HMB Endeavour by Captain Slog - Caldercraft - 1:64

[Captain Slog]

Okay, here is another place holder more than anything.  I have been working on and off on the
Endeavour since mid 2010 I think  .

I get all enthusiastic and go hard for a bit then discouraged and leave it until my enthusiasm returns.  I was working on the remaining 3 ships boats before I got annoyed at myself as they weren’t turning out as well as I had
hoped.  Especially comparing them to a lot of other builder’s ships boats. I will get over them and continue in the near future though.

 

I included a picture of the Endeavour at its current state right now bearing in mind nothing is fixed to the deck as still a bit of
general man handling to finish the hull including painting the ‘white stuff’.

 

Cheers

Slog

 

[BANYAN]

Hi Slog,

 

Mate, looking good and don't worry - I have been on mine since 2006  

 

cheers

 

Pat 

[Guest midnight]

The Endeavour is looking great mate . I haven't touched mine for over 12 months , been busy with other things and building a new hobby room . 

 

 

Cheers Dave

[RGL]

Keep it up, I generally take months off at a time.

[Captain Slog]

Hi Guys,

 

Thanks for dropping by and the comments. 

 

I haven’t had much free time at all to work on my ships and the below is probably spread over 2 or 3 weeks, getting in a hour or so work now and then.

Decided to do the frame tops (?) and the hand rails as pretty quick to do but adds a lot to the look of the ship.

 

Cut out all the parts and cleaned them up and as can be seen put into little plastic box for storage for when I can work on them again.

 

 

Glued all the post tops and handrails posts into the capping rail.

 

 

I painted all the post tops, the sides of the posts and the undersides of the handrails whilst access was still good.

 

 

 

Then glued the hand rails in place and fill some pin holes.

 

Thats all for now.  Next time will get them painted up and on to something else.

Cheers

Slog

 

 

[ross]

this ones on my list,after i have finished the bounty,your build is looking excelent. keep up the good work,just a shame you cant start the log from the begining.

[Captain Slog]

Hi Ross,

Thanks for dropping by.  Do you have a log of your Bounty?

 

I would have done a refresher of my build log for MSW 2.0 but I had some kind of HDD failure back in October 2011 and lost all my photos up to that point.  Probably around a year and half’s worth from box opening to finishing the second planking. (thankfully recovered all the Admirals stuff but mine was lost)

 

I do have photos from sanding and filling the second layer to where I am today but I had a flick through them all and nothing exciting in there.  So I doubt I will post them back up unless someone asks a specific question and I have a photo to show.

 

 

I spent an hour or so in the shed to make a jig for an issue that was bugging me also because I will be close to marking the water line.

 

The photo below was how I used to secure the hull in the stand to get it level and plumb for marking on and measuring bits and pieces.  Basically it was aligning the hull and then securing it with masking tape to the supplied stand.  Two problems, I needed to remove the hull for working on it so had to go through the measuring position and taping secure each time and I was concerned about repeatability.

Secondly even if I didn’t need to remove the hull I didn’t like the tape being in place for any length of time as previously it had marked the hull which showed up after varnishing.

 

The new jig below lets me lift the hull in and out without worrying about positioning and repeatability.   The  jig to holds the keel and stem post level and plumb respectively.  I simply bought a sheet of 16mm MDF, 1800mm long by 300mm wide.

 

I chopped it into 3 lengths of 600mm giving me a few tries in case I messed up and being a lazy sod just left the full 300mm width.  I simply routed a channel down the middle a couple of millimetres deep.  I didn’t go any deeper as the curve of the hull would have then rested on the board; to keep it level the keel needs to sit in the bottom of the channel.

 

I then chopped a length off higher than the stem and screwed it to the end of the main board.  Ideally the vertical channel could have been deeper but did the channel in one length and since I didn’t have a bit the correct width of the channel I had to make repeated passes and didn’t want to upset the router setup.

 

Next up was the taffrail.  I cut stanchions from 3mm x 2mm stock as per the plans and after marking their position with tape I painted their edges before gluing to the bulwarks.  Once the glue was dried I glued the taffrail to the tops of the stanchions and the edges of the rough tree rail and held together with clothes pegs and some aluminium foil so the pegs didn’t stick to the rails.

