.
 
Ok,I have now started work on the decorative figures that run between the windows.These are to be carved out of boxwood(yes I know,I can see where this is heading   )I could cast them,but they are all different due to the angles involved.I am trying to mirror what is illustrated on the kit castings.
This is the start of the first piece.It comprises of two figures on top of one another.I have started with the top one as I want the feet to fall on the rail below the windows.This is very much in the roughing stage.Weight loss,breast reduction,then detailing are on the menu
 
Kind Regards
 
Nigel

Wow the time flies. It has been slightly over a month since I updated my log. However, I have been quite busy with the ship as well as updates to my shop. Since the cannon/carronade construction was covered in detail earlier in the build log, I did not want to duplicate this but rather update the long once they all were done. First, the shop.
 
In preparation for my next build as well as getting to the next level in my tools, I decided to ditch my router table and drill press and use the space for a new mill. I looked at all the various mills and decided to go with a full size mill with a digital read out. I have had great luck with Grizzly tools and their support as been great on all my previous tools. I chose the Grizzly G0759. This is their widely popular G0704 with a built in DRO. This is accurate to 4 microns and will display in either inches or millimeters. By going with a full size shop mill I will be able to work on larger items as well as the detailed work that our modeling demands.
 
So far I have been very happy with the new mill. I have a great deal to learn but it will be a fun challenge.
 
When I last left the log, I was ready to start working on duplicating the cannon and carronades based on the prototypes I built last September. The barrels were all turned and the gunlocks assemblies had been etched. I needed to duplicate the carriages and make the associated hardware.
 
I started with the long guns and then moved to the carronades. Between the long guns and the carronades, I installed the mill. To the first task I completed on the mill was to cut the mounting yokes and mounts for the barrels. I found the long guns/carronades to be a fun sub project.
 
My next project will be to mill the blocks for the cannon rigging. Once the cannon are rigged, I will start building the masting.
 
Here are some shots of the Eagle with the armaments in place.
 

 
This shows the carronade from inboard. The working castors can be seen here. They are not completely on the deck at this time. They will be adjusted/fine tuned during the rigging process.
 

 
One of the long guns from the side. This still needs the cap square pin installed.
 

 
This is the long gun from inboard.
 

I have completed the rudder assembly. The ship would have had a rudder chain. In addition, since Crisman now feels the ship had a tiller, I wanted the chain to transition to rope and this to terminate at the main deck level as a backup for the tiller should the handle be shot off.
 
Since I am trying to make as much as possible for this build, I tried my hand at the chain itself. I hammered brass tubing until it had the form I desired for the inside of the links. Then I wrapped it tightly in brass wire. This was then carefully cut off to form the links. I soldered half the links into individual links then joined them by soldering them with the additional links. Once all the links were soldered, I hung it between two arms of the helping hands to finalize the shaping of each of the links.
 
I cut this in half and connected each side to a ring and eyebolt that mounted in the rudder. I drilled holes from each side of the stern to the main deck and inserted brass eyelets for the rope to pass. I terminated the rope to walnut cleats mounted to the waterway.
 
On a side not, the rope is the first to be added to the ship. It was made on my Byrnes Ropewalk. It will be dressed at the cleats much later in the process.
 


 
 
 
 
 
 
To make the pin rails I created a small jig to mount in my frill presses XY table. This allowed me to drill a hole, slide the hole over a pin in the jig and drill the next hole and so forth. With this I could set the distance I wanted between holes and be assured of consistent holes in the rail. In addition to those abreast the masts, I also added pin rails just forward of the catheads for the bow lines to terminate on. These with the addition of the fife rail at the main mast should allow enough terminations for the ship. While many of these will not be used since there will be no sails shown on the model, they still need to be available for accuracy.
 
 

 
 
 
 
I also completed the chainrails and lower deadeye installations. The deadeyes were turned from walnut then soldered into the chainrail assembly.
 



 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
Now I will turn to the cannons building and rigging the carriages for the starboard side.

A quick update on the Eagle. I have completed the installation of the pin rails as well as turning the required belaying pins in brass. To do this I used Ed Tosti's process to create the jig for the lathe. This made quick work of it. After looking at the available belaying points with the rails installed I felt there would have been more to handle sails than were available with just the side rails. Chrisman used the Niagara for a modified sail plan for the Eagle. However other than the chainplates, there was no evidence of the belaying arrangement.

 
I went back and forth on whether to add more towards the stern or as in the case of the Niagara, adding a fife rail around the main mast. While there was no evidence of any footers for this in the wreck, there was also no evidence of the bowsprit bitts but Chrisman added it where it would have been. So I added the fife rail to the ship.





I installed all the rings to the bulkheads and simulated the bolts through the sides for the breeching rope rings. To do this, I threaded the brass ring, added small hollow eyes to the outside of the hull and glued small square tubing over the end to simulate the square nuts.

I used brass tubing and walnut to create the hawse holes in the bow, then glued in the cannon balls to the waterway.






Lastly I have installed all the channels to the sides. Next I will start working on the chainplates. Chrisman has documented these from the wreck.

I added the bow assembly based upon Chrisman's last drawings of the ship. Then I pinned everything including the top rails. Once they were pinned, I built out the stern davits. 
Rail Pinning





Stern Davits





I have been giving a bit of thought to how I wanted to mount it. I wanted the baseboard to be Walnut to match the ship, and I wanted to mount it to pedestals. I created pedestals out of ⅜" brass. I kept them simple support the ship, but not pull the eye away from it. I also added 2mm brass supports amidships. I felt with the size of the model it needed some lateral support to keep the strain from the keel.

I made these out of brass tubing since the tubing is stronger than solid rod. To mount the ship, I drilled and tapped 3mm holes in the keel to accept a machine bolt. To strengthen the threads I coated them with thin CA and retapped them once the CA was dry. I found these to be pretty strong in testing. 

For the midship's supports, I drilled 3mm holes through a midship frame. The ends of the rod will be covered by the berth deck planking.

Finally I reattached the rudder before mounting the ship.  

I epoxied the pedestals into sockets on the base board. This to both to provide a firm base for the pedestals and to hide the actual glue joint. After a test fit, I applied thick CA to the tops of the 3mm midship supports as well as in the frame holes and slid the ship onto the rods and threaded the bolts through the pedestals. Lastly I used a level to level the ship laterally before the CA had set up in the frames.

Now I will start focusing on the remaining interior fittings as well as the channels.

Below is a photo of the base board once it was ready for the ship to be mounted.






Here is the ship mounted on the base.





The bow assembly.











And from above the bow.





Here is a shot of the installed rudder.





 

Hi all and thanks for sharing.
Just food for thought (inspiration) from a retrieved tip of mine,  from the days of DDM. 
Thanks

thank you!!!!
amazing idea !!!!!!!
 
I did it now and its fantastic !!!!
here is some pics...
 
By the way do you putt some glue after you tie the rope on the belaying pin ?