Beef Wellington

A new post, because this progress is completely unrelated to the posts above. I've been working on making sails with modelspann... I've made a frame to allow the tissue to be prepared from wood with card corners to strengthen in...

And I've been working on the ship's boats again, finishing off the planking of 71.1 the largest boat, hollowing it out, and adding clinkering using paper on the outside.
 



 

The next step with these will be to detail them (the part on the left above will form the floor of the boat, but before that goes in I need to add ribs. I'm pleased with how it's going so far. 
 
Right - sorry for so many updates... I'll try and keep up a bit better in future.

Finally, I made up the rail that forms the attachment point for the gaff sail on the mizzen mast. This is made from brass photo etch eyes and brass rod, and marked the positions onto balsa which was used to hold the parts while they were soldered. By transferring the positions onto masking tape, they could then be moved onto the mizzen mast to ensure the holes were drilled in the right positions.
 

The rail was sprayed black before fitting.
 

I have turned the yards for the main mast, and here is a photo of the main yard taped in position... Having turned this yard, and left it in place as shown, I went out for lunch, came back and it had completely disappeared. Eventually, I realised it had rolled down the back of my boat building table behind a row of cabinets... 45 minutes later, I'd finally retrieved it... to my great relief.

 
 

Definitely time for an update... I've got somewhat behind in the updates so it might be a couple of posts.
 
First off was the bowsprit detailing, and in particular the dolphin-striker.
 
This was shaped from 2mm brass wire, tapered at either end, and then bent into a hook shape at the top.

Once shaped, fittings needed to be soldered on. Four hooks, two on either side of the striker, act as guides for the various rigging lines that pass by the striker. Then chains attach towards the bottom end of the striker. There is a beautiful, fine piece of photo etch that is supposed to sit on the front of the striker as an attachment point. I tried to use this, but I was clearly too clumsy as it crumbled in my hands before I had the chance to try and fit it to the striker. I struggle to imagine it would have held up to having the chains attached, and almost certainly wouldn't have stood up to my rigging process. Instead, I fashioned a simple strap using copper offcuts from the hull tiling fret) that formed two anchor points, one in front and one behind the striker.
 

 
 
It looks appropriate delicate, but is actually quite sturdy, so I feel much more confident this will do the job. More progress has been made, but I'll post another update after dinner
 
Happy building
 
Rob

It's pretty quick once you get going... 5 minutes for a 14ft length of rope... and a whole lot cheaper than buying it I just need to master dyeing the darker rope for the standing rigging. 
 
Below is a shop bought rope on the left and my rope on the right... I couldn't go back

 

Thank you @rwiederrich. Yes, I have to do a walk into the kitchen to turn the boat these days... Ethalion is still sat at the other end of the bench, so not enough room to slide Stefano round the corner to see the other side these days... 
 
While the weather is so exceptionally fine, it seemed like a good moment to take some photos of the whole... Bearing in mind that so much of it is only placed in place at the moment, Stefano's not looking too shabby
 
At some point, I shall try and get some reasonable photos of Ethalion and Stefano side by side - that really would be a fascinating comparison, but Ethalion is protected behind dust covers at the moment, so it will have to wait.

Hi all, 
 
Thanks, as always, for the likes  
 
I finally worked out how I wanted to do the doors for the superstructures and the companions, so those are done. They're made out of two layers of styrene with tabs left on to attach them to the cabin walls.
 

Caldercraft nails were used for the door knobs...
 



Before I could put the doors into the fore cabin, it needed a floor, which was made of 0.5x10mm walnut...
 


Then doors were added to the main companionway.
 

Next, I turned my attention back to the masts, and simulated the sheaves in the maintop mast.
 

I added the iron banding round the main mast cap, and the eyelets. I added the fid using brass wire (cleverly the location of this is laser-etched into the fore and aft beams of the cross trees. And then the whole was given a couple of coats of paint.
 


Finally, I turned the jib-boom, and added the block and seat. I've added a short length of brass wire into back of the jib boom that goes into the block at the back to add strength. I know I'm going to knock it at some point, and I want to give it a good chance of withstanding my clumsiness as and when that happens. The seat that sits between the bowsprit and jib boom needs sanding, but it was quite fragile, so I wanted to glue it in place on the bowsprit before sanding it to add strength.


