HM Cutter Cheerful 1806 by Erik W - 1:48 scale

[Erik W]

Phil and Glenn, Now I don't feel so bad.  Haha.  I always seem to find my way back to projects I set aside for a while.  I try not to have too many things half done at once though! 

 

Eric, Thanks for the nice words!  I'll try to post updates regularly.  The interaction with forum members helps keep me involved. 

 

One nice thing with picking Cheerful up again this late in the game is there are many other excellent builds to reference as I progress with mine.  The plethora of photos are invaluable as visual aids.

 

Erik

[Tigersteve]

Welcome back! I doubt anyone has forgotten your build of this. I was wondering when you would return. Lol

Steve

[Erik W]

Hey Steve,  Thanks!  I like your Pinnacle and Dory builds.

 

Erik

[Erik W]

I finished adding the fancy molding to my Cheerful.  I planned ahead with the lower molding and didn't glue the portion that will be removed for the addition of the top boarding ladder step.  I spent a few evenings thinning and fairing the inboard bulwarks.  Yes, this was a messy pain in the butt.  There was a bit of a learning curve to sand/fair the inside of a curve vs. fairing the hull planking.  The bulwarks framing/gun ports measure in at a hair under 1/16" of an inch thick, which is what Chuck recommended in his monograph.  I also faired the bulkhead tops so the false deck will sit flat on them.  Lastly, I added the keel plates.  I still haven't touched up the paint on the hull exterior, so the build still looks a bit rough at this point.  I've decided I'll do that after the deck planking is finished.

 

Erik

[glbarlow]

Nice job on the fairing, it was new to me at the time too, fun stuff. 

[Tigersteve]

Looks really good. 
Steve

[Chuck]

Outstanding

[Erik W]

Thanks for the likes and nice words guys.  And it's always nice to get an 'Outstanding' from Chuck!  I installed the false deck this weekend.  I used a piece of 24" x 8" x 1/16" basswood.  I cut it in half lengthwise and taped the two halves together.  I cut the false deck template out of the plans.  I then cut all the square deck furniture locators out of the paper plan.  I used clear tape to tape this onto the Cheerful (The plan is wavy in my two photos below.  It was reattached after the fact for these photos).  The clear tape made it easy to locate the center line running through the cutouts.  I then followed Chuck's instructions in the Monograph and used masking tape around the edges to get the actual size of the false deck.  I removed this carefully and taped the false deck plan to the two basswood sheet halves, again using the clear taped sections of the deck furniture cut outs to locate the center line.  Once that was done, I carefully removed the clear tape one section at a time and used the cutout borders to draw their locations on the wood false deck.  Reapplying the tape to that square when finished and moving on to the next opening.  Once the false deck was cut out of the basswood sheets, I faired the edges to get a good fit.  I also wound up adding a thin basswood strip to the stern section of the deck.  There had been a bigger gap than I wanted there.  I installed each half of the false deck using the visible center of the middle of the five plies of the piece of plywood running lengthwise on the center line as the true center line.  Lastly I enlarged the hole in the deck for the mast to it's actual size.  I had left it slightly under size when attaching the decks halves, and trued it up afterwords to make sure it was precisely placed where it should be.

 

Erik

[Stuntflyer]

Welcome back Erik!

[Erik W]

Thanks Mike!  It's been nice to look through your recent builds.  I've enjoyed your Winny, and now the Speedwell.  Also, your on-hold Hayling Hoy is interesting.  The fully framed builds are definitely graduate level modeling!

 

Erik

[JesseLee]

Nice work!

[Erik W]

My progress over the last week has been to plank the first layer of planks of the starboard bulwark.  With my extended time off from this build, 6 1/2 years, I sort of forgot how long it takes to get quality planking done!   I had to break out the hair dryer again to get the bends toward the bow in the planks that sit below the gun ports.  There was a bigger gap than I was comfortable with between the false deck and the bottom of the planks between the forward two gun ports, so I used 7/32" wide planks for the lower plank in that area.  I wasn't too concerned with the finished look of the planks below the gun ports since they'll be covered with a second layer of planks.

