Geoff Matson

I am working on captain's skylight. I prepared a hexagonal prism and a hexagonal-based conical prism from pear wood, adding details cut from 0.5 mm pear strips. I used black paint to represent the windows and made the window bars out of 0.5 mm brass wire. Finally, I finished it with a matte varnish."

Hi Peter, I will try to explain how I made the double eye bolts.
First I cut 20 mm long brass rod from 0,5 mm brass wire. I make loops on both ends of the rod with round nose pliers then I bend the rod in the middle with needle-nose pliers.

Man-oh-man, is this tedious work. 
 
I figured out a way to mimic Mustafa's results. After 4 hours in the shipyard today, strategizing and developing this technique, I'm exhausted. I think it might be easier just to get more of the single eye bolts, bend them slightly and plug them into one hole. The practicum's method of building these out of styrene doesn't seem to be any more practical. I'm going to go home and sit in my sunroom, read a book, and put this on a back burner for now.
 
I thought I was on to something clever with my first experiment. Then realized I'd have a hard time compressing the ends to squeeze them into a single hole. Not only that, but I was not happy with the overlapping straight parts. Doesn't really look like an eye bolt.
 

 
Second try, without using a jig/ fixture. Close, but no cigar.
 

 
The solution? Well, sort of..  I have to cut excess brass wire to close the loops on the eyes. A lot of fiddling with tiny stuff using big fingers.  Time consuming, but doable.
 

 
The process is,
fold the wire over itself,
tuck the fold into the slot in the fixture,
twist the wire around the pins at the end of the slot,
remove and cut away excess brass,
tweak,
fiddle,
curse,
pray,
and hopefully produce the above.

 
 

Decision made.  I'm sticking with the status quo.  
 
I made more work for myself by applying 2 coats of clear polyurethane to the carriages before adding the eyebolts and pins on the quions. The poly clogged the holes, which then had to be bored out by hand.
 
I didn't like hand painting the wheels, so used double sided tape and spray paint/primer instead.
 

 

Progress. Slow going, but the assembly line is at least moving.
 

 

 

 
 

I began fabricating the ship's wheel. I started with the fellies Photos tell everything

All the canopies are complete. I will paint them.
 

Thanks all for the warm welcome back. Yes Greg the whale will be getting a touch up when I have the nerve to stain it on the model... And no Grant I don't think the rat survived the harsh conditions the model was stowed on for at least a year off-site. It was in an open storage facility suffering the seasons. I'm very surprised that there only some very minor cracks in the planking.

The scuppers were drilled from two sides (don't tell not all the way through because they did not line up very well in all places.

The hawse holes are lined with holy. I soaked a thin sheet of holy in water, rolled it up when it was soft and then let it dry in my food curing oven. This gave a nice curve to the planks.   I tinted the seams with pencel lead to make them stand out a little more.


Deck planking added

 
Breast hooks and bucklers installed


 
Remco
 
 
 
 
 
 

Guns!
 
So this has proven to be a real challenge. I turned one barrel on the lathe with reasonable success but I know I wont be able to consistently repeat this with perfect results another 29 times so I decided to go down the road of casting with some very mixed results. Here is the update so far.
 
I wanted to make my moulds with oyumaru or blue stuff but I cannot find either in South Africa. So i went for 2 other options....the first was a 2 part liquid silicon that would be poured around the cannon and then cut away to release the blank and then secured with elastic bands to re pour the liquid resin into it. This did not work at all...
Without the benefit of a vacuum pump to extract all the bubbles it created a mould full of imperfections. The elastic bank required to keep the soft silicon together distorted the mould and therefore produced a frankly rubbish result. The resin also left flakes inside the mould that would be very difficult to clean and finally the resin itself was very brittle and weak(this is clearly just the resin I used and I am not judging all resins). Here you can see the results of lots of struggling....
 

Next up was making moulds from thermal plastic. This process involved heating the product in boiling water. Pressing the cannon blank into the product until it was half in the material, then cooling the product in the freezer and then pressing a second lump of product on top of the cannon to make the second half of the mould...here you can see what this looked like,
 

 
 

 
 
I then pressed milliput into the 2 halves and joined them back together while it set(note the indexing holes and protrusions in the 2 halves of the mould.
 