 

One problem was that the geometry of the hull, stern and rough tree rails all appear to be out as the taffrail didn’t fit nicely either on the ends of the rough tree rails or between them and there appears to be a considerable gap to be filled. Not sure if other Caldercraft Endeavour builders had the same experience.

 

I cut some of the ply sheet which all the rails came from and used this to fill in the corners.  Again I used wood glue and the clothes pegs to hold in position.  Once sanded they blend in nicely and should disappear when painted.

 

 

Cheers

Slog

 

 

[BANYAN]

Nice clean work Slog; looking very good.  you will catch me before I know it, so I had better pick up my pace!

 

cheers

 

Pat

[Captain Slog]

Hi Pat, thanks for the kind words, but unfortunately no way will I catch you up.  I had a nice 4 day long weekend to do a fair bit but this will be my last update for a while. Don’t know when I will get a chance again.  

 

Okay still working on the handrail area I cut out all the swivel gun posts and then used the black cartridge paper supplied with the kit to do the iron banding.

 

I couldn’t decide if I should paint the posts black like most references/other builds or leave them natural.  In the end I decided to paint them and of course the iron banding virtually disappears.  

 

I then painted the sides of the posts before gluing to the hull so I didn’t need to worry about trying to get a good edge against the blue.  I used the  newly made hull holder jig thingy and a square to get the posts plumb and marked the position with tape and glued them up.

 

When I next get a chance to work on the model I will paint all the rough tree rails, swivel gun posts, rail stanchions etc black.  I must say doing all the little fiddly hull details etc for me is probably the most enjoyable part of the build so far.

 

Cheers

Slog

 

 

 

[Jeff-E]

Hi Slog,

Very nice work. I do like the stand you made for holding her square. I have just brought this model and hope to start it next year, maybe  , after I have finished the Norfolk and the Pickle.  

Cheers
Jeff  

[Timmo]

Hey slog. That's looking really good.

Are you still going to do white stuff below the water line? That timber hull looks quite nice as it is. I've read brown is the historically accurate hull colour but it's never sat well with me. I'm interested as the cc endeavour is on my must-build list one day, as it must be for many Antipodeans. You are doing a fantastic job and this is a log That might sway my next choice of kit.

 

Wayne

Edited April 28, 2013 by Timmo

[kenr]

Hi Slog

Good to see you back

Very precise work as always.

Are you still working away on site ?

 

Regards

Ken

[Captain Slog]

Hi guys,

 

Thanks for dropping by. Jeff I know what you mean, so many kits but not enough time, if I had the time, money and space I dread to think how many builds I would have on the go LOL.  I got the card Bismarck because I was fed up working on the Endeavour but now all psyched up to get going with Endeavour again.

 

I wish I thought about the jig earlier as it would have been so much easier to measure against as now that I am putting more details on there appears to be many discrepancies which weren’t obvious before.  The quarter light positioning for one; will know better next time!

 

Wayne, based on your other builds the Endeavour would complement them nicely and highly recommend the Caldercraft version.  I will definitely be going for ‘white stuff’ as I like the way it stands out.  In MSW 1.0 there were 5 or 6 Caldercraft Endeavours on the go and I was lucky as I was always behind them so could learn from their experiences, there was also one (Lillee’s) which had the brown hull and looked good also…but white for me.

 

I am trying to get the last of the ‘heavy’ stuff out of the way so I can get the waterline marked up and the ‘white stuff’ on and concentrate on the details without worrying about marking the white paint through manhandling.

 

Hi Ken glad you dropped in.  What’s it like building another Niagara?  I am not sure I could do the same kit twice, I always feel I want to try something else even part way through a first build LOL.

 

I finished site work last November and now on a city project and there lies the problem.  I had 5, 6 or 7 days home every couple of weeks and could balance running about getting stuff done, keeping the Admiral happy with her projects and still have free time to work on the ship.

 

But this Monday to Friday lark is killing me.  Either get home late most nights or can’t be bothered, plus I can’t really model without natural light; I don’t know I can’t get the lighting right with shadows etc and definitely can’t paint.  Weekends are busy getting her jobs done and only going to get worse as we are getting ready to sell up so lots of renovations coming up.  Bonus is when we move I will have a dedicated hobby room in one of the spare rooms so not all bad.  A couple of shots of your completed Endeavour wouldn’t go astray; I don’t remember seeing any from MSW 1.0.

