themadchemist

Thanks man, there are many ways to paint so google and youtube model weathering and you'll find great tutorials and info, at least on plastic models.
 
I've been working on the gunports lately. The look I want is when the gunports are not strictly opened, but some are closed or halfway opened. I like the uneaven rough and everyday life look of it. Here are some pics of Batavia and Götheborg with the look I like:
 

 

 
 
 

 
 
That ment I had to plan for the cannons to be inside. I also had to plank the back of the hatches as the original BB are hollow. That was actually good as it was easy to stain the planks in the same color as the rest of the ship. The closed hatches are scratched. Here is how far I've gotten:
 

 

 

 

 

 
 
/Matti
 

Hello Jeff,
I appreciate your response, frankness and honesty.

To my understanding payment in advance meant some time shortly before cutting started I was thinking a week or two at most as you state "Even though we custom mill each order, our normal processing time for orders is about 10 days.", but in emails you talked of having 120 days of production from April and May and others spoke of a 3 month wait.
I think the confusion came from this - From your wording from the site
"For first time customers we request receipt of payment in advance of processing your order."
 
I read this as "processing" meaning the task of cutting not the task of making an order form. I'm not making excuses and hopefully some can see how that wording might be interpreted wrong, especially by new builders. My first job was in a meat processing house and to me processing is the physical task of cutting. I wish someone had informed me otherwise.

I'm glad this was able to be cleared in the presences of the community without hard feelings. I've never had hard feeling really, just a sense of loss as I sometimes feel as if I'm alone in a crowd of people. I could have been offended that you said I ranted, but I did, due to my confusion. I also explained in my apology how my disability causes me to not always respond as I might have wished I had.

Just to show my willingness to lay all the cards on the table, here's the email that was a rant. I believe in full disclosure and don't feel I was intentionally offensive, it was a knee jerk reaction to a misunderstanding.

Hello Jeff
I'm not exactly sure where to start. First I would like to say that you've been great at customer service and taken the time to personally answer the numerous questions I've had.
I guess the problem I have is that I've been disabled since 2008 and the budgets tight. I also understand you produce some of the best wood for modeling available. I guess the problem I have is with your 2 statements in your last email.
" Also as a new customer, I would appreciate payment in advance, so that is another reason for just ..." and "so you will not want to wait until the last minute or your order will be pushed back into mid-November..."
First off I realize your a busy person and I respect that. You have a thriving business, no doubt due to you efforts. I don't understand why because I'm a new customer I'd need to prepay in august for an order that may not arrive until november. It isn't the time issue as the wood I want probably won't be used until next year anyway, I'm just planning in advance as I knew you were a busy man. I always expect to have money debited from my account before a purchase on anything I've bought for building so far, but months in advance seems a bit extreme.
I started building because at 43 my life was stolen by a disease that 45 Dr's so far haven't been able in 5 years to figure out what disease has completely stolen my life.
Building is really all I have and it has given me a sense of self worth I lost with total disablity. I say this not for sympathy but so that you know from where I am coming.
It's a hobby I strickly budget for because its important, but I don't have the means to pay months before shipment and wouldn't even if budget wasn't an issue. Maybe I've misunderstood. I never expected a saw or sander to start on a custom cut until you had money in hand, but to pay months before you can even make an estimate of arrival time seems a bit extreme. Maybe I'm just not the type of customer you want or need, which is a shame as I really wanted to do business with you and support your efforts and mine. Maybe I just do not fit the profile of your customer base. Maybe I just misreading your last email. Communication and respect are important to me. I respect what you do and undertand the uniqueness of what you do, I just get the feeling I'm not the type of customer you need.
I apologize for the trouble I've put you through answering my questions. I alway expected to pay before cutting but not far in advance of the job. I find this very dissappointing as I really looked forward to doing business. I apolgize for wasting your time on this matter.

Respectfully and Sincerely
Keith

I have reread that message many times and looked at it from both your and my prospective. It can be seen 2 ways and neither is wrong or right, it all depends on prospective.

Also I hadn't made up my mind on exactly what I wanted as both you and Chuck were instructing me to use the basswood from the kits framing. I felt it was my decision, if I chose to attempt fret sawing the frame pieces from boxwood, why shouldn't I be able to attempt that if I wanted to. If one never does anything different to push the envelope, then I feel that is the line one imposes as their personal limitations. You say that both you and Chuck say it would have been "impractical" but I though I was the captain of my build. I've heard that many time on MSW and believe it.
I respected both you and Chucks opinions, but feel it ultimately is my decision, so I felt I was being told to just conform to the rules. This isn't my nature, in grad school my advisor told me that my research direction was impractical and something he would not help me with, but I still did it anyway. I find failure and an uplifting experience and choose to try the things others avoid. I finished my graduate research and I'm sure I can find a way of building an all boxwood pinnace. I don't care how many times I fails and one only truely fails when one quits.
I always saw the build being made completely out of boxwood and found the curve to switch and use the basswood bewildering. This is why I waffled on the order.

I also explained many times in our conversations that time was of no issue, I felt that you thought I had some time pressure imposed on you completing by a certain date from your previous email to my rant. Your last email before my rant went into a lot of detail about your prior months orders and the future few months and it made me feel as though I was wasting your time and honestly if you have 2 hours of emails a day to content with, I honestly was and many of the things I said in the "rant" are true from my prospective. I may have come off from your prospective as harsh but for me it was a sincere concern as a new builder, wasting the time of a master of his craft. I'm sorry for that and wish I had been better informed prior to contacting you. I never had a time issue, as I planned the build for this year. I stated this at several points through our conversations, but your response of
"I guess that I could have deliberately lied about his lead time"
really seems to be an issue in your mind still, where it NEVER was in mine. I'm sure your always under stress of trying to meet deadlines, I got that feeling over our many conversions and posssibly you projected your feeling of urgence on to me, thinking I was somehow rushing you or asking for favors. This was never my intent. You state on your home page " Even though we custom mill each order, our normal processing time for orders is about 10 days." and you mentioned taking October off, I just feel that you felt I had you under some time pressure that I was never aware of or even considered. If the problem was that I was taking too much time, again I wish I'd known. Honestly if the order had not been made by January, I would have carried less. My issue was the outlay of cash for months, which I didn't expect due to what I've already stated.

If this is your case, then your a victim of your own high standards and completely took me wrong from the beginning. My ignorance of your time pressure only made this worse.

Maybe I should have been more serious and only contacted you when I knew what I wanted, but honestly until talking with you, I didn't even know for sure.

I suppose due to being new I didn't completely understand that you don't make any profit in cutting wood either, as a matter of fact that is surprising and inspiring to me. If that's listed on your site I missed it and if it was something I should have known from being an MSW member, I didn't join MSW officially until Post-crash and no one from the many that recommended you mentioned it.
This should be posted on your site or let it be known through MSW as uninformed people such as myself are always liable to misunderstand. If you do this and make nothing from it, then I have nothing but immense respect for you and your efforts. It also changes the playing field of what HobbyMills is and does. I wonder how many know this fact as I was always under the impression that you were doing this as a hobby turned into your making a living doing what you love.

Hopefully my willingness to air dirty laundry will help prevent confusion for others in the future and make your task easier.

I publicly apologize for anything in my rant that you took as over the top. I just never received any closure from this experience and question my sanity daily. I never intended to offend and had I completely understood your payment policies I would have not have added to your workload. I did sincerely appreciate your finding out all the wood needed for the Pinnace, sheet stock included as I still plan to push the envelope on that build and your list aided me in that.

Thank you for you time in responding and helping to give me closure on an issue that has haunted me for months.
Your closing statement of

"I rarely post on such matters because they do not add value, but perhaps some readers will have acquired some insight into HobbyMill, it's policies, and my thoughts. Hopefully they seem logical and reasonable to most readers."

I see great value in what you have said, if I had read your response prior to last years episode, it wouldn't have happened.
Maybe this shouldn't be brought up in public, but am willing to take the chance to help make MSW a better community. Communication is very important to me and yet I find it is so many time a double edged sword.


 

Hello Jeff,
I appreciate your response, frankness and honesty.

To my understanding payment in advance meant some time shortly before cutting started I was thinking a week or two at most as you state "Even though we custom mill each order, our normal processing time for orders is about 10 days.", but in emails you talked of having 120 days of production from April and May and others spoke of a 3 month wait.
I think the confusion came from this - From your wording from the site
"For first time customers we request receipt of payment in advance of processing your order."
 
I read this as "processing" meaning the task of cutting not the task of making an order form. I'm not making excuses and hopefully some can see how that wording might be interpreted wrong, especially by new builders. My first job was in a meat processing house and to me processing is the physical task of cutting. I wish someone had informed me otherwise.

I'm glad this was able to be cleared in the presences of the community without hard feelings. I've never had hard feeling really, just a sense of loss as I sometimes feel as if I'm alone in a crowd of people. I could have been offended that you said I ranted, but I did, due to my confusion. I also explained in my apology how my disability causes me to not always respond as I might have wished I had.

