Bob Cleek

Considering that in 1775 the beer ration was one gallon a day or eight pints, I find it hard to see how the admiral could say the half pint tot of spirits could be any worse!  Then again, perhaps the beer was weak. The sailors would "prove" that their rum wasn't watered down by pouring a bit on some gunpowder and seeing if the gunpowder would still burn, which confirmed it was at least 57 percent alcohol, or, in other words, "114 Proof," which is pretty stiff stuff. They couldn't do that with beer.
 
 

Ron,
Check with a local builders exchange service.  They have the large format copiers.  The last batch I had done for around 15 prints plus a thumbdrive was around $20.  Just offering another alternative method.

Thanks for the tip! I'll pass on the premixed hide glue.
 
Strongly agree on the drawbacks of PVA adhesives acidity, as does the National Park Service in their conservation standards. (See: https://www.nps.gov/museum/publications/conserveogram/18-02.pdf )  I've repaired "lead bloom" issues by providing case ventilation and it seems to have worked, for the last 20 years or so, at least. At present, short of real hide glue, PVA adhesive seems to be a necessary evil. I expect minimizing PVA to small amounts used in model construction serves to minimize the problem. For that reason, I use clear shellac for stiffening lines and sail material, not thinned PVA adhesive. Case ventilation is essential and not just for lead oxidation prevention. The acid from whatever source slowly deteriorates everything, particularly fiber rigging and sail material.
 
While on the subject of acidic outgassing and display cases,  based on the professional literature, I only use UV-sheilding picture frame glass for display cases and avoid all plastics in case construction at all costs due to their potential acidic outgassing characteristics. High quality plastic glazing materials (e.g. Perspex, Plexiglas, Lucite) are reportedly inert, but I'm not taking any chances that what I'm getting is "the good stuff." (Besides, as a matter of taste, I prefer the more traditional look of a wooden or metal framed glass case.) (See: https://www.nps.gov/museum/publications/conserveogram/08-05.pdf ; See also: https://ccaha.org/resources/selecting-materials-storage-and-display )

Indeed, that's true. If you've got the right dowel and have learned to do it with a sanding block while spinning the dowel, that's often the fastest way to get the job done. 

Well, you're doing it the hard way. Doweling is readily available, but often it's not of a suitable wood species. Also, dowels are often not perfectly straight, nor inclined to stay that way. That's not a big problem for short lengths for pegs and such, but for a long spar, not so much.
 
What you need is a spar gauge. You can then take any size square piece of straight grained wood without any grain runout and taper it on all four sides on your table saw, or with a plane, and then use the gauge to mark the lines to plane to yield a perfectly octagonal tapered stick. After that, sanding it round is a cinch. The only catch is that it's a lot easier on a full-size spar than on a scale-size one because of the dimensions, but a modeler shouldn't have too much problem making a miniature spar gauge to suit the task. full size spar gauges use pencils to mark the lines on tapered spar stock. A modeler's spar gauge does better with sharpened nails which scribe the lines instead of penciling them on.  This web page tells you everything you need to know about making perfectly tapered round spars using a plane and sandpaper: https://www.pettigrews.org.uk/lm/page030a.htm
 

That is not an economical choice.
POF in scales 1:72 or larger will require stock of species that are almost never available precut.  The degree of waste is relatively high and thus expensive. The required thicknesses are often several or many different.  If you are doing it Hahn style - gluing up the frame stock, fixing the frame pattern to that and cutting a complete frame from that, the waste will exceed the fraction actually used.   The practical way is to be your own mill.
A quick search of your area found this example  Wood-Chip Marine Lumber & Supplies  They advertise three appropriate species  Black Cherry  4/4 and 8/4  Hard Maple  4/4 and 8/4 and for hidden or painted parts Yellow Poplar 4/4 and 8/4.   This is rough cut, so the yield is higher than finish planed.  You will need a Byrnes Thickness Sander (or equivalent). 
Getting from rough to something that the sander can use requires a saw.  A 14" bandsaw is much much better, safer and more efficient than a tablesaw -
If you do not have a big boy bandsaw, look for a cabinet shop, trade school, or local wood worker that has one and work a deal.  If it is a civilian, bring your own blades of the required size.  Lenox Diemaster 2 bimetal  1/2" 3 TPI are the sweet spot for blade life and quality of cut surface.
If you are doing miniature scales,  unless you luck into an affordable supply of Castillo or Pear,  you probably have to harvest your own stock.  Fortunately you are in citrus country.  Orange and probably Lemon should work well as also should Loquot.   

