Halifax by rafine - FINISHED - The Lumberyard - 1:48 - semi-scratch schooner

[rafine]

Thanks so much to all of the "likes".

 

Bob

[HIPEXEC]

On ‎10‎/‎4‎/‎2017 at 5:48 AM, rafine said:

Work on the outer hull began with the quarter badges. As with the transom, i needed to make a decision as to how to handle the carvings. My answer was essentially the same; I couldn't make my own; I couldn't use the laser cut carving pieces from the Lumberyard; so I had to use the resin castings from the kit. To use them, I first cut out the windows from the castings and then painted them to mach the hull wood, with a bit of black background. I liked the paint better than what I had done on the transom, so I did some repainting on the transom to try and match. The windows are, again, the Lumberyard laser cut ones, again thinned down considerably. The glazing is again Micro Kristal Klear.

 

I then made up the main channels from boxwood strip, painted them black and glued and pinned them in place.

 

Lastly, I started to add moldings to the hull sides, The lowest is half round and the others are a simple double bead. All of the moldings will be painted black. The moldings were simple to place because when planking the hull I had used base pieces for the moldings in the planking and was able to just follow those base pieces when attaching the final molding pieces.

 

Bob

Where di you get those carvings?

[rafine]

Rich, the Lumberyard kit included cast resin (3D printed?) pieces for the transom and the quarter badges. These included the carvings. I cut away the carvings and discarded the rest of those pieces. I then painted them to match the hull wood.

 

Bob

[rafine]

This week's work finished up the aft portion of the outer hull. This included doing the quarter deck rail, the swivel gun pedestals and the remaining hull molding in that area.

 

The largest part of the work was done on the rail, which was a complex task. I'm sorry that I didn't do any construction sequence photos, but the process was as follows: A piece of boxwood strip for the rail was bent to shape to match the cap rail and its edges sanded round; pieces of square boxwood strip were cut to length for the rail stanchions and holes were drilled in both ends of each for brass pins; holes were drilled in the cap rail for the mounting pins;  beginning with the forward most stanchion, each stanchion was fitted into it's hole in the caprail and then the railing was fitted above it and a hole drilled through the railing for the upper pin; the stanchions were then glued and pinned to the railing in turn, making sure that the full assembly fit as each stanchion was added: when the assembly was complete on each side of the hull, they were painted black and then glued into the caprails as units; the stern end rail was made up and fitted after the side rails were in place. I chose to use pins at both top and bottom of each stanchion because I expect some rigging to be tied off to the rails, creating stress that glue alone wouldn't take care of.

 

The next work was to make up and mount the six swivel gun pedestals. This was straightforward, involving cutting boxwood strip to length, filing them to hexagonal shape, drilling mounting holes for the guns in the pedestal tops, finishing them with wipe-on poly and black paint and gluing them in place.

 

The last work was to fill in the moldings, which required cutting and fitting the prepainted molding pieces.

 

Bob

[popeye the sailor]

nicely done Bob.....she looks great!   

[DocBlake]

Excellent work, Bob!

[Mirabell61]

Bob,

your Halifax is a real beauty, love your clean and tidy work and the positioning of the outcuts in the decks for viewing the interior... 

 

Nils

[Barbossa]

Gorgeous work !

Other manufacturors propose the same kit but this is "Premier League" and thus far beyond comparison.

[albert]

Bravissimo Bob, your work is very very nice.

[alde]

She's coming along beautifully Bob.

[rafine]

Thanks so much Denis, Dirk, Dave, Nils, Christian, Albert and Al for the very generous comments. Thanks also to the "likes". I have to admit that I'm very pleased with the way she is turning out so far.

 

Bob

[Overworked724]

Dear Bob

 

Beautiful work!  I am hacking my way through my own build on this site, and one aspect I have been dreading is the pintles/gudgeons.  I have the rudder (3 actually....just in case I need spares!) ready, but try as I might, using copper stripping seems to be a lost cause - but then again, I have no good experience as this is my first wood ship build.  I am very interested in how you prepared and mounted your pintles/gudgeons using paper.  If you would, any response would be helpful since I would like to follow a 'paper' path to mounting my rudder as well - since it seems to be the path of least resistance. 

