USS Constitution by David Lester - FINISHED - Model Shipways

[Burroak]

I haven't got to that stage yet of putting the copper strips on. I would probably paint the red stripe first and extend it down a little so the copper plates would cover the bottom edge and make a nice clean line.

 

Greg H.

[xken]

David, Here are some of my random thoughts on painting strip or otherwise.... go to an automotive outlet and buy a roll of 1/8" masking tape; this will provide a clean narrow edge. Once applied carefully burnish down with a piece of wood strip with the end cut at an angle to navigate the overlapping edges of the copper. Once burnished the way to avoid color bleed is to seal the tape edge with a couple of clear coats first let completely dry and then paint with color. Any bleed if done correctly will be minimized and if bleed occurs it will be clear. I use a Krylon Matte finish applied in light coats not full wet when spraying. Keep in mind the clear spray will adhere to the copper much better than any water based paint and the water based paint will require a couple of coats. Remove the tape as suggested above carefully and at a 45 degree angle towards the painted surface.

 

Another issue on the copper plating based upon my build observation. I should have let my build set and "cook" longer in the sun to completely dry prior to coppering. I live on the central coast of California and my studio is an unheated 2 car garage vented to the outside and subject to heat swings overnight this time of the year mid 40"s to mid 70's and I am seeing what I think is linear expansion and contraction with exposed corners "popping" overnight. This is one of the reasons I am delaying my painting of the strip to the very end...one to stabilize the hull drying and second to avoid any damage due to the sensitivity of the paint on the foil. Non ferrous metals such as copper, aluminum and such should be primed with the green etching primer "zinc chromate". An acid etching primer is available at automotive suppliers; but is is gray and will run the risk of bleeding when sprayed on the bare copper.

 

Again, just my rambling thoughts. Great job on the coppering so far! 

[David Lester]

Hi Ken,

Thanks for your thoughts. Your approach seems like a very good one. My thought about painting just the first two rows freehand is ok, but only just ok because even though the rows are quite straight, they aren't perfectly straight. It would be nice to get a crisper line, but I was just trying to avoid the problem of the paint bleeding. I hadn't thought of your clear coat idea. I'll make up a test area with some copper plates on a piece of wood and have a practice run first. I think this might be the answer.

David

[David Lester]

Hello All,

I brief update tonight - I have finished the copper plating, both sides as well as the rudder and all the annoying little edge pieces. It feels like a real milestone and I'm pleased enough with the results. When I removed the masking tape from the waterline on the port side, I noticed for the first time a pretty big dip in the waterline at the stern end. It was easy enough to fix by stripping back a few rows in the immediate area, replacing the masking tape to a better position and replacing the plates.

 

Later today I applied masking tape to mark the red stripe. I experimented with it first and it lifts very nicely off the plates without causing any damage, so my concerns in that area were unwarranted. I took Ken up on his suggestion of applying a clear coat to the plates first which should have the effect of sealing the line between the plates and the masking tape. I did that, but simply used some polyurethane. I have now added the red paint, but it will need a couple of more coats before I remove the tape and find out how successful I was.

 

The pictures below are of the finished copper, and I'll add some of the red stripe as soon as it's ready.

 

David

[alde]

Another great Constitution build. I'm looking forward to seeing her progress.

[donrobinson]

She is looking real good David, copper plating turned out nice

Edited March 23, 2016 by donrobinson

[usedtosail]

Nice job on the copper plating. 

[Elijah]

I agree, very nice coppering!

[DocBlake]

That looks great!

[David Lester]

Hi Everyone,

As tense moment this afternoon when I removed the masking tape from the copper plating, but I was relieved to see that it worked very well. My red line is reasonably crisp. There were a couple of places where there was very slight bleeding, but I was able to scrape most of the paint away without damaging the copper. If you look closely enough they are still slightly visible, but when all the many details are added to the hull, nobody's eye will be drawn to them.