Yes, old fashioned hide glue is a great adhesive, but it does demand clamping and it has to be mixed and kept heated in a glue pot. It doesn't have any shelf life once it's mixed, as far as I know. I'm told it's aroma is highly disagreeable, as well. It's the gold standard for fine furniture builders and restorers, though. Interestingly, Titebond has invented what they claim is a true hide glue in premixed liquid form that does not require heating. The next time I have to pick up some glue, I plan to try it. http://www.titebond.com/product/glues/9e9995b4-08eb-4fc6-8254-c47daa20f8ed
 
I agree completely with your conclusions regarding CA. Its shelf life can be extended if you store it in the freezer when not in use, though. I do keep some on hand for repairing broken ceramics and such, but not for model building at all. 
 
Agreed with respect to wipe-on poly, too. This may be an "opinion," but, even applied very thinly, there's no way to overcome the "plastic" look of the stuff, to my eye, at least. Perhaps that can be improved by fine sanding it out, but there's nothing I know that will duplicate the finish of real oil-based paint, varnish, or shellac that's been properly applied and, if desired, hand-rubbed with rottenstone and pumice. I don't think a lot of people have had the pleasure of running their fingertips over a hand-rubbed finish these days. 
 
(PS: In reading Titebond's product literature, it appears that use of water-based paints over hide glue may be inadvisable. See: http://www.titebond.com/App_Static/literature/glues/Crackling.pdf)

If I state something that sounds like a fact, like the percentage of wood movement, you can take it to the bank. I don't write stuff like that without checking with authoritative sources. Anything else is an opinion. 
 
As mentioned, The Wood Database on line is very complete and useful. See: https://www.wood-database.com/wood-articles/dimensional-shrinkage/  The federal government's publications are very helpful. You will find just about anything you want in the out-of-print and highly collectable (an hence expensive) Wood: A Manual for Its Use as a Shipbuilding Material, by the US Navy Bureau of Ships and the US Forest Products Laboratory  (1945) Fortunately, it's now available for free on line.  https://books.google.com/booksid=4LosAQAAMAAJ&printsec=frontcover&source=gbs_ge_summary_r&cad=0#v=onepage&q&f=false Also How Wood Shrinks and Swells by the US Forest Products Laboratory contains an extensive spread sheet of the shrinkage factors of every wood under the sun. https://www.fpl.fs.fed.us/documnts/pdf1957/peck57a.pdf
 
The Workshop Companion has a lot of quickly accessible information: http://workshopcompanion.com/KnowHow/Design/Nature_of_Wood/2_Wood_Movement/2_Wood_Movement.htm
 
Note that the Workshop Companion offers a rule of thumb that if a board shows mostly flat grain on its face, you should allow for 1/4" total wood movement for every 12 inches across the grain, which "will accommodate an annual change of 8 percent moisture content, much more than is common in most areas."
 
How much your house changes shape with changes in humidity is a function of many factors, primarily depending upon the species of wood, its grain orientation when milled, and the direction in which it is oriented in the construction matrix. The articles above will explain it all in greater detail. You are absolutely correct, though, that one of the primary observable symptoms of wood movement in a house is the doors sticking in the summer when the humidity tends to be higher. 

