Beef Wellington

Our fully rigged Swan class  3D model is almost complete. How cool would it have been to have this photo when building your fully framed model? The CD should be ready later this year. Kudos to Denis!
 

Despite the fiddliness those swivel guns came out really well!  I need to start thinking about lids myself.  Quick question on the KristalKlear as your lights turned out really nicely.  I've never used it before but have some waiting, how did you apply it?  The guidance seems to suggest building it up once in position but its hard to mentally get comfortable with that, and I don't want to mess it up and ruin the PE.  Any concerns with it not drying completely clear?

Jason - the KK is quite easy to apply.  Put a fairly substantial drop on a pin or toothpick, and run it around the edges of the windows.  Then draw the pin across the widow and from top to bottom.  You may need another drop to cover the hole.  It shouldn't be necessary to build it up, but if it is necessary I don't think it would be a problem.  I have had no problem with cloudiness, but you must avoid the fumes from CA glue.  Once the CA is fully dried (leave it for a day or two) there should be no fumes.   While doing my Vanguard I wasn't careful enough, and one window was fogged. I simply cut it out with a craft knife (it's easy) and reapplied.  Incidentally PVA has no effect on the KK, so wherever possible it is best to use it.

Progress.  The lower trim for the transom decorations came out well to my pleasant surprise.  In addition to the curvature shown above (the method worked well), there is also a fairly significant curvature of the transom itself.  As I noted previously, the trim is reluctant to bend, so in gluing it below the decoration, it was left clamped in position for four days.  The opaque parts of the windows shown below is simply Kristak Klear that has not yet completely dried.
 

The cabin light lids are finished.  Rather than simply drilling 0.5mm holes for the 'ropes' , I used electrical shrink tubing which I think makes a tidier job.
 

Here is the before and after of the tubing.  Apply heat with a hair drier and stretch.
 

Finally I have started on the swivel guns.  Putting the nobs on the handles is diabolically difficult (drilling a hole in the nob to receive the handle proved impossible) and the result is both fragile and barely acceptable.
 

 
 
 
 

Post 6
Planking continues
I have inserted a balsa filler in the lower hull between bulkheads 4 and 5 which has the greatest space, but I don't think fillers are necessary elsewhere.

739
I planked the hull down to the lower deck level,  using a rule of thumb taper and bend method.
Below this where planking gets tighter I lined off the hull into two bands, the upper of five strakes and the lower of six planks.

737(2)
I used the tick strip method to determine the required tapers.

741
Once tapered water and heat was used to form the necessary edge bend and bow curve.

930
I have given up on trying to leave a space for the second planking in the stem slot, it just doesn't work for me.

931
I will work the remaining strakes up from the Garboard plank which will probably leave me with a spiled plank on the underside of the hull.

932
As with all such builds it is the bow area that is the trickiest, the run of planks to the stern is fairly straightforward.

933
This is the state after a light sanding, one or two lumps and dinks to fettle but I'll leave that until the planking is complete.
 
The quality of the Lime-wood planks is good, and they take a tapering cut very well.
 
I have twelve strakes left to complete and there will be three full lengths of first planking left when I've finished, barring any mishaps.
 I have scrapped a couple of lengths which snapped during the bow bending operation and another couple due to mis-cuts, but I am left with a small pile of shorter lengths which would come in if push came to shove.
 
I rarely enjoy this first stage of a build, but I know from experience that it will come right once the sanding is  completed.
 
On the subject of first planking it is refreshing to see that Chris has chosen to show in the build manual, the hull in all its roughness with ridges and hollows and clinkering, the point at which many new builders look and think Blimey, will this ever look right? - yes it will with careful finishing.
 

797
 
The shipyard is now closing for a week whilst we head up to North Yorkshire, looking forward to those fish and chips at the Cod and Lobster in Staithes.
 
B.E.
11/07/2019
 

A major part of the build is now done. There are 4 radio masts on the side which I can’t do until the planes are put on the flight deck. 
 
Armament and fittings now, then the aircraft. , 
 
 





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Only a little update today as I've been playing around with the upper bow timbers and fairing them into the adjacent ones.
 