 

I now just have to add the fenders to the starboard side, give them a final coat of poly and touch up the black in a couple of places and I will have Chapter 9 of the practicum behind me. Chapter 10 of the practicum deals with many of the outer hull details. In preparation I've been working ahead on some of the components - gunport lids, channels etc. There are sheaves set into the side of the hull and the practicum suggests simulating these with thin slices of dowel. It suggests a 1/32" slice of a 3'16" dowel for each one. I don't have a miniature table saw, so all of my efforts to slice them off with an xacto saw or knife only resulted in their crumbling into bits. My solution was to cut off a thin slice of styrene tubing that I had. (It's 7/32" but I think that's close enough to 3/16" for this purpose.) I then filled them with filler and polyed them. I think this will work, but I'll know better when I actually try to insert them. I included a picture of them below, but when I look at it I realize that I might as well have just photographed eight aspirin tablets - maybe I should just use eight aspirin tablets! 

 

That's all for now, and many thanks for comments and likes.

 

David

[David Lester]

Happy Wednesday Everyone,

I'm still working away, although in for the past while it's been lots of work, but little evidence of progress. I'm using the LLS practicum and Chapters 10, 11 and 12 all concern the many details on the outside of the hull, on the deck and on the bulwarks. I'm grappling a bit with the sequence. I don't care for the sequence outlined in the practicum, but it goes against the grain for me to deviate. I tend to be "compliance oriented" and if it says to do it a certain way, then that's the way it should be. I need to be more like Captain Barbossa in Pirates of the Caribbean, who interprets the Pirate's Code as "more what you call guidelines than actual rules."

 

The practicum has us add much detail to the outer hull first, then all the detail to the centre of the deck and finally detail to the bulwarks. I'm worried about knocking gunport lids and davits and what have you off as I work on the interior stuff and I can't see cluttering up the centre of the deck before I have to drill holes in the bulwarks for the eyebolts, cleats etc. So I'm going to "live on the edge" and do the bulwark stuff first, then the more central deck details followed by the outer hull details and then finally to top rail. 

 

I'm currently working on completing all the many components - gun carriages, gunport lids, horse block, ramps, binnacles etc. etc. A few of them are included in the picture.

David

[usedtosail]

David, don't be afraid to change the sequence to your liking. If it makes more sense to you to do it a certain way, it is probably a good way to do it. I spent a lot of time thinking about this because I am not using the practicum and the ME instructions don't have much of a sequence. So far, so good.

[JSGerson]

Don't feel guilty about not following the practicum to the letter. I'm following Bob Hunt's instructions for the Rattlesnake as a complete newbie and even I deviated from the written word when I though a better sequence was called for. If I remember correctly, somewhere in the my practicum he states that if you find a better way of doing something than he was showing, go ahead and do it. Your doing good, so keep at it.

 

Jonathan

[DocBlake]

I'm with Tom and Jonathan:  There is more than one way accomplish a lot of tasks.  I deviated from the practicum a lot in my MS AVS and AL Swift builds, and for my current Patrick Henry I've almost stopped using the practicum completely!  Don't worry!  You're doing great!  Trust your instincts, but do look ahead a bit.

[Elijah]

She's looking great David! Don't worry about deviating from the practicum.

[Shiprig]

Looks really good David!!

[mojofilter]

Nice start to the copper plating David!!  Do you plan to keep it shiney (i.e. coat it right away), let it age (oxidize) naturally, or patina it somehow?

I have Cutty Sark in the hopefully near future, and the Constitution after that.  Both with real copper plates, so I'm looking for people's methodes.

I will be following your log with interest.

Thanks,

 

- Tim

[David Lester]

Happy Wednesday Everyone,

Just a quick update today. It doesn't look like much progress, but for some reason it has taken a lot of time. I'm working away on the components for the deck, so I've been working off the model. I'm almost finished and ready to start attaching things. I've finished the gunport lids, made the pin rails, prepared all my cleats, made the skylight, binnacles, wheel, ammo scuttles and capstan and the carronades and cannons are all ready for rigging. I've just placed a few of these on the deck for the picture. None of them is actually installed yet.

