hexnut

Plugging away on the planking - here we have 9 rows done on both sides.
 
Seems to be going okay, the planks are very close to matched up at both the bow and stern. Just starting to hit the center line aft. Will have to decide very shortly (row 10) whether to have the stern "seam" herringbone or just butt joints on the centerline.

Let the planking begin.
As mentioned previously, in contravention of the instructions I am starting at the deck and working down, at least until that proves untenable as some of the build logs shift to the bulb as the sides approach the forefoot. Anyway, for now I have one row on the starboard side and three on the port. I started using only push pins but decided to use rubber bands amidships where I can get enough spacing between the pins to stretch the 3" rubber bands I bought. I will have to get more pins tomorrow as the 100 I bought don't seem able to do what I did on the port side on the starboard as well. It takes something like 40+ pins to cover the part shown in the pictures.
So far things seem to be going okay - I use wood glue (Titebond Original) on the balsa filler and thick CA on the frames. I have the wood glue in a squeeze bottle with a .025 tip which seems to put out enough glue to bond without lots to clean up.
 
I built a guide out of spare balsa for beveling the bottom side of the planks to get a better fit. I used the disk sander to put a bevel on the balsa the cut a slot with the table saw ab out half the width of the plank then covered the edge of the balsa with tape to keep from sanding it as well as the plank. With the plank in the slot I use a sanding stick to bevel the exposed plank edge. I mark the plnk ahead of time so I know which side goes where - I don't want the bevel on the outside - don't ask me how I know. Here are two pictures if anyone is interested.
 
I also finished the other two pieces of deck furniture with yellow cedar roofs. So here are some pictures of them. I am working the rest of the deck furniture between plankings.
 
Some day I will figure out how to get the pictures in the correct order - but not today.

With the stern plank in place (I recognize that the stern plank is not in accordance with the plans, but I prefer this orientation and since the hull will be painted it really doesn't matter) I added the top plank on the port side. The instructions recommend starting at the keel bulge, but build logs on the site all started at the deck and worked down so I am following suit.
 
While waiting for the balsa to arrive and various things to dry I did complete the major deck house structure. As I mentioned earlier I decided to use Alaskan Cedar (same wood as will be used for the deck) for the roof of the deck structures that do not have windowed skylights. This includes four sections on the deckhouse (two on the sides, and two on the centerline). I glued up sections of 3/32 X 1/16 cedar planks to make the roofs. I also painted the cockpit cushions a buff color so they are similar to the roof color (the picture on the kit box cover shows red cushions).
 
Here is the first plank on the port side and a couple of views of the deckhouse.

I added three "tabs" and from 1 X 3 to the structure (wood screwed into the structure) to provide a way to hold the hull and mounted it in the three Bessey vices I used for the backbone board.
 
This gave me the access I needed to properly shape the bow. I took a good deal of effort to shape the plywood but I think I got it more or less correct. 
 
With the bow done I used a 7" sanding block with 80 grit paper to smooth out the transitions across the bulkheads, working to eliminate the high spots that I created with the filler blocks. I sanded until I got the laser burn off at least one side of each bulkhead. Both sides in areas where the hull is generally flat.
 
I have made my first pass and cleaned off the surface with paint thinner and am going to use a planking strip to see if what areas need more attention.

I found that with the backbone board in place, I could not get the bow shaped as it should be because the board will not allow me to get close enough to the bow. The fact that the bow "build up" is the same plywood as the other structure does not help either. Anyway, with the filler in place and glued to the structure I do  not think the backer is necessary any longer so I decided to remove it. All the screws came out okay and none of the CA I used to secure the filler blocks leaked somewhere inappropriate so the backbone board came off without incident.
I mounted the hull in two of the Bessey vices with towels wrapped around the keel while I sawed, and sanded (Dremel) off the areas where the filler blocks were obviously above the hull structure and would interfere with the deck. I then put the deck pieces on the the hull and checked every junction between the deck and the structure, marked those where the filler was too high and then corrected them.