Bob,
I remember reading a negative review of the Franklin (Titebond) Liquid Hide Glue here.  A different product Old Brown Glue got higher marks.  A problem with a premixed hide glue is the relatively high water concentration.  I used the Franklin product as a temporary bonding agent, but it did not do what I wished.  It was mostly because of the way I applied it.  I was too through with the application.  It held too well.  Spot application probably would have held. I totally covered both surfaces with a thin layer - the same as I do with PVA.  A wicking spacer of newspaper to allow the ethanol debonder to penetrate the frame thickness probably would have helped. 
 
Charles,
Hot hide glue is probably the wise choice for an archival case.  
 
PVA is very acidic.  I think it is a strong acetic acid solution.  The acid concentration is higher in the water resistant bond product.  It is high still in the waterproof bond product. 
The agent forming the bond is poly vinyl acetate.  When the polymer bond forms, acetic acid is released. As the water evaporates, liquid acetic acid is left behind.  It has a degree of volatility at room temp, it is just much less than water.  The polymerization reaction probably continues over time - possibly years.  That is probably part of the source of its continuous outgassing of acetic acid.  I think this means that the bond gets marginally stronger over time but it also probably becomes more rigid as the degree of crosslinking increases.   This means that a properly made ship model case needs adequate ventilation to evacuate the acetic acid gas as well keeping it from becoming an oven.  It also means that castings with any lead content are doomed with a PVA bonded model.

You could check The Wood Database.  The factor that is pertinent is: shrinkage.   Ambient air changes in moisture content are probably only a small fraction of what the moisture concentration would need to be to match what green wood would have to be.  For the most part, change in length is too small to be significant.  A house framing involves intermittent timbers with nothing to push against. Any plywood or OSB sheathing has any length or width changes subject to being cancelled out because of the alternate orientation of layers.  The thickness does probably change with the environment.
 
As for planking in a model, I am thinking that planking size changes would be subject to some restraint if any tangential increase due to increased moisture was met by a resistance force that was greater than the force that internal water can exert.  Side by side planks pushing against each other may keep a limit on how much water could enter.  It may not move as a unit.  In POF, the frames that the planks are bonded to  are longitudinal to the direction that the planks "want" to move.  This would resist any movement.  Edge glue between planks may be subject to being squeezing, but a tight bond would have very little glue to be squeezed.  
 
It was a material used well before my time, but would hot pot hide glue not be an even more archival favorable bonding material than even PVA?  I suspect that it is way more trouble to use than any advantages it would offer.  It is easily reversible by exposing the bond to hot ethanol.  The protein that forms the bond is it not dissolved.  It is completely denatured, forming small balls that are easily removed.
 
I consider CA to be a completely no go material because along with its chemically toxic vapor, questionable half life, and weakness at resisting sheer forces - in my very limited experience with it,  I found that once opened, a bottle quickly dried out.
 
I am also somewhat dismayed by the apparent popularity and enthusiasm for wipe-on poly.  To my eye, it is too plastic looking as well as tending to produce a layer that is too thick.

Bob,
 
I appreciate the information you are providing, although I wonder if some of your "facts" aren't just "opinions." Please don't take that as a criticism - I am skeptical of most things most people say! There are a lot of "alternate facts" these days!
 
Can you recommend a good source of information about woods and shrinkage/swelling with humidity and temperature changes? I have seen some numbers for the coefficient of thermal expansion of woods, but nothing on humidity effects.
 
You gave an example wood swelling 1% with humidity. That seems pretty extreme to me. If my house (made of wood before plywood was used) swelled 1% it would increase in height about an inch and more than 4 inches in length! Of course it does expand and contract some, causing an occasional door to be hard to close, but my guess is it less than 0.1%, otherwise a lot of things would buckle. I stress the word "guess" because I have no way to conduct an experiment to measure expansion/contraction of the house accurately.
 
Also, almost all of the boards are cut with the grain running lengthwise, including joists, wall studs, rafters and side planking, so I guess it would expand less lengthwise to the grain than crosswise to the grain.

