JerryTodd

A set of beams was installed forward of the fin trunk, to hold the battery. It will lie flat, as low as possible, and be held by Velcro tabs. The focs'le hatch on the real boat was different than the plans, it was much taller with a hinged lid. I used the same wood used in the other hatch coamings and built it up in three layers, log cabin style. I had some notion of putting something up here, like an on/off switch, but I doubt that'll happen. None-the-less, I made a hinged lid and a hole in the subdeck. In side the cabin hatch, I put in brackets to carry an aircraft plywood shelf for the rudder servo to mount in. It's held by screws and will be removable for servicing. The parts for the prop shaft and motor couplings came in Which meant drilling a hole in the stern post for it. This was done with a long 3/16" bit, over sized so the brass tube "stuffing box" can be adjusted and surrounded by epoxy. This is yet another thing that ought to have been done to the keel while it could lie flat, before it was placed on the forms. JB Weld was added inside to ooze into any nooks and crannies the epoxy missed. Another ordered part arrived - a rheostat type speed controller, with forward and reverse. This is operated by a micro servo, so I made up a mount to handle it. It was fitted inside the cabin hatch on a beam that also serves as a stuffing box support, painted with that red spray paint, and fixed in place.

The counter frames went in, showing why I had to trim down the stern post a while back. An oak block was glued in where the rudder tube would go in, to strengthen this area, and a slightly over sized hole drilled through it and the counter. A brass tube was epoxied in with JB Weld. A brass rrod taped to the sternpost behind a spacer made sure everything set up in proper alignment. The rudder was cut from polycarbonate (Plexiglas) and given a brass rod rudder post that was glued and drifted to it with smaller brass rods. A copper plate was cut to size with 4 holes; two for mounting, and two that are tapped for mounting the gudgeon plate. This plate was inset into the boats heel, epoxied and screwed in place. This way water can't seep into the plywood keel because every hole in the hull is lined with epoxy. The gudgeon plate is attached with brass machine screws and is removable. The rudder post slide up through the rudder tube at the counter. The tiller collar will hold it from falling out, the tube keeps it from sliding further up. The gudgeon plate holds the heel of the rudder to the hull and serves as the lower hinge point against the forces the rudder will encounter. Removing the rudder entails removing the gudgeon plate and the tiller, then the rudder drops right out. The visible area around the rudder hole was painted black and the counter planked up with bass sheet. All the wood framing here was painted in epoxy, and each plank was painted with epoxy onit's under side to make sure moisture inside here wouldn't get into the wood. Later this was primed and transom knees were installed. Using bass sheet again, I built the cabin trunk, the visible part that is in essence, a lid. It's details, molding, skylight, compass box, hatch, etc; were all made from the wood of the Pride's top mast I was given earlier. Looking at one of my pictures where the cabin can be seen, I think this wood worked out fairly well for this application. It wasn't strong enough for anything else, like the tiller. I used that "might-be-mahogany" wood used on the bits to make the hatch coamings. I also used it to make the tiller. You may have noticed there is no space to speak of inside the counter where I could hide control linkages for the steering. Instead I'll actually be using the tiller to steer the model, so it will have to have some strength.

I'm a bit late chiming in here, but I have a great deal of data on the sloop of war Constellation, and if someone is of a mind to turn this kit into something of value, I would be happy to share my data with them. I can't speak to the idiosyncrasies of this kit, as mine is a scratch build, but if you're going this route, it's only a kit up to the gunports and it's scratch from there up. Constellation 1871

You plank it up, then cut the ports, thusly:

It's your boat.

The subdeck's underside will get painted with epoxy which will seal it as well as glue it to the deck beams. A layer of 1/32" bass strips about 1/4" wide will serve as the deck planking. It will be died a combination of stains to approximate the color of Prides original decking. These will be set in slow-cure epoxy when the time comes. All that's a ways off yet, as there's still things to be done in the hull before the deck can go on... For instance, the access hatch has to be framed and cut out. A pair of posts were put in near the mast partners between the deck beams and the keel - these are compression posts and should help prevent deformation of the deck, just in case. The motor mount frame was painted and the mounting plate was painted with the red spray paint from earlier. It was then epoxied into the hull. I was volunteering at the Naval Academy Museum model shop and once night one of the other fellas brought in a handful of splinters. Seems the Pride had her fore-top-mast replaced at Richardson's Yard in Maryland and these pieces came from the old spar. That means they were on the boat when I was. Now to figure out how to incorporate them into the model. The bitts were made from some dunnage found on a dock that looks like it may be some sort of mahogany. It's hard and it matches the color of the originals pretty well. Note the subdeck is marked with locations of deck objects, such as hatches. On the access hatch is the scale main hatchway - which obviouslt wouldn't have been large enough for the model. On the right of the photo is the engine room hatch. The small rectangle on the left of the deck in a box that the galley stack pokes out of. The fellow standing there is me, in 1:20 scale. It's a picture of me from about a year before my time on Pride and serves to show scale in the photos. The hatchway marked in the right photo is the focs'le hatch.

