robdurant

Looking very smart. One tip I've found helpful in the past is to mask up the lines and then paint on some clear matt varnish. If this bleeds it doesn't matter. You can then paint the black over it, and it's less.likely to bleed as the gaps are already filled by the varnish. I've used this trick a few times and not had any issue. With that said, your tidying up efforts look very neat. Rob

And... onto the masts. I haven't cut down the top of the mast yet, but couldn't resist seeing how it looked in situ.

It's been a productive week. So here's an update. I've finished off all the deck furniture, and added the belaying pins (blackened photo-etch), and the chain plates... The chain plates were marked out from the plans using masking tape to protect the hull as I put pencil marks on to show where they should go. Once I was happy with the arrangement, I drilled a hole in each to locate the first pin, and then removed the masking tape. The remaining holes were drilled, and the provided pins were fixed in, having first blackened the heads. (It's worth noting that on the top holes of the forward and rear chainplates, the hole shouldn't end up sticking out on the far side of the bulwark. To avoid this, I shortened the pin before gluing it in place with a small dab of superglue. I've also dyed the sail set (these are the premium sails sold separately by Chris at Vanguard, and they really do add to the model). I used Rit dyes for this. About two pints of water were boiled in a big stainless steel pan, then having given it a few minutes to start cooling, I added two teaspoons of Rit Wine powder and Rit Dark Brown powder, half a teaspoon of salt, and a tiny dribble of washing up liquid. Having thoroughly stirred the mixture, the sails were added, ensuring they were completely submerged and wet through. About 30 seconds later, I took out the sails, and lay them out to remove the worst of the liquid. They were then placed on a cooling rack to dry off, turning occasionally. I was really pleased with how these turned out. When I build Lady Isabella (the Zulu from Vanguard's range), I felt the sails ended up a little light... this time, I've managed to get a deeper, richer colour. I'm almost onto the masts now, so soon I'll get the chance to see how they look on Erycina! Thanks for all the likes and encouragement Rob

Hi, A little bit more progress. I've added the details to the companionway, and installed it in place. I've also constructed the main sheet housing assembly and the eyelets in the deck. I replaced the photo-etch for these with wire versions (which I had left over from previous builds), as they're more rounded, and I think I prefer the look overall. Whether you'd really ever notice the difference is another matter entirely, but I'll know A (very-zoomed-in) comparison of the wire and the photo-etch eyelets: And installed... I haven't currently glued the eyebolt holding the double-block in place as I wasn't sure how easy it would be to rig, and I wanted to keep the option open to get more access if I wanted it. It amazes me how much slower building is these days. When I built Lady Isabella, I was working six-day weeks and it took me four months. But progress is progress, and I'm enjoying building this model immensely! Thanks for looking in Rob

An excellent rescue glad you're back on track. I haven't built this model, so I'm not much help I'm afraid. I guess a dry fit will tell you if it will all fit okay?

Sadly it looks like you've planked the wrong side of one of those superstructure sides, and you now have two very neat starboard sides 😟 Even more distressing as you've done such a lovely job of it. I hope the solution proves simple.

Hi all, The rope handles have been added to the hatches. A note for other builders here... and a reminder that no matter how good the kit, it's always worth reading ahead. The instructions tell you to glue the hatches down, and in the next step tell you to install the rope handles. Clearly, if you've already glued in the hatch covers, doing things in this order means you'll have no access to the bottom of the hatch covers to install the rope... SO... either don't glue the hatch covers in until after you've put on the rope handles, OR install the rope handles, and THEN glue the hatches onto the deck. Your money, your choice I chose the latter, because that way I could install the hatch covers first, and know that the loose ends of the 0.5mm thread weren't going to foul the hatch surrounds. It's a simple enough job, a little superglue was used firstly to make a hardened end to make threading it easier, and then to fasten the threads. No knots were necessary. On the removable hatch cover, the glue was added to the underside of the cover where the thread came through, and it was then clipped back flush to allow the hatch to be placed over the others. Now, an admission... I began to assemble the steps and got engrossed, and completely neglected to take an afterwards photo.... It went together quite neatly. Getting rid of the char on the steps and the uprights was a little fiddly, but nothing too bad. I painted the inside of the hole in the deck where the companionway sits black to stop the MDF and plywood showing, and installed the steps. A little sanding on each side of the steps made it a neat fit. As the instructions say - don't drop the steps into the hull! I'm glad I didn't have to find out _how_ irritating and time-consuming it would be to retrieve them. I completely understand the design intent of the companionways, but this is perhaps one of the few areas of the kit where I'm not a great fan of the look. The companionways in the kit have notched edges to aid in getting a neat lined up assembly - these are certainly helpful, but those tabs, (in my personal opinion) slightly spoil the look of the finished article... If you're painting these parts, it's a non-issue. And they don't look terrible... I'm just not a great fan. Here's the photo from the assembly manual - Again, in fairness to Chris and James, it's worth noting that these photos have the char left on - if you sand these edges back the notches will be far less noticeable. Don't take any of this as a complaint. It really isn't. This kit rocks! And as is always the case with a wooden boat model - if you don't like it, scratch build it however you like... the kit's just the starting point. So here's my effort... Pear left over from the planking was split down the middle, and then glued back together to make boards of ~2mm wide planks. The original parts were then used as templates to make full sides. Once cut and sanded to shape (leaving the spaces for the notches in place on the sides, and removing the notches on the front of the companionway), it was assembled. Using the original parts for the front (with the tables removed) and the top, it was all assembled. Thanks to the hatch top, the assembly was reasonably sturdy. Here's a shot before the bottom edge was tidied up... Overall, I'm happier with the look. Next up are hinges and handles, etc... No photos of that yet. Thanks for looking in. Rob

Hope you're feeling better soon, Chris. It's draining coughing all the time. Amazing what's possible with 3d printing now. Those ship's boats look fantastic.