Wipe on polyurethane is simply thinned polyurethane varnish or "clear coating," if you will. It's marketed for folks who don't want to go to the trouble of mixing their own and for that convenience they pay the price of polyurethane varnish for a can half full of far less expensive thinner.   The same result can be achieved using a mixture of half boiled linseed oil and half turpentine. Either way, the "preferred technique" is getting it on the wood however works for you, and then wiping off the excess before it starts to dry. It's really no different than any other oiled wood finish, save for the chemical components of the coating itself. As the man says, "Follow the directions on the can."
 
How many coats to apply and whether you feel the need to sand or not are matters of personal taste. As with all finish and wood species combinations with which the user is not completely familiar,  one should always test the application on a piece of scrap wood of the same species (and preferably the same color, if colors vary in the species) to ensure the result desired. Nothing's worse than ruining a work piece with a botched finish!
 
 
 

Yes, I suppose that's true. I'm probably showing my age. I'm an old school boat painter.  I can't remember when a can of boiled linseed oil and a can of turps weren't staples on my shop's paint shelves. Polyurethane is always "in stock," too, as is its thinner. All I've ever used polyurethane for has been indoor furniture table tops that are going to take a beating. For my purposes, in many applications, the newer synthetics' disadvantages outweigh their advantages. My own personal approach with models is to use professional-standard archival materials to the greatest extent possible. As unlikely as it may be, I like to think that if one of my models happened to survive for a couple of hundred years, some museum restorer would thank me for using reversible natural coatings instead of something plastic that was irreversible. I realize that for many, that's not a consideration at all. The much more likely outcome in my case is that I'll botch something and have to do it over and be glad i didn't use a permanent coating or adhesive!  

Thank you very much and Merry Christmas to all the others too !
 

One last piece of advice in addition, not instead, of the above.
 
Try to pick a subject that will hold your interest.  Whatever you decide to do this, by today’s way of looking at things, will be a lengthy project.  If in a burst of enthusiasm, and seduced by the box art, you buy something and then lose interest later your kit will join the majority of those never completed.
 
Roger
 
 

To add to the discussion.
 
 I have been using CA glue for assembling the model soldiers that I have been painting.  I use very little on the end of a toothpick or something smaller.  If I use much more, my body tells me so-  A nasty sore throat and blocked sinuses.  If I tried to use it in any quantity I’d have a severe allergic reaction.  To me, whatever limitations PVA glues have are nothing compared to CA.
 
My house here in Duluth was new in 1990 and built to my specifications.  We have gas forced air heat and air conditioning.  Neverless, we have significant humidity swings.  Very low in winter and higher in summer as Duluth summers do not require AC most of the time.
 
My models range in age from new to 45 years old, were built with PVA glues and have held up well
 
 
 

I've been keeping my powder dry, but now that It's been said before, I'll pile on. Start simple. Those who provide you with such advice usually have decades of highly involved interest in ship modeling and all have the experience to verify that modeling is a craft, and indeed an art, in which one's skill and ability always increases in the doing of it. This forum is probably the premier ship-modeling forum in the world. There are some amazing artists and craftsmen posting build logs here and the concentration of master modelers in this forum may mislead the beginner into thinking such work is the norm. Their work certainly isn't commonplace and it definitely isn't easy. 
 
Others certainly have more experience with kits than I do, but I am familiar with what has hit the market in close to the last fifty years and I feel confident in saying that I know of no kit model of any fully-rigged Seventeenth Century vessel of the type you are contemplating that I would consider suitable for any but the most highly-experienced kit-builder to undertake. I know there are those who have done so and succeeded to one degree or another, but they are rare exceptions indeed. A beginning modeler is well-advised to select a kit suitable for beginners. These less complex kits are capable of producing every bit as elegant a model when done well as are the "monster" kits. I wouldn't advise a beginner to attempt to build any planked kit other than the high quality ones of recent vintage which provide laser-cut planks. A beginner has enough of a learning curve to deal with besides doing their own lining off and spiling the shapes of the planks and, it should also be mentioned that the shape of a hull in large measure determines the difficulty involved in planking it. A transom-sterned longboat is much easier to plank than an apple-bowed and counter-sterned warship. The beginner is also well-advised to steer clear of square-rigged vessels until they have two or three fore-and-aft-rigged kits under their belt. The increase in the complexity of square rig is exponential. The way to success is first "Do the common thing uncommonly well."
 