I got the new balsa and completed filling in the other side of the hull. I may have violated the "better is the enemy of good enough" on this side as I used Bondo in a few places where my measuring was not up to snuff. Probably should have left well enough alone but...
 
So here is the hull structure with all the filler in place and sanded as each piece was put in place. I know that when using the belt/disc sander to shape the pieces I had a tendency to get the edges very close to the line taken from the model but the center tended to be bigger than necessary. I tried to correct this once the piece was installed on the hull but was not always completely successful. I am planning on taking care of these areas when all the filler is in place.

The additional balsa arrived and I finished the starboard (or is it the port) side. Now on to the other side.
 
While waiting for the balsa I started building the deck house. Here it is after three coats of gloss varnish but before the windows, roofs and cushions are installed. I am thinking about planking the roofs using Alaskan Yellow Cedar instead of the walnut panels and hull planking per the instructions. I think the lighter roofs (hopefully very similar to the eventual deck planking) will help make the deckhouse a little more noticeable.  Per the instructions the four roofs (two centerline and one on each side) are painted "mahogany", al;though the two centerline roofs are made of the same materiel as the deckhouse. I want the "mahogany" material finished in gloss (as you might expect it would be on a "yacht", even a racing one). I am looking through my wood supply to see if I have the correct material. FYI, the non-mahogany pieces are supports I added to make it easier to get the pieces together with 90 degree corners. The tabs supplied with the kit are only good up to a point. I am not sure if the lower parts of these will show when everything is put together so I may paint them a dark color just before attaching the deckhouse to the hull.
 
I have two of the three coats of Wipe-on-Poly on the mast, one m ore coat and it will be ready for pictures.
 
Sso here is the one side of the hull and a few pictures of the deckhouse.

I have run out of balsa, used four 2" X 4" X 12" blocks and got most of one side filled in. More balsa is on the way (from National Balsa in Massachusetts) but given the hurricane I am not sure when it will get here. In the mean time I decided to start assembling the mast.
 
I decided that a round mast was just not that interesting. The kit provides six pieces of half-round wood to assemble the mast. Three really long ones and three short ones. I decided to try for an oval shape by flattening one side of each half-round piece. I started assembly with one short one and one long one per the instructions.
 
Here is a picture of the hull and some of the sanding sticks and tubes that I used to form the balsa to the hull profile.
 
Also the beginning of the mast (which will be close to five feet long when fully assembled). Should be a real project to taper something that long. Youn can see the flattened side starting at the upper black clamp. I will have to complete the flattening where it transitions to full round as it goes through the deck.

With the structure firmly mounted on the strong back I added three 3" X 1.5" tabs to the underside and used three Bessey vices to hold the structure to the top of then workbench.
 
I decided against including the centerboard so fabricated some reinforcements to maintain the underwater profile. I added one in front of the rudder post just for completeness (the kit leaves that area open.
 
Now the messy part, creating the Fillers from balsa wood. I discarded the kit provided pieces for the counter filler and used balsam for that as well. It is slow going and generates a lot of saw dust. I use the Model Machines disc sander, Dremel drum and 80 grit sanding sticks. Here is what I accomplished this afternoon.

More work completed on the main cabin...amazing how the camera picks up all of the imperfections!  Ah well, certainly worth the time...
FYI...it’s only put together for the picture

Rub rails complete!

So instead of using the card stock image for the exterior of the pilot house and main cabin I decided to drive myself nuts and use the smallest of wood possible...
i happen to think it looks so much better.


 
I also installed the remainder of the rub rails.  

Some promotions lol and here’s a picture of a visitor from my backyard today!

Had some fun installing the bulwark stancions...eyes crossed now lol I also cut the scuppers in so that was fun!  And since this is not a real ship anyways I’m doing a little modification regarding where the rub rails go...to be continued.

Did the rear rub rail, and installing a catboat style stempost.

I’ve decided to make my own decking by scribing...any ideas about the best way to highlight the seams? Also how should I get rid of the fuzz?

Made some head way on the bulwarks...thinned them more and started fitting the decking.  
 