That's it for today
 
Happy building
 
Rob
 
 

Beautiful detailed work Jason.  That extra attention to detail with of course your craftsmanship makes all the difference in a model build. Just awesome.
 
Robert

Hi to everyone!
Are you still there?

I definitely fall into the non-gold camp as well...my personal opinion is that the gold actually cheapens the look of a model.  I also suspect that gold paint was not used (did it even exist at this period?) and that actual gold leaf would have been the method used.
 
I recently obtained a copy of "Old Ship Figureheads and Sterns", in it the author alludes to the very elaborate and complex figureheads of the mid 1700's on 1st and 2nd rates (Victory of 1737 and Royal George 1756 being illustrated) were only partially 'guilded' on the primary element, with supporting details being painted.

Hi Stergios, not sure I can impart much advice given this seems to come down a lot to personal preference.  I can't tell exactly where you are, but I think I put the lifts on the yards first, mainly to get these secured squarely.  The sheets and cluelines came next and then the braces and tacks.  Check my log to see if you can tell from photos there, but in general I seem to recall working top downwards, and then mizzen to foremast.  The primary concern was just leaving the deck open enough to have access to secure lines (the upper yards tend to follow the line of the masts for belaying.  For example, the forsheet clue, sheet and tack lines pretty much limits any access to the deck once in place, so this was done last.  I think I took a different approach to you on the bowsprit as I didn't even install the jib-boom until most, if not all the other rigging was in place...,mainly to try and avoid a disastrous break.  I did find using a little swiveling turntableto be very helpful at times (think its call a 'lazy susan')...but all personal preference I suspect.  Good luck!

Foc's'l Planking Wrap-up:
 
Foc's'l and gangway planking is now complete.  Hopefully photo's tell the story.
 
The position of the cathead has been estimated, and a rather bizare planking arrangement was used to hopefully ensure that this will look OK once the cathead is finally installed, basically wanted the planking to be as prototypical as possible, although this will mean staring at a rather jarring joint until this is installed.  The second photo in the series below shows how I'm anticipating this will look once the cathead is in place, and which will essentially hide the joint of the waterway and the artificial planking arrangement.  Once the angle of the plank-waterway termination was less than 45 deg, a switch was made to hooking the ends of the planks, and each of these had to be cut and shaped from 6mm strip (these were tapered the same as before)

The process was continued until the area was complete.  The only deviation being that the last 2 planks on each side were tweaked a little more to try to get these as even looking as possible, and of course the last plank being the most laborious to get an acceptable fit. It is hard to see in the photos, but the curve of the plank can be challenge to ensure that the simulated caulking looks as consistent as possible.  I eperience this challenge on the quaterdeck as well, but a solution that helped here was the use of thin plates of clear mica to help position these as consistently as possible until glue sets (I use PVA glue almost exclusively for planking).

The gangway planking in the waste was pretty straightforward, (in fact the only non-shaped planks on the entire top deck) and comprised almost my last acceptable pieces 4mm maple strip.  It was very close, but I did not run out thankfully.  Photo below shows how the gangway planking 'sits' on the lip of the entryway platforms that form part of the quarterdeck.  The gangway does not have a waterway.

Finally, some overall shots of the top deck, the foc's'l has not been scraped or cleaned up at all yet, which will be the next task.  The question I ask myself is whether the time and effort to taper the foc's'l planking was worth it.  I suspect that anyone looking at this would never notice as the final effect is very subtle, but I can't help but feel that the reason this is hard to see is simply because it complements the shape of the foc's'l without drawing attention to itself.  Overall, I am very pleased with the result, and with this almost complete, it will be nice to be able to turn to other tasks.

Foc's'l Planking Wrap-up:
 
Foc's'l and gangway planking is now complete.  Hopefully photo's tell the story.
 