In these pictures, most of the subsequent upper timbers are only plugged into position to gauge a few things as I progress, plus I was interested in seeing how things would look! I was a little worried that the bow timbers wouldn't sand evenly into each other, but I needn't have as all is perfectly ok. My thanks to Peta_V for his encouraging words too. 
 
A Dremel was used to profile/finish the interior bow area, and a medium grit sanding stick was employed on the exterior. next up is adding the notches to some of the frames and dry fitting them against the pear inner bulwark lining.
 

Beautiful work Greg and very interesting subject.  I go away for a few months an you start, and nearly complete, this beast...

When I got home from work this morning, before going to bed, I glued the deck in place, so it had plenty of time to cure. This morning, I planked the inner bulwarks, painting the planks first (although they will need painting again), so I have a nice clean line between deck edge and lowest plank on the bulwark.
 
I will now mask off the deck, as it will be so easy to damage it, and then sand the inner bulwarks smooth and re-paint after filing out the sweep and gun port openings.

Okay: the upside of the british summer is that you can play cricket, go biking, fishing, sailing, on holiday and hold BBQs; the downside is that time spent on the model gets eroded.  The result is that progress has slowed...but not stopped.  I have been slogging on with the second planking of the ship.  My ambition was to be precise and use the process as a learning experience - improve my planking skills.  in reality I accepted that all this will be hidden under copper plates therefore whilst absolutely important to ensure the shape and flow of the hull is correct, the actual planking is of secondary consideration.   I have finished the portside and am halfway down the stbd side.  I have lined some of the lidded gun-ports and finished planking around the upper bulwarks.  I have noted one error which will irritate me for many weeks to come.  The upper gunports, those around the quarterdeck, have, I believe, been fitted correctly, they are level with each other and in the correct position but the edges of the ports are not vertically parallel with those cut into the ships side for the lower gundeck.   I'm not sure how it came about but suspect the cutting of my lower gunports is to blame especially on the port side where I should have been more disciplined in setting the vertical references.  I'm not sure there is much I can do about this.  A model always has a 'best side' and I think I've just discovered that mine will be a starboard girl!
 
I have to tiddly up some of the woodwork around the lower ports and just file/square the upper ones - the photo is slightly worse than the actual model is!  My plan is to complete the planking, finish the gunport linings, sand and then take stock on how she looks.  First stumble - hey ho. All learning process.

Hi all,
 
Well finally been able to get some things done that tangibly move things forward.  The area around the mainmast is one of the more interesting and complex areas to get situated.  All of these items were scratchbuilt, which of course resulted in the usual re-does as the geometry is critical to get right as the pump axel and cranks need to align with minimal tolerances.
 
Capstan and aft coamings now glued into position, the deck beam needs to be modified to allow the capstan to be positioned appropriately.

 
Little bit of rework on the pumps, the simulated leather washer I had previously painted kept jumping out at me and was a little too 'in your face'.  Stripped this off and went with what seems to be a more traditional modeling approach to use layer of wood to simulate the gasket and plug. Here they are in final position.

 
The main jeer bitts were then positioned first once the pumps were in place to finalise the dimensions of the middle pump brakes.  The kit supplies some PE for these, but knew that these would never be satisfactory and have been planning to make my own.  The supplied wire is around 0.8mm, so 1mm square styrene sections were drilled and cut to give a little more of an authentic look to the winches.  To say this process is delicate and frustrating is an understatement - once drilled, the there is barely any structural strength to the styrene around the hole.  The aft winches were made in one piece which allowed them to be aligned relatively easily and secured using thin CA which worked quite well.  Once glued, the styrene was then gently filed to give a hint of the actual shape.

 
Rhodings were made out of boxwood and painted, to my eye this gave a little better scale look.  The stanchions had been made previously, and notches cut into the deck beam to allow these to be secured.

 
The stanchions were finalized and installed...making the second curved bracing element to be the same as the first took a lot longer than expected.