This produced a reasonable result as shown below. the issue was that the mould struggles to release the material and it seems like the quality deteriorates after each attempt as the mould degrades. I do have a few ideas to improve this and I will report back.
 
 

I then made a little jig to file in the notch for the trunnions. As per the suggestion of Marcus, trunnions add an additional layer of complication to casting which I am not able to overcome.
 

 
I then added the trunnions and primed the 2 sample cannon with a grey primer...
 
44
 

 
I then finished them off with some black paint and this is where I find myself...
 

 
I did get the feeling that these carriages(built to the specifications mentioned in a previous post) were a bit on the small size. The carriages on the hull model also appear to be proportionally larger but I have also found examples in other research where the ratio between cannon and carriage seems equally disproportionate. Like this example of the constitutions 32 pounders from 1858..
 


 
My plan is to keep experimenting and seeing what works.
 
This means:
trying to produce a thinner more flexible thermal plastic mould with what i have already.
 
Trying to create a better silicon mould by changing the ratios of parts A nd B of the mix
 
Trying to buy oyumaru and having it imported into South africa
 
Trying a mould made from other materials like silicone and corn starch....
 
I weill report back soon.
 
Cheers
 
TBE
 

 

Hello everyone
 
I have decided to attempt to make the cannon for this build myself(emphasis on attempt, this is very much theoretical at this point.
 
I wanted to go with the configuration mentioned in "close up" by Tyrone G. Martin which was kindly pointed out to me by @Marcus.K.. The cannon found on the gun deck of the Constitution in 1797 appear to have been 30 x 24 pounders with a barrel length of 8ft. Apparently these were 1ft shorter than the standard length for this calibre. The cannon were made by Hope forge and an original pair can be seen outside the buildings of Savannah college of art and design
 

 
Below is the basic drawing I used as reference along with excellent measurements provided by Marcus, I will not publish his drawing here until I get his permission but it was a real help in making this first version.
 

 
I began by cutting square stock of 10mm x 10mm from a leftover stump and turned it down to 8mm on the lathe. I then marked out the relevant lines dividing the sections and cut the tapers first and then refined by hand. This process was by no means perfect. I am using a unimat that a friend recently gave me, i have no experience on a lathe and my lathe belt broke. In the process I broke off the cascabel and had to remake it separately. I also had a fair amount of trouble creating a finish that was acceptable but I can live with this as it will be cast in resin anyway.
 

 

 
This cannon still needs its cross braces, eagle emblem and fuse protrusion but if anyone has any views on how it can be improved before I take those steps please let me know. this is my first attempt so I can imagine I will get away without a remake. I do feel the reinforcement protrusions may be a little to pronounced but I cant decide if this will be a pro or a con once painted black.
 
Haiko
 

I assume you used a 1 mm drill for mounting these double eye bolts into the bulwarks?
 

I changed my mind: after checking on the Isaac Hull model of 1812 - in which the deck components were done in this special green already - the carriages seem still to be in red. A very dark, dull and faint red (maybe due to the age of that color).. but clearly a red.

Still .. its all just guessing.. right?
I was checking on other forums - the only discussion about red I found here - click me

Hello Again
 
This post is a strange combination of attention to detail and complete abandonment thereof.
 
I Realised that the next step I needed to take would be to establish heights of the gun ports for the gun deck so that I could begin framing them. This required creation of cannon(see previous post) and carriages. The cannon are currently on hold as I am waiting for resin/putty to try and duplicate my sample cannon. So I began on the carriages with a specific focus on those dimensions which would influence the way in which the cannon projected from the gun ports. I decided to use this as yet another exercise in practice for the gun carriages which will ultimately be visible on the spar deck. This process has taught me a lot and I think the results of the visible carriages will be far better.
 
This process was surprisingly simple once I had made a decision on design. There seems to be fairly little information out there on exactly how these 24 bounder carriages looked in 1797 so I settled for a design from the 1768 book “A treatise of Artillery” by John Muller(pages 95,96 and 164). I was pointed to this by a masters thesis on the subject of gun carriages by Katrina Bunyard which I have attached to this post. Please note her summary of the document by muller(page 37) has some minor mistakes which is why I ended up referring to the original . It is worth noting that the Muller guideline has some flaws and there was some variation as can be expected. 


