HMS Victory by gjdale - FINISHED - Mamoli - Scale 1:90

[augie]

Hong Kong?  You went the wrong way and missed out on good old US hospitality  

[gjdale]

Hong Kong was just a 24hr stopover to break up the flight. Georgina (the Admiral) slept for 12 hours straight when we got there, so we didn't even venture outside of the hotel on this visit! Finally made it back to Oz at 7:30am this morning, landing in Sydney after a nine hour flight from HK. Then we stood in a queue for an hour and a half just to transfer to the domestic terminal for our final one hour flight home to Canberra. I feel embarrassed for all the visitors to this country who are met with this sort of inefficiency the moment they set foot here! Still have an hour to kill before our connecting flight, so a perfect opportunity to catch up with the forum.

 

Augie - the US is in our sights for another trip in a few years time (once the bank balance recovers from this one!) I'll look forward to some good old US hospitality then.

[Dan Vadas]

Welcome home Grant .

 

  Danny

[Jim Lad]

Welcome back, mate!

 

John

[mobbsie]

Welcome home mate, hope the journey wasn't to taxing, it's a real bummer the way people are treated at airports, almost a commodity and not individuals who have been traveling for hours.  

 

Still home now and will soon be forgotten.   :)    

 

mobbsie

[gjdale]

Thanks for the welcome home Danny, John and Mobbsie. Finally got home at lunchtime today - a bit knackered after the flights, but pleased to be home again after a wonderful holiday. One of the highlights of this trip for me, and one which will stay with me for a very long time, was the opportunity to get together with Mobbsie and Christine, and Sjors and Anja. I look forward to many more Skype chats with you all and of course I would love the chance to return the hospitality if you make it down under. In the meantime, after a further day of rest, work will recommence in the shipyard on Monday (long weekend here - how's that for planning?! )

[augie]

Glad you 2 made it home safely.

 

Now ---- back to work!

[mtaylor]

Grant,

 

It was great to hear of the adventures and that you're back home safely and (hopefully) none the worse for wear.   I won't order you back into the shipyard like a certain Commodore... but do take 24 hours off for rest.  Then back to the shipyard!!

[rdsaplala]

Welcome home Grant, hope you had a nice vacation, I'm sure you missed Victory, I know we did

[texxn5]

Welcome home Grant, glad you made it safely.  I also was able to meet up with another member of the forum Dave (lambsk) and his Admiral Fran.  Wonderful experiences aren't they....to be able to connect with someone else involved in our "insanity".  I have friends in Austrailia and hope to visit someday.  It's on the "bucket list".   Time to get back to work....holiday is over.... 

[gjdale]

Thanks Augie, Mark, Aldo and John.

 

As directed by certain senior officers, I returned to the shipyard today and re-commenced block production.

 

I had previously made batches of 1/4" and 3/16" single blocks, bedding down techniques on these larger sizes before tackling the smaller ones. Today I made a batch of 5/32" (approx. 4mm) and made a start on some 1/8" (approx. 3mm). It was about a third of the way through the 5/32" batch that I had a major "aha!" moment, or as some might say, a BGO (Blinding Glimpse of the Obvious).

 

The BGO came as I was thinking about the drill-press component of the process. As you know for previous posts and Chuck's description of the overall method, the blocks are made from "gangs" of stock strip that are shaped on one end first on the mill, half shaped at the second end, then drilled with two holes, then retuned to the mill for the final end shaping and parting off from the gang. The mill process is quick and easy. It takes a little fiddling to get the set-up right to start with, but once done it remains set for the entire production run for that size of block. Until now, the slow part of the process has been the drill press as the fence has to be re-set for the second set of holes with each row from the gang. This is not only time consuming, but also a source of inconsistency in hole placement as it is very difficult to re-set the fence in exactly the same place each time. Then it hit me! If I set the fence for the holes at one end of the block, and then inserted an appropriately sized spacer against the fence, I could then drill the second set of holes without moving the fence. And of course, this would mean that the fence would be set only once for the entire production run, saving time and providing consistency of hole placement. As it happened, the required spacing was exactly the thickness of a blank piece of stock for that sized block - not sure if that was just a coincidence, or if there is some mathematical logic behind it, but it worked. I'd say this "discovery" has increased my production rate by about threefold, at least, and has also significantly reduced a frustration factor!

 

The not-so-good news is that I think I will have to re-make the stock for the 1/8" blocks. I did the set-up and a couple of trial runs late this afternoon, and it appears that the groove I cut for the sheave holes is too deep. This weakens the side walls to the point that there is a lot of breakage when run through the mill. Chuck did warn about this in his original posts, and I've just learned it first hand. It's not a big deal, just a small amount of wastage and a bit of extra time to prepare the new stock. A job for next weekend me thinks.

[Kevin]

Welcome back home, i was waiting for that to say a big thank you for the netting, 

[gjdale]

You are most welcome Kevin, I hope it meets your needs.

[Micklen32]

Glad you enjoyed your visit to England Grant

Even though you had to put up with Mobbsie and Sjors       

I hope the weather was to your liking???