Just to show my willingness to lay all the cards on the table, here's the email that was a rant. I believe in full disclosure and don't feel I was intentionally offensive, it was a knee jerk reaction to a misunderstanding.

Hello Jeff
I'm not exactly sure where to start. First I would like to say that you've been great at customer service and taken the time to personally answer the numerous questions I've had.
I guess the problem I have is that I've been disabled since 2008 and the budgets tight. I also understand you produce some of the best wood for modeling available. I guess the problem I have is with your 2 statements in your last email.
" Also as a new customer, I would appreciate payment in advance, so that is another reason for just ..." and "so you will not want to wait until the last minute or your order will be pushed back into mid-November..."
First off I realize your a busy person and I respect that. You have a thriving business, no doubt due to you efforts. I don't understand why because I'm a new customer I'd need to prepay in august for an order that may not arrive until november. It isn't the time issue as the wood I want probably won't be used until next year anyway, I'm just planning in advance as I knew you were a busy man. I always expect to have money debited from my account before a purchase on anything I've bought for building so far, but months in advance seems a bit extreme.
I started building because at 43 my life was stolen by a disease that 45 Dr's so far haven't been able in 5 years to figure out what disease has completely stolen my life.
Building is really all I have and it has given me a sense of self worth I lost with total disablity. I say this not for sympathy but so that you know from where I am coming.
It's a hobby I strickly budget for because its important, but I don't have the means to pay months before shipment and wouldn't even if budget wasn't an issue. Maybe I've misunderstood. I never expected a saw or sander to start on a custom cut until you had money in hand, but to pay months before you can even make an estimate of arrival time seems a bit extreme. Maybe I'm just not the type of customer you want or need, which is a shame as I really wanted to do business with you and support your efforts and mine. Maybe I just do not fit the profile of your customer base. Maybe I just misreading your last email. Communication and respect are important to me. I respect what you do and undertand the uniqueness of what you do, I just get the feeling I'm not the type of customer you need.
I apologize for the trouble I've put you through answering my questions. I alway expected to pay before cutting but not far in advance of the job. I find this very dissappointing as I really looked forward to doing business. I apolgize for wasting your time on this matter.

Respectfully and Sincerely
Keith

I have reread that message many times and looked at it from both your and my prospective. It can be seen 2 ways and neither is wrong or right, it all depends on prospective.

Also I hadn't made up my mind on exactly what I wanted as both you and Chuck were instructing me to use the basswood from the kits framing. I felt it was my decision, if I chose to attempt fret sawing the frame pieces from boxwood, why shouldn't I be able to attempt that if I wanted to. If one never does anything different to push the envelope, then I feel that is the line one imposes as their personal limitations. You say that both you and Chuck say it would have been "impractical" but I though I was the captain of my build. I've heard that many time on MSW and believe it.
I respected both you and Chucks opinions, but feel it ultimately is my decision, so I felt I was being told to just conform to the rules. This isn't my nature, in grad school my advisor told me that my research direction was impractical and something he would not help me with, but I still did it anyway. I find failure and an uplifting experience and choose to try the things others avoid. I finished my graduate research and I'm sure I can find a way of building an all boxwood pinnace. I don't care how many times I fails and one only truely fails when one quits.
I always saw the build being made completely out of boxwood and found the curve to switch and use the basswood bewildering. This is why I waffled on the order.

I also explained many times in our conversations that time was of no issue, I felt that you thought I had some time pressure imposed on you completing by a certain date from your previous email to my rant. Your last email before my rant went into a lot of detail about your prior months orders and the future few months and it made me feel as though I was wasting your time and honestly if you have 2 hours of emails a day to content with, I honestly was and many of the things I said in the "rant" are true from my prospective. I may have come off from your prospective as harsh but for me it was a sincere concern as a new builder, wasting the time of a master of his craft. I'm sorry for that and wish I had been better informed prior to contacting you. I never had a time issue, as I planned the build for this year. I stated this at several points through our conversations, but your response of
"I guess that I could have deliberately lied about his lead time"
really seems to be an issue in your mind still, where it NEVER was in mine. I'm sure your always under stress of trying to meet deadlines, I got that feeling over our many conversions and posssibly you projected your feeling of urgence on to me, thinking I was somehow rushing you or asking for favors. This was never my intent. You state on your home page " Even though we custom mill each order, our normal processing time for orders is about 10 days." and you mentioned taking October off, I just feel that you felt I had you under some time pressure that I was never aware of or even considered. If the problem was that I was taking too much time, again I wish I'd known. Honestly if the order had not been made by January, I would have carried less. My issue was the outlay of cash for months, which I didn't expect due to what I've already stated.

If this is your case, then your a victim of your own high standards and completely took me wrong from the beginning. My ignorance of your time pressure only made this worse.

Maybe I should have been more serious and only contacted you when I knew what I wanted, but honestly until talking with you, I didn't even know for sure.

I suppose due to being new I didn't completely understand that you don't make any profit in cutting wood either, as a matter of fact that is surprising and inspiring to me. If that's listed on your site I missed it and if it was something I should have known from being an MSW member, I didn't join MSW officially until Post-crash and no one from the many that recommended you mentioned it.
This should be posted on your site or let it be known through MSW as uninformed people such as myself are always liable to misunderstand. If you do this and make nothing from it, then I have nothing but immense respect for you and your efforts. It also changes the playing field of what HobbyMills is and does. I wonder how many know this fact as I was always under the impression that you were doing this as a hobby turned into your making a living doing what you love.

Hopefully my willingness to air dirty laundry will help prevent confusion for others in the future and make your task easier.

I publicly apologize for anything in my rant that you took as over the top. I just never received any closure from this experience and question my sanity daily. I never intended to offend and had I completely understood your payment policies I would have not have added to your workload. I did sincerely appreciate your finding out all the wood needed for the Pinnace, sheet stock included as I still plan to push the envelope on that build and your list aided me in that.

Thank you for you time in responding and helping to give me closure on an issue that has haunted me for months.
Your closing statement of

"I rarely post on such matters because they do not add value, but perhaps some readers will have acquired some insight into HobbyMill, it's policies, and my thoughts. Hopefully they seem logical and reasonable to most readers."

I see great value in what you have said, if I had read your response prior to last years episode, it wouldn't have happened.
Maybe this shouldn't be brought up in public, but am willing to take the chance to help make MSW a better community. Communication is very important to me and yet I find it is so many time a double edged sword.


 

September 5, 2010
 
 
Next job was making a couple of hatch gratings. Good practice for the hatches on the main deck. One thing I realized is that for the main deck I should make the hatch gratings first, because they will set the size for the coamings, and then the planking around them.

This is the way the lower deck gratings came together. First, cut a couple of the laser cut strips into pieces for the two hatches--
 

 
 
After putting them together, I wiped some watered down PVA over them, and let them dry--
 

 
 
Next they are sanded flat--
 

 
 
Then the edges are sanded flat--
 

 
 
And glued another strip of wood to the outside. [This extra strip around the perimeter is how the replica Niagara gratings are constructed, but it doesn't seem to be the historical norm, and I decided not to do it on the upper deck grates.]  On the larger one I decided to glue the outer strips on before sanding it flat--


 
 
Here they are both sanded--
 

 
 
I decided that the smaller one was too big, so I had to trim a section off, and glue a new edge piece on, and sand it down again--
 

 
 
I rubbed some finish on them and here they are sitting on the lower deck. Next I'll make some coamings, and trim the planking as necessary to make it all fit together--
 

 
 

Ron

August 17, 2010
 
 
I made up an amusing little jig to mark the location for the berth deck. It rests on the gunport sills, and will give me a consistent dimension which follows the sweep of the main deck--


 
 
When I got closer to the stern, I had to break it apart and refashion it a bit
so it would fit--
 

 
 
I cut two one-piece planks, boiled the fore part of each, and clamped them to dry--
 

 
 
While I glue the planks bit by bit (clamping on the planked starboard side of the hull is difficult) I'm sanding the laser char off of the main deck beams--


 
 
August 19, 2010
 
 
Gluing the port side strake was much easier--
 

 
 
Puff has been very feisty lately. She hasn't tried to chomp on the ship yet; as long as I don't try to wave it in front of her, I think it's safe. She does keep hopping up on my table to sit on the plans, though, as I work on drawing up some deck rearrangments--
 

 
 
I'm thinking that I will follow Clay [cfn1803--check out his Oneida in the completed ships gallery.]  ,and line the beams up with the gunports. The beams (in red) are drawn over the deck plan. these red beams are drawn centered on the gunport locations,  the carronades are not shown accurately. This also shows that I would have to move both masts back about 1/4 inch--12" in scale, not to mention shifting the hatches. Still thinking on this course of action--


 
 
I have to make sure the berth deck beams are not be in conflict with the pillars for the main deck
beams. Moving the main deck beams to fall regularly in line with the gunports would make this easier to plan and accomplish.


