mtaylor

It very much looks like it will work, Jay. That is one sweet bit of joinery...

Sweet paint work. The graphic look great, Pete.

Very well done, Johann.

Johann is right... beautifuly done, Remco.

Beautiful framing, Mike.

Lovely work, Jay. Good catch on the riding bitts and it appears to be an excellent fix.

The whisker booms look a 1000% better, Nenad. I agree.. not everything can be to scale. As for the cherry pie dish... I'm very tempted to catch a plane this winter. It looks wonderful.

It's been 20 years since I used photoshop. We used to do that for certain tech manuals and here I'd forgotten all about it. Argghhhhh... Lovely drawing... err... photo. Looks like very detailed pencil sketch.

Stunning work, Alexandru. This is inspirational.

Nice work, Joss. As an observer, I see nothing amiss.

Chuck, Joel gave some great advice. There is a tutorial here: http://modelshipworld.com/index.php/topic/353-planking-instructiontutorial-by-jack-nastyface/ That is pretty easy to follow for planking the Swift.

Let's try the spice.... I've heard it's pretty good.

Wow!!!

I guess these old eyes didn't deceive me then...? It does seem strange though.

The whisker booms, maybe????

A very beautiful model, Alex. Congratulations on such a wonderful ending.

Thanks Nigel. I'm still trying different things but repeatability is going to be the key. Debbie and Charles are working on their solution. E&T, Thanks for the insight. I believe they all have their quirks being optical systems. And that test cut idea is a great one.

I've been reading and re-reading those tutorials as well as the Jim Roberts' book on planking. And I should add.. Dan's wisdom has helped immensely with this. I don't have issues, at this point, with the lining and spiling, or the bending and fitting of planks. What has been giving me fits until I started sketching out the area is where the stern ends of the planks start to come around the end of the hull to start landing on the transom. There's a fashion piece that covers the counter and the ends of the hull planks. After re-studying, re-thinking, the Licorne drawings just weren't detailed enough as I was cutting the fashion piece short by about 1/8" or so. Just enough that I was seeing gaps and not a happy camper with the appearance. I've delved into a couple of French frigate monographs and have sorted out that that the lower end of the fashion piece and plank ends are hidden by the quarter gallery drop. The solution was simple once I figured out what was needed... Now that the laser cutter is sorted out, I'm focusing on finishing up the wide planking... sanding... and hopefully pictures in a couple of days. After this, it's the garboard strake and then lining off the rest of the hull for the narrow planking. A bit of the pain to have several different widths of hull planking but it's sorting itself out.

Looking good, Nils. I have my fingers crossed for you when you get to the propshaft area.

Looking better and better, Denis. What's a bit of overspray among friends? The drawing in the link Sam gave... maybe it's my eyes and probably is, but I swear that the third stack back is the tallest. But that wouldn't make any sense. Maybe it's past my bedtime or I've inhaled too much boxwood smoke today....

Days? So far, it's been two weeks. :) One would think that they would have all their crap in one bag, right? I think I'm lucky. Debbie got a turkey of a machine. I wouldn't have tried as long as her and her husband did after the first two weeks and no progress. Anyway... I'm going to go back to planking and figuring out how to do some things like rail carvings, watchkeeper's bench, gun carriages, and hopefully, the ship's boats. There's probably more but I'll have to fiddle and learn as I go.

Chris, I agree with Edwin. As far as the drywall and anything else that needs done, find an independent who will do the work you can't do or won't attempt. Drywall isn't hard, just a pain in the neck... Actually find a couple of them. Talk to them, pick their brains and see about looking at some of their finished projects. You should be able to get some ideas on what you can do and what they need to do.

I think.. I hope... this is final test post of this review unless I do something really stupid or find some additional info somewhere. I'll be glad to answer any questions, however and share any knowledge I've gleaned. The lens holder did have issues. The hole down the middle was burred badly at the top (laser light input) and off-center at the bottom (laser light output to lens) which seems to be a common problem with Chinese made machines. There were scorch marks on the burrs and on the inside indicating that it needed to re-machined and made perfectly round. The unit is aluminum and about 2" inches long. Ok... aggravation time. After a some "calm down and focus" time, I chucked it into the lathe and fired it up. Using a boring bar, I took off about 0.010 inch of material and got the inside perfectly round from top to bottom and the top was de-burred. The beast was then reassembled and tested. I noticed that the kerf is a bit narrower and that it's cutting deeper into the wood. For example, what took a speed of 12, power level of 9mA, and 4 passes to cut some of Jason's fine euro boxwood that 3/32" thick, I managed to get up the speed to 16, keep the power the same, and only 1 pass. Similar results on 3/16" thick Castello (not the euro) and for the first time, I managed 1/4" Castello. Took 4 passes but it I was happy since previous tests, I gave up after 6 passes at a slower speed and higher power. On a side note, Boxwood is the toughest wood to cut from what I've seen. Euro box seems harder to cut than Castello with a laser. Maybe in the next couple of weeks, I'll try some ebony which should be interesting to say the least. BTW, basswood cuts like butter now. Here's a picture to compare to the previous one at post #24. Less charring and a cleaner cut. I went for broke on the photo and using the super macro setting went for the biggest image I could get to challenge this fix. Final Thoughts: I'm still not recommending it. There's only been two reviews out there.. this one and the one by Debbie over at Sawmillcreek.org. I'll be adding mine there also. If I had known the challenges I would be facing, I would have looked at a different machine AND a different company. Since my scale of choice is 1:64, I seriously doubt I'll have to cut 1/4" wood but 3/16 is very likely and doable. If my Licorne and the ships I have planned are any indication, mostly it'll be 1/8" and thinner. If anything else pops up.. I'll post it.

Simply.. Wow!!!!! You are truly a master machinist, Wefalck. My hat is off to you.

Just phenomenal work on the pulleys...