rvchima

Hull Painted, Railing Installed - 23 days, 55 hours The hull was painted with three coats each of Rustoleum Colonial Red, Krylon gloss white, and Krylon gloss black from rattle cans. The rails and interior were brush painted with gloss white acrylic. I am leaving for Europe in a few days and rushed to get this all done, but probably should have taken my time. I can see a few seams between boards and a few fingerprints on the black areas. Not bad but I could do better.

Second Planking Complete I started at the top rail and worked towards the keel. The thin second layer of 0.5 mm walnut planks were amazingly flexible. I just glued them directly to the first layer with CA. No tapering necessary. After lots of sanding, crack filling with Famowood, more sanding, two coats of Aqua Coat, and more sanding, I think I am ready to paint the hull. At least I'll see how it looks after a coat of primer.

First Planking Complete - 14 days, 31 hours The second layer of planking is walnut, 3mm wide x 0.55 mm thick - not much material to sand down when I screw up. And why walnut if it's going to get painted anyway?

There are so many Bluenose build logs on MSW that I debated whether to add another. I am already glad that I did, since I've learned that the Maple Leaf flags that come with the kit are incorrect. However, I looked at the web sites for all the other Bluenose kits and guess what? They all have Maple Leaf flags! What gives?

Trevor, Thank you so much for the history corrections! I'm just repeating the text from the Italian instructions. Regardless of her win/loss record, she sure is a beautiful ship. Thank you also for the tip on the flags. I will certainly not use the ones supplied with the kit, and if you can suggest any alternatives I see what I can do.

Starting on the Hull and Deck The frames popped out of the laser-cut ply and fit perfectly on the keel. I planked the two thin plywood sub decks by gluing down full-length strips and then notching them with a chisel to make individual boards. The technique is described here. I stained the decks with two coats of Minwax Golden Oak and finished them with Minwax Polycrylic satin from a rattle can. When I test fit the decks on the keel they didn't line up in the center. Low and behold, the keel was warped about 4 mm off straight. Darn, I wish I had noticed that before I added all those frames. I ended up notching a piece of poplar to go around the frames. Clamped to the keel from below it held it straight while I glued the decks in place. The decks held the keel straight afterwards. I've started the planking using the technique described in the book Ship Modeling Simplified: Tips and Techniques for Model Construction from Kits by Frank Mastini. Basically you glue the planks to the frames with CA, and glue the planks to each other with PVA (carpenters' glue.) The CA hardens in a few seconds and holds the planks in place, no nails needed. I do about three frames at a time. Oh yeah, I have a hot plank bender now and am using that to roughly shape the planks before attaching them. The kit comes with a simple stand, but I usually prefer to mount my models on a permanent base - much easier to handle during construction and afterwards. But the sub keel on this model is just 2.25 mm thick, too thin for screws. I don't know what I'll do - maybe turn some wood pedestals and glue in place later?

What's in the Box Seems like not much for €106.99, but that's what kits cost anymore. I love the "EASY TO BUILD MODEL" text on the box. Easier than many of the models I've built lately, but with a planked hull and full set of sails this will be anything but easy. Planks, dowels, thread, blocks, and a few miscellaneous parts. Three pages of full-sized plans. Three sheets of laser-cut parts. Two flags on adhesive-backed cloth, and cloth for sails. and a booklet with one page each of instructions in English and Italian, and about 20 pages of drawings.