Testing the position of a few of the main beams--
 

 
 
 
August 21, 2010
 
 
I didn't have any strip wood in the right size for the berth deck beams (just going by eye, I decided on 1/8" (6") square beams). One of the lazer cut billets was that thickness, and there was extra wood on the edge, so that became my berth deck beam stock--
 

 
 
After cutting a number of beams to approximate length, I played for quite a while with the spacing, keeping in mind the openings for the masts, and a main hatch, and where the posts for the main deck beams above would be located. No
doubt this isn't at all historically accurate (I'm completely ignoring the coppered magazine, for example), but it will serve my purposes--
 

 
 
Once I was satisfied with a spacing plan, I started sanding and cutting the beams to final size, and gluing them in place--
 

 
 
Here is the berth deck framing--
 



 

 
 
 
August 22, 2010
 
 
On my berth deck, I placed a temporary centerplank to act as a guide for the rest of the planking--
 

 
 
Then I started laying planks--
 

 
 
I got this far with the planking, and then realized I have a problem--
 

 
 
I didn't account for the bitts and bowsprit step coming down through the decks to the bottom of the hull. I have a berth deck beam in the way. I'll have to figure out how to fix that.

 
 
August 23, 2010
 
 
I quickly cobbled together a "study model" of the bitts, and put some of the main deck beams in place. I discovered that I'm in good shape. The bitts pass by the berthing deck beam. I will have to cut a hole in the deck where the pencil is pointing, but that shouldn't be too difficult. Similar situation with the bowsprit seat--
 

 
 
So I am nearly finished with the planking. I have a little section left to do under where the stove will sit, but I went ahead and started scraping the rest--


 
 
The berthing deck planking is pretty much finished. I am very glad I did this--it was good practice for the main deck.  (Although I hope I haven't used up too much of the planking stock--there's been extra of most of the strip wood in the kit, but this might be pushing it!) I had some minor issues with the scraper that I will have to handle better on the main deck. And nibbing the planks on the main deck is going to be a real challenge to do neatly--
 

 
 
 
Ron

August 11, 2010
 
 
Not much actual model work lately, but lots of thinking.


I've decided to plank about 3 strakes on each side of the keel, for the mast steps to sit on. Then I'll run a strake farther up the hull on each side for the berth deck beams to fasten to. Then I'll plank just over half of the berth deck, to accomodate the stove, ladders, capstan; whatever needs to extend up through the gun deck. So, no bulkheads, compartments, or other detail below.
At least that's the plan.

First is some additional fairing at the bow and stern to make a smoother surface for the planks near the keel. I shaved away
some very uneven framing with the scalpel, and then did some sanding--
 

 

 
 
 
August 14, 2010
 
 
I've finished (almost--last piece clamped and drying) two interior planking strakes. The gap between the planks and the keelson is taken from the INA Jefferson model. I have a feeling it's not exactly right as I've done it [not wide enough], but I don't think it's even going to be visible in the end--
 

 

 
 
Next will be the mast steps. That will be fun, it seems like I've been doing planking forever. Now I'll get to build a little structure.
 
 
 
August 15, 2010
 
 
My mast steps are generally modeled after the INA Jefferson's, shown here-
 

 
 
I think maybe they are made with a rectangular "mortice" which would be shimmed to fix the mast tenon in place, rather than the whole mast step being made to slide forward or back for adjustment. Just a guess.


This was my first experience using the rotary tool as a milling machine. Here are two pieces together being cut out to fit over the keelson-
 

 
 
Another piece was routed along the edge. This one will be cut into short lengths to make up the sides of the mast steps--
 

 
 
Here are the four pieces that make up the forward mast step. The long pieces have been sanded by trial and error to fit the curve of the hull--
 

 
 
Here they are glued up. The one on the left is turned upside down--
 

 
 
I'm mulling over whether to put the little bolts on them--
 

 
 
And here they are sitting in the hull--
 

 
 
 
Ron

August 1, 2010
 
 
Here's the current work on the clamps--
 

 
 
On the planked side of the hull, clamping is more challenging. I'm gluing in two phases, to lessen my chances of making a bad move during the rush to get the clamps set before the glue starts to harden.

Stage 1-


 
 
Then after Stage 1 dries, Stage 2-
 

 
 
One more set to go.
 
 
 
August 3, 2010
 
 
More pictures of the clamp clamping--
 

 
 
I think it's time to clean my tiny "workbench". You can see why I move the model to my dining room table to actually perform any work on it!--
 

 
 
The last deck clamp is now drying--
 

 

 
 
Now I have to make another decision--about whether to include any of the lower deck. I need to do the mast steps at least, and if I'm going to include any ladders going down from the upper deck, they probably need somewhere to land.  And what about the stove? If I want to invite views in through the open frames, maybe I ought to put something in there, although doing so was not part of my original thinking, and it won't be very easy to see.
 
 
 
August 5, 2010
 
 
I have decided to add some of the lower deck. I won't try to include everything that would be there (it probably won't be very authentic), but just enough to indicate that there was a lower deck, and for the ladders, stove and capstan to fasten to.


The upper deck clamps have been sanded--
 

 

 

 
 
And now I have to do some research and planning for the lower deck.

 
Ron

May 1, 2010
 
 
I cut a scraper to make some trim pieces for the stern--


 

 

 
 
Here is the stern with the transom trim pieces glued on. the starboard one (closest in the photo) has been sanded down to just about the final shape, the port side is still rough and just tacked on--
 

 
 
Here is a trim piece held up for fitting. It doesn't fit as well as I'd like--


 
 
In this view you can see the size of the gap between the counter planking and the hull planking. The trim piece just doesn't quite cover the ends of the hull planking well enough--
 

 

 
 
 
So I think I need to add a sliver more of counter planking, which will have to be blackened after I get it cut and shaped right--


 
 
Then I think the trim piece will fit better. This picture shows the two pieces, however they are not finished--when I'm done the pear filler piece will barely be visible, but it should help the boxwood trim piece cover the ends of the planks--
 

 
 
 
July 30, 2010
 
 
I cut some filler pieces for the counter planking, and glued them in--
 

 
 
I had saved some of my blackening solution from earlier, but I guess it has a definite shelf life, because it did not work this time. I used some black artist oil paint to color them instead.

I cut a new (more traditional) profile pattern in my razor blade scraper, and made some new trim pieces, and glued them
on--
 

 
 
And the trim piece that goes between the transom and counter planking has been boiled, and taped along a curve similar to the transom to dry--
 

 
 
 
July 31, 2010
 
 
Gluing the trim on--
 

 
 
And the stern is finished for now--
 

 

 
 

 

 
 
I think finishing the deck clamps, and then the deck will be next.
 


Ron

March 9, 2010
 
 
A few more pictures of the hull, along with the most recent activity:

The shine is dulled down a bit, but still there. (Funny, the previous pictures showed it stronger than it really is, these show it weaker than it really is.)--
 

 
 
A couple of closer pictures--
 

 
 
You can see where I've started to mark locations for the treenails in the wale. I'll probably wait until I plank the bulwarks, and treenail the wales and bulwarks at the same time--
 

 

 

 
 
Now I took one of those "hold your breath and hope" steps. I've been a little unhappy with the look of the cherry and pear side by side. As I've said, the cherry looks just great by itself, but next to the pear it takes on a yellow/green cast, which worsens with the finish I'm using. So I stained the frames darker. Gulp!
 
Hard to tell if it's an improvement or not--


 
 
On the inside, half are still "raw"--
 

 
 
I would say that the unstained cherry frames look just fine in the photos. Maybe even better than those I've stained--you would have to really wonder if I did the right thing staining them. Unfortunately, the color problem just doesn't show in the photos. Even stained, it's not exactly what I want. I would like some contrast between the cherry and pear, rather than a "not-quite" match.  Maybe if/when the cherry darkens over time, it might end up to what I see in my mind.
 
[in hindsight, I don't think the cherry/pear combination is a good one. Pear is such a great wood for modeling, and when they're side by side, cherry just doesn't measure up. In staining the cherry darker, I was trying to make it contrast, in color, from the pear, so they wouldn't "compete".]
 
 
Looking out the window, she's waiting patiently to be finished and at sea. How can I tell her she's destined to remain "docked"!?
 

 
 
 
Ron

February 20, 2010
 
 
Not only do the upper stern strakes need more sanding, but there's an even worse problem lurking there.

When I dry fit the sternpost, at the very top the planks tuck in too much. It's hard to tell from this photo, but the three or
four strakes at the top of the sternpost do not meet flush with the edge of the sternpost--
 

 
 
I decided to go for the fix on this one.

I applied alcohol to the problem area. Note, there was minor bleeding of the marker ink with the alcohol, so anyone who thinks to try the inked paper caulk--BEWARE. I don't think it has ended up causing a permanent problem in this case, but don't be surprised like I was!
 

