Beef Wellington

Thanks Peter and Jason, the safety razor blade does make for a stable  scraper, and I'm pleased with the outcome. A simple profile but one I think that is appropriate for a humble Cutter.
 
I agree Jason, a model is more than the sum of its parts and the eye is drawn to the overall effect. The eye registers that the moulding has a profile detail, which really is sufficient at this size of model at this scale. Once completed we don't spend our time looking at it thro' a macro lens. 🙂
 
Post 35
Moving inboard - lining the bulwarks.
I am planking between the bulkhead extensions with 1.5 x 5mm Lime wood strip, and will then reduce the extensions to be flush.
I don't really trust myself to get going with the Dremel without this sort of guide.
Straightforward but tedious stuff this, measure, chop and fit, from just below deck level to bulwark top.

2013
The addition of this inner layer does firm up the outer  bulwark planking particularly along the top and in the stern area where the top edges may be vulnerable to splitting.

2014
So to start with the Dremel, I drew guide lines across the top of the bulwarks and got to work.

2016
The Dremel can only go so far down to the deck level so there is some chisel work to be done.

2075
Working at low revs  the Dremel soon reduced the excess and I went as close as I dare.

2076

2079
At this stage the bulwarks have been reduced to a tad over 1.5mm (excluding the outer planking).

2083

2084
Some fine adjustments and tidying up now required before I return to fixing the decorative mouldings along the topsides.
 
B.E.
24/08/2018
 
 

Catching up on a lot of progress, some really beautiful results, well done OC!

Catching up a bit, love the treenails and nicely done on the molding strip.  My feeling is that impression of the detail, rather than absolute accuracy, is 90% what the eye sees, and my eye likes what it sees 😊

Catching up a bit, love the treenails and nicely done on the molding strip.  My feeling is that impression of the detail, rather than absolute accuracy, is 90% what the eye sees, and my eye likes what it sees 😊

Although the summer weather has been pretty good lately except for a couple of 100 degree days, I did manage to get some work done.  The 24# cannons are rigged and now I can start to put the upper gundeck into place.  Here are some photos.  Some progress is better than no progress or even worse... reverse progress!

 
Starting to look like a warship.
Tom

Upper planking is finished...

Hi all,
 
A swift update. Mainly a conveyor belt of getting gun carriages finished. I'll try and outline the process I'm using below:
 
I'd already removed all the wheels from the boards, fitted them onto my mini drill and put them over sandpaper to get rid of the char. Then I put the big and small wheels in separate bags so I could find them later.
 
1. Assemble the carriage frames. (Sides, axles and front and back)
 
I used a plasticard jig to do this.
 
2. Whittle the axles to fit the wheels.
 
There's no shortcut. It's just slow and steady with a sharp xacto knife, stopping and checking the fit time and time again.
 
3. Drill the holes for the eyelets and breaching rings
 
I made a template for the sides out of plasticard, and for the back. The side one worked brilliantly by slotting over the axles. When I came to use the one at the back, there wasn't enough purchase to stop it simply getting picked up by the drill and spinning on the drill bit. So I used some masking tape to stick it into place on each carriage. (This is for the eyelet that will be fixed to the rope used to pull the carriage back in to the Frigate.
 

 
The holes were drilled with a 0.65mm drill. The hole with the cross through it on the template is the pre-drilled hole used for the supporting bar between the sides. This template was used for both sides, simply reversed. The notches in the bottom fit over the axles where they narrow) By leaving my wood working vice a little ajar, I could sit the axles into the gap, and that gave the support to be able to drill into it carefully with a proxxon mini-drill. Again, I'm sold on this little drill. All in, for the 28 main guns, it was  196 holes, without the re-opening up after painting for the pre-drilled holes, so the proxxon drill made a massive difference.
 

 
4. Add the bar that goes between the sides.
 
This was .65mm steel bar - not sure where it came from, but it saved me needing to blacken a whole bunch of brass rods, and looked pretty neat.

 
 
5. Add the fore and aft part on top of the bar, and the back axle.
 
(This remained unpainted, because I liked the contrast, and wanted a way to show the carriage was box as per the grating surrounds etc...)
 

(wow, close ups are cruel! or maybe my eyes are being overly generous!)
 