A brief update today. I realised I hadn't put on the vessel name decals yesterday... so on they went. Photo etch for the pintles and gudgeons next... (blackened using IPA to clean, "Casey's brass black", and then water to rinse) And then it was time to focus on the deck a little... Scuttles were blackened and then added... Hatches assembled... I'll leave the hatch open a little to show off the extra detail that Chris has designed in for this hatch. These are still dry-fitted at the moment, and I shall add the rope handles before gluing in place. One of the other builds I read on this forum noted that the forward hatch is offset to starboard very slightly, so hopefully I'll remember that when I come to gluing it in place. It's shown on the plans - just easy to miss. And a few more parts - the base for the steam winch, and another part - these were blackened / painted, and then glued in place making sure to line them up carefully using appropriate sized rods where they need to line up with holes in the deck. And finally... the view from above. Thanks for all the encouragement. It's so encouraging to see things moving ahead so well now, and to be spurred on by the likes. As I've said many times already, this kit really is beautifully designed, and makes the task of building a real joy. It's nice to get to the stage where you see real progress each time you work on it. Rob

Decals on... I used Microset and then Microsol to apply the decals. This allowed me to get them to really soften round the wood grain. Thankfully, the wood seemed to take this really well, and although you can see the wet look on the wood in the last photo (from applying the depth marks to the other side of the keel, this has now dried to the same colour as it was before. A quick point of note- when you're marking out where the depth markings go, don't forget that at least some of the sheet plans aren't 1:1 scale with the model... In fact, they're about 1.3x smaller - so do factor up your measurements before you mark out where the decals are going. This becomes important again when measuring up and making the spars (which, it's worth noting, have the correct measurements written next to them.) Thanks for looking in Rob

Thank you for the kind comments @JacquesCousteau @AJohnson

Well, what a productive day it's been... surprisingly so. Yesterday I managed to fit the remaining uprights behind the bulwarks along with the part that runs round the stern and tying off points. The hull was then masked, and painted Tamiya matt acrylic Cockpit Green (XF-71). The secret with these paints (when brush painting, as I do), is to resist at all costs the temptation to go back over a bit you've painted already until it's truly entirely dry. Any attempts to repaint an area will drag the skin that is probably already forming, and it'll turn into a hot mess (ask me how I know!)... the tamiya paints seem far less forgiving than the Vallejo acrylics that I use more often ... there are, however, colours that Tamiya simply seems to nail that I can't find anywhere else. The blue I used on Ethalion, the green I'm using here. They just have a nice scale subtlety that avoids you being slapped round the face with the colour - this is, of course entirely subjective - so, paint your model whatever colour pleases you and feel free to ignore me I do like this muted colour and how it contrasts against the pear, and I'm pleased with how it turned out. At this point, and as I put the model somewhere safe overnight, I thought a picture with the first, and third wooden boat I built would be an interesting contrast... Caldercraft's Sherborne and Pickle are of a similar size... I also painted the strips that run along the bottom of the green stripe, black. As always, Chris provides marks that show precisely where all of these things should go, which makes it really quick and easy to get these parts into place. This morning the first job was to glue these black stripes into place. I don't know what I'd do without masking tape! I figure if masking tape will hold the part in place while it glues, I've probably got it fitted reasonably well... if I'm using clamps and nails and screws and a vice, I probably haven't taken long enough to get it fitting before I glue it... I figure this approach also guards me against getting taken out when a glue joint fails somewhere down the line! 🤣 So... bulwark tops were fitted, and paint touched up... and here we are. I'm not planning to paint the bottom of the hull on this model. I've painted all of my hulls before, but I'm rather pleased with how this one has gone, and I think I shall leave it obvious that it's planked all the way down. More updates soon, I hope. Thanks as always for looking in, and for your encouragement and likes. Rob

Well, half-term is finished, and with that change comes more time and space for sleep and model boat building... I finished the hull planking a couple of days ago. Whether it's my best effort, I'm not sure, but overall I'm pleased with it. I've taken off the bulkhead tabs above the false deck, fitted the deck, and begun the task of adding the uprights on the inside of the bulwarks. While some glue was drying, I assembled the wooden parts of the rudder. As always the fit of the parts is wonderful. Here are some photos of progress... (wow - close-ups are brutal!) Thanks for looking in Rob

Thanks for asking. There are gradual improvements... a long road, but I'm grateful for all I can do. And it's lovely to be getting somewhere with Erycina, too.

Hi all, A brief update, as there's no a huge amount to show - just the ongoing process of planking. Nevertheless, I've completed the second-planking on the starboard side, and I have six planks to add on the port. I found that the width of the false keel at the stern was a little narrow to allow the planks to come out to the same width as the keel once it had the outer pieces attached. To alleviate this, I added some card inserts with superglue. Not pretty, but no-one will know, right? With this done, I continued planking, and here are the results on the starboard side. (Who knew a hob makes such a good photo-backdrop!) The yellow is masking tape to protect the pear from muck, glue, and scratches while I man-handle the hull to get the lower planks on. To return to a question I posed myself earlier on in this build. I decided to add a stealer in at the stern, so that the planking could drop beneath the counter, rather than curving up. In retrospect, (and perhaps, predictably), if I were doing this over again, I would definitely follow Chris and James' lead and make the planking follow the curve of the rail. The alternatively leads to a slightly weird curve as the plank twists through 90 degrees to drop under the counter. Well, we live and we learn. I don't regret giving it a try, as I've learned more through the process, and I sincerely hope this won't be the last hull I shall be planking... so there's time to have another crack at it Thanks for looking in. Rob