 
 
I also removed the shim I had put on to push the sternpost back about 1/16th of an inch. I needed to take the shim off because the alcohol was loosening it anyway, and it would give me deeper access to the planks--
 

 
 
Next I pried the loosened planks away from the deadwood--
 

 
 
I made a small shim to push the planks out, so they would meet the sternpost more correctly--


 
 
Then, after filing the excess part of the planking shim away, and sanding and filing the ends of the planks, I was able to glue the sternpost (and its shim) on, and then more sanding--
 

 
 
Those top planks still need some work, and I'm not sure I'm going to be able to get those few caulk joints to look the way they should, but the fit to the sternpost is better than it was. The photo (as they often do) is making things look worse than they really are.
 
 
 
December 7, 2009   [i've grouped a couple of older posts regarding treenails here, to keep all of them together.]
 

After weighing many factors, I think I may go with bamboo for the treenails, so I have started manufacturing them. I tried first with some bamboo chopsticks, and it was hopeless. They were very weak, and I couldn't make it past one or two holes in the drawplate.

Then I remembered some bamboo gardening stakes I have. They were very weathered, and I wasn't sure they would be any better than the chopsticks, but they actually are working guite well.

For the hull I need 1" treenails, which is .020". That's the third from the smallest hole on the drawplate. I was quite skeptical about my chances of working down that small (I can barely even see the hole!). But I've made about fifteen "straws". When I
took the picture I had about 7 done--
 

 
 
They are about 7" long, so if I need a 1/4" long treenail (being conservative here--1/8th inch might be enough) that's 28 per straw. I might need 1000 or so, so I probably need between 30 and 40 straws.
 
 
 
December 9, 2010
 
 
With some technique advice from other members, I was able to join the .016" club--
 

 
 
Couldn't do it without pliers, and it seemed like it took as long to do those last two holes as all the previous ones!

The small one also makes my .020" straws look like logs in comparison! .020" is right for the hull, but maybe I'll need the smaller size for the deck. Good thing that's a ways off.
 
 
 
January 4, 2010
 
 
After making all those bamboo treenails, I tested them out, along with some other techniques, on my hull section mock-up.

I wanted to see how simulated caulking on the hull would look. The upper four caulk joints use black craft paper ("construction" paper is what I've always called it, but I don't know if everyone knows what I mean by that). The lower four joints use regular medium weight computer printer paper made black with a "sharpie" magic marker. I like the way the thinner joints look--they are much closer to scale [And indeed, as you have seen, that's what I used]--
 

 
 
The treenails are kind of a mess. I took the old planks off and put them back on (with the new caulk joints) so some of the old silver wire spots moved around a bit. But here's the key:

The blue circle shows bamboo treenails in a hole that was drilled with a bit just a little too big. I was waiting for the right one (#76 .02") to come in the mail.

The red circle shows bamboo treenails with the right size hole. I was unhappy with all the bamboo treenails.
They look too dark to me. If they were larger, they might not have gone so dark, but this is the right size.

The green circle shows .020" holes filled with a watered down slurry of pearwood dust and glue. When I went over it with
the tung oil varnish, I think it may have disolved some of this filler because many of them look like dark empty holes now.

The yellow circle shows.020" holes filled with a slurry of full strength glue and pear wood dust. This looks the best to me (actually you can barely see the good ones, but that's about right). The only problem here is that the results weren't consistent (some still showed as a dark hole). I need to make sure the "paste" gets down into each hole.
 

 
 
I'll chew on these experiments for a while. But it looks like I am going to abandon all those bamboo treenails I painstakingly made!! And the silver wire I bought!
 
 
 
 February 22, 2010
 
 
Now it's on to treenailing!
 
I've decided to go with the bamboo, partly since I can't bear for all those slivers I painstakingly drew down to tiny size to go to waste!

I'm starting on the very bottom of the hull, which will be the least visible part--so if my beginning workmanship isn't the best, it won't be too obvious!

Near the middle is a portion that I sanded down, to see how they will look. They're so small, that even though they are still darker than I would have liked, they really fade away from a distance--
 
 

 
I thought my caulk joints were very thin (and most of them are), but next to the treenails some of them look positively fat!  On balance though, I still like the caulking--
 

 
 
Only a thousand or so more to go! I'm so glad I'm only doing half the hull--and this is a small ship to boot!
 
 
 
February 23, 2010
Here's a picture--as close as I can get--of the sanded down treenails. The treenail diameter (1 inch) should be four times the caulk width (1/4 inch). Just by eye it looks--close enough. 
 

 
 
 
February 26, 2010
 
 
I still don't know whether treenails or iron spikes are historically accurate for this ship, but I'll settle for them just looking good!

I looked at three sources for the treenail pattern. (Goodwin, Underhill and Davis) The one that was the most helpful and seemed most accurate was the one by Charles G. Davis in "The Built-Up Ship Model". It looks a bit random at first, but there is a very sound logic to the way the treenails are placed. However, Davis didn't show what it looks like where the butt joint of the planks interrupts the pattern, so I improvised there--


 
 
[i have not seen this pattern used in any other models--maybe because it's 'busier".   Every model I see uses the simpler pattern, which according to Davis, would be for single frames, whereas this was correct for doubled frames]
 
 
 
February 27, 2010

 
I've marked about 3/4 of the locations, and I have a growing patch of treenails.

Doing about two planks worth at a time (or about 50 treenails), I start the holes with a push pin, drill them, and glue the treenails in. Then repeat for another small section.

I do wish I had something that would cut these off flush. [How about the No.11 knife or a razor blade?] My supply of treenail straws is being used up faster than I thought it would, and surely there are or will be a couple of straws worth of waste in those bits that stick out.
 

 
 
 
March 1, 2010
 
 
I ran out of treenail straws, so I draw down two or three, use them up, then draw down 2 or three more, etc.

I'm a little more than half done, and the bow is marked and drilled--
 

 

 
 
 
March 6, 2010
 
 
Another small milestone in the long modeling process--the lower hull treenailing is done!
 

 

 
 
After looking at the next photo I realized I wasn't completely done--
 

 
 
When I first looked at that photo one empty hole near the left center jumped out at me. I filled that one, looked at the photo again and noticed another!

Hopefully there are no more empty holes, but I can't guarantee it!--
 

 

 
 
Now, I will sand it down. Then some thinking about what to do next.
 
 
 
March 6, 2010
 
 
Here's the hull sanded down and with a couple coats of finish on. It looks pretty glossy, but I haven't steel wooled it yet--
 

 
 
Next I made a rough working stand to hold the hull upright. First cut a couple of templates for the supports out of cardboard--
 

 
 
Then cut them out of a piece of scrap wood with my jeweler's saw--
 

 
 
Then glued them on to a base. I need to do some fine tuning of the support curves, and then I'll put some foam padding on the supports, and it should be good to go--
 

 
 
 
Ron

As will we. But like you, we'll get over it and you'll be back to model building before you know it. Just like we'll be back to ogling over your work.

I started this thread, and I think it was a comment I made later about Jeff's payment policies, that unchained these long posts by both sides. I'm glad that the final outcome seem to be an understanding on both parties. At least, I hope so.
I would like to do business with Jeff sometime in the future.
 
As David said...

Jeff at the Hobby Mill is providing a heck of a great service to those that need precut wood and I would use his service if I did not  have a plainer and thickness sander in my little shop at home.   
 
If you can start with rough cut pieces, two other suppliers from whom I have purchased wood over the years and recommend are Exotic Woods in Burlington Ontario (bought from them at their place when driving to Toronto) or Gilmer Woods in Portland Oregon which was strictly by internet and mail.   Over the years the savings of sizing my own wood has more than paid for the plainer and thickness sander.  
 
Allan

Well spoken on both sides.  There was misunderstanding and confusion all around.  Lets call it a day and everyone go to the bar and have a drink. 
David B 

Hello Jeff,
I appreciate your response, frankness and honesty.

To my understanding payment in advance meant some time shortly before cutting started I was thinking a week or two at most as you state "Even though we custom mill each order, our normal processing time for orders is about 10 days.", but in emails you talked of having 120 days of production from April and May and others spoke of a 3 month wait.
I think the confusion came from this - From your wording from the site
"For first time customers we request receipt of payment in advance of processing your order."
 
I read this as "processing" meaning the task of cutting not the task of making an order form. I'm not making excuses and hopefully some can see how that wording might be interpreted wrong, especially by new builders. My first job was in a meat processing house and to me processing is the physical task of cutting. I wish someone had informed me otherwise.

I'm glad this was able to be cleared in the presences of the community without hard feelings. I've never had hard feeling really, just a sense of loss as I sometimes feel as if I'm alone in a crowd of people. I could have been offended that you said I ranted, but I did, due to my confusion. I also explained in my apology how my disability causes me to not always respond as I might have wished I had.

Just to show my willingness to lay all the cards on the table, here's the email that was a rant. I believe in full disclosure and don't feel I was intentionally offensive, it was a knee jerk reaction to a misunderstanding.