From the smell of them, I thought the old model's rigging was tarred just like their prototypical counterparts - they always smell like Stockholm tar to me.

So, once more in go the clamps. This time, making sure I measure from the right point, I used a different approach. I laid in two layers of 1/8" thick strips, then installed the deck beams - now recut thinner - butted to the clamp. Another layer of 1/8" strip was installed between each beam. Mast partners were installed, then framing for the main cabin and the access hatch. The access hatch doesn't correspond to any hatch actually on the boat - none of them was large enough at this scale to give me the access inside I needed. The inner cabin trunk is framed from 1/8" plywood that came from a cigar box, or something like that. This isn't the cabin you'll see, but an inner sleve the outer cabin trunk will slide over, like a box lid. This will help keep out water. Card stock was used to lay out the deck and make a pattern. The sub deck was cut from 3/16" luan plywood. It was kerfed underneath to help it flex in two directions; sheer and camber. After giving the top strake a coat of black, I started marking the spar plan with 1:20 scale dimensions in preparation of making the spars. I made a mounting plate for the motor from an electrical box cover plate. The motor came from an old cordless drill. I was getting concerned that a section of bulwark might get broken off by some big clumsy oaf, like me, so I put a rail on to connect it all. This isn't the finish cap rail, but more of a structural member. This rail will actually be in two parts. This part is the inner part mounted flush with the outboard side of the hull. It's glued and trenailed (wooden toothpicks) into the top of the planking. An outer part will be applied later, bring the rail to it's correct width. And some more paint.

Fortunately when I got the plans from Gilmer, I got the full set with structural details, especially a cross section of the structure; because it's not at all easy to tell where the top of the deck is. This apparently was a problem found by some company doing flooding analysis on her, they were given a profile and not knowing where the deck was, calculated to the top of the rail. As it is, the top of the deck is level with the top of the wale, which was the next piece to be installed. I had a length of screen molding we used as a batten, or spline, when laying out Mark's skiff on the plywood. It was precisely the width of the model's wales. With the wales on, the prop notch cut, and the dagger board trunk installed, hull was ready to get some paint. First, a coat of primer. Then I found some spray paint that pretty closely matched the color of Pride's bottom paint I thought I had a picture of Pride out of the water where the color of her bottom could be seen, but nearly all my shots of her hauled out are black & white newspaper photos. This image is from 1980 and you can see a little of her bottom color. I hand painted some flat black above the waterline. The wale widens forward at the hawse pipes, this was installed next, but I'm not drilling the hawse holes yet. Again, referring to the cross-section, the top of the deck extends to the top of the wale. This is capped with a waterway log, which itself has a cap. There's light planking above this to the cap rail. The portion of the waterway cap that's exposed outboard forms something of a channel down the boat's side, and this part of the cap is painted red. I cut some 1/16" square strips and sanded them 1/2 round. This was applied to the outside of the hull to represent the outboard portion of the waterway cap rail. At the top of this channel between the wale and the waterway cap, snugged up under the cap are the channels. This were more white pine, thicker at the hull and tapered to about half their thickness outboard. One was installed. Looking back, I'm not sure why I only did one, but Some black paint touched up the faux waterway rail and the channel below it. Then put a coat of white on the bulwarks, and cut the gunports. The wing transoms and fashion pieces were fabricated and installed, and the facny piece and moldings on the transom.. Something didn't look right with the deck clamp, and upon investigation, I found it was off at the bow and stern. It was too well attached to just detach and move, so I pulled it out completely. Had I installed the wale first, I could have more accurately gauged where to install the deck clamp (minus the thickness of the plywood sub-deck and decking). Finding a small container of red paint turned out to be a challenge. I wound up with a $2 can of spray paint and proceeded to paint the waterway cap. Finally, the rest of the channels were installed. And everything painted