Read up as much as possible on any specific kit you are considering. This forum has extensive kit review data available. Be aware that many kits are wholly incapable of producing model in the color glossy picture on its box's cover. That model was built by a highly experienced modeler who almost certainly did not limit themselves to the parts and materials contained in the kit and honest kit manufacturers will disclose that in the fine print somewhere. Most experienced kit modelers who have not "gone over to the dark side" and abandoned kits entirely routinely at least replace all the kit-supplied planking wood and rigging blocks and line because they are simply not up to their standards. (The after-market for such materials and fittings is testimony to the shortcomings of many kits!)
 
A last bit of advice to a beginning kit builder is to select a kit that has been well-covered in the build logs section of this forum. They will provide a very valuable source of instruction as a new builder builds the same kit. Others' mistakes can be almost as instructional as our own! You don't have to re-invent the wheel.
 
While I doubt there's any reliable data available on the subject, I believe most experienced modelers would agree that the percentage of kit models completed is but a small fraction of those purchased, which is pretty remarkable considering the price of many of the more complex kits. There's no point in encouraging the undertaking of a project which is beyond the abilities of the builder. The whole point of the exercise is to enjoy doing it.
 
If you want to get an idea of what a top of the line kit suitable for a "determined beginner's," first and second builds, I'd recommend you check these two out. Their entire "how to build it" monographs are accessible from their websites. The longboat also has a "group build" project posted on this forum and linked from the webpage.
 
https://syrenshipmodelcompany.com/medway-longboat-1742.php
 
https://syrenshipmodelcompany.com/revenue-cutter-cheerful-1806.php#
 
 
 
 

Yes, I suppose that's true. I'm probably showing my age. I'm an old school boat painter.  I can't remember when a can of boiled linseed oil and a can of turps weren't staples on my shop's paint shelves. Polyurethane is always "in stock," too, as is its thinner. All I've ever used polyurethane for has been indoor furniture table tops that are going to take a beating. For my purposes, in many applications, the newer synthetics' disadvantages outweigh their advantages. My own personal approach with models is to use professional-standard archival materials to the greatest extent possible. As unlikely as it may be, I like to think that if one of my models happened to survive for a couple of hundred years, some museum restorer would thank me for using reversible natural coatings instead of something plastic that was irreversible. I realize that for many, that's not a consideration at all. The much more likely outcome in my case is that I'll botch something and have to do it over and be glad i didn't use a permanent coating or adhesive!  

Quite the dissertation. It is my opinion that your ‘facts’ are just another opinion and like all opinions, including mine, worth about as much as that toilet paper roll - though everyone knows it should hang down from the front. 
 
Anyway, I use CA and I’m happy doing it. This post has gone off the rails.  I’m out. 😇

For someone using a large quantity like a full sized furniture workshop, I can understand mixing my own for cost savings, but for a small hobbyist usage like model ships, it's just not worth the hassle IMO when a single small can will last me for multiple models or until I leave the can open and let it dry out.. lol.. 

The ease of use (shake can, pop open top, apply to rag, use) vastly outweighs the cost savings of mixing it myself.  

Wipe on polyurethane is simply thinned polyurethane varnish or "clear coating," if you will. It's marketed for folks who don't want to go to the trouble of mixing their own and for that convenience they pay the price of polyurethane varnish for a can half full of far less expensive thinner.   The same result can be achieved using a mixture of half boiled linseed oil and half turpentine. Either way, the "preferred technique" is getting it on the wood however works for you, and then wiping off the excess before it starts to dry. It's really no different than any other oiled wood finish, save for the chemical components of the coating itself. As the man says, "Follow the directions on the can."
 
