Washington by Foultide (Dan) - Continental Galley

[Foultide]

Hi all, welcome to my build.

This will mostly be a pictorial rendition of the Washington. Every body likes pictures.

I'm not going to tell this crowd how to build ships.

There are other excellent build logs of this ship in progress and I'm pretty sure this will not be better than those but I will do my best.

This is my first scratch build so I'm riding the learning curve.

Feel free to over suggestions,criticisms ect.. or ask questions.

The main structure of the vessel is going to be Cherry. I'll use Holly for the deck planking, Swiss Pear for the hull planking and some Walnut for the Wales and

deck bits. This should give some nice color contrast.

I did the keel in three sections as "Yamsterman" suggested did make the rabbit much easier to work.

So without any farther Adieu here are some pics.

 

[shipmodel]

Hi Dan - 

 

This may be your first scratch-built model, but you clearly have experience and skills.  Nice, tight joinery on the keel and stem.

 

I will be following along and enjoying your photos.

 

Best of success with the project.

 

(another) Dan

 

 

[WackoWolf]

Nice clean start. Like your choice of wood.

[kayakerlarry]

Dan,

 

Very impressive for your FIRST scratch build!  I love the look of cherry.  I haven't used holly (I do have a few uncut branches in my supply...) or swiss pear but I am sure they will compliment the look.  Looking forward to see your progress.

 

Best of luck.

 

Larry

[Tigersteve]

I will follow along. Looks like a strong start!

Steve

[MEDDO]

Looks great so far.  I will also follow along as this is a strong contender for a future build.

[Foultide]

Moving forward with a little progress.

I assembled 4 ribs free form and found there was too many parts to get consistent shape. 2 were O.K. but the other 2 needed remaking.

I made a form to build them on as these first 20 or so are mostly the same....

Ribs A through M are formed but not 100% complete as they still need bolting and the frame work for the ports and sweeps.

Undecided at this time to cut them now or wait and cut them later.

Thanks to all who showed up for the meeting.

[Eddie]

Hey howya goin Foultide mate, great start with her mate, I to will be starting this ship soon, best of luck with her.    

[Mike Y]

Pulling up a chair, looks interesting!

What scale are you building?

Also, as usual, you might want to cut the frames a bit outside of the lines, to have a bigger margin when fairing the hull.

[Foultide]

On 5/21/2017 at 5:12 AM, JosephHuntley said:

Hey Dan have a couple questions if you dont mind as my plans when i bring into cad lost some quality.

 

I am on the keel and from what I can tell the keel and false keel come to abt .21" wide.

I got the Rabbet at like 1/16" wide but I cant seem to tell what the proper thickness of the deadwood is and how deep the notches for the cants are.

 

could you help me out with them. and are the forward aprons the same thickness as the deadwood.

 

these are great plans just wished had a few dimensions on them

Hi Joseph, sorry to keep you waiting. 1\16 on the rabbet might be a bit deep but only just so your probably O.K. there. I get  .015 in for cant depth and I used the 1\8 in  stock that came in the wood package. Yes aprons are the same as the dead wood. I'd be lost with out my digital micrometer and magnifying glass.

Hope this helps.

[Foultide]

On 5/27/2017 at 9:13 AM, Mike Y said:

Pulling up a chair, looks interesting!

What scale are you building?

Also, as usual, you might want to cut the frames a bit outside of the lines, to have a bigger margin when fairing the hull.

H i Mike scale is 1:48.

[Foultide]

Here is a little more progress. I used some hard pink styro and some long pins to create a adjustable jig for the ever changing rib shapes.

Worked out very well, keeping the top of the Keelson rabbet as the common point.

Started to fair some and got a few copper bolts in.

Cheers

 

[Foultide]

and no there ribs are not done yet as you can see the Keel rabbets have yet to be cleaned up.

[robnbill]

You are doing a great job with the joinery. I have a couple of suggestions you might want to look at. First is to try to align your frame sections with the wood grain. This makes the strongest frame. This minimizes the grain running across the short section of the frame (as shown in the second frame from the top in your last photo). This is never perfect, but was the technique used by the builders.

 

Second, I found it good insurance to glue the frames up on top of the template. This insures the frames do not get sprung one way or the other during glue up.

 

[Foultide]

On 6/4/2017 at 9:42 AM, robnbill said:

You are doing a great job with the joinery. I have a couple of suggestions you might want to look at. First is to try to align your frame sections with the wood grain. This makes the strongest frame. This minimizes the grain running across the short section of the frame (as shown in the second frame from the top in your last photo). This is never perfect, but was the technique used by the builders.

 

Second, I found it good insurance to glue the frames up on top of the template. This insures the frames do not get sprung one way or the other during glue up.

 

Thanks for the advice Rob, I did the odd grain matching so when people come to admire the ship the change of grain direction would be more obvious and they could see where the joints are. This way they can see it isn't just one piece of wood. I havn't had problems with the ribs springing but some of the shapes weren't completely true.

Cheers

Dan

[Foultide]

The time for summer activities is over here and I'm back to working on the Washington. Here are some progress pictures.

I started cutting the gun port mortises off the ship but decided to do them after mounting on the keel. I could get better alignment this way.

It seemed to be getting a little helter skelter cutting them solo.

Dan

[alde]

She's coming along great.

[Foultide]

Well things are rolling along some days it's two steps forward and one back. Found I had a bit of a twist near the bow managed to work most of it out.

The front Canti ribs are one rib and not doubled up so had to redo those. The bow filler pieces were a hand full and I think I made three stern tops # 8.

 Sadly I forgot to reduce the size of some of the pics I took here are a few that made it.

Merry Christmas to all.

[Foultide]

On 10/30/2017 at 8:53 AM, alde said:

She's coming along great.

Thanks Al..

[Foultide]

Found some time over the Holidays for ship building.

Dremel bit in the drill press serves as a poor man's milling machine.

[Foultide]

and some ship bits.

Thanks for stopping in.

[Mike Y]

Nice!

[Osmosis]

I am always amazed when I see one of these coming together. So far beyond my skill level and a real treat to watch. I am most definitely on board for the rest of the voyage. 

[Foultide]

Thanks for the nice Mike and all the likes..

On 1/5/2018 at 10:47 AM, Osmosis said:

I am always amazed when I see one of these coming together. So far beyond my skill level and a real treat to watch. I am most definitely on board for the rest of the voyage. 

This is definitely stretching my skill level. Having to get creative along the way.

[Foultide]

Some more progress. My bending technology is being put to the test. Bending sideways is a challenge but I found if I soak the piece in hot water,then press it into a form of the shape  and hit it with the heat gun I can get pretty close to what I need.

So here's where we are now. 

The thick and thin boards are in and so are the crutches. Made a modification to correct an error but I think we are good.

Cheers Mates.

[Foultide]

A little more progress. I had pretty much decided not to tree nail below decks and save it

for the upper decks. The parts anyone will actually see. At this point nothing is fixed as I may still change my mind.

The deck is holly.

[the learner]

Great start! this looks like a great little model to start a serious scratch build as a first choice and one that you can solicit help!

[Foultide]

On 1/18/2018 at 7:23 PM, the learner said:

Great start! this looks like a great little model to start a serious scratch build as a first choice and one that you can solicit help!

Hi Guy, yes this is a interesting ship to build, simplish yet complex.

[Foultide]

More progress pictures.

The stove was constructed of balsa. The stove floor is a mixture of white glue, coloring and saw dust.

I some point I realized I had forgotten to put in a door on the well house so I  had to came up with a solution.

Cheers all...

[the learner]

great start and wow fast too! I have started following all the Washington builds, what a great project