 

Cheers

Slog

[ross]

Hi slog, hoping to post my log shortely( waiting for new camera), your build is progressing very nicely, that jig you made is a excelent idea,going to do one myself, keep up the good work.

[kenr]

Hi Slog

PM me your email address and I will send you some photos of my Endeavour.

As long as you dont insist I dust it first

With the Niagara. I had put so much time and effort into the build that I couldnt just throw it out.

And at the same time I knew I could do a better job so hence the purchase of a new kit and start again

 

Regards

Ken

[Thomas S.]

Hi Slog,

 

I watched your build log in the old forum ... and am happy to see it here again. Beautyful work!!!

 

Regards

Thomas

[Captain Slog]

Hi All,

 

Thomas thanks for dropping by.  I also followed your build and referenced yours and other build photos when I want to check how others done something.  I have a few other builders Caldercraft Endeavour photos  saved from MSW 1.0.

 

Will you be starting your Endeavour log in MSW 2.0 again?

 

I have been sneaking in little bits and pieces of work this weekend and finished painting the rough tree rails swivel gun posts and stanchions.

 

 

I moved on to the ships lantern as I wanted to try out my new airbrush out on the yellow top and bottom. Unfortunately I forgot about the air hose so will have to wait until next week to try it.

 

All the parts shown below including the photo etch lantern, cast metal top and bottom and 1mm brass rod.  The castings weren’t too bad.  A file round the edges cleaned up a bit of raggedness and a small bit of flash on the top bauble thing was cut off. A small rub with fine sand paper then a scrub with hot soapy water and an old toothbrush to remove any residue.

 

The photo etch lantern is smooth on one side and has grooves on the other. (See photo 7 to see what I mean). I assumed the grooves went on the inside and closed up when the segments are folded together.  It was very tough to bend this way and I couldn’t get a sharp bend line so I flattened it out and flipped it over.  I then bent the lantern with the grooves on the outside.  Using a small square file I held the photo etch down as hard as possible and slid a razor blade under it and prised it up.

 

Then using a bit of MDF I sanded to 60 degrees I checked the angle was correct and continue working round each segment.  Some sections bent easier than others and once all bent went round and round tweeking by eye each bend until the edges closed up and then ran some CA glue down the seam.

 

Dry fitted all the parts to make sure they fitted.

 

To paint the lantern I needed to somehow hold the small awkward cage whilst spray painting.  I came up with an old paint brush and a couple of clothes pegs to hold one of the Admirals hairs which I threaded through the cage.  (I have no hair of my own  ).  Then went outside and used Citadel Paints Skull White from a spray can. The black spring clamps were too keep it off the bench.

 

A close up of the drying lantern still hanging from, a now considerably thicker, Admiral hair.

 

Cheers

Slog

 

 

[st george]

Great looking build Slog. I like the use of hair too.

 

David

[BANYAN]

That lantern came up a treat Slog; nice work.  It will look very good in place.

 

cheers

 

Pat

[Captain Slog]

Hi Guys,

 

Thanks for your comments.

 

Been squeezing in a bit of work here and there and finished up the lantern.  I used a bit of 1mm brass rod and bent it to shape as per the drawing on the plans.  I used games workshop Chaos Black spray to paint it. The rod was then glued, using CA, into a 1mm hole drilled into the base of the lantern.

 

I used the same 1mm drill to make a hole in the stern and it is too large so when the time comes to fix it I might use epoxy as the lantern is very top heavy.  I may also make outriggers to hold it more securely like the AOTS and the Endeavour replica shows.

 

I decided to smash out more of the deck furniture as the hull isn’t too far off being painted and finished. (only taken me 3 years give or take a week to get to this stage). I decided to do the stern platform and the binnacle which were all on the 1.5mm walnut ply sheet other than the 2 steps which is from the 5mm solid walnut sheet.  Here’s all the parts cut out and tidied up a bit.