Hello Jeff
I'm not exactly sure where to start. First I would like to say that you've been great at customer service and taken the time to personally answer the numerous questions I've had.
I guess the problem I have is that I've been disabled since 2008 and the budgets tight. I also understand you produce some of the best wood for modeling available. I guess the problem I have is with your 2 statements in your last email.
" Also as a new customer, I would appreciate payment in advance, so that is another reason for just ..." and "so you will not want to wait until the last minute or your order will be pushed back into mid-November..."
First off I realize your a busy person and I respect that. You have a thriving business, no doubt due to you efforts. I don't understand why because I'm a new customer I'd need to prepay in august for an order that may not arrive until november. It isn't the time issue as the wood I want probably won't be used until next year anyway, I'm just planning in advance as I knew you were a busy man. I always expect to have money debited from my account before a purchase on anything I've bought for building so far, but months in advance seems a bit extreme.
I started building because at 43 my life was stolen by a disease that 45 Dr's so far haven't been able in 5 years to figure out what disease has completely stolen my life.
Building is really all I have and it has given me a sense of self worth I lost with total disablity. I say this not for sympathy but so that you know from where I am coming.
It's a hobby I strickly budget for because its important, but I don't have the means to pay months before shipment and wouldn't even if budget wasn't an issue. Maybe I've misunderstood. I never expected a saw or sander to start on a custom cut until you had money in hand, but to pay months before you can even make an estimate of arrival time seems a bit extreme. Maybe I'm just not the type of customer you want or need, which is a shame as I really wanted to do business with you and support your efforts and mine. Maybe I just do not fit the profile of your customer base. Maybe I just misreading your last email. Communication and respect are important to me. I respect what you do and undertand the uniqueness of what you do, I just get the feeling I'm not the type of customer you need.
I apologize for the trouble I've put you through answering my questions. I alway expected to pay before cutting but not far in advance of the job. I find this very dissappointing as I really looked forward to doing business. I apolgize for wasting your time on this matter.

Respectfully and Sincerely
Keith

I have reread that message many times and looked at it from both your and my prospective. It can be seen 2 ways and neither is wrong or right, it all depends on prospective.

Also I hadn't made up my mind on exactly what I wanted as both you and Chuck were instructing me to use the basswood from the kits framing. I felt it was my decision, if I chose to attempt fret sawing the frame pieces from boxwood, why shouldn't I be able to attempt that if I wanted to. If one never does anything different to push the envelope, then I feel that is the line one imposes as their personal limitations. You say that both you and Chuck say it would have been "impractical" but I though I was the captain of my build. I've heard that many time on MSW and believe it.
I respected both you and Chucks opinions, but feel it ultimately is my decision, so I felt I was being told to just conform to the rules. This isn't my nature, in grad school my advisor told me that my research direction was impractical and something he would not help me with, but I still did it anyway. I find failure and an uplifting experience and choose to try the things others avoid. I finished my graduate research and I'm sure I can find a way of building an all boxwood pinnace. I don't care how many times I fails and one only truely fails when one quits.
I always saw the build being made completely out of boxwood and found the curve to switch and use the basswood bewildering. This is why I waffled on the order.

I also explained many times in our conversations that time was of no issue, I felt that you thought I had some time pressure imposed on you completing by a certain date from your previous email to my rant. Your last email before my rant went into a lot of detail about your prior months orders and the future few months and it made me feel as though I was wasting your time and honestly if you have 2 hours of emails a day to content with, I honestly was and many of the things I said in the "rant" are true from my prospective. I may have come off from your prospective as harsh but for me it was a sincere concern as a new builder, wasting the time of a master of his craft. I'm sorry for that and wish I had been better informed prior to contacting you. I never had a time issue, as I planned the build for this year. I stated this at several points through our conversations, but your response of
"I guess that I could have deliberately lied about his lead time"
really seems to be an issue in your mind still, where it NEVER was in mine. I'm sure your always under stress of trying to meet deadlines, I got that feeling over our many conversions and posssibly you projected your feeling of urgence on to me, thinking I was somehow rushing you or asking for favors. This was never my intent. You state on your home page " Even though we custom mill each order, our normal processing time for orders is about 10 days." and you mentioned taking October off, I just feel that you felt I had you under some time pressure that I was never aware of or even considered. If the problem was that I was taking too much time, again I wish I'd known. Honestly if the order had not been made by January, I would have carried less. My issue was the outlay of cash for months, which I didn't expect due to what I've already stated.

If this is your case, then your a victim of your own high standards and completely took me wrong from the beginning. My ignorance of your time pressure only made this worse.

Maybe I should have been more serious and only contacted you when I knew what I wanted, but honestly until talking with you, I didn't even know for sure.

I suppose due to being new I didn't completely understand that you don't make any profit in cutting wood either, as a matter of fact that is surprising and inspiring to me. If that's listed on your site I missed it and if it was something I should have known from being an MSW member, I didn't join MSW officially until Post-crash and no one from the many that recommended you mentioned it.
This should be posted on your site or let it be known through MSW as uninformed people such as myself are always liable to misunderstand. If you do this and make nothing from it, then I have nothing but immense respect for you and your efforts. It also changes the playing field of what HobbyMills is and does. I wonder how many know this fact as I was always under the impression that you were doing this as a hobby turned into your making a living doing what you love.

Hopefully my willingness to air dirty laundry will help prevent confusion for others in the future and make your task easier.

I publicly apologize for anything in my rant that you took as over the top. I just never received any closure from this experience and question my sanity daily. I never intended to offend and had I completely understood your payment policies I would have not have added to your workload. I did sincerely appreciate your finding out all the wood needed for the Pinnace, sheet stock included as I still plan to push the envelope on that build and your list aided me in that.

Thank you for you time in responding and helping to give me closure on an issue that has haunted me for months.
Your closing statement of

"I rarely post on such matters because they do not add value, but perhaps some readers will have acquired some insight into HobbyMill, it's policies, and my thoughts. Hopefully they seem logical and reasonable to most readers."

I see great value in what you have said, if I had read your response prior to last years episode, it wouldn't have happened.
Maybe this shouldn't be brought up in public, but am willing to take the chance to help make MSW a better community. Communication is very important to me and yet I find it is so many time a double edged sword.


 

Hello Jeff,
I appreciate your response, frankness and honesty.

To my understanding payment in advance meant some time shortly before cutting started I was thinking a week or two at most as you state "Even though we custom mill each order, our normal processing time for orders is about 10 days.", but in emails you talked of having 120 days of production from April and May and others spoke of a 3 month wait.
I think the confusion came from this - From your wording from the site
"For first time customers we request receipt of payment in advance of processing your order."
 
I read this as "processing" meaning the task of cutting not the task of making an order form. I'm not making excuses and hopefully some can see how that wording might be interpreted wrong, especially by new builders. My first job was in a meat processing house and to me processing is the physical task of cutting. I wish someone had informed me otherwise.

I'm glad this was able to be cleared in the presences of the community without hard feelings. I've never had hard feeling really, just a sense of loss as I sometimes feel as if I'm alone in a crowd of people. I could have been offended that you said I ranted, but I did, due to my confusion. I also explained in my apology how my disability causes me to not always respond as I might have wished I had.

Just to show my willingness to lay all the cards on the table, here's the email that was a rant. I believe in full disclosure and don't feel I was intentionally offensive, it was a knee jerk reaction to a misunderstanding.

Hello Jeff
I'm not exactly sure where to start. First I would like to say that you've been great at customer service and taken the time to personally answer the numerous questions I've had.
I guess the problem I have is that I've been disabled since 2008 and the budgets tight. I also understand you produce some of the best wood for modeling available. I guess the problem I have is with your 2 statements in your last email.
" Also as a new customer, I would appreciate payment in advance, so that is another reason for just ..." and "so you will not want to wait until the last minute or your order will be pushed back into mid-November..."
First off I realize your a busy person and I respect that. You have a thriving business, no doubt due to you efforts. I don't understand why because I'm a new customer I'd need to prepay in august for an order that may not arrive until november. It isn't the time issue as the wood I want probably won't be used until next year anyway, I'm just planning in advance as I knew you were a busy man. I always expect to have money debited from my account before a purchase on anything I've bought for building so far, but months in advance seems a bit extreme.
I started building because at 43 my life was stolen by a disease that 45 Dr's so far haven't been able in 5 years to figure out what disease has completely stolen my life.
Building is really all I have and it has given me a sense of self worth I lost with total disablity. I say this not for sympathy but so that you know from where I am coming.
It's a hobby I strickly budget for because its important, but I don't have the means to pay months before shipment and wouldn't even if budget wasn't an issue. Maybe I've misunderstood. I never expected a saw or sander to start on a custom cut until you had money in hand, but to pay months before you can even make an estimate of arrival time seems a bit extreme. Maybe I'm just not the type of customer you want or need, which is a shame as I really wanted to do business with you and support your efforts and mine. Maybe I just do not fit the profile of your customer base. Maybe I just misreading your last email. Communication and respect are important to me. I respect what you do and undertand the uniqueness of what you do, I just get the feeling I'm not the type of customer you need.
I apologize for the trouble I've put you through answering my questions. I alway expected to pay before cutting but not far in advance of the job. I find this very dissappointing as I really looked forward to doing business. I apolgize for wasting your time on this matter.