 
The layout of the main topsail sheet bitts dictates that the winches need to made separately reflecting actual practice.  These longer winches proved much more challenging than the shorter ones, and many were attempted before 2 acceptable ones were completed.

 
Elm tree pumps were shaped from boxwood stock, and the PE fittings came from an extra set I found left over from my Snake build.  These were fun items to make up, but will not be finally fixed just yet as they are very delicate.

 
Overall shots with everything in place shows just how crowed this area really is.  Overall, very happy with how this ultimately turned out.  The main topsheet bitts align underneath the deck beam at the forward end of the quarterdeck.

 
Overlaying scaled copy from AOTS, one can get a good sense for the reason for the scuttles in the quarterdeck which would have been necessary to be able to remove the various pump shafts.  I'm considering modding the quarterdeck to allow these scuttles to be left open to allow the pump mechanisms to be better seen.

 

Rigging 8mm Double Block

Beautiful work Greg and very interesting subject.  I go away for a few months an you start, and nearly complete, this beast...

test
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Top rendering job QiGang,
 
Would like to learn more about this planed kit
 
Nils

Some renderings

Today was the kind of day that you have to keep telling yourself that you're having fun.  No really. This is fun! The most tedious stuff ever!  I must have glued about 3 million tiny triangles.  At least it felt like it!  These are some of the pics of what I have been doing for the past 2 days.

This work is extremely trying. But it wouldn't be half as bad if Pontos would put a little more effort into their docs. You spend half the time trying to decipher their directions. Oftentimes screwing up after looking at another picture several pages down. VERY annoying and I know I've mentioned it before, but it's just that bad and hopefully they get the message. The quality of this stuff is fantastic to say the least, but if you aren't used to their tricks and techniques, it will seem like a very bad waste of money.
I'm working my way towards the actual hull. These assemblies are "barriers" that go along the side of the hull between decks. Pretty soon I'll have to get into the dreaded armament, but my least favorite, those damn lifeboats!
And so it goes...

Working on the hull, so much to do.Used Tamiya Basic Type Putty for it as it dries reasonably fast. I had to add three layers ... oh what joy ... finally I could make some dust as all those wood builders are complaining about
 

 
Added the trurrets for those 15cm gun turrets at it's flanks, and after that I could put on the first two deck pieces.
 

 
The focsle has a superstructure on it, with a vent. Instead of following RGL's method of drilling it out, I cut layers from the inside until it opened the "louvres". If you look good you can see the red top from the glue bottle
 

 
Lot's more to do before I can start priming the hull. I am not painting ribs like RGL, I have been over photographs for quite some time, and studied them thoroughly, but I cannot find a single one showing the lines so typical for the modern ships. I may have to take into account that the bottom hull plating at that time was far thicker than presently applied. The upper hull has been armoured and doesn't show any ribs or oilcanning effects either, which will make this build comparatively easy to paint. However I will be trying my hand at chipping and weathering. First things first though: Finishing the hull for priming ... off at a slow pace

Especially for Sam (so he finally starts working on his own build) ... movement registered at the yard ...
 

 
Couldn't get the halves nice and flush, so I'll be filling and sanding a bit

If memory served me right,   I ran a strip along the center line  as part of my armour belts (on my warpy kit)  that way it hid the bottom hull join.
 
OC.

Because I still was reluctant to continue with gun rigging, I put the transom in place and started on its decoration. While trying to fit the flexible decoration part I found that it was too wide and would not fit around the quarter galleries stern windows. As it was already mutilated after scratching away the elephant I brought myself to cut it in half, taking out about 1,5 mm in the middle. (A similar operation had already worked for Pickles boat so I did it again.)
 
The now 3 parts were painted and glued onto the transom. After much re-gluing, light sanding, touching up again and again with the 4 colours used (black, yellow ochre, white and flesh) and mending Pegasus' broken wing I achieved an acceptable result which even for once looks better on the pictures than in reality. Using only 3 basic colours and just a little more on the central image of Bellerophon on Pegasus looks right to me - not pretentious but with a simple elegance. Again, less seems to be more.
 
