Belco

Rear Admiral of the Red being rowed out to his Flagship off Drakes Island in Plymouth sound 
W/C mixed media Artboard  11" X 8"
jim

one from some time a go. 1997 I think 
Jim 

Shore party. Fresh water was a constant worry in the days of sail.
jim

A/S Trawler on Convoy escort, butting through a heavy swell and getting ready for the coming night on the 'bumpy road North'
W/C 15" X 11"

Isles class Trawler based on HMCS Liscomb in typical North Atlantic weather
Watercolour 15" X 11"
Jim

At sea early 20 century.
Not one of my best, but a nice way to pass the afternoon.
W/C 15" X 11"
Jim

While working on my modified MS 1:96 scale version of the “Phantom” I found that I needed to make three very small turnbuckles. (They were referred to as stretching screws on the plan.)  I had bought some brass telescoping thin wall tubing previously for making yard bands and thought up a way to use them to make a fairly realistic fitting.  I took some 1.3 mm brass tubing that was just big enough to allow an eye bolt that came with the kit to slip into it.  Then I used the 1.8 mm brass tubing (the next size up) that the 1.3 mm tube could be slipped inside of that for the main body of the turnbuckle.

 I marked the length of the 1.8 mm tube and the length of the opening with a felt pen. 

 Taking the 1.8 mm tube to my vise, I cut out the open areas on both sides with a fine narrow file.

 I cut  the 1.8 mm tube to length for the main body and cut a pair of short lengths of the 1.3  mm tube for the inside ends of the turnbuckle. Taking the five pieces to my soldering block, I applied flux to the shortened eye bolt stems and the outside of the 1.3 mm tube. 

The pieces were then assembled together and stretched out on the block with a couple of toothpicks stuck through the eye bolt holes to hold it steady.

 
 I cut some small flakes of solder and placed them at the ends of the turnbuckle body and applied my soldering iron to the 1.8 mm tube.  After it cooled off I just cleaned up the ends with a fine file and blackened it.  While the fitting still seemed a little large to me, I was quite satisfied with it.  By varying the size of the components the size of the turnbuckles can readily be adjusted for various other scales.

 

Thanks to everyone for all the likes and replies.
 
I applied three coats of oil based poly. I hope this will make it a little easier to peel off and replace the sand paper. Here they are with some 80 grit self sticking sand paper applied.
 
The holes in the handles were drilled so I had a way to hang them while the poly dried.

I have already started using them on my current build and thy work great.
 
Best regards

So the final bit of building for s few weeks.
 
The running bars have to exactly match the back plate - i.e 15.000" across the shoulders. The difficulty is I don't have a vernier that long, however as they say "necessity is the mother of invention. I started by turning the bars over length as measured with an engineers rule.
 
My only accurate measuring device was the milling bed y axis - graduated on the hand wheel and fitted with a DRO.
 
The first step in measuring was to place an end stop on the parallel location bar mentioned earlier. The position of the end stop was then fixed with the edge finder. The DRO and the hand wheel graduations were set to zero.

The bar was pushed up hard against the stop and then the edge finder was used to fix the other end of the bar.
 

One bar was 15.416" long while the other was slightly shorter at 15.406". The shoulders on either end therefore needed to be .208" and .203" respectively.

 
It was critical that the shoulders on the bars were cut concentric, so rather than relying on lathe chuck accuracy I used a collet block in the 4 Jaw chuck. This allowed me play with the accuracy of the set up of the bars to my hearts content.

Using the dial gauge I set the running of the bars at circa .0005 or better before cutting each of the 4 ends. The shoulder diameter was .314" +/- .00025" to match the drilled and reamed holes in the end plates. The ends of the bars were drilled and tapped M5 to take the fixing bolts.

The test of all my efforts at accuracy was in the assembly.
 


Phew! - it turned out OK.
 
IMG_0399.MOV
 
 
 

Two weeks ago I went to the local machinery suppliers open day and came away with a nice little X Y table. It came out of the redundant stock bucket and was a snip at £30. 

 
It is made of cast iron / steel (unlike many cheap fleabay products) and has gibs and locks on both axis. The hand wheels are calibrated in thousandths of an inch with one revolution giving .050 inch travel (20 TPI). The x travel is 5.250 inch and the y travel is 2.625 inch.
 