Respectfully and Sincerely
Keith

I have reread that message many times and looked at it from both your and my prospective. It can be seen 2 ways and neither is wrong or right, it all depends on prospective.

Also I hadn't made up my mind on exactly what I wanted as both you and Chuck were instructing me to use the basswood from the kits framing. I felt it was my decision, if I chose to attempt fret sawing the frame pieces from boxwood, why shouldn't I be able to attempt that if I wanted to. If one never does anything different to push the envelope, then I feel that is the line one imposes as their personal limitations. You say that both you and Chuck say it would have been "impractical" but I though I was the captain of my build. I've heard that many time on MSW and believe it.
I respected both you and Chucks opinions, but feel it ultimately is my decision, so I felt I was being told to just conform to the rules. This isn't my nature, in grad school my advisor told me that my research direction was impractical and something he would not help me with, but I still did it anyway. I find failure and an uplifting experience and choose to try the things others avoid. I finished my graduate research and I'm sure I can find a way of building an all boxwood pinnace. I don't care how many times I fails and one only truely fails when one quits.
I always saw the build being made completely out of boxwood and found the curve to switch and use the basswood bewildering. This is why I waffled on the order.

I also explained many times in our conversations that time was of no issue, I felt that you thought I had some time pressure imposed on you completing by a certain date from your previous email to my rant. Your last email before my rant went into a lot of detail about your prior months orders and the future few months and it made me feel as though I was wasting your time and honestly if you have 2 hours of emails a day to content with, I honestly was and many of the things I said in the "rant" are true from my prospective. I may have come off from your prospective as harsh but for me it was a sincere concern as a new builder, wasting the time of a master of his craft. I'm sorry for that and wish I had been better informed prior to contacting you. I never had a time issue, as I planned the build for this year. I stated this at several points through our conversations, but your response of
"I guess that I could have deliberately lied about his lead time"
really seems to be an issue in your mind still, where it NEVER was in mine. I'm sure your always under stress of trying to meet deadlines, I got that feeling over our many conversions and posssibly you projected your feeling of urgence on to me, thinking I was somehow rushing you or asking for favors. This was never my intent. You state on your home page " Even though we custom mill each order, our normal processing time for orders is about 10 days." and you mentioned taking October off, I just feel that you felt I had you under some time pressure that I was never aware of or even considered. If the problem was that I was taking too much time, again I wish I'd known. Honestly if the order had not been made by January, I would have carried less. My issue was the outlay of cash for months, which I didn't expect due to what I've already stated.

If this is your case, then your a victim of your own high standards and completely took me wrong from the beginning. My ignorance of your time pressure only made this worse.

Maybe I should have been more serious and only contacted you when I knew what I wanted, but honestly until talking with you, I didn't even know for sure.

I suppose due to being new I didn't completely understand that you don't make any profit in cutting wood either, as a matter of fact that is surprising and inspiring to me. If that's listed on your site I missed it and if it was something I should have known from being an MSW member, I didn't join MSW officially until Post-crash and no one from the many that recommended you mentioned it.
This should be posted on your site or let it be known through MSW as uninformed people such as myself are always liable to misunderstand. If you do this and make nothing from it, then I have nothing but immense respect for you and your efforts. It also changes the playing field of what HobbyMills is and does. I wonder how many know this fact as I was always under the impression that you were doing this as a hobby turned into your making a living doing what you love.

Hopefully my willingness to air dirty laundry will help prevent confusion for others in the future and make your task easier.

I publicly apologize for anything in my rant that you took as over the top. I just never received any closure from this experience and question my sanity daily. I never intended to offend and had I completely understood your payment policies I would have not have added to your workload. I did sincerely appreciate your finding out all the wood needed for the Pinnace, sheet stock included as I still plan to push the envelope on that build and your list aided me in that.

Thank you for you time in responding and helping to give me closure on an issue that has haunted me for months.
Your closing statement of

"I rarely post on such matters because they do not add value, but perhaps some readers will have acquired some insight into HobbyMill, it's policies, and my thoughts. Hopefully they seem logical and reasonable to most readers."

I see great value in what you have said, if I had read your response prior to last years episode, it wouldn't have happened.
Maybe this shouldn't be brought up in public, but am willing to take the chance to help make MSW a better community. Communication is very important to me and yet I find it is so many time a double edged sword.


 

Hello Jeff,
I appreciate your response, frankness and honesty.

To my understanding payment in advance meant some time shortly before cutting started I was thinking a week or two at most as you state "Even though we custom mill each order, our normal processing time for orders is about 10 days.", but in emails you talked of having 120 days of production from April and May and others spoke of a 3 month wait.
I think the confusion came from this - From your wording from the site
"For first time customers we request receipt of payment in advance of processing your order."
 
I read this as "processing" meaning the task of cutting not the task of making an order form. I'm not making excuses and hopefully some can see how that wording might be interpreted wrong, especially by new builders. My first job was in a meat processing house and to me processing is the physical task of cutting. I wish someone had informed me otherwise.

I'm glad this was able to be cleared in the presences of the community without hard feelings. I've never had hard feeling really, just a sense of loss as I sometimes feel as if I'm alone in a crowd of people. I could have been offended that you said I ranted, but I did, due to my confusion. I also explained in my apology how my disability causes me to not always respond as I might have wished I had.

Just to show my willingness to lay all the cards on the table, here's the email that was a rant. I believe in full disclosure and don't feel I was intentionally offensive, it was a knee jerk reaction to a misunderstanding.

Hello Jeff
I'm not exactly sure where to start. First I would like to say that you've been great at customer service and taken the time to personally answer the numerous questions I've had.
I guess the problem I have is that I've been disabled since 2008 and the budgets tight. I also understand you produce some of the best wood for modeling available. I guess the problem I have is with your 2 statements in your last email.
" Also as a new customer, I would appreciate payment in advance, so that is another reason for just ..." and "so you will not want to wait until the last minute or your order will be pushed back into mid-November..."
First off I realize your a busy person and I respect that. You have a thriving business, no doubt due to you efforts. I don't understand why because I'm a new customer I'd need to prepay in august for an order that may not arrive until november. It isn't the time issue as the wood I want probably won't be used until next year anyway, I'm just planning in advance as I knew you were a busy man. I always expect to have money debited from my account before a purchase on anything I've bought for building so far, but months in advance seems a bit extreme.
I started building because at 43 my life was stolen by a disease that 45 Dr's so far haven't been able in 5 years to figure out what disease has completely stolen my life.
Building is really all I have and it has given me a sense of self worth I lost with total disablity. I say this not for sympathy but so that you know from where I am coming.
It's a hobby I strickly budget for because its important, but I don't have the means to pay months before shipment and wouldn't even if budget wasn't an issue. Maybe I've misunderstood. I never expected a saw or sander to start on a custom cut until you had money in hand, but to pay months before you can even make an estimate of arrival time seems a bit extreme. Maybe I'm just not the type of customer you want or need, which is a shame as I really wanted to do business with you and support your efforts and mine. Maybe I just do not fit the profile of your customer base. Maybe I just misreading your last email. Communication and respect are important to me. I respect what you do and undertand the uniqueness of what you do, I just get the feeling I'm not the type of customer you need.
I apologize for the trouble I've put you through answering my questions. I alway expected to pay before cutting but not far in advance of the job. I find this very dissappointing as I really looked forward to doing business. I apolgize for wasting your time on this matter.

Respectfully and Sincerely
Keith

I have reread that message many times and looked at it from both your and my prospective. It can be seen 2 ways and neither is wrong or right, it all depends on prospective.

Also I hadn't made up my mind on exactly what I wanted as both you and Chuck were instructing me to use the basswood from the kits framing. I felt it was my decision, if I chose to attempt fret sawing the frame pieces from boxwood, why shouldn't I be able to attempt that if I wanted to. If one never does anything different to push the envelope, then I feel that is the line one imposes as their personal limitations. You say that both you and Chuck say it would have been "impractical" but I though I was the captain of my build. I've heard that many time on MSW and believe it.
I respected both you and Chucks opinions, but feel it ultimately is my decision, so I felt I was being told to just conform to the rules. This isn't my nature, in grad school my advisor told me that my research direction was impractical and something he would not help me with, but I still did it anyway. I find failure and an uplifting experience and choose to try the things others avoid. I finished my graduate research and I'm sure I can find a way of building an all boxwood pinnace. I don't care how many times I fails and one only truely fails when one quits.
I always saw the build being made completely out of boxwood and found the curve to switch and use the basswood bewildering. This is why I waffled on the order.