How many coats to apply and whether you feel the need to sand or not are matters of personal taste. As with all finish and wood species combinations with which the user is not completely familiar,  one should always test the application on a piece of scrap wood of the same species (and preferably the same color, if colors vary in the species) to ensure the result desired. Nothing's worse than ruining a work piece with a botched finish!
 
 
 

Well, I think the main reason people don't add "in my opinion" disclaimers to their answers to direct questions is because they realize nobody's much interested in anybody else's opinion. Facts, yes. Opinions, no. Everybody already has opinions. They don't need any more. If somebody disagrees with someone else's statement of fact, they are free to offer evidence to the contrary, and should. That's the problem with the internet. Any fool can pontificate about anything they know nothing about and most do. (Can you say, "herd immunity?")
 
For example:
 
1. "CA is the best choice for planking a hull using Chuck’s method." That's an opinion. It needs facts to back it up. The majority of people who've used CA are adverse to its use for many sound reasons beginning with the difficulty of working with it, the fact that it soaks into wood and affects subsequent finishing results, it is not a recognized archival material, has a relatively short "working time" before it sets up, is much more difficult to un-bond than PVA, has a relatively short shelf life and a relatively high price, and so on. Your mileage may vary. At the end of the day, "best practices" dictate that all parts of a model to the extent possible should be mechanically fastened, not just glued, anyway. 
 
2.  "I have models over 25 years old done with CA that are just fine and look great." The fact that you have models done with CA that are over 25 years old is a fact. That they are just fine and look great is an opinion, or, at best, an unproven fact. It's too early to call. Let us know how they are holding up in another 75 years. The "industry standard" is a model that properly cared for should last 100 years without exhibiting any deterioration. At present, CA hasn't been around long enough to know if it lasts that well.
 
3.  "I don’t think any well built ship model survives dropping to the floor, it’s best not to do that." Now, that's a fact. Don't ask me how I know this.
 
3. (Again) "Edge gluing is not only totally unnecessary it’s also detrimental to the look of the hull." That's a fact, not an opinion. 
 
4.   "I doubt the humidity variance in most first world homes creates an issue."  Whether it does or doesn't depends upon many variables in every instance, but "first world homes" isn't one of them.   It's a fact that humidity is a factor to be considered in any fine woodworking. Frolich addresses a substantial problem he encountered with wood shrinkage in his fine book, The Art of Ship Modeling. One ignores it at their peril. It's sort of like Covid in that respect. 
 
5.  I’ll put up my nine models as examples of using CA for hulls any time." Not to worry. I don't think anybody doubts you built them with CA adhesive and they are still sticking together. See No. 2. above.
 
Many don't offer what they have to say as "just their opinion" because they have little interest in expressing their opinions. They are only interested in sharing what they know to be true. If somebody prefers to offer opinions, they should go to FaceBook.   Preferences are largely irrelevant. There's a right way and a wrong way to do most things, and then there are "preferences," which, more often than not are just excuses for doing it the wrong way.  My wife insists that loading a toilet paper roll so the paper end hangs down the back of the roll, between the roll and the wall, instead of off the front of the roll like you've probably seen in every hotel you've ever been in, is her "preference." She was not convinced when I showed her the original patent for the toilet paper roll which clearly shows the roll coming off the front and not the back. That's obviously the way it's supposed to work. So, she has her own "preference," and i have my own bathroom.  

One should carefully consider the downside risks of gluing planking seams, whether by application of adhesive to the seams, or by coating the inside of a hull with epoxy resin adhesive which soaks into the seams from inside. As noted correctly, wood moves with changes in the ambient humidity levels of the environment it's in. This movement is primarily across the grain and its amount varies depending upon the wood species and, within the same species, even the location where the wood is grown. This is called tangential movement. Most woods will shrink tangentially six to ten percent when dried and will swell back depending upon the moisture content absorbed. The amount of movement is relatively small, assuming properly dried wood being used to begin with, but can still be considerable if the distance you are dealing with is relatively large. 
 