6. Add the eyelets and breaching rings.
 
The breaching rope rings are not included in the kit as far as I could tell, so I wrapped thin black lacquer wire around a 1mm drill bit lots of times, slid it off, and cut it into lots of rings with a pair of scissors. These were gently prised open and pushed shut on one of the blackened copper eyelets to make a ring. Tedious, but looks pretty good. My only slight concern is that these might be slightly tight for the breaching rope. I need to check this sooner rather than later. They fit the scale of the rings on Chuck Passaro's excellent pdf of his gun carriages (see his website), and it's that I've been working to.
 





 
7. Make up the wedge with it's holder, used for setting the elevation of the gun.
 
I used my mini drill to spin the box strip and files to shape it into the handle for the wedge.
 
8. Put the gun barrel in place
 
(not glued yet, because I want to set the height of all the guns individually.)
 
9. (Also not done yet) Add black card strip over the main bar the gun sits on, so it looks like it's held in place by metal bars.
 
I tried those last few steps on one gun as shown above and it looks nice to my eye.
 
Having seen these close-ups I clearly need to go over and have another look at some of these and tidy them up a bit, but it at least gives an idea of the process I've been using.
 
Anyway - 14 guns down, and a bunch still to do, but the weather was nice this afternoon and it seemed like a good opportunity to try and get some photos of the progress so far.
 




 
I can see a whole bunch of things that need tweaking / fixing before it all gets fixed in for good, but it's nice to see that I'm at least heading in the right direction
 
Happy building everyone!
 
Rob
 

Hi all,
 
Thanks again for all the likes.
 
I finished the rudder, added the straps and spectacle plate (yes, they should be brass, but I find the brass / copper colour combination jarring, so someone painted mine) - and hung it. The straps on the hull are still to add. The straps are made out of card as the photo-etch ones are oversized.
 

 
I've continued working on the fittings for the gun deck. I made a little production line, and put together the main parts of all of the 18lb gun carriages. I'm not done with that, but I was going cross-eyed whittling all the trunnions, so I decided to deal with the guns, too.
 

I did an experiment, sanding the char back, but not trying to remove it completely... the carriages will be painted, so I'm happy with this.
 
I also purchased some casey brass black (this comes with a serious health warning!) and I've begun blackening the guns themselves. This was more involved than I expected. The method I used is as follows:
 
1. Use a brass brush in my proxxon mini drill to gently buff the cannon (this removed any surface coating)
2. Wearing gloves, wash thoroughly in fairy liquid (I started with white vinegar, but the fairy liquid seemed to work just as well, and it stinks considerably less!)
3. Transfer to clean water.
4. Remove and air dry - this was done with the gun muzzle sat on top of a brass rod so that no part of the outside of the gun was touching anything.
5. Dip into neat Casey Brass Black and keep a close watch until it looks fairly black... lift out with needle nose pliers and drop into clean water.
6. Once clean, take out, dry off and buff with kitchen towel. Any areas that had not blackened nicely were buffed with the brass brush again, and the process repeated.
 
Sometimes I didn't get a completely even finish the first time, but by the second time, the guns had turned a nice even grey. The finish is far more even than my painting efforts, and it buffs to a nice shine - the kind of finish you can imagine a gun crew being really proud of... (In the photo of the gun on it's carriage, there are a number of steps left unfinished on the carriage.) I'm thrilled with this. I need to finish blacking the guns, (I've noticed that caldercraft sell brass carronades now, so I'll look at getting some of them for the quarterdeck)... and then I need to work out a way of blacking the copper eyelets in reasonable bulk without them turning into a black clump! perhaps sticking them into a balsa block?
 
Here are my results.
 

 
Looking through the previous build logs for the Caldercraft's Diana, I was concerned that the guns provided with the ship may be a slightly odd shape with cascabels that were over-sized and a somewhat heavy muzzle... My fears were unfounded when I opened the fittings. They're things of beauty. Looking at the ones supplied before, it seems that Caldercraft have very much upped their game! Kudos!
 
Here's a pic of one of the ones I received (they're all identical) - it seems to match up very closely with the AOTS diagram.

 
And just 'cos I can, a picture of the gundeck with all it's unfinished carriages. Very pleased so far.
 

 
Happy building
 
Rob
 

Catching up on a lot of progress, some really beautiful results, well done OC!

Transfer day -  I foregot how fiddly this stage was  but I managed to fit them,    so apart from doing a little bit of light touch up,  then mounting it on a base and a final spray of rattle can matt (need to buy one of these)  its near finished.
 
OC.
 

Evening everyone,   here are the pics as requested  - 
 
The spraying went quite well  I think.
 
OC.