 

Once this first layer was sanded smooth, I measured the total thickness of the bulwark at the top.  It comes in at 5/32", or a hair less.  With this new layer of planking I then painted the frames of the gun ports.  This revealed areas that needed sanding to hide the visible seam between the gun port frames and the interior planking.  I used a hard sanding stick to do that.  Then I applied another layer of paint.  It seemed like a good idea to paint the gun port frames at this point as it also gives a good opportunity to visually confirm that the port frames are a proper shape and thickness.  The next step is adding the layer of 1/32" thick planking below the gun ports.

 

Erik

Edited October 14, 2023 by Erik W

[Seventynet]

Welcome back Eric. You are doing an outstanding job on the Cheerful. And your photography is second to none. Love it!

 

Ian

[Erik W]

Ian, Thanks for the kind words!  I have had your Cheerful build bookmarked.  I like the way your Cheerful has more bare wood showing than most.  It looks great!  And thanks for noticing my efforts at getting good photos.  It actually takes some time to set everything up.  Since I photograph on my work surface, I have to move everything out of the way.  And I can only really photograph on the weekends when I have time during the day while the sun is shining, as a good portion of the overall lighting is from a window.

 

I added the 1/32" thick planks below the gun ports.  I did these as hull length single planks to keep the plank run looking smooth.  I also wound up adding a 1/32" x 1/32" strip along the bow area between the 1st and 2nd gun ports beneath the two main planks.  This was probably unnecessary, but when I measured the gap it came out to be pretty close in height to what will be the 3/64" thick deck plank plus the 1/32" thick waterway.  So, better safe than sorry.  I then did a bit of sanding to thin the 1/32" planking as Chuck suggests in his monograph.  Once I have the port side planking to the same point, I'll further thin both sides slightly, and round the hard edge a little.  I've always found when modeling 2 sides that are supposed to be symmetrical, completing them to 90% or so, while working on first one side and then the other, and then finishing both sides at the same times helps make it easier to get them where they look identical.

 

Erik

Edited October 15, 2023 by Erik W

[Erik W]

Over the last week I planked the port side bulwarks.  I spent a few hours today doing the final sanding of both sides of the bulwarks which included thinning the areas of the bulwarks tops that were thicker than the others in preparation for adding the cap rail.  I carefully thinned the 1/32" thick spirketing to a thickness somewhere between 1/32" and 1/64".  I then rounded the edge of the top spirketing plank a bit.  Lastly I softened the edges on the stern frames to reflect the look of Chuck's visible stern frames on his Cheerful build.

 

Erik

[Nirvana]

Erik that looks so good and smooth.

Looking forward to the next step.

[Erik W]

Thanks for the likes.  My progress this week has been to get the bulwarks painted.  I used Vallejo brand Flat Red 70.957.  I can't recommend Vallejo paints enough for brush painting.  The pigment is extremely fine, and they're easy to apply without any visible brush strokes.  I used a new 3/16" wide flat brush to apply 6 thin coats of paint.  Every handful of strokes I dipped the brush tip into water to thin the paint, and then applied the paint over several seconds with around half a dozen strokes in a given area.  It's important to stop brushing over the area before the paint starts to thicken (thickening causes the brush strokes to be visible).  I didn't worry too much about how well each coat covered the surface knowing that I'd continue to apply more coats until I achieved a solid coverage.  The important thing with each coat is even coverage with no visible brush strokes.

 

Erik

[Erik W]

I was out of town visiting family in Annapolis, Maryland, for a few days this week.  While there, I went to the US Naval Academy Museum.  Not my first visit there, but always a fun outing.  And grabbing lunch downtown afterwards is a must as well.  On the 2nd floor, the museum houses the Rogers Collection of wooden ship dockyard models, as well as newer built models from all eras of naval history on the 1st floor.  If you haven't been to this museum, I highly recommend it.

