Nuestra Senora del Pilar de Zaragoza by marktiedens - FINISHED - OcCre - scale 1:46

[marktiedens]

Update - the second planking with cherry veneer is now done! Not perfect,but I am pleased with it. Now for a little sanding - not too much as it would be easy to sand clear through the veneer. No drop planks or stealers were necessary.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Mark

[Landlubber Mike]

Looks great to me!  Nice job!

[marktiedens]

Thanks Mike! Now that I look at it some more,maybe I should have used walnut veneer instead of cherry to better match the pre-stained keel & stem. I tried to sand off the pre-stained keel, but it had penetrated too deep to sand off. I wish OcCre had not pre-stained it.

 

Mark

[Landlubber Mike]

Could you laminate the stem and keel?  I have a problem with my La Renommee where Euromodel uses different woods for the stem and keel.  The keel looks a bit lighter   Since my stem has come off once already, I’ve been thinking about scratching the stem, stern post and rudder, and laminating the keel with the same kind of wood.  Otherwise, I could even try laminating keel with walnut from the kit, but not sure I have enough.  Did you have that issue with the Royal William?

 

One question too if you don’t mind on the cherry veneer.  You said it was tough to cut - any tips?  Were you using a table saw or hand cutting the strips?  I went to Woodcraft a few days ago to find a lighter wood for my Renommee’s upper hull planking and found some cherry veneer in a lighter shade than typically seen (bought some normal cherry veneer as well).  I notice that the veneers they sell tend to be so thin they have a curl like they were thick paper.   Anyway, just wondering if you figured out and easy way of working with it.  Thanks!

 

 

[marktiedens]

Laminating the stem & keel is still a possibility - I will have to see if the extra thickness will be a problem. On my Royal William the keel,stem,stern post,& rudder are darker than the hull planking - laminating them would have made them way too thick & cause other problems,so I left them as is.

 

It`s not really hard to cut,just hard to cut straight strips off of. I found a strip cutter at Micro Mark that worked pretty good once I got the hang of it. The tool instructions say to use a #2 or 11 blade,but I found that a curved blade worked much better - the straight blade wanted to follow the wood grain,but the curved blade didn`t. As far as cutting the spiled planks,I would cut templates from card stock to fit the curves & cut the veneer freehand with the curved blade in my exacto handle. After a bit of sanding on the edges,I got them to fit pretty good. Needless to say,I broke numerous pieces while cutting & sanding - I lost count of how many times I had a piece almost fitted & then -oops,I pressed a little too hard on the sandpaper & broke the piece! I don`t have a small table saw,so I don`t know if that would work any better or not - it might work if you had an extremely fine blade & zero clearance insert for the saw plus a way to keep the veneer very flat on the saw. My veneer had a curl in one area too,but I just worked around it Also,I cut the strips about 7mm wide which made them a little easier to work with.

 

Mark

Edited April 1, 2018 by marktiedens

[Landlubber Mike]

Thanks Mark, that's all really helpful.  Appreciate it!

[Snow]

Very nice looking ship and never heard of her good luck and happy building

[marktiedens]

Thanks Snow!

 

Mark

[marktiedens]

Well, that keel & stem just kept getting uglier & uglier the more I looked at it,so I used what I had left of the larger scraps of the cherry veneer to laminate them - much better!

 

 

 

 

Still a little final sanding to do.

 

 

Mark

[Landlubber Mike]

Looks great Mark.  Just out of curiosity, did you laminate the front and top of the stem or just the sides?  I’m wondering if I need to do something similar on my LAR for a better match if the woods...

[marktiedens]

Yep - basically everything that shows was covered. Being made of plywood, the edges looked worse than the sides.

 

 

 

Mark

[donrobinson]

Wow Mark, You have done so much since I was last here. She all looks great, love how that stem looks now!!!

[marktiedens]

Thanks Don.

 

Mark

[marktiedens]

Hi everyone - a little more progress. The sides of the ship between the wales was painted yellow ochre.Then the lower line of gunports(the ones with lids)were lined. Then the upper planking was started & the bow deck and beakhead bulkhead were planked. Next will be finishing the planking aft of the waist & adding the wales. After all that,I may go ahead & put a finish on all that cherry. Haven't decided whether to use polyurethane or Danish oil - will do some experimenting to see what looks good.