  
I have attached a spreadsheet which can be used to calculate cannon carriage sizes according to the Muller measurements if anyone is interested. I also added a Imperial to metric converter to assist with the calculations. (only edit the red cells if you ever make use of this or the formulae will disappear.)
Using the dimensions for the short barrel 24 pounder gun I calculated the dimensions for this gun and assembled accordingly. I chose to leave off the truck and simply calculate the height of the carriage as if the trucks were there. I also gave it a solid base as this would certainly not be visible and I omitted the curve at the lower part of the side plates. I also made a mistake with the forward transom and put it too far forward(it is meant to be directly above the forward axletree. I only realised this once I had assembled all 30 carriages and decided to draw a line on the madness and left it as is. ..i would like to add that basswood is appalling to work with at this scale as it is continuously creating fluff which has to be addressed. I did this with a combination of sandpaper and passing the carriages over a candle flame to burn off these fibers.
 
I have yet again failed to create a proper database of photos on this but I began by cutting a series of stock from the basswood supplied in the kit. This consisted of the following
 
30 bases – 12.7mm x 2.5mm flat stock – cut 20mm long
30 front trucks – 4.15mm x 4.15mm square stock – cut 11mm long
30 rear trucks – 3.5mm x 3.5mm square stock – cut 11mm long
60 Side piece plank 1 – 1.5mm x 3mm flat stock – cut 20mm long
60 Side piece plank 2 – 1 mm x 2.4mm flat stock – cut 18mm long
60 Side piece plank 3 – 1 mm x 2.4mm flat stock – cut 16mm long
60 Side piece plank 4 – 1 mm x 2.4mm flat stock – cut 14mm long
60 Side piece plank 5 – 1 mm x 2.4mm flat stock – cut 12mm long
30 Transom pieces – 2mm x 5.9mm – cut 5 mm long
 
Beginning with the base I cut a template with the correct width for the front and rear of the carriage and transferred this to the base piece.
 I then placed the first 2 side pieces which cover the whole length of the base by aligning them with the marks I had made using the template and installed the transom.
 Once this glue has set I marked the correct height of the transom and sanded each one back to match this measurement.
Next was to sand back the rear of the carriage and square it off neatly until it was just slightly over the final length(19.5mm)
I then stacked the side pieces from largest to smallest stepping the side pieces correctly at intervals of at the rear of the carriage and allowed the front edges to hang over for future squaring off
I then installed the front and rear trucks

 
I then sanded the front face to bring the carriage back to final length and neaten off the front face(19mm) and sanded the sides to bring the side plates down to 1.82mm(in theory) and take away the excess material from the base.
 
Next was to make the recesses for the trunnions and shape them out with a round file. 

 
I then burnt all the fibres off with a candle and spraypainted them with a black basecoat. At this point I realised that my trunnion recesses were very poorly aligned and redid the upper plank of the carriage to create a slightly better result.
 
 

 

 
 
 
 

 

The last step will be to paint the carriages.
 
I am torn between the options of Spanish brown(a far more brownish red) and Lead red. I realise this will barely be visible but I would like to start my search for the correct tone in the right direction .
All the research I have done indicates to me that the most likely colour was indeed a red colour of sorts but the shade is the issue. Tyron Martin refers simply to “Red” in his discussions on the matter(at least that which I can find) and there is some reference to Spanish  brown in the ships manifests and my understanding is that budget was key in these things and Spanish brown was cheap. There does however seem to be contemporary evidence in models and paintings that a brighter red was used and I assume the constitution restoration was done with historical accuracy in mind.
In my mind have narrowed it down to the Spanish brown shown of this George Washington era building.....

and the red of the carriages as shown on the constitution today. 

If anyone has any suggestions on what colour or shade might be most appropriate please let me know. I am sort of thinking I will go for a Red with a brown undertone but any suggestions would be swell!
 