 

Throughout the build, I am approached various jobs with fear and trepidation, only to find they weren't too bad after all. On the other hand from time to time something jumps up and catches me off guard. The latest in this category was the skylight. I found it to be one of the hardest parts to make yet. My final result is nothing to write home about, but it's about my sixth iteration, and it's as good as it's going to get. I tried forming the hexagon from individual pieces and I tried cutting it from a sold block. I tried using wood and I tried using styrene and most attempts ended in an amorphous blob covered with glue. I don't have any miniature machine tools; only hand tools. This final version is cut from a single piece of basswood with styrene trim and I can live with it, although the six sides and not exactly even. The trim on the upper portion is half round styrene and flat strips on the base. The bars on the windows are very fine brass rod.  I wasn't sure what to use for the cap, so went searching through my basement and in my drawer of lamp parts I found a hollow brass ball which was on the end of a lamp's pull chain. I filed it down until only about half of it was left and popped it on top. The tops for the binnacles are the same. I tried using a couple of the brass beads from the lamp chain, but they were just a bit too big. This morning I went into a local jewelry making supply store we have in town and found these very small hollow brass beads which I was able to use in the same way by filing them in half. I only needed a couple, so the owner of the store just gave them to me - the advantages of small town living! 

 

That's it for now; soon on to rigging the cannons.

David

[David Lester]

Hi Tim,

Thanks for checking in. I just stuck the copper plates on and plan to leave them alone. I can live with whatever happens to them. I don't know if the copper tape I used has a finish or not  but I'm thinking it doesn't, because when I opened the roll of tape, the first outer bit of the tape was tarnished and rest of it was bright and shiny. So I anticipate that the hull will darken down some and that's fine with me. I did take one precaution though. Through my reading I learned that the one roll of tape included in the kit was not likely to be enough to do the whole hull and several people found that when they finished the hull with the second roll, there was a noticeable colour difference. To avoid that I ordered a second roll well in advance of needing it and when I did the coppering, I worked from both rolls at the same time. So if it does change colour it should all change at the same rate. You definitely need the second roll. It might be possible to cover the whole hull with one roll, but you would need to not waste one single plate. That was not the situation in my case - I have quite a bit of copper bits stuck to my basement floor. I probably have the only coppered basement floor in all of Cobourg if not the county!  

 

David

[David Lester]

Hi Again,

Let's begin with the premise that "there is no such thing as a stupid question." With that in mind, I have a question (but it's possibly a stupid one even so.) What are people's thoughts on rigging the gun carriages with the train tackle (I believe it's called), the one that connects the back of the carriage to the deck? I notice some modelers include it and others don't. My inclination is to omit it, simply because there is so going on the deck as it is, it seems it might be adding too much clutter. On the other hand if it should be there then perhaps I should add it.

 

I realize that my question is naïve as I don't really have a clear understanding of how much of the equipment on a ship such as this was actually used. If I understood how and when this tackle was used I would be able to answer my own question. Was this tackle in place all the time, or was it removed and replaced depending on whether or not the guns were in use? If it wasn't a permanent fixture, then there's justification for modeling it either way. If it was a permanent fixture than there's a stronger case for including it.

 

Many thanks in advance for any input. Also, thanks for checking in and the likes.

David

[mrshanks]

I always say "go with what looks good to you".  For my own thoughts... it's a matter of scale.  I believe the connie kit is 1:76 scale, so the cannons are rather small.  At that scale I would probably omit it as well.  At a larger scale it might be a different story.  You could rig up just one with the tackle and see how it looks then decide from there..  Regardless of what you decide, I am absolutely sure it will look great!!

[mtaylor]

David,

 

That bit of gun rigging is the inhaul for the guns. If, for some reason, the gun didn't recoil enough to reloaded, it was used to pull the gun back.  It would have only been in place when "action" was expected and even then not always.  It was sometimes unhooked and kept out of the way so as not to be tripped over but kept close at hand if needed.