With the hull glassed, I began to install the deck clamps. These were of the same pine used to plank the hull, only 3/8" wide and 1/8" thick. One later was epoxied to the hull. The placement of the deck beams was determined based oh hatch locations, mast partners, etc. While my friend Mark was building his skiff outside the shop, I put some of his leftover epoxy into the bilge of Pride's hull to fill crevasses, seal, and strengthen the garboard area. There are things that should be done to the keel while it's still just a flat piece of wood, and before it's a permanent part of the hull. Cutting the cut-out for the propeller is one such thing. I wasn't sure how I was going to attach the external ballast until I saw some Newfie schooner models as big as Pride that used a simple fin with about 15-20 pounds of lead in a bulb. Going with the idea, I started building a dagger-board box for the fin to slip in to. The sides are 3/16 luan plywood, glassed on the inside faces, with a pine separator epoxied on fore and aft. The remaining portion of the aluminum sheet I cut Constellation's yard trusses from will be the fin. This oscillating tool I got from Harbor Freight for $10 made quick work of cutting the hole for the trunk to fit in to. This, of course, is another thing that should be done to the keel before it's part of the hull. Portions of the form at that station became internal braces for the dagger-board trunk. They would be epoxied in. The trunk was itself epoxied in. After sanding, some glass cloth was laid over it to fair it into the hull and the keel. Anything not covered with cloth was painted with resin. The trunk got a cap from a bit of cherry I had around and a motor mount was fashioned from one of the forms. A hole was drilled at the center of the trunk along the keel and a brass tube was epoxied into it. When it set, I cut the tub flush inside and outside. A matching hole was drilled in the fin, where a brass machine screw and nut would hold the fin to the boat. The tube protects and seals the end grain of the trunks plywood where the screw will go through. I began to fit the deck beams, but these seem thicker than they need to be. They're like this on Constellation, but there's a lot more head-room inside Constellation compared to Pride where space is at a premium.

I do need to build a pram to chase them around in.

I don't think I have more than $200 invested in her yet. Her keel was some scrap 3/8" CDX plywood, as were her forms. Her planking was from some left over white pine 1-by-something "shelving board" my step-dad called it. The sails were a couple of yards of Supplex for $10-15. The radio was bought on ebay for about $100 and I have multiple receivers so I can run any one of the three models with the one transmitter. The servos were the expensive part at about $100 for the set of them. There's some glue, polyester resin and glass cloth - but no great quantities, and the single gallon of resin has served three models so far. Paint, but again, not any great quantities. I'm a Scottish Jew, pinching pennies is in my blood.

Pride in the Pacific 1982 In late 1976 I got a job as a laborer on a construction site in Baltimore's Inner Harbor. At the site they were building a Baltimore Clipper schooner named Pride of Baltimore. Pride under construction in November 1976, just about when I started there. Five years later, on my 21st birthday, I reported on board as Pride's newest crew member. I spent two months aboard the boat in charge of her guns as she took part in the bicentennial reenactment of the battle of Yorktown. Yours truly is at the top right, in the cocked hat. A summary history of the boat is available at my site, as is an album of the few photos taken during my time aboard. In 1982 I acquired a copy of her plans from Thomas Gilmer with the intent to build a sailing model, but I was young, moved around a lot and it just never happened. In November of 2011 I got to seriously thinking about actually building a model of Pride and figuring out what size to make her. The upper limit was as large, overall, as Constellation, but there was a lower limit also. I tried scaling her the same as Constellation (1:36), but looking at what she would need in terms of batteries, winches, servos, etc; I didn't see how I could fit the equipment needed to control so complicated a rig. I decided to make her 1:20 scale, as large as I could and still stuff her into a van or SUV. With her lines scanned and scaled up I printed her stations on paper. There were glued to 3/8" CDX plywood, cut out, sanded, etc, and stood up on the old building board Constellation was built on. A work in progress: every item I draw in scale gets added to this plan. There they stood for nearly a year. On November 19, 2011 I cut out the keel, mounted it on the forms and began planking. I learned my lesson on Constellation and fully planked the hull, but I taped the edges of the forms so the planking wouldn't be glued to them, and they could be removed - leaving me with full access to the very limited space. The hull was planked in pine strips 1/8 thick and 1/4" wide. They were glued to each other, but only pinned to the forms. The pins were akin to half-length straight pins and bent at the slightest look, making planking extremely tedious and hard on the fingers. I wasn't doing the next one that way. I also didn't spiel the planks, but just laid them on from the keel up, and the sheer down, leaving that football shaped hole to fill. The hull being glassed and painted, it wasn't an issue visually, except that it bother's me constantly. I'm not doing that again either. By Halloween, the hull was planked. The hull was filled, sanded, filled, and sanded some more. The aft-most form with the counter and transom forms was given a tap with the handle of a screw-driver and came right out. Soon the other forms followed, leaving the hull open. The inside was sanded and then painted with diluted Tightbond III to get into the nooks and crannies of the planking and glue everything up. It was then given two coats of poly resin. The stern post was too tall, a sign of advanced planning. I cut it down with a rotary tool - you'll see why later. The stern and then the sides were fiberglassed with 4 oz cloth. Pride's plan compared to Macedonian's The concept I restarted the build logs for Constellation and Macedonian that were lost in the crash. There never was a build log for this model on MSW, but, what the heck, there is now.