 

 

 

 

Mark

 

[donrobinson]

Beautiful painting, very nice work. Please show your results with the Danish oil, I am interested in seeing that

Edited April 10, 2018 by donrobinson

[marktiedens]

Thanks Don.  First I will have to go get some oil - I thought I had some but can`t find it.

 

Mark

[donrobinson]

It will show up when you come home with the new can. LOL

[marktiedens]

Update - the wales have now been added. I painted the edges black before gluing them on,then finished the painting after installing them. Also,some mouldings were added on the upper part of the hull. The instructions said to file a groove in some strips then round off the edges with sandpaper to make the mouldings. I have a better way - I got some of those micro shapers & had them made in no time at all.

 

 

As far as finishing the lower part of the hull,I coated some scrap pieces with Danish oil & polyurethane to see the difference. The upper one is the Danish oil finish,& the lower one is the poly finish. As you can see,there is very little difference. I am probably going to use the polyurethane because of the toughness of the finish. The oil finish looks nice,but any little glue spots(which there are a few) will show up as light spots because the oil won`t soak in. I`m afraid that I will sand clear through the veneer in places to get 100% of the glue spots off.

 

 

Mark

[marktiedens]

Hi everyone - more progress! Fist, the anchor davits were made from the supplied wood - the simulated sheaves were formed with a small round file after drilling the holes. Then the openings were made in the bulwarks & the davits were glued in place along with the knees. Next, I thought it would be a good time to do the roundhouses. The parts list showed them as pre-formed pieces,but darned if I could find them,so I made them from a walnut dowel cut in half & added some brass eyelets from the fabric shop. Finally the mouldings were added - they were made from some leftover brass moulding from another build

 

 

The caprails were then made from the supplied wood(sapelli). Since this wood is 2x12mm it was pretty much impossible to bend around the tight curves. The tightly curved areas were done by cutting small pieces to go around the curves,then after a lot of filing & sanding the joints they were painted black. You can see the joints in the close-up,but at arm`s length they look just fine. I think they pass the running horse test.

 

 

 

 

Mark

 

Mark

[Old Collingwood]

Very good work.

 

OC.

[Landlubber Mike]

Beautiful work Mark.  Everything looks so crisp!

 

Interesting result with the Danish oil.  I used it on some test pieces and it seemed to impart a little more of a yellow hue, but maybe I was using a lighter colored wood.  

[marktiedens]

Thanks O.C.!

 

Thanks Mike - after sitting a few days,the test strip with the Danish oil was slightly darker than the one with the poly.I just finished applying the poly to the hull & will have some pics as soon as it is dry enough to handle.

 

Mark 

[marktiedens]

Hi everyone - the hull has now been finished with polyurethane. There is a bit of variation of the color of the wood once the finish was applied, but that`s ok - adds a bit of character.

 

While the finish was drying,I made up the timberheads on the forecastle railing & they were pinned & glued in place.

 

 

 

 

 

Mark 

[Old Collingwood]

She is looking lovely,  did you have to shape the timberheads yourself?

 

OC.

[marktiedens]

Yes,I had to shape them myself from the provided wood strips - something called "koto",a light colored wood similar in hardness to basswood. They were not hard to shape - I just used a small file to shape them & then sanded the edges a little.

 

I did notice something while looking ahead through the pictorial instructions - there are no gunport lid hinges provided. They look to be glued wide open against the hull. Well,I think I have enough hinges left over from my last build,so the lids WILL have hinges when I get to that point in the build.

 

Mark

[rafine]

She's coming along beautifully Mark. Really nice work .

 

Bob

[marktiedens]

Thanks Bob! While I`m here,the bow entry doors are done. They were made sanding the edges of 3x3mm timber & glueing them together. The hinges were kit supplied items. There was nothing behind the doors to keep them in place,so I added a strip of wood on the inside to glue them to.

 

 

Mark  

[donrobinson]

Very nice work Mark, your hull is spectacular! 

[marktiedens]

Thanks,Don. 

 

Mark

[zappto]

Doing very clean work on the hull, she will be real beauty!