 

Best

Patrick

[rafine]

Thanks so much Patrick. Unfortunately, I have no photos of the process I use, so I'll try to explain. First, I will admit that what I do is not "correct", but merely an attempt to create the impression of proper pintles and gudgeons. Age has caused me to resort to some tricks. For the pintles, I begin by gluing an "L" shaped piece of wire into a hole drilled in the rudder. Next, I glue a piece of black painted thin card to the rudder so that it hides the horizontal portion of the wire. For the gudgeons, I glue the black painted card to the stern post and then add an eyebolt in a hole drilled through the card. At small scales, this seems sufficient to fool the eye into seeing a seemingly proper rudder mounting. 

 

Bob

[Overworked724]

That helps!  It also gives me some good ideas. 

[rafine]

Moving forward along the hull, from midship toward the bow, I've added a variety of items. These include the fore channels, additional hull moldings and various sizes and shapes of timber heads. I've also added eyebolts for gun tackles and  rigging attachment to the interior, as a matter of convenience at this point (holes were also drilled for  the breeching ropes but the ringbolts won't be added until the guns are done).

 

The various timber heads were all made up from boxwood strip. They were fully shaped with files on the strip wood stick before being cut off to length, brass pins added, painted black and then mounted in holes drilled in the caprail. The last attached photo is an overall shot that shows the work on the hull to date.

 

Well, there seems to be no escaping the fact that it's time to do the headwork (always my least favorite part of a build), so that will be the next order of business.

 

Bob

[Gahm]

Wonderful job, Bob! She is a beauty!

 

Thomas

[popeye the sailor]

look'in better and better Bob!   fitting 'er out is the best part!   

[mobbsie]

I'm liking her a lot Bob, she's looking super.

 

Be Good

 

mobbsie

[rafine]

Thanks so much Thomas, Denis and Mobbsie for the very generous comments and thanks also to the "likes".

 

Denis, the best part will be when I get by the head work  .

 

Bob

[donrobinson]

You make it all look so easy Bob

[captgino]

Wow... amazing!

[rafine]

Thanks so much Don, JP and the "likes".

 

Don, we all know how deceiving such looks can be. 

 

Bob

[rafine]

Work on the head is now complete. It was the pain that it always seems to be, but there is also a sense of accomplishment. At he risk of boring you all, I will go through it on a step by step basis, with photos of each successive phase.

 

I began with the cheeks. These were each done as laminations of two pieces cut from thin boxwood sheet, then sanded on their facing edges before being glued together and then final fitted to the hull. Card templates were used to get the initial shape.

 

Once the cheeks were in place, I made up the main rails. These too are made as laminations from thicker boxwood sheet, using card templates. After lamination, each rail was sanded to their tapered shape. The timber head shape was then filed into the upper end. The rails were then final fitted to the hull and glued into place.

 

 At this point, I chose to make and add the upper molding and then the knight heads and timber heads at the bow. These were filed to shape from two sizes of boxwood strip, painted black and then pinned and glued in place.

 

Next were the head timbers, which were made from boxwood strip and fitted,, with what seemed like endless trial and error, until they fit between the main rails and the cheeks.

 

The next, and possibly the most difficult, task was to do the cathead supports and the lower rails .These were done in segments. The first segment was the lower rail, which was made from boxwood strip bent to shape and fitted between the stem and the hull and glued in place to the head timbers. Then came the most difficult piece in the process, the cathead supports. These were first cut from thick boxwood sheet, using card templates, and then filed and sand to shape. This was a task, since they had to fit the hull contours, as well as the angles of the catheads and match up to the position, size and shape of the lower rails. I found it necessary to use very small filler pieces of strip to mate the two segments.

 

I the added the final pieces of the lower hull molding at the bow and between the fore channels and the cathead supports.

 

The last item was to paint the 3D printed resin figurehead from the kit and glue it into place.

 

Bob

[donrobinson]

Looks like it must have been hours of meticulous work but well worth it as it looks tremendous 

[albert]

Great beautiful work Bob.

[Mirabell61]

Wonderful work Bob,

 

those bow pictures show your accuracy at work, nice color scheme also   

 

Nils

[DocBlake]

Beautiful job on the head works, Bob.

[Jim Rogers]

A true Shipwright. 

[alde]

She's looking really nice Bob. 

[MEDDO]

 You make it look so easy.  Once again very nice tight and clean work.