 

I did manage to make some progress on my Cheerful.  I added the cap rail.  The cap rail is 7 pieces cut out of 1/16" sheet.  One piece for the stern, and 3 for each side.  I have quality digital calipers accurate to .0001" to measure with, so getting the rail to a uniform width was easy enough, it just took some time to sand down.  The cap rail measures in at a bit under 5/32" wide.  I also fashioned the hawse plates out of 1/32" thick sheet.  This was pretty straight forward with first cutting the plan out and then transferring the lines to the wood sheet.  Drilling the hawse holes in the hawse plates and bulwarks was pretty easy as well.  I had an issue with drilling and filing the bowsprit hole though.  While the hole was aligned properly, parallel to the keel and level with the keel, I got a bit carried away with enlarging the diameter up to the final bowsprit diameter.  When I inserted the a 5/16" drill bit shaft to double check the diameter, there was a little slop as it passed through the hawse plate.  I did that thing where I tried to convince myself I could live with it.  I couldn't.  So, I pried it off and fabricated a new one.  This time though I deliberately left the bowsprit hole a smaller diameter than what the bowsprit will be.  I figure it makes the most sense to tweak the hole diameter when I have the bowsprit made, so I can adjust it to the actual diameter.  Live and learn.

 

Erik

Edited November 5, 2023 by Erik W

[Nirvana]

So clean and so nice!

[Freebird]

Erik,

 

Welcome back! Been waiting for you to get back on board as your build is extremely nice. I too have Cheerful on the docks and now that building season is upon us, I’ll be back at it as well. Keep up the great work!

 

Rick

[Chuck]

Beautifully done...

[Erik W]

Thanks for the kind words and likes folks!  This week's progress was getting the fancy molding on the edge of the cap rail.  I used the same method as I did creating the other fancy molding, but once the profile was scraped in I sanded the back side down to reduce the 1/32" thickness so it wouldn't add too much to the overall cap rail width. 

 

My next task was making the stern gun port lids.  Back when I completed the planking on the stern, the gun port interior framing did not line up correctly with the stern planking.  A bit of an irritant, but I knew with the port lids modeled closed, it wouldn't be noticeable when all was said and done.  The top photo below show the misaligned interior port and planking.  The port lids pictured below are the 5th and 6th ones I made.  I wanted to get the exterior planking lined up correctly as well as the lid interior level and lined up correctly also since you can see the individual boards under the slightly opaque covering of red paint (hard to see in these photos).  The port lids are a bit Frankenstein-like, but look correct from both the interior and exterior.

 

The port lid hinges were ordered from Chuck 7 or so years ago (it looks like he has updated those hinge kits since back then).  To simulate the actual hinge I used .030" styrene rod painted black along with the hinge straps.  The rings at the bottoms are made from the .016" wire that came with the port hinges secured with a small loop of .010" brass wire.

 

Erik

 

[Erik W]

I feel like I reached a bit of a milestone on my build today, so I have included a ton of photos in celebration! While being a perfectionist, things frequently don't turn out quite as well as I'd like, but I'm happy with the build so far.  And it's turning out pretty well considering it's my first major wooden ship build, after my Model Shipways longboat project many years ago.  Though there is still quite a ways to go on the project, with the exterior painting complete, there is a certain finished look now.  I really like the lines of the Cheerful.  I spent the week painting the cap rail, repainting the wales, and spending much time doing the final sanding of the hull and tweaking the finish (after viewing these photos, I cleaned up where the black paint meets the wood in the stern area).  Now on to Chapter 7 of Chuck's monograph, and adding the deck fittings, and planking the deck.

 

I have a couple of questions for you folks.  I used Wipe-On Poly back on my longboat build.  Applying it to the hull, and then applying any paint to those areas that needed it afterwards.  On my Cheerful, I applied WOP above the wales way back when those were planked, but have since sanded it off as I cleaned up that planking in preparation to add the fancy molding.  I never applied WOP anywhere else on the model.  Now, as you can see, the hull has painted areas amongst the bare wood.  I'm thinking I might not apply WOP at all.  The hull has made it nearly 7 years with temperature and humidity fluctuations without any noticeable signs of aging.  My questions then are, is it really necessary to apply some kind of protective coating to the wood?  Has anyone here not applied WOP, or similar finish to their build?  And if you did apply WOP to a model with areas that you already painted, how did you go about applying the WOP (apply it carefully around the painted sections, apply it to the painted areas also, etc)?  Thanks!

