Stuntflyer

Rather than using a compass, is there a small tool which can be purchased online to draw a center line down the length on 1/4"-1/2" wood strip? Thanks, Mike

Looking so nice, Chuck. A whole new look for Speedwell.

Beautiful work as always! It's seems to be coming together so quickly.

Hull planking (prep) One of the things I've been wanting to do was to see whether or not I could get away without having to spile the hull planks from 3/64" sheet. I was hoping that I could just edge bend boxwood planks to match a spiled shape. With that in mind I ran a test to see if indeed it could be done. The sequence is a little off since I thought of taking the photos after some of the steps were completed. I retraced the steps as best I could. For better viewing I have focused in on a smaller area of the hull. The first thing I did was to attach the hull template to my hull. I ran some 1/4" striping tape along the lower edge of the template and then back masked the upper edge of the tape. After that the original layer of tape was removed. You can see a bit of the back masking at the stem. I could have just drawn a line along the bottom of the template instead of using tape. Being a test of only one plank, I didn't want to do that. Hey, that's just me complicating things. Here is the back masking (original taping removed) where the lower edge will line up with the upper edge of the plank. I traced the lower edge of the tape (the shape for the upper edge of the plank). This gives me the shape needed for spiling or hopefully just some edge bending. You should be able to see the pencil marks across each frame. The resulting shape resembles a gentle "S" curve. Something like this. I was able to edge bend the boxwood to match the spiled shape without any difficulty. Clamping the test plank to the hull was done without having to do any twisting or bending. Mission accomplished! Mike

Totally, it looks so real. Your artistry is very apparent. Mike

Really nice! Doesn't look too difficult to make at all. Mike

Thanks, Chuck! I think it's going to be a while before I'm anywhere near where you're at. I still haven't finished up fairing the hull. Now that the fairing cap is on I will work on getting that done. After that I want to start painting the ports. Are there any other options that would work nicely with the friezes other than crimson red?

Absolutely, Erik. You should be👍

Lower counter I gave a lot of thought towards doing the lower counter in AYC. Unfortunately, I didn't have any sheets on the shelf. I know it all seems pretty straight forward, just a simple planking job. That wasn't the case at least for me. It would have been easier to do this in AYC being that the wood is much more flexible than boxwood when doing this kind of work. After the planks were in I faired a nice rounding into the wood with some miniature scrapers. https://www.amazon.com/Lynx-Mini-Scraper-Set-4pc/dp/B00ICISC2U There were a few areas where the cedar quarter panel was slightly over faired (rounded off) on the lower edge which I compensated for when I faired the outer edge of the lower counter. Mike

Great idea, Chuck! as long as the shear is good, then all should work out nicely. I’m gonna take a look at what Greg did on his build. It should be an interesting comparison.

I'm happy to see that your back at it again. Looking nice! Mike

Thanks guys! Your kind words are very much appreciated, as always. I'm looking forward to getting those first planks on the ship. Something different! Chuck, thanks for the heads up. I added the first counter planks and there was no issue getting the lower edge of counter flush with the square tuck Mike

Square tuck I wanted to give this a try at least once before making use of the laser cut versions. #1. I copied the angle from the laser cut piece onto the joined strips. #2. The frame was made and set parallel with the angled line. #3. The curves were done with the spindle sander and disc sander along with a bit of hand work. #4. Almost ready to place on the ship. I Still needed to taper the frame. The most difficult part was trying to get symmetry between the two sides. It's not perfect, but certainly close enough. I was kicking myself when I noticed that the top of the port side square tuck is 1/64" lower at the stern post compared to the other one. Of course this won't be seen once the moulding is on. I left the outer area of the frames without any tapering. There is a tiny filler plank that goes between the tuck and the first strake. I will wait until that's on the ship, so I can sand that area all at the same time. Anyway only one shot at it for this result. Mike

As you know, Chuck faired the hull with the top jigs in place. After supporting the hull with some planking, he was able to remove the jigs and add the fairing caps for both shape and support. Through hands on experience he knows that this approach will work out nicely. I wasn't so sure that it would work out the same for me. I was concerned that after removing the top timber jigs, I would find myself having to fair the hull a lot more. This would be quite difficult with the planking already on the hull. With that in mind, I decided to take a different approach. I added a chock between each frame where they would be covered by planking. Adding the chocks meant that I could pull the laser cut top timber jigs (before doing any planking) while maintaining support for the frames. After adding the fairing caps, I could fair the hull more accurately at the shear. Generally this turned out to be true at least for me. There were some areas at the shear that needed more work, but an inch or so below the shear the fairing work was good. Yes, a few hours of extra work that turned out well in the end. Notice that there is still enough room for the .025" cap rail to sit just below the top of the transom. There was an enormous amount of work needed to fair these aft cants. It took me the better part of three days. Remember this is boxwood, not AYC. Anyway that's done now.😁 Mike

Well done!