 

I have used this technique a lot for holding small parts together square for gluing.  I use a small engineers square and various clamps and clothes pegs etc to hold them.  This is a front panel of the binnacle and one of the sides.  The PVA doesn’t really stick to the metal so after a short time the wood parts can be prised off the square.

 

I used a steel rule and a clothes peg to hold an inner binnacle panel whilst the glue dries.  I have found that after gluing and clamping I can usually remove the piece to work on it more after only 10mins.  So  could alternate between the platform and binnacle pretty quickly.

 

After gluing all the end and internal panels to one side I could place the opposite side on and hold together with clothes pegs.  Only need to add the top panel to complete.

 

The 5mm block stairs glued to the upright panels of the platform and the top planked with Tanganyika strip (spelling?) which was used on the deck.  I had forgotten just how poor the supplied Tanganyika wood strip was when I did the main deck.  Didn’t matter so much for this as only need short lengths.

 

After trimming the platform planks to length I used the square again for gluing the upright/steps to the platform

 

The finished binnacle and stern platform shown in place.  They aren’t glued down as still have a handrail to put on the platform and some binnacle eyebolts for lashing and might try fashioning a small brass vent for the binnacle map light.  I gave them a couple of coats of minwax wipe-on poly. Doing both components from cutting out to taking finished photos was around 3 hrs work.

 

Cheers

Slog

 

 

[Ferit]

Salute Slog,

Your build is very clean, sharp and net... Really beautiful... Could you share some photos of the full front view of the transom?

 

[Captain Slog]

Hi Ferit,

 

Thanks for dropping by.  Is the photo below what you are after?

 

On the stern I have still to do the window deadlights, the opening ropes for the lower ports and the rudder pendants and maybe the rudder coat. 

 

These will all be done once I finish painting on the anti fouling ‘white stuff’ on the hull as after that there is no need to man handle the hull much or turn it upside down so don’t need to worry about damaging delicate bits and pieces. Once the white stuff is done I will also finish the varnish below the counter.

 

I had look at your Berlin log and you are doing a fantastic job.  Very clean and sharp.  You have done an outstanding job on the details you have scratch built to replace the kit items, I especially like your doors you have done.

 

Cheers

Slog

 

 

[Ferit]

Hi Slog,

The transom looks already impressive. My thought is that the transom is the most characteristic part of a ship and yours is being very well done. By the way thank you very much for your comments about my Berlin. I would be following the stages of your build...

[Captain Slog]

Hi All,

 

Ferit, thanks for your kind comment.  Since I have almost finished the hull (except for the white stuff) I have been concentrating on the deck furniture and the little detail bits as I can do these without worrying about making a mess or lots of tidying up afterwards. (I work at the kitchen table).  I wanted to try and make some rings for the supplied eyebolts that will be fitted in their multitude shortly.

 

The technique of bending the wire round a drill isn’t mine.  I saw it on MSW somewhere and I apologise to the original author for not giving credit as for the life of me I can find where I saw it or by whom.

 

I remember reading that the brass wire can be annealed to make it softer by heating.  I tried just using my cigarette lighter which would have worked but taken to long and the yellow flame leaves black soot on the wire.  So I used the gas stove and 3 things happened, the blue gas flame turned green, the wire went red hot instantly and it was cool enough to touch after only a few seconds.

 

Okay, Caldercraft supply hundreds of copper eyebolts which are 10mm long and the wire is 0.55mm thick (based on my cheapo vernier) and trying different drills into the hole I determined it was 0.94mm.  A 0.99mm drill didn’t fit.

 

I then used a 1.16mm drill bit to drill a hole into some MDF and when deep enough I put the shank back into the hole.  My thinking was this would be stronger for pulling against than if the fluted part was in the hole <shrugs>

 

Then taking the annealed 0.5mm brass wire I bent it over the edge of the MDF so I could hold it tight and then tightly wound the wire round the shank of the drill bit.  I think doing this actually work hardened the brass wire again as it felt like it was stiff again

 

Then sliding the coil off the drill bit, I used a Stanley knife to get the point into the coil and cut, then moved in and cut and so until I worked my way along the coil.  Each cut produces a ring.  It only took a few cuts before I lost the point of the blade but persevered.  I think annealing the wire again before cutting might be easier.  I will try that next time.