I have ordered my paint  - Tamiya Acrylic rattle can.
 
Also we had a day in the sun on the patio, so I brought my HMS Greyhound out for a swim.
 
Thank You sincerley for all the comments and likes - it sure makes building this tube  more enjoyable.
 
OC.

Entrance to Portsmouth harbour with a First Rate Line of Battle ship and Frigate passing a 'Two Decker' doing some rigging maintainance.
W/C 15" X 9"
'Pompey' is the RN name for Portsmouth
Jim

USS Robert H McCard. Leaving Charleston Naval Base with the old Cooper River Bridge.

Haven't been painting for a while, but did this yesterday and today 'Dispatches' no particular ships.
Jim
watercolour 14" X 10"

Hello all,
 
Thanks again for all the interest, likes and comments.
 
I made a start today on wiring up the mast and yards,   for this I used my stash of very thin copper wire,  I started with the top level and attached them to the two yards, then I came a quarter of the way down the mast and added the two support wires.
After the wires were secured with ca glue,  I gave the cables a coat of black  and the mast/yards light grey,  next was to drill the placement hole on the deck of the rear block and secure the lower mast.
 
I then attached the two support cables to the edge of the rear block and secured with ca,  and to finish off I glued in place the radar ontop of the mast.
 
Here are a few pics.

Bit more progress this evening  - they are painted and fixed down.
 
OC.

Hi all for the interest and the kind words and likes!  Have been on a bit of a hiatus, other distractions and a need for a little break.  Think I'm now back in the groove with the passion back again....looking forward to catching up on everyone else's progress on their builds.
 
Tim - the photos are maybe being overly kind, no airbrush, just regular brushes.  I generally don't dilute the Admiralty paints, but do tend to use a damp brush.  The blue on the hull is an exception where layers of dilute blue have been built up to avoid brush marks where possible, the Tamiya paints don't really lend themselves to this as much, but it seems to work.
 
 

Evening all,   more progress today   starting with the correction I did last night, I checked the side wall/front hanger door situation  - and I had corrected it ok,    I then attached a circuler device on the rear of the hanger deck (not sure what purpose it serves).
 
Next was time to start on the funnel (warspite only has the one)  this is built in various sections including a searchlight platform and sub deck below that,  my thinking was to use the kit part with the pe plating ontop,  but to fit the sub deck out of pe, these platforms are fitted to two colums with the searchlights fitted ontop of these.
 
The photos show the platforms fitted to the funnel but not fitted to the boat deck, there is still quite a bit of pe work and scratch building to be fitted.
 
Thank you for all the continued interest in my build and the comments and likes.
 
OC.

The ole lady was nearly finished off with one of these bad boys, but her stuberness and resolute attituide saw her through despite sever damage and no power, not to mention taking on 5000 tons of water.
 
Photo curtosy of wikipedia.
 
OC.

Hello,
 
The Agamemnon has a new home......
Because I don't have much space in the house I was looking for a new home for her.
Someone from the building where we are living has seen the Aggy and I told him that I need a good place for her.
Just around the corner of our home there  is a nursing home.
They want to show the model in a meeting room on a book shelf.
I bring her and a lot of older people just came in to take a look and.....the oh's and ah's are flying around  ( In Dutch of course )
I'm very pleased that now others can admire her.
And if I want to see her.....no problem, just 3 minutes away......
Here are the pictures.
 
Sjors
 
      15/5000    

Greetings  All
                        I have taken my Diana out of storage, and decided to continue my build after approx three years.  I tell a lie !!!!!.   All I hear from friends is. “ Where’s that Diana ?”   “ That Ship should have been finished by now” or “It’s about time you started building that ship again” or words to that effect. So I have given in to all the earache I get. As I said I have today got my self ready to continue. I had reached the stage of cutting out the gunports after finishing the first  planking. The ports are roughly cut out on the starboard side, and I intend to line them next, and then start on the Port side.  Unfortunately I cannot locate the two instruction books which I know are in the house somewher,  but I do have  all the plans to hand. What I need to know is the gunport sizes which I think are 14mm x17mm  and if the four gunports with lids ( three at the stern, and one at the bow) are the same size.  I also need to know the strip size I should be using for the linings.  Thanks to you all in advance for your help. DAVID.
 

Been plugging along slowly. Haven't posted until now because there would be too little to show until I got a little more done. By the time I rig a line or two I am in so much pain I have to leave it and come back later so it takes a while.
 