 

I'm playing "catchup"....    Your build is looking great.

Edited April 7, 2016 by mtaylor

[David Lester]

Thanks for the input guys. Mark, I was pretty sure this tackle was in place only when needed and Mike, I agree with you about the scale of the model. For these reasons I am going to leave it off. Depending on how many of my eyebolts vanish into the abyss that is my basement floor, I may install the eyebolts on the deck though. I've already added them to the carriages.

Thanks again,

David

[skipper1947]

I just noticed your build log here David. You skylight looks great near as I can tell. Also, I like your deck planking, did you do anything to the planks or did they come that color?

 

Skip

[David Lester]

Hi Skip, Thanks for checking in. It's the miracle of out of focus photography that makes my skylight look ok, but thanks for your comment nevertheless. The decking is painted - it's just basswood. In Bob's practicum he tries to approximate the way the decking looks today, which is quite dark, but I'm not sure if that's the way it was intended to look or if it's just the result of thousands of tourists walking on it. I suspect the latter. In some photographs of the actual ship you can see areas where it isn't worn and it appears to me to be more of a honey colour. Bob mixed brown and gray paint, applied it and then rubbed much of it off. The photos of his model match the current appearance of the decking quite closely. (I should say until recent appearance, as the Constitution is now in dry dock, having another restoration.) I was afraid to apply paint as that seemed to me like a heavy handed treatment, so I tried a number of times to stain it. I had every colour under the sun on it at one time or another and they all looked terrible. The basswood doesn't seem to take stain very nicely. I stripped each one of them off and then went the paint route. I mixed some orangey-brown paint I had kicking around with some medium gray, painted it on and rubbed most of it off. It actually worked quite well. If it isn't perfect, it's certainly better than anything else I had tried and isn't too bad a match for it's (until recently) current appearance.

David 

[usedtosail]

David, your deck and deck furniture look great. Nice job.

[David Lester]

Good Moring All,

I have a brief update. I've pretty much finished preparing all of the components for the deck and have begun installing them. I'm working from the stern to the bow and completing all the elements for each area as I move along. I've eliminated some of the rigging on the carronades. There are supposed to be two sets of tackle on each side, but I'm just modeling one of them. The scale of the blocks seems too big to me and when I tried to include the shorter set of tackle I ended up with the two blocks sitting very close together or even touching. It just looked too crowded and messy to me, so I've stripped it back a bit and leaving it at one set of tackle plus the breech line. I'm not sure if coiling the ends of the rope on the deck is historically accurate or not, but I'm doing it anyway for two reasons - I like the look of it and it's not hard to do and it tends to draw the eye away from some of my less skillful detailing.

David 

[skipper1947]

I like it David. I tried googling "sailing ship gun rigging" and found at least one picture showing the same method of coiling gun lines.

 

I know we are discouraged from pasting photos because of copyright, but I believe it is OK to past the link to the web page (right?)

 

http://www.shipmodeling.ca/images/01079.jpg

[David Lester]

Thanks Skip, Now I'm fussing that the line is too white. It isn't actually white at all; it's a real taupe colour but it looks white against the deck. It seems I'm never happy unless I'm unhappy about something! I noticed in the picture you indicated (I can't imagine that there's a copyright problem with simply including a link) has quite light coloured rigging too.

Thanks again,

David

[DocBlake]

Great work, David!  I scaled back the rigging on my MS AVS because of the same problem:  The blocks were way too big for rigging a 3 pounder cannon at 1/48 scale!  As to the rope coils, they look great.  On a real ship thy were only formally laid out like that for inspection or when a dignitary was on board.  Obviously the coils couldn't be maintained during battle or even when the vessel was underway.  You can see the same phenomenon at your local yacht club, where lines are neatly coiled on the pier next to the boat, only to be tossed on board, in less than formal fashion when under way.

 

First rate work so far!