So, if you are building a model using vertical grain stock, as one should, the tangential (cross grain) side of its planked hull can easily total six inches. That's six inches of grain to shrink tangentially and even at a rate of movement of one percent, you are getting close to a sixteenth of an inch, which would be a quite noticeable crack in a model's topsides. If the planks are not fastened to each other, each will shrink individually and if you have maybe 24 1/4" planks, that shrinkage will only amount to 1/24th of a sixteenth of an inch. (You can do the math to get an exact fraction... a good example of the advantages of metric measurements!) That amount of movement isn't going to be noticeable at all and most coatings will allow for such movement without cracking at the seams. However, if the seams are all glued together, they all move as one, and the "weakest link law" takes over. In that case, a sixteenth of an inch crack along the weakest glued seam... or a crack in the wood itself... is going to occur at the weakest point. Conversely, swelling will push the glued sheet of planking for that sixteenth of an inch against everything it butts up against, again potentially causing a structural failure at the weakest point, or tend to buckle the "planking sheet" outward, breaking the glue bonds... or the wood... at the frames. 
 
Now, with prime wood species which have low movement factors and with relatively stable humidity, you may not run into any problems at all, but theoretically, the potential is there and I've seen its results in more than one model I've restored. More often than not, parts, cap rails, for example, start popping off and nobody knows why.
 
Monocoque wood hull construction is tricky. For my money, I prefer to give the wood as much opportunity to move on its own as possible without concentrating swelling and shrinking stresses within the structure.
 
Others' mileage may vary, of course.
 

Well, I think the main reason people don't add "in my opinion" disclaimers to their answers to direct questions is because they realize nobody's much interested in anybody else's opinion. Facts, yes. Opinions, no. Everybody already has opinions. They don't need any more. If somebody disagrees with someone else's statement of fact, they are free to offer evidence to the contrary, and should. That's the problem with the internet. Any fool can pontificate about anything they know nothing about and most do. (Can you say, "herd immunity?")
 
For example:
 
1. "CA is the best choice for planking a hull using Chuck’s method." That's an opinion. It needs facts to back it up. The majority of people who've used CA are adverse to its use for many sound reasons beginning with the difficulty of working with it, the fact that it soaks into wood and affects subsequent finishing results, it is not a recognized archival material, has a relatively short "working time" before it sets up, is much more difficult to un-bond than PVA, has a relatively short shelf life and a relatively high price, and so on. Your mileage may vary. At the end of the day, "best practices" dictate that all parts of a model to the extent possible should be mechanically fastened, not just glued, anyway. 
 
2.  "I have models over 25 years old done with CA that are just fine and look great." The fact that you have models done with CA that are over 25 years old is a fact. That they are just fine and look great is an opinion, or, at best, an unproven fact. It's too early to call. Let us know how they are holding up in another 75 years. The "industry standard" is a model that properly cared for should last 100 years without exhibiting any deterioration. At present, CA hasn't been around long enough to know if it lasts that well.
 
3.  "I don’t think any well built ship model survives dropping to the floor, it’s best not to do that." Now, that's a fact. Don't ask me how I know this.
 
3. (Again) "Edge gluing is not only totally unnecessary it’s also detrimental to the look of the hull." That's a fact, not an opinion. 
 
4.   "I doubt the humidity variance in most first world homes creates an issue."  Whether it does or doesn't depends upon many variables in every instance, but "first world homes" isn't one of them.   It's a fact that humidity is a factor to be considered in any fine woodworking. Frolich addresses a substantial problem he encountered with wood shrinkage in his fine book, The Art of Ship Modeling. One ignores it at their peril. It's sort of like Covid in that respect. 
 
5.  I’ll put up my nine models as examples of using CA for hulls any time." Not to worry. I don't think anybody doubts you built them with CA adhesive and they are still sticking together. See No. 2. above.
 