 

Erik

Edited November 20, 2023 by Erik W

[Nirvana]

Erik, that is pure beauty!

In some angles it looks like a painting. 
Well done!

 

[glbarlow]

The entire exterior of both my Cheerful and Winchelsea including the black wales but excluding the friezes have multiple coats of WOP as does unpainted wood on the deck and deck furniture. I don’t include WOP over painted interior areas, the multiple coats of red paint are enough. Just how I do it. 
 

 

Edited November 22, 2023 by glbarlow

[Cathead]

I'm in no way an expert on this, but on my builds involving exposed wood, I've always used natural food-grade wood oil, the kind you'd use on cutting boards or wooden utensils. You can see the resulting finish on builds like my revenue cutter or NRG capstan in the signature below if you want to assess the look. The oldest model I've treated this way is 9 years old, has gone through lots of temperature and humidity swings in my house, and has been just fine. 

 

My strongest reason for doing this is I really don't like using hazardous stuff in my modeling. Poly comes with all sorts of concerns from being an oil-based flammable to needing adequate ventilation for application to not wanting it on your skin. Whereas food-grade wood oil is as benign as it gets.

 

It's probably true that, in the long run, an initial application of wood oil won't protect as well as one of poly, because it doesn't create a hard seal. In other applications (like countertops) you would normally apply more wood oil every now and then to maintain the surface, which isn't practical on a ship model. So down the road it's possible that wood oil would still lead to some level of warping, cracking, etc. But I haven't seen it yet, and my guess is that a well-built model kept in reasonably stable indoor conditions shouldn't see major problems; our models aren't subjected to the same stress as countertops or utensils. At least I assume you aren't planning on eating off the Cheerful's deck!

 

I don't have a deeply educated opinion on the long-term value of one or the other, but I've seen no problems with this approach over multiple models, and really value the simplicity and benign nature of the material. I'd be interested to hear counterarguments from someone with relevant experience.

 

 

[archjofo]

Fantastic work !

[cotrecerf]

4 hours ago, Cathead said:

I'm in no way an expert on this, but on my builds involving exposed wood, I've always used natural food-grade wood oil, the kind you'd use on cutting boards or wooden utensils. You can see the resulting finish on builds like my revenue cutter or NRG capstan in the signature below if you want to assess the look. The oldest model I've treated this way is 9 years old, has gone through lots of temperature and humidity swings in my house, and has been just fine. 

 

My strongest reason for doing this is I really don't like using hazardous stuff in my modeling. Poly comes with all sorts of concerns from being an oil-based flammable to needing adequate ventilation for application to not wanting it on your skin. Whereas food-grade wood oil is as benign as it gets.

 

It's probably true that, in the long run, an initial application of wood oil won't protect as well as one of poly, because it doesn't create a hard seal. In other applications (like countertops) you would normally apply more wood oil every now and then to maintain the surface, which isn't practical on a ship model. So down the road it's possible that wood oil would still lead to some level of warping, cracking, etc. But I haven't seen it yet, and my guess is that a well-built model kept in reasonably stable indoor conditions shouldn't see major problems; our models aren't subjected to the same stress as countertops or utensils. At least I assume you aren't planning on eating off the Cheerful's deck!

 

I don't have a deeply educated opinion on the long-term value of one or the other, but I've seen no problems with this approach over multiple models, and really value the simplicity and benign nature of the material. I'd be interested to hear counterarguments from someone with relevant experience.

 

 

On a few other than ship modelling projects (wood toys for grandchildren) I have recently used linseed oil varnish WITHOUT any desiccants in it. It can be applied with a brush (in narrow places) or with a rag on smooth larger surfaces. Removed excess oil after a while. It well penetrates into wood, accentuating its grain and needs 48 hrs to thoroughly dry creating a firm seal. I like to employ it because its food proof.

 

Joachim

[Tigersteve]

Looks really sharp Erik. I’ve found WOP on painted surfaces does not work for me. Too shiny. Not much help, I know. Looking forward to how you proceed w the model and the finishing. 

Steve

[Erik W]

Thanks for the kind words and input guys.  I appreciate the feedback! 

 

Erik

 

Erik