Yakatabune by RichardG - FINISHED - Woody Joe - Small

[GLakie]

It turned out splendid Richard. Your daughter will love it.

[Omega1234]

Hi Richard

 

What a beauty!  Nice. clean and precise work, which is a credit to you.  Your daughter's going to be really chuffed!

 

Cheers

 

Patrick

[gjdale]

Your daughter is a lucky girl indeed Richard. Simply lovely work. Well done Sir!

[Mahuna]

Very nice look - great job.  It also looks like a quality kit.

[catopower]

Beautiful work Richard! That's turned out to be a really nice looking model. I have one unstarted on the shelf. Seeing how wonderful yours looks is making me think I'm going to have to take it down and build it. Problem is that I can think of at least 4 people that I'd like to build one for...

 

By the way, I think leaving the laser char on this model actually works to your advantage. It's such a natural looking color that it makes a nice contrast with the very light colored wood, making the details stand out better. 

 

Funny that the instructions don't mention the ropes for the rudder. Good catch.

 

Clare

[RichardG]

Thanks George, Patrick, Grant, Frank, and Clare. And I really appreciate the likes as well.

 

This is such a great and supportive site!!

 

My daughter hasn't seen it yet, she wants to wait until it's complete. I have been passing on some of the comments but I had to explain what chuffed means .

 

And yes I agree with Clare, the laser char does improve the look.

 

All the best,

Richard

[Omega1234]

Hi Richard

 

Thanks!  I have to agree with you about MSW.  It's a great forum.

 

All the best.

 

Cheers

 

Patrick

Edited September 9, 2015 by Omega1234

[RichardG]

She's Complete   

 

 

Well it's only taken a month to get everything else done! Work and home projects + some fun things got in the way (but generally in a good way).

 

Lanterns

 

These are small laser cut dowels with colored paper strips wrapped around them. 

 

 

In the kit, there are 5 each side but I needed them to be fairly sturdy so I only put 4 on each side where there are supports. A very small peg (turned from a toothpick) was added for extra security.

 

 

Stand

 

I decided not to use the stand that came with the kit. I'm not putting the ship in a display case and it would be too easy to knock off a shelf (it only weighs a couple of ounces). I wanted a dark base to show off the boat but didn't want it to be overwhelming so I took a length off poplar about 10" x 2 1/2" then added a thin layer of walnut on the top. Some 1/4" sq wood on the bottom gives a slightly floating look. This was finished with a few coats of wipe on poly and the nameplate that came with the kit.

 

I wanted to be able to easily remove the boat from the stand so I decided to use some magnets I already had. In the bottom on the boat I added two 3/32 cube magnets and inserted 1/8" dia 3/4" long magnets about 1/4" into the stand. These are very strong neodymium magnets that easily hold the model even with a layer of wood between the magnets. I then sheathed the magnets in brass tube (to match the brass on the model).

 

 

Extras

 

The larger Yakatabune model has some rope work on the oar and rudder. Clare (catopower) very kindly supplied the details for this. I used some of Chuck's rope (bought for my other build).

 

This is the oar wrapping 

 

The larger model has a wooden cleat to hold the oar rope..

There was no way I could fabricate this so I used 2 pieces brass wire soldered together. This was then chemically blackened (another first for me).

 

The oar is not very secure so I added brass wire to the pivot point and glued it to the figure supplied with the kit (he also has brass wire added to his feet!).

 

There is also rope added to the rudder. This is how the stern looks.

 

 

Well that's all for now. I don't want to make the post too long and it's late here.

 

I'll post the details of the lighting and final thoughts later in the week.

 

Thanks for reading,

Richard.

 

[GLakie]

Very nicely done Richard. The extras add a bit of elegance to her. 

[GuntherMT]

Congratulations on winning finishing!

Nicely done, and a fine looking vessel.

[gjdale]

Congratulations on a fine build Richard. She looks fabulous!

[RichardG]

Lighting

 

I made a small wood base for the battery, lights, and switch to fit inside the cabin space, I didn't want any of it visible.

 

 

The LED's needed to be raised above the deck level. My first attempt was to used 1/8" sq basswood to make raised frames. Although it was fun making all the lap joints, the frames were clearly visible from the outside when the lights were on and looked pretty bad.

 

 

So I stopped for a while to try and think of a way to hold up some extremely small LED's. I found some small diameter clear plastic tube.

 

 

It's actually the ends from the inside tubes of a couple of ball-point pens.

 

The wire was threaded through a small hole in the side and the LED's fixed in place by a drop of glue at the top. The tubes were a perfect push-fit over a toothpick dowel. One dowel in the base and the other in a low frame over the battery holder. A little bit of pale yellow paint over the tubes to soften the light and some soldering of wires and it was all done.

 

 

The battery overhangs the edge to make it easy to pull out and the whole thing just slips into the deck well and the cabin goes over it. Nothing is fixed down.

 

 

This is how she looks.

 

 

 

Final Thoughts

 

My first wooden ship model is complete    .

 

I've really enjoyed this kit. It wasn't too difficult, was good value for money, and the instructions using just the pictures were fine. All the pieces were cleanly cut and fitted well. If you're a little heavy handed as I am, adding some support pieces is a good idea. I would also have left the side rails until the very end - you don't want to know how many times I fixed them!

 

I would definitely do another mini-kit as a gift and one of the larger ones is now on my to-do list (but there's 3 others in front so it'll be a while).

 

Again my thanks go to Clare for posting his excellent builds, pointing me to this kit, and for the help with the rigging.

 

Thanks also to the many kind responses and all the likes. And to Bob Riddich for his inspiring build of the Higaki Kaisen.

 

BTW, my daughter loves it  . 

 

I asked my other daughter (she's almost 11) if she wanted one. She said no, she wants me to make her a desk. This means I'm going have to get the big saws out!

 

All the best,

Richard

 

 

[GLakie]

Congrats Richard! That lighting is perfect. Not to overpowering, but still enough to show off that detail. I like that easy access to the battery too. Also, I knew your daughter would love it. 

 

Cheers

[gjdale]

Your daughter is a lucky girl Richard. The lighting looks great and adds a lovely finishing touch to a fine model. Well done, Sir!

[catopower]

Beautiful job on your Yakatabune, Richard! I love the way you built the lighting. 

 

Hey, I know what you mean about having to reattach the support rails. I had the same issue on my 1/24 scale version.

 

Congratulations!

Clare

[Keith_W]

Congratulations on finishing your ship! Really neat build for a first timer. You have something to teach us!