I got the bow way nicer then yesterday.  I am struggling matching the cabin with the deck since it is not flat.  Wish the had a template for it.  Trying to match the prints to my best ability.

I found some wonderful pictures online of similar tugs so I’m going to try and do better with the details, however I can’t get over the cast fittings in this kit!  The plans lack dimension and detail like spacing of bulwark supports, distance off the deck the grating is, etc.  I am thinking about drilling the holes out between the grating rather then painting them black, what do you think?

Thinned my bulwarks.  Wasn’t too bad with the Dremel I have.  I did 1/16”, couldn’t imagine doing 1/32” as the kit says would be correct scale.  

Is it wrong to have three logs at once?  Another solid hull to keep me occupied while my other boats are drying, or waiting for something.  No rigging and I think this one will be fun.  Surprised there are no logs for this boat, perhaps there is a reason?  For the low sale price of $39.99 the castings are really nice and the is vastly improved I believe since the cabin is now laser cut and not a solid chunk of wood.  
 
I sanded some some of the hull and I’m hoping this will be good practice for the thin bulwarks my phantom requires.

So here are some internet color photos that seem to corroborate the color I've got at least for the newly-applied deck stain.  Given that Gambier Bay survived less than a year after her commissioning, and after doing a bunch of ferry service delivering aircraft to Enterprise and others only really saw about 6 months of action prior to being lost in the Battle of Samar, it's probably not realistic to show her deck as extremely weathered.  I'll have to decide how much I want to try to do and how.  It's a large area.  Maybe with a large soft brush I could do some very light dry-brushing to reflect worn stain - probably light gray paint since exposed wood would likely bleach gray really fast in that environment.  Plus the photo of the Dauntless is a great one - need to hang on to that as I have a 1/48 Tamiya Dauntless in my kit stash somewhere...

So some additional progress today, but I'm not 100% happy.  The photos below show the dazzle camo scheme mostly done.  Even though I lightened the Ocean Gray and the Black with 10% white, I wish I had done much more, maybe 25%.  They still look too dark for that "huge object, far away" atmospheric fading effect.  But I'm not redoing it at this point - file for next time.  I was not happy with the location of the edge of the antifouling red as I originally painted it, so oversprayed with black and will come back next time and re-mask and re-spray the red.
 
What is more of a quandary for me is the deck blue.  I used Hasegawa's recommended mix (50/50 Navy Blue / Dark Gray) and lightened it with 10% White.  It looks much too dark to me, and not blue enough.  What do others think?  If I am going to change it, it has to be now, before I start hand-painting all the other tiny bits of deck surface around the gun mounts, sponsons, etc.  I'm thinking adding a bit of medium blue and a fair amount of white to it.
 

After a week plus of crazy work travel and no time for models, this weekend I got a start on the splinter camoflage scheme.  I used the kit paper templates by cutting them out and using 2-sided tape to stick them to masking tape, then stick the masking tape to the model.  This worked kind of OK, but after the third color (so far I've done light gray, gray, and ocean gray in that order) the masks were starting to lift and not stick back down.  So I pulled them all.  Next weekend (the week will again be crazy with travel and a board of directors meeting) I will carefully mask just the areas that need to be black (I will use very dark gray) and paint them.  Then do a LOT of touching up.

Got the gun decks installed; there was the same small gap requiring a bit of Evergreen sheet to close it on the starboard side.  Also dealt with the extra deep seam between the deck halves.  All that remains here before it is ready to paint is to complete installing the little cantilever supports under the larger gun tubs that house the 40mm guns.  All of the guns, liferafts, and PE railings will be built and painted separately before installation.  I will need to work out how I'm going to hold especially those tiny 20mm guns to install the PE bits and paint them.

Built the sides of the main deck - for some reason there was a small gap amidships only on one side - took a little bit of Evergreen to fill it.  First photo shows it test-fit onto the hull.  It is snug, but it goes on.  Gun tubs will be next.  Also got the sponsons (Thanks for that bit of terminology Bob) faired in smoothly today.