Bluenose was a 285 ton Canadian fishing schooner launched on 26 March, 1921. She was built to compete for the International Fisherman's Trophy held in alternate years off Lunenberg, Nova Scotia, and Gloucester, New England. She won the race in 1921 and every other race that she entered after that. (See corrections by Kenchington below.) She is depicted on the current Nova Scotia license plate and the back of the Canadian dime. There are LOTS of Bluenose builds on MSW, with kits offered by four companies in three different scales. I made an unofficial count of the kits listed as FINISHED. Company scale no. of logs Amati 1:100 3 Billings 1:100 2 Artesania Latina 1:77 8 Model Shipways 1:64 11 I decided to to build the Amati kit, mostly because I have built a few of their models am running out of space for larger models. Of the three Amati Bluenose build logs on MSW, only one has much detail. I will link it here so I can refer back to it later. It was completed 10 years ago, so I don't feel too bad adding another Bluenose build. Bluenose by SimonV - FINISHED - Amati - Scale 1:100 - first wooden ship build

I was away for a couple of weeks and didn't look in on your build. Your planking is perfect and the WOP is just beautiful on the pear wood. Congratulations on a marvelous job. If dampening the damaged area does not fix the problem, try touching the dampened area with a hot clothes or bending iron. Try it on some scrap first.

Thank you to everyone for the kind comments on my build. It was a challenge but also a pleasure to build such a fine kit, and always fun to share the work with people who appreciate it. Rod

FINISHED - 441 Hours, 165 Days Since my last posts I finished and attached the ships boats, anchors, lanterns, and some stub masts. I knew from the start that this would be a hull-only model. I simply don't have room in my house for another large model. @chris watton at Vanguard Models has produced an absolutely beautiful model in the Sphinx. The materials are all excellent, the laser-cut parts all fit perfectly, and the photo-etched parts make detailing the model easy. (Well, relatively easy.) The kit uses some unconventional parts. I had my doubts about the photo-etched eyebolts and the MDF anchors, but in the end they look perfect. I do think the ship's wheel and the floors of the ship's boats would be better done in wood, but again they look fine. My finished Sphinx is so photogenic that I hired a professional photographer to take photos of her. Many thanks to Leea at Asheville Headshots for her beautiful photos. Here they are.

The Boats Don't Quite Fit The fit of the ship's boats has always been a bit "iffy," but after I added the wales to the their sides they were just too close for comfort. And so, deconstruction. I moved the two outer boat racks each about 2 mm outwards, and now everything fits comfortably.

That is a beautiful model Walter. Congratulations on a job well done.

Ship's Boats The ship's boats comprise a 28' pinnace, a 24' launch, and a 22' yawl. Can someone out there please tell me the difference between the three? Is it the size, intended function, crew size, rigging, or something else? I finally acquired Lavery's excellent book, Arming and Fitting of English Ships of War, 1600 - 1815, and read the long section on ship's boats with great interest. But there was so much detail that I still don't understand the basic distinction. But that didn't stop me from barging ahead with construction. The boats are built over MDF bulkheads. They are single-planked with thin pear strips. This one has been sanded and filled with acrylic filler. Here's what they look like off the base. Then you twist the bulkheads off with pliers. VERY scary, but no damage. Sanding the inside is not fun. The interior gets fitted with thin ribs. I used Tamiya tape to set the spacing between the ribs. OK, full disclosure. The manual recommends using PVA wood glue for planking instead of CA, so of course I used CA on the first one. It went together OK, but after I filled the exterior and removed it from the bulkheads a lot of joints opened up. I got nervous and painted the interior with PVA. Big mistake - now the ribs would not stick to the interior with CA, so I had to use PVA on them, which increased construction time a lot. On the next two boats I used PVA on the edges of the planks and dots of CA on the bulkheads to act like pins. That's how I planked the main hull, and it worked very well on the boats as well. Here are the three boats temporarily in their cradles on deck. Now I have to find a way to make the PE floor boards look like wood. That's a mystery to me, why Chris decided to make all these wood parts out of PE, when they could easily be laser cut from thin pear wood and stained to match. It won't keep out water. I hope that it will keep out paint.

End of Hull Construction - For Now The boomkins, seats of ease, and hammock cranes are all complete. Here are a few photos. Boomkins and 2 seats of ease for 140 sailors. The manual says to skip the aft hammock cranes for now because they will interfere with rigging the shrouds. The manual never gets back to them, and most other builders omitted them as well. I won't be rigging shrouds so I built them.