Stern Windows Further back, I posted a drawing of the ship in drydock in Boston Navy Yard (Charlestown) in 1859. Now I took another step toward that image. I had cut out the stern ports back when I cut all the ports to install the resin gunport lids, but I didn't cut all the way through. I thought I would just install the window frames into this recess, but the fiberglass matt surface just wouldn't get smooth. So I cut out a port and made a window frame to install from inside the hull. That looked like it would work, so I cut the rest of the ports, made more windows, epoxied everything in place, painted everything and Constellation no longer had a blank face, er, rear end. The "glass" portions of the windows will get several coats of clear gloss. I didn't use glass because there's noting to see through them and I didn't see the point. Medalions Since she was built, to this day, Constellation has had three fiery star medallions on her stern; her constellation of stars; one in the center and one each on the backs of the quarter galleries. So far as I've been able to determine, these medallions are the original set she had when she was launched. I tried carving one in Sculpty, but it was too bulky and thick. I had a little boxwood left over from a carronade I made for the Hornet project and remembering how nice it was to work with, I tried a different approach. I sliced off a slab of the boxwood and cut and carved the star. This was mounted on a sheet styrene backboard. Already it's looking better than the first attempt. Bit by bit, I added details carved in styrene sheet. When it was done, I primed it and then mashed it into some clay three times, poured a little resin in, and a few minutes later I had three pads of butter that looked like Constellation's medallions. These were trimmed, sanded a little, washed, degreased, and primed. The raised details were painted gold... The background was painted midnight blue. I examined the oldest photos where I could see these on Constellation and felt that there was a color difference there. Looking at common depictions of stars, comets, and shooting stars in period art and carvings, it seemed fairly typical to make celestial objects gold on dark blue backgrounds - so that's what I did. The medallions were then given a couple of clear coats and then epoxied onto the stern. As I mentioned on the chainplates, I decided to use wood screws to attach them to the hull, rather than through bolt them. To that end, I epoxied strips of oak inside the hull to give the screws something to screw into. I also put some fiberglass over the inside of the stern windows to make sure things were sealed up tight. looking aft from inside the hull. As of this date, this is where the model stands on top of a cabinet in a living room, waiting for the shop to get put together so work can resume.

A working model without a crew, to me, looks odd. I'm not modeling the Marie Celeste, but, in fact, a warship, which tend to have pretty large crews. Constellation had a complement of some 20 officers, 220 sailors, and 45 marines. I don't intend to include all of them, but there will be some 30-40 figures visible, especially around the pivot guns. First, I have to determine what Officers, sailors and Marines looked like in 1856. The simplest are the Marines as I have reenacting buddies that do Marines of that period. Officers I haven't nailed down yet, and sailors are a bit like these fellows, except I've seen these boys IDed as both US and British Man-o-War men. It's hard to find images of US sailors in the mid-1850's, except some Japanese art from Perry's visit. I though the plethora of 1:35 scale military figures would make finding something I could convert easy - far from it. The closest I've managed are some WWII Russian sailors, but it was $5 for the set and I should be able to get a couple of basic figures to take a mold off of and clone a crew from them. From this I assembled one fellow you've seen in several images above to help represent scale, I call him "Ivan." He was painted with acrylics per the method found on the web site.

Thank you for the kind words. When I started this project the Internet was pretty new, to me at least, and it wasn't easy finding information, or other people doing such things. Since then I've come across a bevy of wonderful models. Some aren't much up close, but beautiful under sail, while some just boggle the mind at any distance. Victor, who built the Royal William mentioned earlier, built a Victory some years before, same 1;36 scale I think. "Bill Huizing (pronounced Hy-zing) of Summit, New Jersey in 2009 completed an utterly magnificent RC model of the Charles W Morgan whaler seen by visitors to Mystic Seaport." quoted from Mark Steel's column in DuckWorks Bill doesn't do the Internet" built the 1:24 scale Charles W Morgan I think you'll appreciate. There was a YouTube video of it sailing, but it's become "private" sorry folks, it was something to watch it sailing about in Mystic Harbor, a harbor I've sailed about in myself a few times. This little fella from Down-unda built himself the bark Sindia - now that's impressive - he can nearly get in it and sail it himself! The sailing and static pictures are all very nice, but I tend to go looking for the shots that show the guts, how they handled control, and how they transport these beauties! Guess I'm just an RC square-rigger geek.