I also explained many times in our conversations that time was of no issue, I felt that you thought I had some time pressure imposed on you completing by a certain date from your previous email to my rant. Your last email before my rant went into a lot of detail about your prior months orders and the future few months and it made me feel as though I was wasting your time and honestly if you have 2 hours of emails a day to content with, I honestly was and many of the things I said in the "rant" are true from my prospective. I may have come off from your prospective as harsh but for me it was a sincere concern as a new builder, wasting the time of a master of his craft. I'm sorry for that and wish I had been better informed prior to contacting you. I never had a time issue, as I planned the build for this year. I stated this at several points through our conversations, but your response of
"I guess that I could have deliberately lied about his lead time"
really seems to be an issue in your mind still, where it NEVER was in mine. I'm sure your always under stress of trying to meet deadlines, I got that feeling over our many conversions and posssibly you projected your feeling of urgence on to me, thinking I was somehow rushing you or asking for favors. This was never my intent. You state on your home page " Even though we custom mill each order, our normal processing time for orders is about 10 days." and you mentioned taking October off, I just feel that you felt I had you under some time pressure that I was never aware of or even considered. If the problem was that I was taking too much time, again I wish I'd known. Honestly if the order had not been made by January, I would have carried less. My issue was the outlay of cash for months, which I didn't expect due to what I've already stated.

If this is your case, then your a victim of your own high standards and completely took me wrong from the beginning. My ignorance of your time pressure only made this worse.

Maybe I should have been more serious and only contacted you when I knew what I wanted, but honestly until talking with you, I didn't even know for sure.

I suppose due to being new I didn't completely understand that you don't make any profit in cutting wood either, as a matter of fact that is surprising and inspiring to me. If that's listed on your site I missed it and if it was something I should have known from being an MSW member, I didn't join MSW officially until Post-crash and no one from the many that recommended you mentioned it.
This should be posted on your site or let it be known through MSW as uninformed people such as myself are always liable to misunderstand. If you do this and make nothing from it, then I have nothing but immense respect for you and your efforts. It also changes the playing field of what HobbyMills is and does. I wonder how many know this fact as I was always under the impression that you were doing this as a hobby turned into your making a living doing what you love.

Hopefully my willingness to air dirty laundry will help prevent confusion for others in the future and make your task easier.

I publicly apologize for anything in my rant that you took as over the top. I just never received any closure from this experience and question my sanity daily. I never intended to offend and had I completely understood your payment policies I would have not have added to your workload. I did sincerely appreciate your finding out all the wood needed for the Pinnace, sheet stock included as I still plan to push the envelope on that build and your list aided me in that.

Thank you for you time in responding and helping to give me closure on an issue that has haunted me for months.
Your closing statement of

"I rarely post on such matters because they do not add value, but perhaps some readers will have acquired some insight into HobbyMill, it's policies, and my thoughts. Hopefully they seem logical and reasonable to most readers."

I see great value in what you have said, if I had read your response prior to last years episode, it wouldn't have happened.
Maybe this shouldn't be brought up in public, but am willing to take the chance to help make MSW a better community. Communication is very important to me and yet I find it is so many time a double edged sword.


 

Thank you to everyone who has supported and recommended my products.  As with most things there are two sides to each discussion and our past experiences guide our decisions going forward.
 
My experience with PayPal has not been positive and I've always felt that their security had serious deficiencies.  In the past this was underscored by the fact that within minutes of receiving any correspondence from them, I would receive spam from all over the world.  Yes, I've been a long time member and my information was hacked in one of their documented attacks a number of years ago.
 
About two years ago I experienced an identity theft issue that was traced directly back to their security.  As a future preventative measure I discussed this with a couple of my banks and they explained that a high percentage of their identity theft issues were related to PayPal transactions.
 
So as a business and personal decision I do not plan to offer their services.  My perspective is that it would seem illogical for me to reward a business who harmed me and from a personal basis why would I ever want to jeopardize my financial status over a hobby.
 
I realize that some customers may find this difficult to understand, but I look at HobbyMill as a service to this hobby in much of the same way that the moderators offer their service to this website.  It is a break even business where I perform all of the tasks with the single objective of improving the quality of wood products offered to this hobby.  In other words, if I were to shut it down today, it would not have any financial impact on me and I would have a lot of time to spend on my own modeling.
 
I may have my own illusions about this, but I believe that through MSW and my efforts some of the builders in this community have begun to raise their expectations on the quality of milled wood products and services.  My business has grown a lot over the years and I would welcome other suppliers to the community who are willing to provide similar or better quality products, because that would support the objective with which HobbyMill was founded.  Over the years I have advised a number of customers on how to mill their own wood.  I have also added the section on my website covering operation of the Byrnes saw with the intention of assisting customers to improve their own milling quality.  So again, if there are other parties interested in offering top quality wood, I would be happy to assist them because I feel that it is a win for everyone.
 
This thread has been centered on some of my policies and some customers who would prefer me to change those policies.  I realize that some customers may not agree with them, but hopefully this response will provide some insight into my thinking and at least serve to rationalize that they are not arbitrary.  If it were focused on the quality of my product, then I assure you that I would take a different approach.
 
As a home based business my wife is very tolerant of the dust and noise created from milling wood, not to mention the 2 hours each day working on e-mails.  One other policy that has not been brought up is that you will not find my telephone number listed anywhere.  After giving my number out to a few customers, my wife started to become my secretary because I am always in the shop.  My wife didn't appreciate being my secretary and then the calls started to come in at all hours of the night.  So keeping peace at home and getting sleep is the rationale behind e-mail only communications.
 
Another policy is that I do not sell within the state of Ohio to avoid dealing with collecting and filing state income tax.  I do all of the tax filings for the business so I try to minimize this because most of the time the filings would just be zeros.  At one time I would just give the wood to Ohio customers and request that they make a charitable donation to their favorite charity.  That was pretty goofy and it only lasted a few years.
 
My payment policy has always been that I request payment in advance for first time US customers and thereafter I include an invoice.  International customers I always request payment in advance and this is as much as insuring that I'm getting paid in US dollars as it is a credit issue.  All of this has always been on my website.  I realize that my lead times have started to stretch way out, but I try my best to advise my customers of anticipated delivery.  I've only missed one delivery and I sent, unsolicited, a full refund to that customer.  The customer felt that was "over the top" and declined the refund.
 
So here comes Keith.  He asked some good questions on one of Chuck's designed kits, so I contacted Chuck because he designed the Pinnace supplemental wood package that I offer.  Chuck did a good job, as always, explaining some of the issues and we both advised Keith that it would be impractical to implement the modifications that Keith was thinking about and also that the prototype was built using Chuck's original design method.
 
In the interim and at that time I was trying to plan a new batch of Pinnace packages.  Also I had announced both on my website and to Keith what the anticipated lead time would be on the new batch of packages.   I had an announced shutdown coming up and I have other customers who have paid and I've promised them delivery on their orders as well as other repeat customers.  Keith still hasn't placed an order after more than 2 months of communication for a standard package and he is asking about the lead time for a custom package or a standard one with supplemental wood, but he never gives me the details.
 
I did advise Keith that his lead time is dependent upon when I receive an order, what the details of the order would be, and I pointed out the pending shutdown and that his order was rapidly approaching the bubble as to if it would be milled before or after the shutdown.  I also reminded him about the payment policy for new customers.  Keith's response is a rather long rant indicating that my payment in advance policy with an extended lead time was unreasonable.  From my perspective, I had asked an received advanced payment from other first time customers, so waiving this for Keith did not seem fair to my other customers.  Also this is the only time that I've ever received such a response from a customer.   My conclusion was that I didn't feel that it was fair to other customers to create an exception and even though I had invested a fair amount of time to assist Keith, he was never going to be satisfied with my service.  I guess that I could have deliberately lied about his lead time, but that is just not me and also he never provided final details on the order.  As an aside, outside of the policies listed above I have only declined orders from one other person.
 
In the end, it appears that Keith found a source that he is happy with, so all is well in the end as that was my objective from the start.
 
Life is too short and this customer/supplier relationship was just not meant to be.  I wish Keith continued success and enjoyment with this hobby.
 
I rarely post on such matters because they do not add value, but perhaps some readers will have acquired some insight into HobbyMill, it's policies, and my thoughts.  Hopefully they seem logical and reasonable to most readers.
 
Sorry for being way too winded and thanks again for the support!
 
Jeff Hayes
HobbyMill

I myself spend hours, over days, which fade into weeks, watching others without progressing myself. Although lulls in building that appear that way outwardly, often are rather busy in our own minds, making decisions and working through obstacles, both perceived and real. Learning by watching others.
I'm completely satisfied with Ron's "I don't know" as it make completely good sense to me.
 
All I know is that I'm thankful for all that Ron has shown and taught me about building, of the greatest things, I think the fact that patience and perseverance lead to quality is one of the best learned from his build. I'm sure his build log is worth another reread, the good ones are
 
All I know is that I'll be here when "I don't know" becomes pictures again, quality is worth the wait.

I agree, more pictures.
You've taken this build so far from its roots its hard to fathom. Magnificently done hexnut.
 
I too find that the more I learn the more I realize my ignorance, but that's why our brains are designed to acquire new information I guess. Its also why I like this hobby so much. Thanks for the inspiration you pass along by sharing your vision.

