USS Constitution by Texxn5 (John F) - FINISHED - Revell - PLASTIC - 1:96

[texxn5]

Thanks Sarah, yeah, had a few disasters, but making progress. Had another one last night, the Admiral ran over the bowspirit and knocked some lines loose as well as breaking off the tip. All repairable though so no big deal. That's where I'll start today.

[texxn5]

Well, the repairs turned out to be minor...looked worse than it was....never underestimate the power of CA and Accellerator...almost fixes anything...lol...So, back to moving forward again...

[texxn5]

Today has been rigging lifts, leech and bunt, and halyards. Will post pictures tomorrow. Goal is to finish the Mainmast tomorrow. Slow progress, but progress to say the least.

[AndyMech]

If you can do all those lines in a day, even if just for one mast, you are blazingly faster than me.  I've been doing my rigging a bit orthogonal to you - same lines on all masts (as opposed different lines all on one mast), but there are days where I can only get 4 lines rigged, in about 4 hours.  Balancing the lines is the hard part for me, where one line goes through two blocks down to two pins, etc.

 

Andy.

[texxn5]

Oh, I wouldn't say I'm faster by any means. I really can't get that much done in a day. I too have problems balancing out the lines. I found after a few builds on this thing, that perhaps starting at the foremast going one yard at a time gave me more working room...what an oxymoron...working room on a model ship..this seems to be working ok, it still gets congested , but at least I don't have un rigged yards in the upper part of the mast to get tangled up in until I have to. I have been hanging one yard at a time, then rigging the lines below the next one until I have to actually have the yard above to start attaching to. So far so good. It takes me a good hour to rig some lines, and then I have to study them to see if I like them, then move to the next. Your's looks great, thanks for keeping up with the pictures.

[augie]

Don't feel bad Andy.  Took me 3 hours to strop on 6 brace pendants this morning.  It's how you get your money's worth out of a kit

[texxn5]

Yeah Augie, I think we get our moneys worth on these things.  I'm looking forward to moving on to the wooden ships.  Plastic gets frustrating because of it's fragile nature...I think.  It's rewarding though because of "instant" detail with minor screw ups...lol

[AndyMech]

Thanks Augie and texxn5, I was kind of wondering if I was overly slow with or not.  I suspect not, and I agree that the end result is the goal, not the time taken.

 

Mainly, I was wondering if there were tricks or techniques that might allow it to go faster, but other than the yard mounting, perhaps not. I did do all my standing rigging before mounting yards.

 

And, Augie, I remember decorating yards - the Connie has 12 yards, and I think it took me several months to get all the footropes, blocks, booms, etc, on them all.  I was sure glad when I completed that.

 

I am also looking forward to wood modeling, as I feel the plastic requires so much finesse to keep things from bending or distorting.  Wood will bring it's own challenges, I'm sure.  Plus, there's the bar set by Augie's Syren 

 

Andy.

[texxn5]

You know Andy, I think Augie might have started something here using the wire for stirrups for the footropes.  Man that would have been easier and faster and I would have done that to mine except when I learned about doing it, it was too late since I had completed the foremast.

[AndyMech]

I know Augie's stirrups look good, but when I did mine I was very concerned about getting the wire not have kinks in it.  I use a 28-gauge wire (I think it's 28 gauge) to make the eyebolts, and since it's so thin it's easy to get a sharp bend that may be difficult to remove.

 

So, I did my sitrrups with a rig and little white glue (the Ship Modeling for Dummies method) and it worked pretty well.  The tough part is getting the footropes to lie naturally and I got better at that with practice.  And with 12 yards to rig, there's plenty of practice to be had, as you well know.

 

Perhaps, Augie, you can enlighten us on how you attached the wire to the yard and how you made the loop at the end for the footrope?  Maybe it's not as tricky as I imagine?

 

Andy.

[texxn5]

I haven't worked with the wire on this ship. I can see where there could be problems with kinks though. I never got my footropes to lie correctly, so I started trying to glue them to the stirrups, this works great until you hit one with fingers or tweezers. It does however, lie better than if loose, and I intend to go back and reglue them when I finish with the masts. Augie what words of wisdom can you share with the fleet?

[texxn5]

OK, here's the update photos from the weekend.  Ran the Topsail Halyards last.  Now ready to move up the mast for the Top Gallant yard.  This is Friday and part of Saturday.

[texxn5]

Parts of Saturday and Sunday. Trying to get all lines done before moving up the mast.

[texxn5]

Finishing up with the Halyards

[texxn5]

Now for mounting the Main Top Gallant yard. Things should get quicker on the next two yards since there are not as many lines to run..

[texxn5]

After looking all of this over, I am now really glad I decided to run the footropes, stirrups, and blocks on all of the yards at the same time. As I recall from the time I quit working on this three years ago, this was the point of "burnout" as I had started the foremast and worked for 2-3 days straight with few breaks to complete it, then I was faced with starting on the yards again with the tedious footropes etc., after stopping then, and now with the help of this forum I am now going to stick with this until I get it finished, which is ultimately the completion of a 44 year project. On a different subject and veering off course for a moment, last year I finished the restoration of my original car, which I had new as a Senior in High School in 1967....it is a 1967 Plymouth GTX, one of only a few to have survived...she is now Concourse quality and still all original. Sorry for being briefly offcourse....lol

[DSiemens]

Are your back stays loose and if so is this something that is tightened later?  They just look like they are sagging a bit.  Over all great looking ship though!

[texxn5]

yeah, overall I'll have to try to tighten some lines once I get my hands out of it.  Some have been knocked loose and reattached.  I think I can tighten up everything as it progresses farther. 

[Old Sea Dog]

Very nice work.

[texxn5]

Thank you, greatly appreciated. It's very nice to know that I'm not the only idiot on the block, and that there are many more people that also do this same insanity....many are more anal than I am on perfection....lol....

[DSiemens]

You are definitely not the idiot on the block.  While I'm good at my ship bottles there's a lot I don't understand about the big ones. 

[texxn5]

Good for you Daniel, I don't even know how to think about bottles....except to drink them.....

[Sjors]

Hi Texx,

 

I have be missed this one 

And she is almost finished!

It looks awesome!

Great job.

I think it should be long ,but I watch you closely!!!!!

 

Edited April 23, 2013 by Sjors

[texxn5]

Thank you Sjors.  Yes, this one is almost finished.....it's been a long time coming.  I wish I hadn't last all my pictures of her construction.  But at least I still have the ship..

[Sjors]

That's the most important thing Texx.

And you have your memories….the good and the bad!

 

[texxn5]

Yes Sjors, that is right I do have lot's of good memories....

[texxn5]

Well, today I finished the Main Mast, and will start with the Mizzen Mast.

[texxn5]

These might have a little more detail.

[DSiemens]

Wow so close to the end you can taste it.  She's looking fantastic.  

[Sjors]

Really a great job!

I hope I get mine like this…...