Now we come to the chainplates. I was initially going to bolt them through the hull, and that requiring access inside the hull, would delay getting the deck on, which, in turn, delays getting on the deck details and hammock rails, etc, ie: finishing the darn thing. Instead of bolting them, I will use brass wood screws into an oak backer inside to attach them to the hull. I feel this will have the required strength and allow them to be removed, if need be, for repair or replacement. Riveting them, as the originals are, would be too much trouble to deal with at this scale. Constellation's chain-plates consist of five basic parts A strop that wraps around the lower dead-eye and bolts to... a link strap that lays against the channel and is connected to... an oblong iron link that is connected to... another link that's shaped like a bent exclamation mark (I call it the "pinched-link,") and pinned to the hull by a... dog-bone shaped, half-round, iron backing-link that is riveted to the hull and spreads the load. The ship appears to have retained her chain-plates through the years. What's on the ship today appears to be the same as the earliest photos where they can be discerned. I'm reasonably certain what's visible in the 1914 photo is correct for 1856 - and unable to find evidence to the contrary - that's what I'm going with. I'm making the chainplates from brass sheet and rod in the same layout as the originals. This way they should function well enough for the model while looking correct, and to scale. It's times like this I wish I could manage some photo-etching so I could make a whole pile of the link-strap (#2) at once - they really are quite a pain to make. The pinchlink isn't too bad; I wrap it between two pins in a block and literally pinch it. Soldering I do with soldering paste and a micro torch. They will be painted, but I blacken them to give them a sort of primer coat first. I haven't had much luck making the strop. The real ones are doubled iron rod, but brass rod small enough to double doesn't like being soldiered. I plan to try it with a soldering iron and see if that works better than the torch. The backing link is a half round piece of iron with the flat against the hull. I haven't figured out my approach to this part yet, though it would be nice to PE a whole set of them and be done with it. So far I have 46 each of parts 2, 3, and 4 shaped and waiting to be soldiered.

Constellation was originally fitted with two 10" shell guns mounted on the spar deck and designed to pivot. They can be seen in deSimone's 1856 portrait of her at Naples. Her bulwarks where the guns were mounted, were made into panels that could hinge down, out of the way as seen in the sketch of her stern in 1859, and a photo of the bow portion which she retained right up into the mid 1950's, when she was brought to Baltimore. The stern portion were reduced so only the panels at the quarters remained, and then at some point they were removed entirely and a "solid" bulwark installed. Some of the bronze hinges for these panels still exist, though the ones for the stern are long gone and many for the bow are missing. The guns themselves were mounted on carriages that slid on a chassis that could be pivoted on either end, or in the center. Iron tracks were screwed on the deck to keep the chassis from tearing it up. What pattern these tracks were laid in I've yet to discover. The restoration folks say that somewhere they're referred to as "circles," but I've read accounts from the Kearsarge that refer to them as "circles" or "traverse circles " where photos of her deck show something more complex than a simple circle, but more akin to what's seen on this model of the sloop of war Savannah, razeed from a frigate. In fact, manuals printed prior to the Civil War are, I believe, much closer to what Constellation probably had: I actually started making these guns before work resumed on the model in 2009. I didn't have a lathe yet, and tried turning a barrel on my drill press, which didn't turn out well. My friend Dan, following my build on RCGroups, offered to turn a barrel for me and sent me a lovely piece of work. I fined it up and added some details to it, then made a rubber mold and a resin casting. The mold got bubbles in it and the casting came out looking like the gun was recovered from the bottom of the ocean. I'll have to come back to that experiment at some point. The chassis for my carriage was a modified version of the plan I acquired from the Archives for the steamer Mississippi's guns. At the time I was under the assumption that rollers were required at either end to function on a single circular track. The manuals, showing the exact same chassis, show that is not the case - so these will be rebuilt, or replaced, with correct ones at some point. These guns were replaced with a pair of Parrot Rifles at the start of the Civil War; a 30 pounder forward, and a 20 pounder aft, both on mounts very similar to those of the 10" shell guns. Plans for these mounts are also available at the National Archives, and are what the restoration people are hoping to install someday. They already have a 20 pounder Parrot tube on board mounted on an ordinary truck carriage. Note the size of the 20 Parrot compared to the model shell gun as compared to the men.