I had been thinking about making a mini mill for a while. I find my bench mill is a bit too meaty for the smaller ship work and its maximum speed of 2400 rpm is much too slow for smaller drills and end mill cutters when working on aluminium, brass and hardwood. 
 
I did a bit of calculation on cutters of up to 3mm diameter (table below) and concluded that a spindle speed of 10,000 - 30,000 rpm wouldn't be too excessive.
 

Having bought the table I had a hunt through my "rainy day" store and came up with the following:-
 
Cross slide lead screw from my long retired Boxford lathe. This is nicely engineered with the screw mounted on double trust bearings and calibrated in tousandths (1 revolution = .100 inch). It will give me 6" Z axis travel.
 

2 speed "Rotozip" 550 Watt spiral saw body with speeds of 25000 and 33000 RPM. I have had this for 20 years during which time its had about one hours use. Its got loads of torque and nicely tight bearings. Ideally i would like to put speed control on it but as yet I'm not sure how.

A digital read out, bought cheaply on a whim for £5. ( I will need 2 more). Its Ideally sized for the x axis.


To make this a success I need to pay a lot of attention to the accuracy of the build but the first job was to come up with a design. I worked through a few options before coming up with the following general arrangement (drawn at full size).

 
The column frame will be made out of .375" thick aluminium plate and the milling head will run on two pairs of linear roller bearings riding on on a pair of .473" bars that in a previous life were kitchen door handles. 

 
This should keep me off boat building for a while!

Well, I am about to start fairing my first POF ship and realized I had no proper sanding blocks.
 
So off to the local Home Depot for a look around. I quickly realized that they had for off the shelf sanding blocks was not going to work. As my wife and friends have told me over the years "my brain has no off switch" so I started looking around for materials to make my own.
 
I did not want to spend a lot of money or time so I went looking for lumber that was the right size to begin with. I was in the paint department looking for adhesive backed sandpaper when I thought of those stir sticks they give you. Perfect. Only now you have to buy them $.98 for a pack of 10 and right with them were packs of 30 over sized tongue depressors for the same price. Plus one 12"x18" sheet of adhesive backed sandpaper came to about $8.00.
 

By the time I got home I had a rough plan anyway. I was only going to need a couple of each so I had plenty for several attempts. The only tools I would need would be my Exacto razor saw and miter box, needle files, a square, a ruler and a few clamps.

One of the tongue depressors after soaking in hot water for about 15 minutes and then getting wrapped around a piece of 1/2" PVC pipe.

While that was drying I laminated the other 2 together and set them aside to dry.

While I cut up the 2 stir sticks.

The first pieces clamped up and set aside to dry.

Back to the tongue depressors. The ends were cut off approximately the same length as the width of the TD and the ends of the remaining piece mitered.

I think you can see where this is going.

 

Glued up and set aside to dry back to the other one. I cut the 2 squares in half and glued them in on both ends.

And here they are after a little trimming and sanding.



 
Not bad for less than $8.00 and a couple hours work. I think the flat one will be fine but I am not so sure about the rounded one. I think I should have laminated 2 together for the rounded part as well. We will find out how they work after a couple of coats of oil based poly to toughen them up a little.
 
Best Regards

Hello all. You might have noticed my absence but I’m still here…
Well, it’s been a long time since a previous presentation work of mine but I’m not notorious for accurate build logs anyway. So I have come to prove myself again …
 
I started the model one year before accepting the challenge to build a model with open hull.
I didn't work on it regularly, so that's why the lack of many photos, not that I have in my mind to take photos in other case…
I chose to represent a vessel from my place of origin, the Island of Mytilene (Lesbos).
It was a small double ended vessel (Tserniki type) which was used for coastal trading.
It was usually rigged with a half lateen sail or a sacoleva sail (sprit sail).
......
 
I observed many photos of that vessel from the archives of 3w.naftotopos.gr and I modified an old plan of that hull type.
                                                       
 
I built the model following the method plank on bulkheads removing a number of them afterwards from the middle of the hull.
I prepared the false frames by soaking proper pieced of wood, bending them and drying them on the surface of the removed bulkheads.
......
 