 

Here are the rings.  0.5mm with a roughly 1.16mm hole.  Some of them have nicks where I couldn’t cut through in one and moved the blade.  I used a safety Stanley (which I hate) and the blade would sometimes slide back in. so took a couple of goes to cut.

 

Here is a shot of trying to feed the open ring into a less than 1mm hole. Doing one took longer than making all the ones in Photo 5.  Plus initially lost 1 in 3 to some rift in space.

 

Finally managed to get it in, keep it in and squeeze it gently closed with needle nose pliers.

 

I think I will use a larger drill bit next time as 1.16mm rings was very difficult to handle and actually doesn’t leave much room for the rigging thread plus it will be easier on my fat fingers and eye sight.  I will also try annealing the coiled wired again before cutting, but overall quite happy for a first try.

 

Cheers

Slog

 

 

[Captain Slog]

Hi All,

 

A bit of an update on making eyebolt rings. I tried a couple of things to see if they could be made easier. Firstly, using the same technique of annealing the wire over the gas stove, I wrapped the same 0.5mm wire round a 1.37mm drill shank instead of the 1.12mm drill used the first time. This gives a real life hole of almost 88mm and an overall outside diameter of 152mm which is probably a fair bit over scale).

 

After pulling the coil off the drill I re-annealed the coil to red hot again. The slightly larger ring allowed the point of the Stanley knife to get in further and I could cut 2 rings each time and was a lot easier as the brass was softer and didn’t lose the point of the blade this time. The larger ring also made it easier to grip with tweezers to feed through the eyebolt.

 

Also the second annealing after coiling made flattening the ring and closing the ends so much easier and I think the ends closed tighter as the ‘spring’ of the wire had gone. I will continue to use the larger drill as although over scale the easier and far quicker fabrication is preferable to me.

 

Now that I can make fairly reasonable eyebolt rings I decided to go back and re-do the mid-deck hatch. I originally made this as per the plans which instructed to use the supplied eyebolts as is and just bend then down flat to replicate the ring. These were originally glued in place with CA glue and the tail on the underside bent flat and more CA applied liberally along the underside.

 

The bent tails were easily pried up with a finger nail and the eyebolt pushed back out through the drilled hole. After painting the modified eyebolts I glued them back into the drilled holes, which in my opinion looks heaps better than the bent over eyes.

 

Time to paint the lower hull.  I planned in using the following for marking the hull line.  A combination square with a pencil clamped to it.  2 problems the pencil couldn’t go back because it hit the 45 degree angle part which meant it was pretty floppy out at the point and secondly because I used the hull holding jig I couldn’t get the point in close enough to touch the stem.

 

I cam up with the following a bit Heath Robinson but go the job done and I could reach right in to the stem.

 

If anyone has been following my log from MSW 1.0 you might remember that I placed the wales one plank width to low.  This meant the water line didn’t match up with the plan and worse, it bisected through one of the rudder hinges. 

 

3 options, place it where it is supposed to go and have a part white and part black hinge.

Place it below the hinge but have a shallow waterline or place it above the hinge and have a decent white hull but the waterline intersecting with the wale.

 

I placed the waterline above the hinge as in my opinion is the best option of the 3.  I only had 18mm Tamiya masking tape which is too wide to follow the curve under the rear counter so pulled out a length and cut the 2 edges from to use.  Looks a bit ragged on the top side which doesn’t matter as used the clean edge for the line.

 

I placed the tape slightly above the pencil line and then used a eraser to buff the tape down and remove the pencil line

 

After using the Tamiya tape to mark the line I used cheapo decorators tape to build up a bit of width ready for masking out with paper

 

Again using the decorators tape I used a shiny newspaper supplement to cover everything else up.  I think newspaper is to thin and there is the right the newprint will come off or bleed through if it gets damp.  Here it is already for painting.

 

I made this post whilst waiting for the white to dry.  The whole painting process wasn’t too successful in my opinion as a number of problems crept up.  I almost had a disaster which was narrowly avoided.  I will go through the problems I had in my next post either later today or tomorrow once the tape is removed and the finished result seen.