I like the poats too They're a fun side project and I'm looking forward to completing these and getting the rest built. I've got as many to build for Macedonian; a Zodiac and a boat for Pride of Baltimore; and Gazela Primeiro will have a few dory's stacked on deck - it's almost a hobby unto itself.

A few more gunports were cut out, some stern windows, and holes drilled in the rest of the ports (I cut them starting with a drilled hole). I'm real careful cutting out these gunports as what's left will be the finished product and I don't want to screw it up - that's why it's been a bit slow - I only do maybe 4 at a time. My situation hasn't changed, I'm still trying to stuff 20 pounds into two 5 pound bags, but I have made some progress. Then a pipe broke in the house I'm moving out of and it rained into my basement, which was my "office" and living room. I had already moved a lot out, like my wargames and books, but some things got damaged, and few things destroyed. and this is after some clean-up took place. The models had been moved some time before, along with supplies, tools, etc. Some of my plans got wet, but I managed to save them. A couple I had printed on the plotter were lost, but I can reprint those. safe in their new home My shop, which is officially known as has been moved to a 13 x 20 garage and needs to be organized and set up, which will mostly involve running adequet electricity. There's 88 square feet less floor space in the new place, but it's got a good concrete floor and all my tools and benches are, or will be on wheels. The first project will be a proper dust collection system since the place is attached to the house, my lady would appreciate it if I didn't track sawdust everywhere. It'll be nice this winter when I won't have to trudge 20 feet through the snow to go the the loo, just go in the door and there it is. So, this brings the log up to current, as of the first week of September 2013. When work resumes, Macedonian will get her remaining gunports cut out, and then internal framing around each will be installed. Moldings will be applied to the hull and the quarter deck and focs'l ports will be cut out. Then, I think, she'll be ready for some paint. In the mean time, I'll edit some of the posts above to fix omissions, and my fat-fingering of the keyboard, to try to get it as complete as possible. I would appreciate any questions or advice any one might have about my approach to a large scale remote-controlled square-rigger, up to this point, at least. There's a lot of challenges ahead on this thing and controlling the squares is actually the least of them. The fore-n-aft sails that over-lap and cross over stays are more of a challenge. The figurehead and other ornamental items will, for me, be as much of a challenge. I'm completely broke, so getting fancy tools, photo-etching, 3d printing, and quality woods like boxwood, is pretty much out of the question, so I have to make do with what I have at hand and the skills I can muster.

Ship's Boats In September (2010) I got a copy of the lines for Constellation's boats from the National Archives in Silver Spring, Maryland. I cannot convey the feeling you get holding an original document dated 1854 in your hand. To look at the erasure marks, and handwriting, and all the details put on this paper 156 years before. The archives actually scanned them for me and I also got a paper copy. They're drawn in 1:12 scale (1"=1') and only show the lines, no construction details, hardware, seat arrangements, etc; but they are, specifically, Constellation's boats. <= Constellation's boats in 1856 by deSimone. Again, I sifted through MSW to see how other built their boats, and found a variation on a common theme in Gene Bodnar's thread on building a 1:32 scale Constitution in six sections. His boat's were about the same size, maybe a little bigger, as mine would be. <= Three of Gene's boats for Constitution. This method of building ships boats is basically the same way I build any model hull... There's 6 boats in all: a 31' launch, a 1st cutter of 28'7", a 2nd cutter of 25'10", two 26'6" quarter boats, and a 28'2" whaleboat, which I assume hung on the stern as there's no "stern boat" listed. All but the launch I believe to be clinker built. I decided to start with the 1st Cutter. It was the largest clinker built boat of the group. I produced patterns for all the boats and printed them on 8.5" x 11" label paper. Then I cut them out, peel them off, and stick them on the wood. The parts for the stern-post, keel, and stem was basswood (lime), but the forms were balsa. I used balsa because of the small size, ease of shaping, and I had several sheets of 1/8" sheet laying about. Also, when it came time to separate the model from the forms, balsa would offer the least resistance, and would give before a rib did if something stuck that shouldn't have. The forms were cut, trimmed, sanded, beveled, and glued to a building board. Each form got a rib bent over it made of 1/16" bass. These were held by rubber bands to the form. The transom, stern-post, keel, and stem were shaped, rabbeted, and bearded as required, glued together, then glued in place on the ribs. Planking of 1/32" bass sheet, commenced at the garboards, and proceeded up to the rails. Being clinker built, there's no other way to to do this but to spiel each plank and put them on in order. When the planking was complete, the stem and transom were cut loose of the build board and the boat was lifted off it's forms. The forms are actually at every other rib, so additional ribs were bent into the hull. Rub rails were glued on. Floor boards, oar notches cut, and seat clamps installed. Seats fitted. The model was painted, and more details added; meanwhile the largest of Constellation's boat took shape. The launch was carvel planked using the same set up used for the cutter; but the building board was made narrower so the form would over hang the sides. This allowed me to use rubber bands and clothespins as clamps where the build board was in the way before and prevented that on the cutter. The launch is a 30' boat with a coppered bottom and mounting a boat howitzer, with a whole structure for handling the gun inside. I "coppered" the bottom with peel and stick aluminum duct tape, which is sheet aluminum. I painted that copper with the paint I had painted Constellation's bottom with. The launch is ready for it's gun, but still needs some details, like the iron fittings the gun carriage attaches to, and the gun and both it's carriages. Both boats need things like seat knees, oars, rigs, etc - before they can be called complete. Next: Pivot Guns