I had to paint the inner of the hull before I plank the deck and keep it covered for the rest of the construction.
......
 
The grapnel anchor was made by using fishing hooks that were set and glued inside a hole in a plastic rod, while the cleats on the mast were made by modifying some fishing swivels…
 
The Shackles were made as is shown there
The Belaying pins were made as is shown there
The Sails were made as is shown there
The cargo was made by chopping some twig pencils.
 
It took me much time to decide about the colors on the model…Painting is always the only stage of my builds that stresses me. Wanting to give a local-origin character in my models, I'm always anxious whether I have chosen the right colors or I have turned it to a clown.
......
 
Finally the stand was made by a piece of plywood and some wooden rings which were cut in half.
I hope my wife won’t notice the missing curtain hoops... 
 
See the finished model in gallery.
             
Many thanks

Hi.
Well i have finished the Turtle ship.
Thanks to all that contributed to the design and the build.
It was FUN and lots of learning.
 
Photos...
The crews Head.(Toilet)

Decorations. around the ship..

Holes in the roof for thrusting the lance up into anyone on the roof.

 
Another view of the roof.

The Bow area.

 
View of Bow with anchor in place.

 
The Rudder (Note its not balanced ??)

Pegs in main beams that support the deck.

Stern area with top structure removed.

 
Mid section with top structure removed.

Close up of the oars for sculling.( interesting method they used. 3 or 4 oars men with one master oars man.)

Another internal view.

 
Stern view with top structure removed.

 
Bow anchor.

 
Anchor winch.

 
Captains cabin with private Head (toilet) to the side.

 
That about concludes the build for me...
Thanks for all the likes and wonderful comments.
 
Regards Antony.
 
 
OGH.. the extra photo.. Close up of the oars.

Fantastic everything looks so clean and crisp. The red edge sounds good to me as it will emphasise the fact it is a cut away

Hi.
Updates as per previous post.
 
Main Deck is now planked and needs a fine sanding.

 
Main deck from above.

 
Rudder and tiller.

 
Winch for anchor.

 
Drum

 
Anchor

 
The Bow front panel.

 
Doors are working and I need to add a beam lock to the both ends of the ship.

 
All the hand rails made up . Need finishing before adding to decks.

 
Various ladders made up. also needs finishing.

 
second Deck from above.

 
Second deck from below.

 
Bow and stern ends added to model.

 
 That's it for today.
Regards Antony.

Hi.
Happy today...The deck fitted the hull and is now in place.
 
Picture one is the Hull side securing details. I used elastic bands to mark there position as you can see.

 
The Deck being planked. Not sure if these would have been fixed in place or just laid into the recess.

 
another close up of the side fixings.

 
Bow area fixings.

 
Looking from the Bow towards the stern of the ship.

 
Next job will to be finish the deck planking and add the deck beams fixing pins and wedges.
Also need to make the ladders that lead from the deck into the hold.
 
 
Thanks for looking in.
Regards Antony.
 

Few more details..
could not find clear evidence for the cleat on top of traveler rail (if it is indeed a traveler as there are several of those rails).
It seems though something is there and seen it on another similar craft... so will let it be

Found a sandbagger in Long Island maritime museum…. Slightly modified sandbagger

 
Took me 3 days and 3 different versions to finish the centerboard stopper, now on to turnbuckles, wooden cleats (curtesy of Syren Ship Models), etc.
 

I recently placed an order for some Hobby Zone Products with Hobby World USA. It was my first time dealing with Hobby World and I could not be happier. Ordering was easy, but I would call or email to check stock because their website is not always up to date. My entire order was shipped promptly and received within 1 week.
 
I ordered the following three items.
All arrived well packed and undamaged. As you can see in the picture my limited work area is becoming quite cluttered so it was time for some extra storage space.

 
I thought I would do a sort of review/build log of these products. The building slip has been pretty well covered in another thread so I won't rehash what has already been done. I started with the easiest one, the wall unit storage.
 
The illustrated instructions were very simple and easy to follow.

 

 
I started by laying out and checking all of the pieces. All were nicely router cut with no chips or marks that I could see. Overall the fit and finish of the parts was exceptional.
 