It's not been too bad I suppose considering   

I look forward to see the continuation of your build   

[gjdale]

Thanks Mick,

 

Yes the trip was wonderful. We were quite fortunate with the weather - only had a little bit of "Scotch Mist"

[gjdale]

Hi all,

 

A little bit of an update to report.  Have spent the weekend making blocks (did I mention it's a long weekend here!) 

 

Last weekend, I concentrated on the 5/32" (3.97mm) size and made 568 of these (all single blocks).

 

I've been making my way down in size, so started with 1/8" (3.18mm) and decided to test out making double and triple blocks at this size as well.  In all, I made 284 singles, 60 doubles and 28 triples at this size. All went reasonably well.  So far, so good.

 

Then I went down to the next size: 3/32" (2.38mm) and started running into some problems.  First up, I had scored the stock blanks too deeply, so the side walls would shatter every time the mill passed through them.    So, nothing for it but to re-make the stock blanks. No big deal.  The next problem was that at this size, the overhang on the box jig just wasn't sufficient to hold them in place when the final parting cut was made with the mill, and there are now several hundred 3/32" blocks occupying the space-time continuum somewhere between the workbench and the garage floor.      After persisting with this for a while and getting only about a 10% yield (what was that definition of madness again?), I decided to try something different.  So, I adjusted the depth of cut on the mill so that it left the blocks attached after the final pass, by a paper thin amount.  This was enough to stop them disappearing into the never-never and I was able to easily break off the finished blocks from the stock. I ended up with 144 of these blocks. Here's how it looks:

 

 

 

I then went on to the smallest size blocks: 5/64 (1.98mm).  I take my hat off to Chuck (again)!  These made the 3/32" size look like child's play.  However, I persisted (employing the same method) and eventually managed  a reasonable yield.  I finished up with 160 of these little suckers. Fortunately, I don't need that many of these two smaller sizes! 

 

Here's a shot of the whole "family" so far:

 

 

From left to right they are: 1/4" (6.35mm); 3/16" (4.76mm); 5/32 (3.97mm); 1/8" (3.18mm) triple, double, single; 3/32" (2.38mm); and 5/64" (1.98mm)

 

And here's a shot of the smallest with the largest, just for comparison.

 

 

And finally, my stash to date.  

 

 

I gave away most of my initial run of the larger two sizes and will probably re-make these anyway as I'm not satisfied with the sheave hole placement on these.  I still need to make some doubles and maybe triples in the 5/32" size, and I need to make some singles and doubles in a 9/32" (7.14mm) size as well.

 

The good news is that I've got the techniques all weighed off now, so one or two more weekends of block-making and I should be ready to start attaching them to my ship! 

Edited October 7, 2013 by gjdale

[Jim Lad]

A very nice herd of blocks, Grant!

 

John

[gjdale]

Thanks John,

 

I was wondering what the collective pronoun for blocks might be. Perhaps a "murder" of blocks would be appropriate!

[Kevin]

nicely done

[ZyXuz]

well done, Grant!

and thanks for sharing the way of making them 

[Sjors]

Excellent work Grant !

 

How many of those long weekends do you have ???????

It seems once a month 

 

[mobbsie]

Hi Grant,

 

Hope your not suffering to much from Navy Day celebrations mate.

 

Nice job on the ( herd ) blocks, the family is growing, well done.  

 

mobbsie

[Micklen32]

Beautiful work Grant

Those blocks are absolute gems

Superbly made

Well done Grant

[rdsaplala]

Wow! those are sweet looking blocks, Grant, you have a very nice production line there my friend!

[augie]

Your effort here has been ....... outrageous.  They would be too nice to use on anything I'd ever build.

 

I believe the plural term for blocks is 'bevy'.

 

FANTASTIC, Grant.

[mtaylor]

Sweet looking blocks... and those are destined for the scrap heap?   Did I read that right?   

 

I agree with Augie.. a bevy of beautiful blocks. 

[Chuck]

Looking very nice.  I just made a batch of 1.5 MM blocks...Special order for a buddy of mine.  Thank god I didnt have to make that many.

 

Chuck

[gjdale]

Thanks everyone,

 

I'm pretty comfortable with the production method now.

 

Mark - it's only the two larger sizes that I'm thinking of scrapping as these were early production runs that don't have the sheave holes placed quite right. I'll see how they rig up first - it may be that the error isn't noticeable. It's no big deal to re- make those few - the larger sizes are relatively easy to work with!

 

Chuck - I don't know how on earth you managed to make them at 1.5mm - the 2mm were almost too much for me!

 

Not much time in the shipyard this weekend, but have managed to make a few more. No pictures today as it's just more of the same.

[gjdale]

Okay - I lied!

 

Here's a couple of pics of this weekend's limited production run.  These are all 9/32" (7mm) blocks, single and double. These are the largest I've made to date.  I think I've got the sheave holes pretty much in the right place now.

 

 

And a couple of close ups. Some final finishing around the holes is all that's required to use these.

 

 

 

Hopefully more production next weekend - I'm getting into the groove now (pun intended).

[Micklen32]

Looking at those they make you feel as if you want to rip all the rigging out you have ever done and replace it all   

Superb work Grant