Many don't offer what they have to say as "just their opinion" because they have little interest in expressing their opinions. They are only interested in sharing what they know to be true. If somebody prefers to offer opinions, they should go to FaceBook.   Preferences are largely irrelevant. There's a right way and a wrong way to do most things, and then there are "preferences," which, more often than not are just excuses for doing it the wrong way.  My wife insists that loading a toilet paper roll so the paper end hangs down the back of the roll, between the roll and the wall, instead of off the front of the roll like you've probably seen in every hotel you've ever been in, is her "preference." She was not convinced when I showed her the original patent for the toilet paper roll which clearly shows the roll coming off the front and not the back. That's obviously the way it's supposed to work. So, she has her own "preference," and i have my own bathroom.  

I've been keeping my powder dry, but now that It's been said before, I'll pile on. Start simple. Those who provide you with such advice usually have decades of highly involved interest in ship modeling and all have the experience to verify that modeling is a craft, and indeed an art, in which one's skill and ability always increases in the doing of it. This forum is probably the premier ship-modeling forum in the world. There are some amazing artists and craftsmen posting build logs here and the concentration of master modelers in this forum may mislead the beginner into thinking such work is the norm. Their work certainly isn't commonplace and it definitely isn't easy. 
 
Others certainly have more experience with kits than I do, but I am familiar with what has hit the market in close to the last fifty years and I feel confident in saying that I know of no kit model of any fully-rigged Seventeenth Century vessel of the type you are contemplating that I would consider suitable for any but the most highly-experienced kit-builder to undertake. I know there are those who have done so and succeeded to one degree or another, but they are rare exceptions indeed. A beginning modeler is well-advised to select a kit suitable for beginners. These less complex kits are capable of producing every bit as elegant a model when done well as are the "monster" kits. I wouldn't advise a beginner to attempt to build any planked kit other than the high quality ones of recent vintage which provide laser-cut planks. A beginner has enough of a learning curve to deal with besides doing their own lining off and spiling the shapes of the planks and, it should also be mentioned that the shape of a hull in large measure determines the difficulty involved in planking it. A transom-sterned longboat is much easier to plank than an apple-bowed and counter-sterned warship. The beginner is also well-advised to steer clear of square-rigged vessels until they have two or three fore-and-aft-rigged kits under their belt. The increase in the complexity of square rig is exponential. The way to success is first "Do the common thing uncommonly well."
 
Read up as much as possible on any specific kit you are considering. This forum has extensive kit review data available. Be aware that many kits are wholly incapable of producing model in the color glossy picture on its box's cover. That model was built by a highly experienced modeler who almost certainly did not limit themselves to the parts and materials contained in the kit and honest kit manufacturers will disclose that in the fine print somewhere. Most experienced kit modelers who have not "gone over to the dark side" and abandoned kits entirely routinely at least replace all the kit-supplied planking wood and rigging blocks and line because they are simply not up to their standards. (The after-market for such materials and fittings is testimony to the shortcomings of many kits!)
 
A last bit of advice to a beginning kit builder is to select a kit that has been well-covered in the build logs section of this forum. They will provide a very valuable source of instruction as a new builder builds the same kit. Others' mistakes can be almost as instructional as our own! You don't have to re-invent the wheel.
 
While I doubt there's any reliable data available on the subject, I believe most experienced modelers would agree that the percentage of kit models completed is but a small fraction of those purchased, which is pretty remarkable considering the price of many of the more complex kits. There's no point in encouraging the undertaking of a project which is beyond the abilities of the builder. The whole point of the exercise is to enjoy doing it.
 
If you want to get an idea of what a top of the line kit suitable for a "determined beginner's," first and second builds, I'd recommend you check these two out. Their entire "how to build it" monographs are accessible from their websites. The longboat also has a "group build" project posted on this forum and linked from the webpage.
 
https://syrenshipmodelcompany.com/medway-longboat-1742.php
 
https://syrenshipmodelcompany.com/revenue-cutter-cheerful-1806.php#