The position of the cathead has been estimated, and a rather bizare planking arrangement was used to hopefully ensure that this will look OK once the cathead is finally installed, basically wanted the planking to be as prototypical as possible, although this will mean staring at a rather jarring joint until this is installed.  The second photo in the series below shows how I'm anticipating this will look once the cathead is in place, and which will essentially hide the joint of the waterway and the artificial planking arrangement.  Once the angle of the plank-waterway termination was less than 45 deg, a switch was made to hooking the ends of the planks, and each of these had to be cut and shaped from 6mm strip (these were tapered the same as before)

The process was continued until the area was complete.  The only deviation being that the last 2 planks on each side were tweaked a little more to try to get these as even looking as possible, and of course the last plank being the most laborious to get an acceptable fit. It is hard to see in the photos, but the curve of the plank can be challenge to ensure that the simulated caulking looks as consistent as possible.  I eperience this challenge on the quaterdeck as well, but a solution that helped here was the use of thin plates of clear mica to help position these as consistently as possible until glue sets (I use PVA glue almost exclusively for planking).

The gangway planking in the waste was pretty straightforward, (in fact the only non-shaped planks on the entire top deck) and comprised almost my last acceptable pieces 4mm maple strip.  It was very close, but I did not run out thankfully.  Photo below shows how the gangway planking 'sits' on the lip of the entryway platforms that form part of the quarterdeck.  The gangway does not have a waterway.

Finally, some overall shots of the top deck, the foc's'l has not been scraped or cleaned up at all yet, which will be the next task.  The question I ask myself is whether the time and effort to taper the foc's'l planking was worth it.  I suspect that anyone looking at this would never notice as the final effect is very subtle, but I can't help but feel that the reason this is hard to see is simply because it complements the shape of the foc's'l without drawing attention to itself.  Overall, I am very pleased with the result, and with this almost complete, it will be nice to be able to turn to other tasks.

Foc's'l Planking Wrap-up:
 
Foc's'l and gangway planking is now complete.  Hopefully photo's tell the story.
 
The position of the cathead has been estimated, and a rather bizare planking arrangement was used to hopefully ensure that this will look OK once the cathead is finally installed, basically wanted the planking to be as prototypical as possible, although this will mean staring at a rather jarring joint until this is installed.  The second photo in the series below shows how I'm anticipating this will look once the cathead is in place, and which will essentially hide the joint of the waterway and the artificial planking arrangement.  Once the angle of the plank-waterway termination was less than 45 deg, a switch was made to hooking the ends of the planks, and each of these had to be cut and shaped from 6mm strip (these were tapered the same as before)

The process was continued until the area was complete.  The only deviation being that the last 2 planks on each side were tweaked a little more to try to get these as even looking as possible, and of course the last plank being the most laborious to get an acceptable fit. It is hard to see in the photos, but the curve of the plank can be challenge to ensure that the simulated caulking looks as consistent as possible.  I eperience this challenge on the quaterdeck as well, but a solution that helped here was the use of thin plates of clear mica to help position these as consistently as possible until glue sets (I use PVA glue almost exclusively for planking).

The gangway planking in the waste was pretty straightforward, (in fact the only non-shaped planks on the entire top deck) and comprised almost my last acceptable pieces 4mm maple strip.  It was very close, but I did not run out thankfully.  Photo below shows how the gangway planking 'sits' on the lip of the entryway platforms that form part of the quarterdeck.  The gangway does not have a waterway.

Finally, some overall shots of the top deck, the foc's'l has not been scraped or cleaned up at all yet, which will be the next task.  The question I ask myself is whether the time and effort to taper the foc's'l planking was worth it.  I suspect that anyone looking at this would never notice as the final effect is very subtle, but I can't help but feel that the reason this is hard to see is simply because it complements the shape of the foc's'l without drawing attention to itself.  Overall, I am very pleased with the result, and with this almost complete, it will be nice to be able to turn to other tasks.

Hi Chaps, we'll I am back after a little hiatus.   Ron, Mark, Pat, Bob and the likes - thanks for the kind words as always. 
 