The only exception was the Logo oddly enough. However because this particular unit is symmetrical I was able to turn the back panel over and build it with out the logo showing. The fit on all of the parts is quite snug and required some light taps with a hammer in some cases. I decided to dry fit each assembly before actually gluing them.
 

The first step is to build three main sub assemblies. I used the back plate as a sort of jig for building these by gluing up the assembly then making sure that there was no glue on the back edges I "Plugged it into the back panel and let it dry. This way I was sure that when it came time for the final assembly everything would line up.
After assembling the three sub assemblies together the back panel is glued in place. This was kind of daunting as there were so many slots and tabs to apply and spread glue on. Then aligning them for assembly before the glue started to set up was a little tricky. This is where dry fitting at each step came in handy.
 

The three drawers were fairly straight forward.
 

I would say that this was a fun and useful little project. The assembly to this point was done in one afternoon. No doubt it could be hung up and used just as it is. But I will do some light sanding to ease some of the edges and apply a couple coats of oil based poly before loading it up.
 
I am guessing that the bench top unit will go together in much the same way. I will update when I get going on it.
 
Thanks for looking in.
 

Using a tool I shaped from the flattened non-hook end of a crochet hook, I was struggling mightily to belay lines in the tight spaces under my pin rails.  The tool was just too large and I couldn't maneuver the line easily.  I came up with the idea of inserting the pointed end of a sewing needle into a thin dowel (actually a throwaway chopstick from a Chinese restaurant) and threading the line to be belayed through the eye.  Here are the old and new tools:

Instant success!  The needle's eye easily gets the thread around the bottom end of the pin, and makes it easy to form and place the final locking loop.

Inspired by Michael Mott’s excellent tool (https://modelshipworld.com/index.php?/topic/14463-restoration-of-bassett-lowke-albertic-by-michael-mott-scale-1100/&page=5&tab=comments#comment-452268 and newer version further down in the thread as well as BANYAN’s review of it: https://modelshipworld.com/index.php?/topic/15249-michael-mott-designed-third-hand/&tab=comments#comment-473797), I decided to put into action something that I had planned to do for a long time. From my late father’s estate I inherited a cast-iron foot that presumably belonged to a some sort of chemical laboratory equipment. Not being impressed with the commercial ‘third-hand’ I kept this piece of cast-iron with the view of converting it into a tool with less and better controllable degrees of freedom. Also just having a pair of cheaply made alligator clamps didn’t add to the useability of that tool that, in consequence, spent most of its life on the shelf. I also inhereted a good quantity of pre-war quality alligator clamps.
 

Third hand with small hooks for rigging work
 
The cast-iron foot was de-rusted and a proper seat for the bar-clamp had to be filed – I could not find a way to clamp the piece to the table of my milling machine. The foot then was primed and painted in my favourite ‘bottle green’ (RAL 6007).
 

Third hand with small clamps in steel
 
Working predominantly in small scales with tiny parts, I sized the tool appropriately. The main bar is 6 mm steel and the two pillars are 10 mm aluminium. I actually prefer steel, but in this case working with aluminium was faster on my small machines. The arbors for all the clamps are 4 mm steel rod. The diameter of 4 mm was chosen, as the alligator-clamps have sleeves that are meant to be pushed over 4 mm-banana-plugs.
 

Third hand with alligator clamps
 
Thinking about the likely kind of applications, I made a pair of small sprung clamps from steel, a pair of larger toolmaker-style clamps (excellent idea by Michael, btw) in aluminium to be used for soldering, a pair of small hooks in 0.5 mm piano-wire for rigging tasks, and a pair of collect-chucks.
 

Third hand with toolmakers-style clamps in aluminium
 
The collet-chucks are a commercial products from China with ten collets that clamp from 0 to 3.2 mm. I thought this might be a good idea for clamping wires and perhaps ropes safely without distortion or marring. They were so cheap at 1.50€ for a chuck with ten collets that there was no point in makimng them myself.
 

Third hand with collet chucks to hold wires etc.
 
I also plan to make set of clamps from bakelite for soldering, but have not received the material yet.
The thumb-screws are also bought-in, as I have local source here in Paris that sells them for one Euro a piece, which is not exactly cheap, but good value considering how much time I would have spent making them myself.