Fiberglass With frames set in and the hull's shape stable, it was time to glass the outside. I started with the transom Then the portside Once that had set-up, it was on to the starboard side There, that wasn't so bad Excess resin went into the bilges and on the lower frames. After the glass set-up and was sanded, there were some blisters where the glass didn't lay and bond to the hull, these came off while sanding and were filled with auto-body putty. More sanding and another coat of resin brushed on, then sanding again. Some clean up and degreasing and it's... Wale Ho! On this model the wale isn't the structural member it is on a real ship, but I did want it done in an anchor-stock pattern as it would be visible on close inspection. I started by cutting a block of white pine, as used for the rest of the planking, to the offset anchor-stock shape, then slicing off 1/8" thick planks. I started on the starboard side by marking the positions of each plank on the hull from the bow aft, and actually started gluing them on amidships. I used CA to attach them to the hull, and Titebond III to glue them to each other. Clamping them to the hull took some thinking at places, as did clamping them to each other without lifting them off the hull. At the bow the pieces needed to be precurved, so the SBJ (Sophisticated Bending Jig) was employed. The pieces were wet, clamped in the jig, and left overnight. It took a little over a week, but the starboard wale was done. Now to the port side! I took a slightly different approach this time. Clamping the pieces to the hull was quite tedious, so I used the nails I used to hold the planking with during construction to hold the pieces onto the hull here. This made things go much quicker and smoother. Before starting though, I cut out a gunport just for fun. I was afraid the hull would flex with the ports cut out, but I need them cut before I frame up the hull thickness behind them, because that framing sets into the gunport opening a bit. Actually, the planking is set back creating a rabbet for the lid to close against. My friend Mark was building a crabbing skiff at my place, and while he had the epoxy out, I stole a bit to give the wales a couple of coats I then started carefully cutting out each gunport opening. Once all the gun ports are cut out along the gun deck, the internal framing will go in around each one, making the hull the right thickness as seen through the gunports. The focs'le and quarterdeck ports will be cut after they're framed and the external moldings have been installed.

Lines were rigged connected course yard to course yard the same distance from the center-line on each side of the model. Lines that would serve as braces ran from the main course yard ends to the quarters of the hull and to the springs on the post, and then to the winch. This way the winch would swing the main course yard and the connecting lines would move the fore and mizzen yards at the same time. This is not how the model will eventually be rigged for running, but it would do for a test sail. Video of Brace Testing The fids were pulled, the topmasts lowered, and batteries put on the chargers. The next day, July 10th, 2011, the model and it's equipment and accessories, were stuffed into the Tahoe. I took the model, and my lady who was to be the official videographer, supplied with camera and tripod, a quarter mile down the road to Sloop's Cove on Stoney Creek, where the neighborhood has a public pier and water access - such as it is. At the site I raised the rig, bolted on the ballast, and tested the systems. Getting her into the water, I placed the sandwich bags full of lead bird shot left over from the ballast torpedo and weighing about 12 pounds, into the hull and moved them about to trim her. There still wasn't enough weight to get her down the the LWL and she stood about 1-1/2 inches high in the water. Then off she sailed. And some of the video... It wasn't an unsuccessful day, but it was a bit disappointing. The winds were too light and variable, and in the creek there, they swirled and eddied about. The model never really got more than a few feet of any real sailing. When it would puff strong for a bit, she handled it fine, then it would shift and catch her aback. She also handled the occasional wakes from passing boats quite well. Then, about an hour in, the battery died. I later found it had failed completely and needed to be replaced. The model was near the middle of the 100 yard wide creek and headed toward a boat dock about 50 feet away from me. I went into the water and swam over to meet her. She gently bumped her forestay against the dock and stayed there till I got to her. I'm not much of a swimmer and quickly wished I had brought one of my floatation vests to make the job easier - but it was in the 90's and the water felt pretty good. Next time I'll have some form of chase boat; a kayak, inflatable, or preferably a pram I'll build. Note: That thing at the base of the mizzen is an on-board camera. It took some incredibly boring video. If I can get some editing software that will let me put it up split-screen fashion in sync with the other video, I'll post it somewhere. Video of the Recovery or how the big bald ape rescued the model ship from certain doom without himself drowning. Then it was out of the water, off with the ballast, down with the rig, and into the truck.