Sjors - Its nice to have the option to use the kit part rather than nothing, its insurance 
 
I've landed a new job, which is some relief - even though I had time on my hands I couldn't enjoy building but did what I could when the mood took me.  I'm not sure how the scratch builders feel, but these cheeks and rails had me thinking I'd never get them done and asking myself if I'd bitten off more than I could chew.
 
First off, I had to decide how I wanted to terminate the rails.  This period seems to be a bit of a mix in styles, mixing more elaborate decoration with a hint of future frugality.  I decided to err on the side of ornamentation after studying some NMM models, which basically just meant a larger scroll on the hair bracket and lower cheek I tried to follow guidance in TFFM as much as I could, and I've shown the progress pics below.  This wasn't as hard as I thought and for a first effort I was pretty happy, but I'll leave final judgement to others.  I knew I'd be painting these, so I found myself occasionally putting a think coat of paint on to get a better sense for the contours which is difficult with the pale castello.  
 

Once the scrolls were done, I made a scraper for the contour and tried to add the profile.  I found this very tricky and found myself battling the curve, the changes in width and the slight grain, especially in the thinner sections.  First approach was to shape the cheek piece and the rail and then glue together (I did these off the model painting would be next to impossible once mounted).  This didn't work as well as hoped, the profiles didn't match and the edges had rounded, but some filler and rework did the job.  For the others, I glued the cheek piece and the bracket before profiling which seemed to work fine.  I used a touch of sepia wash to highlight the profile.  Near the scroll, there is barely a profile so paint is needed to give the effect.
 
Overall, I give myself a "C" on the profiling:  hopefully could do better next time but needed to move on or forever be stuck in hairbracket purgatory.  Next time () I think I'd try using pear rather than castello but didn't have any of the right dimension to hand to try.

Lastly, couldn't resist adding a little more detail than the kit offers and wanted to add both a Filling piece and Trailboard.  Looking at contemporary Artois models, the filling piece is quite substantial and adds a distinctive look.  First off, I tried making a 1mm thick version bent to the hull shape - too thin.  I next tried a 2mm think version, but again felt it was too thin.  Tried 3mm, but it was impossible to bend, so went with a 5mm castello sheet and shaped as needed.  This was quite a bit of work as none of the sides are at 90deg, and the hull curvature needs to be accounted for, luckily this doesn't need to be perfect as the interior faces will be hidden by the  cheeks.  The trailboard was relatively simple but again took a while to get the appropriate shape.  Once complete these should go together like a jigsaw puzzle.....

And the finished result.  These will not be glued until I have the port side pieces finalized, but they fit together just fine.  Overall, I found this tricky and time consuming, but educational.  Without detailed plans there was a lot to consider to get the alignment looking right to my eye, for example, the lower cheek scroll terminating at the foot of the figurehead, the hair bracket scroll aligning with the rounded top of the lacing piece.

Finally, recognition for all those failures forever consigned to the wastebasket of progress....

Wow..Christian, Doug, Pat, Harvey, Carl, Tom, Wayne, VACorsair, Eamonn, and the likes, thanks guys for interest and the overly kind words.  Narrative below will explain more, but think I've irrevocably stepped off the 'being happy with kit parts' ledge...this can only mean even slower progress...but perhaps more fun
 
I know I'm bouncing around a bit so apologies for that, but continuing foundational aspects which seem easier with the ship careened over on a towel.
 
Challenging Cheeks:
 
The kit supplied cheeks are hair rail are not that great.  The cheeks themselves come nowhere near to fitting the hull, and I'm pretty sure the hull form is correct.  The only option was to scratch my own cheeks.  Aside from the fit, they are also seem rather undersized.

The next consideration was the hair rail and lower cheek, and decided to go whole hog and redo these as well.  Given that there needs to be two of everything, I cheated and sparingly glued with PVA glue some 3mm sheet together and then cut to shape.  The pieces were then separated using rubbing alcohol, and voila, 2 matching parts with the work of 1!  These parts are still very slighty oversized to allow them to be fine tuned once other parts are made - necessary given I don't have any true plans to work from and that these pieces form quite a complex shape. 
 
Photos below show hair rail prior to separation.  The difference in dimensions is quite evident to that appearing in AOTS which I used as a guide for the scratch piece.