Howdy all.  My modeling time is currently in short supply thanks to my three-month-old baby.  Even though I don’t have the time, energy or concentration to really dig into a model I’ve still had the urge to work on something.  ANYTHING.  I had recently purchased a Serv-O-Matic from Syren and the cherry it’s made of was so beautiful I decided to make it my project. 
I don’t think I need to do a review of the project as I see so many of them in use on various build logs, but I’ll just say to anyone debating about getting one – Get it!  The quality is terrific, and Chuck’s service can’t be beat.  Mine had a very minor issue when I received it and Chuck had it corrected wicked quick.
I followed Chuck’s instructions and spent a goodly amount of time removing all the char from the pieces.  Time consuming but worth it.  I used a true sander as much as possible to avoid rounding the edges too badly.  After sanding to 220 grit I assembled everything but did not affix the gears or end pieces.  Then I rubbed in by hand a coat of 100% pure Tung oil, wiped off the excess after an hour or so and then repeated the oil coat the next day. 
After that I allowed the unit and all the pieces to sit in the brightest window of the house for about a week turning the pieces each day to make sure they got even coverage.  As most of you probably know Cherry darkens and reddens naturally and that process can be sped up by exposing it to bright natural light.  Once I figured the Tung oil was as cured as it was going to get (not really at all but it’ll at least stop seeping) I applied two coats of semi-gloss water based polyurethane with a careful sanding between coats.  Lastly, after allowing the poly a week or so to cure I applied a coat of past wax to get that soft burnished look.
So below you see the result of me turning what most people would do in a few hours into a two or three week project.  In one of the pictures you can see an untreated piece of cherry which gives you an idea of just how much a little work will bring out the color and character of the wood. 

DRINK CAN RING-PULLS
After the above entries, taken from USS Constitution builds that I follow on MSW, this one comes from my own build.  I had noticed some iron-works marked on the plans. As this hull will eventually be copper-plated, I wanted to replicate these hull braces as an added detail.

 
To my eye, the horseshoe-shaped front brace looked a lot like a drink can ring-pull …

… so I salvaged a few for a trial. Holes were drilled to simulate the bolt-heads. The ring-pull ends were trimmed off.
 

… shaping the bow hull-brace around a pencil-tip.
 

Braces for the stern were cut from the rim of the drink can, annealed and straightened.
 

… grooving out a seat for the stern braces.
 

The horseshoe-shaped bow brace fitted into position ...
 

…. and the stern braces also placed. The surface of the braces sits slightly proud of the keel.
 

 
Since I am still a long way from planking and copper-plating my hull, a test was done to see how the braces would appear, once plated …

... NOTE TO SELF: Be more careful when coppering-over the holes.
 
 

SHOELACES
Browsing some of the logs that I follow recently, and I stumbled upon this idea by one of my favourite USS Constitution builders.

 
Thanks to Tom (UsedToSail) for this idea to reproduce more realistic slings for the boats on his build.
Over to Tom …
“I have been doing some thinking about how to stack the two cutters on the waist rails. The plans show only the large cutter with cradles underneath and strong backs over the tops to hold it down. I could use the same method and use cradles on the small cutter to sit on the strong backs, but I thought they might stick up too high. In the AOS book, they show the small cutter inside the large cutter, with fenders between them. I liked this method better, but was struggling how to make fenders until one day, as I was tying my shoes, it hit me to try pieces of shoe laces. I bought some white oval laces and after cutting the pieces, I browned them using brown shoe polish. I was quite happy with the look.”
 
Tom says that he first tried this with round laces, but it didn't look as good:

 
Better success was had using a flatter lace …

 
And a later pic from Tom’s build, showing the boats positioned on-deck …

 
 

Let's see if we can get this thread back on track ...
 
CHALK
Perhaps the best method of recreating small, carved details can be found in XKen’s USS Constitution build log. Wood carving is a skill-set that can take years to master. One slip-up can mean having to re-do hours of work. But Ken has found an easier way.

 
Here, he shows us how to use a piece of ordinary black-board chalk to carve the detail ends for his catheads. With Ken’s permission, I have lifted a few pictures from his log. I’m sure that his explanations speak for themselves …

 

 

 
And here's the final result, in position on Ken's Constitution build.