After closing the side galleries I could see what benefit I gained from the extra work with hollowing out the gallery frames to give a view into the lower part of the side gallery: Well, not a big one, but I'm still glad I tried it. Next time I should radically cut away as much as possible of the part where it touches the hull.
 
 

3 parts of the transom decoration ready to be glued on
 
 

the yellow ochre looks a bit more golden than in reality
 
 

the transplantation of Bellerophon was quite successful

Well, I couldn't resist  - The stump masts were looking a little.... stumpy?
 
So I sat down and worked out what lengths I thought the masts ought to be... AOTS has them as being significantly shorter than the Jotika plans - two to three centimetres. 
 
This is what I came up with...
 

 
So the measurements are taken from the bottom of the mast to the upper deck (marked "B") - this was measured from the stump masts, I'd already made. Then the second measurement was taken from AOTS diagram F1/5, F1/6 and F2/1 from the upper deck braces to the top of the mast. By working out the distance between the upper (gun deck) and the fore / quarter deck above it (which turned out to be approx 3cm) I could then work out the entire length of the mast from mast step to top. As I said, this ended up 419mm for the main mast, 345 for the foremast, and 239 for the mizzen. Top and TGt masts were also calculated using the AOTS diagrams F1/3, F1/4, F1/5.
 
And here it is, with some scrap left at the top of each mast for when I put it into the lathe to turn it down... 
 

 
In other news, I also attached the channels on the port side today, and drilled the holes for the chain plates to attach to the hull.  
 
As always, thanks so much for the likes, and here's to happy building!
 
Rob

Hi Jason, I worked out the dimensions at 5 cm intervals, and then planed, then sanded some 5mm square strip to those widths (they were only shaped on one side, so completely flat on the other. Those were used as the templates on either side of the strips, which were laid down edge down in between those strips. Once held tightly in place with masking tape, they were sanded down with a sanding strip. It took a while, but once done they were all done in one go. The hardest thing was handling all of the strips and getting them lined up and fixed down in the first place. It was an exercise in patience. I've tried to draw the process below... 
 
QuarterdeckPlanks.pdf
 
I've also attached the plan I made of the deck based on measurements from my model... (I wouldn't recommend relying on these measurements for yours too much, as I know I could have done a better job with the fairing of some of the bulkheads, so I have a little bit of a bulge on my model, but it gives an idea.)
 
ethaliondeck.20190222.pdf
 
Yes, this really is one of (if not the) most challenging bits of the model. I haven't worked it out yet either, but I'm relying on lots of card templates, eyeball 1.0, and plugging away bit by bit. I  figured if I got the rails in place, I could start thinking about the gratings. Curved gratings? That does sound like a massive challenge. I think I may go for a number of flat sections... perhaps if the turns were gentle enough a curve could be sanded / scraped in (using a template with sandpaper over the top, or a curved scraped used across, rather than fore and aft) rather than building it curved? Just thinking out loud. I may use the kit supplied parts as a starting point and see what they look like. 
 
I haven't made the vanity rail yet, so that's the next challenge. Also, I need to work out how to scrape a nice profile on the head rail as it changes width... and thin it down a bit. 
 
Anyway - those are my thoughts so far  A few deadeyes to secure on the channels first. Starboard finished, but port still to go.
Happy building
 
Rob

Sorry for hijacking here, but just to add Rob's excellent summary above.  The other factor to be aware of is what the ship plans show, they could be as designed, as built, as refitted etc.  Its possible to purchase the Diana plans at full scale and it amazing the amount of additional detail that can be seen, and notated on other plans (for example, the Diana plan indicates that the Jason's and Diamonds foremast was moved forward 6 1/4 inches), suggesting that specifically identified plans per the NMM may not be unique to a ship, but more to a class.  Regarding the open bulwark topic, the fashion was shifting at exactly the time these were designed and built.  Armament carried is a similar situation.
 
Bottom line, even for specific ships, there is latitude to build how you would like and still be 'historically accurate' - just look at the debate that goes on about the configuration of HMS Victory at Trafalgar, and she's still in existence!  I'd recommend buying the Diana AOTS book, in the historical preamble there is lots of context to the above points.