Since my last posting I have rigged the main & fore topmast backstays, main & fore topmast stays, main & fore topmast preventer stay, fore & main topgallant shrouds, main & fore topgallant backstays and the main royal backstays. It doesn't look like that much in the pictures. When trying to rig the block and rope coil for the main royal backstay I snagged the door to the companionway and snapped it off. It went right down the hole below so I have to make another. I have accidentally cut a line or two and have had to re-rig them. I found it very difficult to rig the lanyards for the fore topmast and fore topmast preventer stays. There is very little room to work with. I am still not satisfied with my mouse making but they are ok.

With all the sudden and unexpected interest, I'll throw you good folks a bit of a bone (not one of Freyja's chew bones though). I'm out of the shipyard for the near future, but I'll share a few pics of how far I managed to get with the planking. Not really too many more strakes left to go, I can't remember if it's eight or nine by my last count. The wales are done, but not fully painted, just the top and bottom edges.
 
And popeye, it's not so much the pitter patter of little feet.... more like the thundering footfalls of a herd of galumphing baby elephants!
 
Andy

From the pointy end to the square end:
 
For the past few weeks, I've turned my attention to the stern.  First up are the windows.  The kit's stern piece is thin ply, and it would work fine, but it's not boxwood.  So I decided to continue with my bashing and try to scratch out everything.  For the frames, I glued in some fairly thick stock (1/8 inch):
 
                                           
They required a little bit of trimming, just to ensure that the actual windows would follow the curvature of the counter (which seems to be a bit less pronounced on NMM's plan).  To get the windows into the proper angle, I used the kit's stern piece as a framing jig:
 
                                           
 
That worked pretty well.  You can see that I marked out the alignment of each of the center frames, and that helped a lot.  I used 3/64" stock for the frames, and cut lap joints for the corners and to set in the horizontal cross piece.  For the vertical cross piece, I cut only one lap in the horizontal piece, and then set the vertical piece up as close to the top and bottom as I could.  That helped with the alignment.
 
                                          
Here they are all in place, with the munions.  In this photo the munions look out of alignment, but I just went back and checked, and in real life they don't look as bad.  Plus they'll be covered with pilasters. 
 
My one gripe is that the 3/64 inch stock makes for some pretty thick looking windows.  I don't think I could have gotten anything thinner to work, since these are pretty delicate as is.  (I might also mention that as I was dry fitting one window in place, it shot out of my tweezers, and flew into the Captain's Cabin.  It took my strongest flashlight, a long bent wire, and 90 minutes of patience to fish it out of there.  That's also when I saw LOTS of shavings and dust lying in there that I also extracted.)
 
Next is the taffarel.  FFM details a lamination process that took me a while to understand, but I think I have worked it out.  It consists of 3 layers.  The bottom, with the grain running horizontally, is the main outline of the taffarel.  I simply traced the kit's piece onto some 1/16" stock, and cut it out.  The middle layer constitutes the three coves along the bottom of the taffarel, and its grain runs vertically.  Then the top layer forms the "arch of the cove" or the border, and it is very thin and fragile, even with the grain running horizontally.  I cut a mold on my bandsaw out of some pine scrap:
 
                                    
 
In this I first glued up the top two layers, covering them with plastic wrap so they wouldn't stick to the mold:
 
                                    
And then I clamped the mold together overnight. 
 
                                     
 
Out of the mold, I hollowed the coves a little bit, and here we are:
 
                                     
 
For the carvings, I'm pretty much planning to follow the layout on the NMM plans, of the King & Queen of the Seas, with various sea monsters around them.  I thought of trying to make the King & Queen a merman & mermaid, but I couldn't get the fishy lower part to look right, since it needs to curve over the cove.  But I do think that instead of the putti flying in the middle section I'll try to carve a Kraken.
 
A few years back I started carving the figures into the taffarel itself.  I gave that up when I saw other builders glue figures onto the taffarel.  And so that's the procedure that I'm following.  And this time as well, instead of using a power carver, I'm using a high number of #11 exacto blades (it's the sharp point that has proven most useful, and it breaks easily).
 
So far I've mostly finished Her Highness:
 
                                        
I was pretty disappointed when I saw this photo, because she looks like nothing more than a blob.  I did cut the folds of her skirt, some curls in her flowing locks, and something of a "face."  But obviously I'm going to have to do some more refining, to get the details to stand out more -- and of course with poly wiped on, they will show up a bit more, but so will all the flaws.
 
And that's where I am.
 
Cheers,
 
Martin