As a side note, the quality of the walnut parts are just not good, the main/false rail would need a lot a work to get presentable so suspect these will also be remade at some point.

The cheeks themselves took a long time (days) to get right due to the angled concave curve and lack of plans.  Pretty happy with the results, though the parts still need some fine tuning as the rails are a little thick still I think.  I'm hoping to use a scraper to give a profile to the edges, and a quick test shows that this should work OK even for a quick test.  This also commits me to what will probably be my first simple carvings on the scrolls, but that's for another day.
 

Side by side comparison of scratch vs kit supplied pieces..

BE, Pat, Joe, Michael, Nils, Wayne, JPAM  and the likes - thanks so much.
 
Ron - I'm hoping to make it, would love to see your fantastic Diana in person, my challenge is always football/soccer as I coach my sons team and that takes a big bite out of weekends at this time of year.  If I could just arrange a game in New London then I'd be set!
 
Small update, I've been missing making posts but I have a little to share and hope pictures make up for it.  Continuing to work on the more foundational aspects as I can.  Paint has been applied to the upper hull - I used Tamiya matt XF-18 medium blue.  I applied many layers of watered down paint and corrected larger imperfections, but left the slight imperfections from planking visible.  I'm no painter and have limited experience with modern acrylics!  Watering down the paint gives a nice smooth finish, but at the expense of surface uniformity - this should disappear completely once a clear sealer is applied so not concerned.  I found that using a brush the undiluted paint dries so quickly that brush mark are inevitable.  Lots of touchup to do which should be pretty easy, but I want to get a protective coat of poly onto the boxwood to reduce the risk of mishaps.
 
The waist rail has been applied on one side and the side steps added.  I left gaps for the fenders, after having already cut these roughly to shape - using boxwood of course adds the number of pieces that need to be fabricated to keep consistent.  I wont attach these until later.  Steps were made using 2x2mm boxwood strip and a different profile scraper to the side molding and then cut length and shaping the ends.  These hopefully give more of an impression of the fine molding as keeping that to scale was just too much for me.  The upper and lower 2 steps are not glued yet.  I think they pass the scale test with the assistance of Able Seaman Lewis.


I've also made up the anchor lining bolsters, not identified in the kit plans but approximated from AOTS and TFFM.


And the usual 'all over' shot of where things stand..

 
 
 

Foc's'l Planking Wrap-up:
 
Foc's'l and gangway planking is now complete.  Hopefully photo's tell the story.
 
The position of the cathead has been estimated, and a rather bizare planking arrangement was used to hopefully ensure that this will look OK once the cathead is finally installed, basically wanted the planking to be as prototypical as possible, although this will mean staring at a rather jarring joint until this is installed.  The second photo in the series below shows how I'm anticipating this will look once the cathead is in place, and which will essentially hide the joint of the waterway and the artificial planking arrangement.  Once the angle of the plank-waterway termination was less than 45 deg, a switch was made to hooking the ends of the planks, and each of these had to be cut and shaped from 6mm strip (these were tapered the same as before)

The process was continued until the area was complete.  The only deviation being that the last 2 planks on each side were tweaked a little more to try to get these as even looking as possible, and of course the last plank being the most laborious to get an acceptable fit. It is hard to see in the photos, but the curve of the plank can be challenge to ensure that the simulated caulking looks as consistent as possible.  I eperience this challenge on the quaterdeck as well, but a solution that helped here was the use of thin plates of clear mica to help position these as consistently as possible until glue sets (I use PVA glue almost exclusively for planking).

The gangway planking in the waste was pretty straightforward, (in fact the only non-shaped planks on the entire top deck) and comprised almost my last acceptable pieces 4mm maple strip.  It was very close, but I did not run out thankfully.  Photo below shows how the gangway planking 'sits' on the lip of the entryway platforms that form part of the quarterdeck.  The gangway does not have a waterway.