A brace was installed under the quarterdeck level to hold the curve in the transom. On Christmas day I found that St Nick hadn't sanded and resined the interior of the hull as I had hoped, so it fell to me to do it. It was sanded, cleaned, and given a couple of coats of poly resin. Excess resin was poured into the bilges to fill any nooks and crannies so small parts, dirt, and water would have no where to hide. A full size paper pattern of the gun ports, moldings, and other such hull details was made. Care was taken to use the plan to make sure items that were on surfaces curved away on the profile were in their proper place, such as the bridle ports. As I was cutting out the gunports on the pattern I realized I had formed a gunport lid; I couldn't resist doing them all that way. Macedonian is a little shorter than Constellation. Constellation compares in length to the frigate United States so you get a little bit of an idea of the size relation between Macedonian and United States. The build table was leveled, then the hull placed on it level port and starboard, and with the waterline marks fore-n-aft at the same height from the table. A pencil resting on a block of wood cut to the right length was used to mark the waterline. Approximately every-other station used to make the hull was cut down to scale framing dimensions and reinstalled into the hull. The reason for this is because the complex shape of the hull with it's tumble-home and counter tumble-home, was trying to flatten out. These frames are glued into the hull with epoxy mixed with wood dust.. The rest of the interior from the gun deck up, will get framing and ceiling planking to make the hull the proper thickness. Some idea of the size of the thing - 5 foot from tip-to-tip. Next: Fiberglass!

The 1854 sailplan shows 17 sails. There were stuns'ls, though they're not shown. The sails will be made from DuPont Supplex. Supplex is the sail cloth provided with the SC&H kits. It's strong, light, UV resistant, wrinkle resistant, and water resistant. It's typically used in wind-breakers and such garments. Besides, the appearance and performance experienced by my friends Dan Lewandowski and Victor Yancovitch on their models is a pretty good selling point Dan's 1:24 Syren (from an SC&H Grasshopper kit) *** I get Supplex from Rockywoods.com. I got white, but some might prefer the color they list as "Nomad." I think that used to be listed as "Wheat"and is the color used by Victor on his Royal William. Vic's scratchbuilt 1:36 Royal William Constellation will inevitably carry some 2,807.01 square inches (1.8 square meters) of sail, but for now I'm focusing on 5 sails; the jib, driver, and three tops'ls. (#'s 2, 6, 11, 15, & 14). One change I made to the sail plan was raising the clews of the heads'l a little to make it easier to pull them across the stays. Interestingly, this was done to the actual ship's heads'ls at some point as can be seen in the 1862 portrait of the ship. Each sail was drawn on paper full size, and cut from the cloth with a hem allowance added. All sail panels were drawn on with a .05 fine point permanent marker. Tablings were cut from the cloth and the edges heat sealed with a hot knife. These items were glued to the sail with Liquid Stitch fabric adhesive and ironed with a clothes iron. Holes were made for lacings, reef points, etc with the point of a hot soldiering iron, which makes a hole and seals it against runs at the same time. The hem was folded and glued, then folded and glued again and all ironed flat. Then came the bolt rope. This is nylon cord about 1/16" diameter. It's glued with fabric glue and stitched onto the sail as was done on the prototype, except I did a stitch about every three strands instead of every strand. Jib Fore tops'l main tops'l Driver Mizzen tops'l (on just cut main tops'l) All the sails were cut, all the heads'l were hemmed, but only the 5 needed were bolt-roped.