Window sills I will admit that these were quite tricky to make. Different angles everywhere and some trial and error was needed in order to get them just right. I probably had 3 or 4 throwaways before getting the ones you see here. Stern frames In order to make these, I sandwiched two roughly cut frames together with some Elmer's School Glue and then adhered the plan drawing for final shaping. This was easy enough to do with the help of the spindle sander, disk sander and scroll saw. Transom On top of the shear there will be a 5/32" fairing cap and a 1/4" cap rail that sits on top of that. The two pieces will add a total of about 3/32" more height to the top of the shear. I wouldn't want the cap rail to protrude above the top edge of the transom. With that in mind, I decided to fair the quarter deck shear before adding the transom. This way I could check the clearance before adding the transom. It was really just a matter of getting that small triangular piece taken down to the right height while fairing the shear. I added the 5/32" fairing cap for the quarter deck and faired the outer hull using the cap as a guide. Mike

FWIW, I'm not sure that will work out. I looked at mine a few minutes ago and the all red base for the skylight looks right. Place a few simulated planks around the skylight, just to see how it will look once the deck is in. Mike

Framing (final pieces) I have finally finished all of the framing. About nine months to do them all including about 160 milled scarph joints. It certainly feels like a milestone. Though mostly done, I still need to do some minor cleanup fairing, especially where the cants transition into the deadwood. FYI: Here is the fit that I was shooting for when adding the last frame, #29. Mike

I was hoping for a little more progress this week. The problem was that I started nit picking. One of the things that I've been wanting to do from the beginning was to avoid any color matching with paint for areas that might not have turned out as expected. Typically that would be something like an open butt joint or where two different wood types join together thus changing the uniformity of the look. Looking at this closeup photo from my previous post, it's not hard to see that the AYC quarter panel is a lighter color than the end grain of the wing transom which is made from boxwood. The lower section of the quarter panel for the most part is covered by planking. However, some of the lighter AYC color will be seen after the planking is completed. Knowing that, I decided to remove some of the AYC from the quarter piece and replace it with boxwood. Actually, it was quite easy to do and I was able to complete the work in less than an hour. See photo below. Fashion piece The fashion piece was cut from 5/32" sheet. The tricky part was getting a nice flow into the bearding line and a good joint along the deadwood and wing transom. I ended up having to make two of these in order to get the one I liked. I left the top of the fashion piece standing proud. Also, I left some of the paper template attached which could be used as a sanding template. I recommend doing this rather than trying to get a perfect fit everywhere. It's hard to explain as to why, just that it's easier to fit the piece and fair the top into the wing transom afterwards. If I end up back into nit picking mode, I might do a bit more work at the bearding line transition. Also, note that the boxwood filler is in and mostly faired. Mike

Another way would be to place a flat sheet on a flat bench or table so it hangs over by a wee bit. If you're right handed, place the sheet on the "right" side table edge. That makes it easier to sand the sheet without having to twist your body. Tape down the edge sitting on the table. Round off the over hanging edge using the 11" bar sander like this one from Great Planes. After that you could rip the rounded strip away from the sheet with the table saw or cut if off the sheet with a #11 blade.

Nicely done!

Thank you all for the kind words, and for all the “Likes”. Very much appreciated.

Wing transom and quarter panels The wing transom is made from 5/16" sheet. Using the template from the plan sheet, I cut out the basic shape and then milled the four angled notches. The templates for the remaining curve shape (forming that parallelogram shape) are on the plan sheet as well. I just copied what Chuck has described in his build log on page 8, post #228. The wing transom was pinned with 24 gauge wire and glued to the deadwood. The pinning was done to make it easier to set the height of each end and fore/aft positioning without having to worry about it sliding back and forth at the same time. After the wing transom was installed I started work on the two quarter panels which attach to the wing transom. What is important to note is that the cant frames should be fully faired prior to installing the quarter panels. I worked on this until I got a smooth transition between the last aft cant and the quarter panel. Once that was done, I glued the panels in place. Mike

Chuck, you certainly have my 👍 on the transom work. Those figures look great, beautifully done!

Happy Thanksgiving, everyone! I'm finally over a bad cold which prevented me from fairing those aft cant frames sooner. With so much wood to remove, I decided to stay with the adhesive backed 80 grit sandpaper until final cleanup. No doubt AYC would have been much easier to deal with than boxwood. Still, no complaints! Mike