 

Cheers

Slog

[Captain Slog]

Okay, here’s part 2 of the sorry tale of hull painting.  After masking up the hull in the last post I set up the airbrush and mixed up the Admiralty Paints Hull White.  In previous posts with experimenting with the airbrush I tried using Tamiya Acrylic thinners which didn’t really work very well.

 

This time I just used water and it was a lot better.  I decanted about 10ml of paint and mixed in 3ml of water and the consistency looked very good.  I then started spraying one side of the hull first going round the stem, keel, stern post and the water line and then filling in the hull.  The first coat was very light and could still see the walnut underneath.  It would take a lot of light coats to cover the hull fully.

 

I did a couple of coats like this and again they were very light to build up the opacity.  Then went to the other side to do the same and then that’s when it started to block the needle with build-up.  I pulled the mixing cap off and cleaned it and continued spraying but the paint flow quickly reduced again and after getting a couple of light coats on the other side I gave up in frustration.

 

I took the ship outside and sprayed it using the Citadel Skull White from a spray can.  Got a bit wet at times but it’s very forgiving as each coat flashed off it tightened up.   But had some problems with overspray as will be seen in the photos below which I think was because of the large spray of the can and moving the ship which probably dislodged some of the masking paper.  The airbrush had a small controllable pattern which wasn’t an issue.

 

I would spray a lightish coat with the spray can come back in then go out and do another coat etc for several coats.  This was a near disaster as I went back out and picked up the can gave it another long shake and started spraying only to see Chao Black going on to the hull! (I picked up the wrong can as they are identical other than the Paint name.  Luckily not too much went on and a few light coats of the white covered it up.

 

Here’s the rudder and hull painted in the shed.

 

 

Once I peeled off the tape the actual waterline isn’t too bad.  A lot better than expected with little or no bleeding under the tape.  A bit of over spray in the corners where it was difficult to get the tape into the sharp internal edges.  Looks a bit off going into the wales the way it does but I still think this was the best option.

 

Here’s the horrors now.  So much overspray got in under the paper I couldn’t believe it when I peeled back the tape.  My heart sank.  The starboard side copped it with the stern, some of the wale and the rough tree rails, stanchions and channels getting a dusting of white.

 

If I persevered with the airbrush I wouldn’t have all the remedial work ahead of me, as usual will know better next time.

 

I have already started to clean up the overspray with wire wool and fine grit paper.  I have touched up the yellow channels and the stern castings and touched up little bits of the French blue.  Also I covered all bare wood with a couple of coats of Wipe-on poly leaving only the black wales and the railings etc to re-do.  Should hopefully get it finished up today which I will post pictures of the completed hull later.

 

Cheers

Slog

[Captain Slog]

Hi All,

 

Well a major milestone, 3 years in the making has been reached.  The hull is essentially finished.  There is still a lot to do to it but its all little detail work and of course the deck furniture.

 

A lot of blood, sweat and tears to get to this stage but overall relatively happy with the outcome.  There are a lot of mistakes made along the way and lots of lessons learned.

 

Cheers

Slog

 

 

[Timmo]

That hull is looking good Slog. I wouldn't have noticed the waterline issue unless you'd pointed it out.

I've learned similar lessons about overspray from a can. You simply can't rely on spray direction keeping it away from gaps in the masking as it somehow seems to drift upwards, sideways and everywhere. That paper would have been fine if the edges were taped together to make it a continuous cover.

 

What brand and colour of yellow have you got on the transom decorations?

I'm still dithering over the yellow to use for the stern of my granado and yours looks good.

Wayne

[Captain Slog]

Hi Wayne,

 

Thanks for the comments. The paint I use is Jotika/Caldercrafts own Admiralty Paints, yellow ochre. I ordered the white hull paint set from Cornwall Model Boats when I purchased my Endeavour from them.

 

There is an Aussie stockist of Admiralty paint at the following website

http://www.miniaturesteammodels.com/category89_1.htm

 

I have found the Admiralty Paints to be very good especially for coverage particularly the red ochre, black and French blue.

 

I have been having difficulties in airbrushing with them but can’t be sure if that is just acrylics in general or my n00bness.

 

Cheers

Slog

[kiwiron]

Hi Cpt Slog she's looking great nice job.I want to do the Endeavour sometime,if you have them could you post your early construction photos when you get a chance,it would be great if you can.ron.