February 14, 2010
 
 
These are the last two spiled planks to go on. The one on the right has been shaped, steamed, clamped to the hull to dry, and then removed. The one on the left was sanded to shape, but I'm not going to steam it. The water swells the wood, and if I steam that last plank it won't fit in place to dry anyway--
 



Here are the two planks dry fit. The one more forward is the plank that was steamed--
 

 
 
The plank which I didnt' steam appears by an optical illusion to bend away from the hull more that it really does--
 

 
 
I glued the paper caulking to the first plank and glued it in place. The pieces of wood which stick out are just scraps which I'm using to wedge the glued plank against it's neighbor--
 

 
 
Then glued the next plank. The excess paper doesn't look so good--
 

 
 
But it sands away nicely--
 

 
 
I calculate 11 more planks to go. After so many months of seeing the frames, it takes a little getting used to them being covered up!
 

 
 
 
 
February 14, 2010
 
 
[Responding to a question about "exactly what" I was using for the caulking paper.]
 
I am pretty happy with the way the caulking is turning out. I have a couple small "gaps" where either the paper didn't extend to the outer plank edge, or it got dislodged when glueing. To fix those I might score a line at those few spots and fill it with something black.


But here's how the paper works. This is a sheet of regular weight, white computer printer paper (what some of us once knew as "typing" paper!)--
 

 
 
Using a permanent black marker, I color one side. Somewhere, I'm sure you could just buy black paper, and not have to manually color it, but it was faster for me to do this than try to find some at a store! Also, I don't even need a full sheet to do the whole hull--
 

 
 
The marker bleeds through, but not completely--
 

 
 
So I color the back side, too--
 

 
 
And there's my caulking paper. [i can't stress enought that you TEST your wood, marker, paper, glue, and finish combination.  The last thing you want is for the marker to bleed when you put finish on a hull that you have finished planking!!!!]  I haven't measured the thickness of the paper, but I think it is not too far off, scalewise. I believe the caulk joints should be about 1/4 inch--
 

 
 
When I am ready to glue a plank, I cut a strip of caulk--
 

 

 

 
 
I run a bead of glue along the edge of the plank, and smooth it to a thin coat with my finger--


 
 
Then glue the paper to the plank. (You can see a pencil arrow at the front edge of the plank. This reminds me which side of the plank is "out" and, of course, which is the front end. It's helpful both during the sanding, so I know which edge to bevel and which direction to bevel it, and also when gluing the paper caulk, just to help avoid gluing the paper to the wrong edge of the plank--which I have done!)--
 

 
 
After a couple minutes, I trim the ends--
 

 
 
Before gluing the plank to the hull, I glue a small piece of caulk to the end of the previous plank. Usually I forget to do this until I have the new plank coated with glue, and then I'm rushing to get this small piece in before the glue on my plank starts to dry! But this time I remembered--
 

 
 
Then I put glue on the frames, and run glue along the long caulk edge, and short end, of the plank--
 

 
 
And clamp the plank in place--
 

 
 
There's still just enough space to wedge a couple clothspins in the frames to push against the edge of the plank--
 

 
 
 
February 19, 2010
 
 
Last plank!!--
 

 

 
 
I still have to do some clean-up and overall sanding, but, by golly, she's planked!
 

 

 
 
Ron

January 28, 2010
 
 
I shaped and glued a few more planks on--
 

 
 
But the bow is not right.

I think the termination spot is about right, perhaps it could go forward another 1/8th inch, but what really started to give
me a headache is how it sits in the rabbet. At the very tip, it's not sitting right. I had tons of trouble trying to get the next plank to match up to it, and sit in the rabbet correctly. (This is actually the second try on that piece.)--
 

 
 
In the area of the circle, there is a "hollow" where the plank doesn't meet the keel cleanly, and the paper caulk shows too much. I could scrape the paper out, but the gap will remain--
 

 
 
I though briefly about trying to fill the gap with sawdust/glue paste, but decided to take the two planks off and try again.

It wasn't a major flaw, but everything else was looking so good, I just couldn't let it be--
 

 
 
So a little backstep--take 3 on the two bow planks, hopefully third time's the charm!
 
 
 
 
January 30, 2010
 
 
The problem with the forward plank was the twist and bend. Mostly it was that I had bent the tip just a bit too much.


But I did decide to lengthen the new one about 1/4 inch anyway, thinking that the run will be a little better looking. Here's a comparison between the previous plank and the new try--
 

 
 
And here it's glued on, also a new second plank. These are better than before--


 

 
 
Here's a bent and tapered stern plank, ready to go--
 

 
 
I dry fit the plank--
 

 
 
Then glue the paper caulk joint. Because of the extreme curve at the end, I glued an oversize paper to it. When it dries I'll trim it back to the plank edge--
 

 
 
And then I glue it in place. The angle of the light emphasizes the difference in thickness between the new plank and the previous one. This will require a lot of sanding to get the planks to match up. This the most extreme example of this so far--
 

 
 
With eight strakes to go, I'm just over halfway done with the hull planking.

 
 
February 2, 2010
 
 
Ship work is rather slow, just a small update here.

This plank I made from the wider stock, and roughly sanded it to a curved shape--
 

 

 

 

 
 
Here is a wet bow plank being clamped to dry, and a middle plank being glued--
 

 
 
And a shot of my work area. When I am able, I move some of this into the dining room next door, but sometimes I work right here. The rotary tool is the only power tool I've used (it's the only one I've got!), and up to this point just for sanding--
 
 

 
 
The drawing is the Chappelle plan from the Smithsonian Institution.
 
 
 
February 8, 2010
 
 
Planking continues slowly. I'm working now on closing the bow area, and then continuing aft. In this photo the gap at the stem looks narrower than it really is, but even so I think I need to shave a little off the planks there to make it just a little wider (about 1/32 wider, it's really pretty close to all right)--


 

 
 
 
February 11, 2010
 
 
Here are the last couple bow planks being installed.

First they are roughly sanded to shape, and dry fit--
 

 
 
Some more sanding, and they fit pretty well now--
 

 
 
After sanding just a bit more, and cutting them to the correct length, the paper caulking is glued on to the plank edges, and then the planks are glued in--
 

 
 
Then I did some overall sanding--
 

 

 
 
I'm on the planking home stretch now!
 
 
Ron

Hi Matti
 
That's a nice insight into your phyc mate.
 
I like your way of thinking.
 
Be Good
 
mobbsie

Thanks Chris for the kind words! Do you mean to to make the painted sculptures and surfaces more gritty and aged like on a ship thats been in use for long? Or to make them look like on Vasa in the way she looks now? I guees you mean the first so I answer that I made sci fi models earlier and learned alot from looking at how ILM modelshop (the guys who made the studiomodels for the original Starwars films) did their paint jobs and weathering in the days before computer generated effects. They could make plastic cups look like huge engine part just with a really great paint job. So looking at their models like the x-wing or Slave 1 and think through how they did it is worth a lot in my opinion. You also learn lots from looking at youtube videos about weathering models; military vehicles and figures often have amazing paint jobs and there are lots of videos of how they do it.
 
Weathering wood like the hull is quite hard and more unforgiving as you can't simply redo the paintjob like you can on plastics. A good tip is to have pictures of what you are trying to achieve with the paint job and think through what stages are needed. I find pictures of replicas like Batavia or Gotheborg to be great and I also look a lot at paintings by the artist Vroom. I sometimes take pics of a building or a train that looks interesting. Other models can also be good for this, and you can ask the builder how he did the paintjob. If you like my work then look at Franks HMAT supply and Nigels Royal Caroline both with really great paintjobs. I think we use different techniques so read their logs aswell. I think my main tip is not to try and make it perfect, the odd and quirky stuff often gives character, so I try and add stuff like that. Perfect is boring, drama is good.
 
About weathering a model of Vasa. Paintjobs usually comes down to artistic preference, what look you like and that's what you should do. But sometimes I hear the argument that a Vasa model should not be weathered and this is how I see it:
  
She was built outside during a period of two years. Two years is a long time for wood to stop looking all fresh cut. I had new cut wood starting to turn grey by laying in the sun and rain in one summer.
 
Vasa was tarred giving her a look far from a unpainted and unweathered model. I can definitely appreciate a natural looking model as it can be a nice look in it self, but it’s not the way the real ships looked.
 
Here is a picture of Gotheborg when she was launched. And she had been inside a building during the whole build.
 


 
It's easy to imagine she would have looked even more gritty if she'd been built and tarred outside.
 
A surface outside goes dirty quite quickly at least where I live. Dust and pollen will cover it and rain will make dirt runnings. Sun will blend colors,
 
Some weathering is in my opinion necessary if you want the model to look realistic and have a sense of scale. Washes is also a great way to blend the colors.
 
Finally a pic from the Vasa film. I share the way they imagined she would have looked in this scene:
 

 
Sorry for the long post, but I find this topic interesting.
 
 
/Matti
 
 

Made the last steps of the capstan work:
 

 
And how it turned out mounted to the ship:
 

 

 
The lighting outside was great for captuaring the paintjob so I snapped a few more.
 

 

 
 
/Matti