Finally, some overall shots of the top deck, the foc's'l has not been scraped or cleaned up at all yet, which will be the next task.  The question I ask myself is whether the time and effort to taper the foc's'l planking was worth it.  I suspect that anyone looking at this would never notice as the final effect is very subtle, but I can't help but feel that the reason this is hard to see is simply because it complements the shape of the foc's'l without drawing attention to itself.  Overall, I am very pleased with the result, and with this almost complete, it will be nice to be able to turn to other tasks.

David - you can rest easy, there is plenty of historical latitude at this specific time period when these ships were designed and built, which was a great period of change to really do what you want.  Built up bulwarks were the fashion, then moved back to open bulwarks, and then finally built up again.  Armament wise, carronades gradually added to, and final replaced the quarterdeck and foc's'l cannon.  Available plans are not consistent for specific ships, probably because of the factors above and depending on when they were drafted and what they represent (as designed, or built, or when in service).

Congratulations on battling through though doesn't sound like it was much fun, and we can all relate to that.  You've got some very creditable results there despite the challenges, and the top and butt planking looks great.  
 
I know its not much consolation, think we are all struggling with the inconsistent, poor quality of even aftermarket providers.  Each time I have had to order something from CMB, I've added in some maple strip which I will need for the quarterdeck and foc's'l.  Aside from the poor quality you allude to, I've been supplied with wood that clearly wasn't even maple (limewood strip and sheets of something that looks like soft maple, cherry and something I can't even guess at after I explored cutting my own strip).  

I seem to recall that the black lines are the 'as designed', the red shows 'as built', and the green would show alterations made after the fact.  Of of course, how disciplined this update procedure was is unknown.  Curious which plan this comes from, looking at the barricades, it looks like it shows a ship pierced for cannons (smaller ports) which would suggest an earlier design.  I came to conclusion looking at a number of plans (which would have been drawn at slightly different times for different ships/yards) and considering the changes in approach at the time this class was built (esp. built up vs open bulwarks, adoption of carronades) that there are enough inconsistency to perhaps never know exactly how they looked at a specific time.  I think it is also true that some of the plans are mis-labeled, typically identifying ships generally as Diana, when it may be representing the entire Artois class, or a different ship in the same class.
 
I purchased the profile plan for "Diana" from NMM, which seems to be general for the Artois class.  Interestingly, on that plan the mizzen position seems to be closest to that of the 'green' mizzen on yours (which adds to the confusion a little).  FWIW, there is a notation on my plan indicating that the position of the foremast on both "Jason" and "Diamond" was moved forward 6 1/4 inches, and this is shown with a green X on the mast center only rather than showing in full.

Hi Dunnock, great to see another 'Diana' coming to life, looks like you are thinking well ahead.  I'm sure you've seen many of the other fine builds going on right now and I'd suggest letting folks know you've started your log.  Sure you'll get plenty of support and this kit definitely has its head scratching moments.  Look forward to more.

Lookin great Peter, somehow missed your start and already you've completed the first planking.  This looks like a great kit, shame its not 1:64.  Going back a little to the railing question.  I think you should feel free to go with what works for you.   When she was built I'm sure she would have had the open railings as that was prevalent, these seemed to go out of favour in the last part of the century and would have been built up.  I believe those ships where this was done would have simply followed the lines of the rail, i.e. a curved decorative shape at the front, but this was a relatively short lived fashion.  On the later ships (very early 19th century), and possibly those that had been rebuilt, these bulkheads would have lost the decorative flourish and simply been square which seems to have been prevalent from that time on until the end of the age of sail.

Love it Chris.  Don't know how you do it at that tiny scale.

Day 32: The hull planking is, for the most part, complete. I'm generally happy with it considering this is my first model in 40 years, but there a few spots that might need a bit more attention (or so says my OCD). Next up I'll add a few of the hull-detail pieces and then start shopping for paint. I'm debating between flat colors and semi-gloss, but I'll likely go with flat so I can make whole ship look just a bit weathered. I'm worried about starting with the above-deck features as that part will make or break the whole project. 
 
 

This subject and kit are very intriguing Mike, will definitely be following along.  There seem to be a multitude of molded plastic/resin (?) parts which I'm hoping the kit provides elements to further detail these.