As always criticism and feedback is most welcome
 
Cheers
 
TBE
 

Cannon Carriage Calculator.xlsx

Main fife rail completed. There is one more fife rail to be built for the mizzen.

See, there is an advantage for going slow, now I got you to show me how it's done. Beautiful work on the stanchions and fife rails. Now if I can just set up my Dremel drill stand so it can perform this feat when the time comes.
 
Jon

The rigging of all the guns are complete and I started making the fife rails. First I fabricated ridding bitt knees. To make the stancions I shaped the 4x4 mm pear bar with a file on the lathe then I opened holes and channels to represent the sheaves.
 

Thank you Greg. Now that I think about it, it would have been better if I had stained the blocks, but I just applied matte varnish.

I would like to show how I produce these 3 mm blocks for those who are interested. I have shared this method before, but I wanted to share it again for friends who do not know. First, I turned the wooden dowel with a diameter of 3 mm into an ellipse bar with my milling machine. Again, using my milling machine, I drilled holes with a diameter of 0.6 mm on this elliptical rod and then cut slots to represent the pulleys. After these procedures, I separated the blocks from each other by cutting them with my circular saw. I got rid of the excess with my sanding machine and cut slots on both sides of the blocks with my milling machine.

By trestle, I assume you mean the display base that I made for the Constitution. If so it's roughly 18 1/2" wide, 7" deep and 1 1/2" tall.  As for the central support, I use the billet from which the bulkheads were pulled to get the shape.  The height of the pedestals and the measurement from the base to the bottom of the groove in the central support are 1 3/8".
 
 

Oh snap!  Thanks to a mistake I acknowledged way back when when installing the waterways, my carronades do not fit well on the spa deck.  The waterways are way too big and I can't get the carronade anywhere close enough to the gun ports to look good. 
 
Hell's bells, not even the longer parts that came with the kit will reach the gun ports.  Sigh..
 
See last two photo in this set to see what I'm talking about.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
 
 

Finally, I drilled holes for port lights and scuppers.

Here they are installed and the paint extended to below the waterline:

I used the MS scuppers rather than create my own, so they are closed, which is ok by me.  It just means that they aren't forced open by escaping water.
 
This gets me up to date.  Now I can figure out if I should:
             1.  Copper the bottom
             2.  Detail the outsides of Qtr Galleries and Stern
             3.  Add the head rails
             4.  Something Else?
For those of you who are beyond these, which did you choose, or which do you wish you would have done first?
 
Thanks,

Next came framing for the windows.  I decided to see whether or not I could make the MS laser cut windows work here, and so first created a template for the opening.

For now, I'll leave the windows out.  I have decided at least for now that I won't be glazing the windows on either the quarter galleries or stern so that there is a better view through them, but until I put the windows in place that decision can change any number of times .
 
Then laid it out on paper with measurements of the windows.

Next, I overlaid the windows to see what it looked like.

And went ahead with framing.  All along the way, I double-checked to make sure the windows fit.  I didn't get a pic of the finished last window framed until it was painted.


Near disaster hit when I was doing the port side - the forward-most window broke off at the bottom.  But I managed to find all of the pieces, and glue them all together.  It's still pretty fragile, but will do to get it into place.

 
 

I decided to detail the interior of the quarter galleries somewhat, knowing visiblity will be somewhat limited.  Initial measurements indicated that the floor would rest on the top of the fairing block.  I made the fairing block from a laminate of three 1/8" sheets of basswood, and the bottom block from a laminate of two 1/8" sheets of basswod.  The laminates were to simulate planks - not sure it made much difference, but it's there.  I then used my rotary tool with a sanding drum to shape the blocks, and in the case of the "bottom block", I hollowed it out to make a wall (see photo below). 
 
First, the fairing block installed 

Next, the floor attached.  Also, the roof block attached.

Next, the Captain's (or is it Commodore's?) head.

And finally a lamp.  Although out of scale, it gave it a little more to look at.  Also the "bottom block" has been attached forming the outside wall.

Next step, getting ready for the dreaded quarter galleries.
 

After a week of sanding during the evenings, here are the results (after sealing and steel wooling):



 
I was very pleased with the results - remember, I'm a relative newbie to this.