HMS Diana by Vane - Caldercraft - Scale 1:64

[ECK]

Looks Great. Good planking work.Here is a picture of the stern are of my HMS Surprise, a very similar frigate design. You can see how low it is below the bulwarks.  You may be running into the same issue I had with the whale being too wide.There is a discussion on my build on it and if you look at the Diana book you might see  a difference from the instructions. I had to cut mine down. Yours looks  about 1 row too much. Sorry if giving advice but the comments from others saved my bacon.

 

[Vane]

Nice build. Yes I saw the discussion on your whale and thought long and hard when I put together mine (which is 18mm) which is in accordance with the plans. But one problem with the plans is that the blackstrake is not clearly marked. 

 

[ECK]

I agree with you. Pictures are hard to gauge .

[ERS Rich]

A lot of work!  Lookin’ good!

[ECK]

I am so sorry to all, especially Vane who has been doing such excellent work. I put the photos in the wrong blog . I am new to blog posting. I deleted my error.

Edited July 26, 2021 by ECK

[Vane]

We have all heard about the Chuck method for planking....  it was abit to hard for me so I decided to come up with a more simple version... I give u the Vane method... PM me if u want a lesson.  I only charge 1$ per hour 😛

[Beef Wellington]

Nothing wrong with that, spend your time on the things that WILL be seen! 

Edited September 1, 2021 by Beef Wellington

[glbarlow]

Well…it’s interesting….

[Wahka_est]

As it wont be seen then it fall to category where only person truly influenced by that is you and everyone else that you show that thinks its supposed to be like that (not here ofcourse). But like said before - it wont be seen .

 

But upper part looks really nice .

Keep it up!

 

Vahur

[Jasseji]

10 hours ago, Vane said:

We have all heard about the Chuck method for planking....  it was abit to hard for me so I decided to come up with a more simple version... I give u the Vane method... PM me if u want a lesson.  I only charge 1$ per hour 😛

Well, i did the same on my LN below the Waterline, only i upped the lazyness factor by using 2 Layers of 0.5mm thick strips instead of one layer 1mm thick.

 

It wont be seen, focus on the visible stuff, good work

[Vane]

Short update on the planking. Need to trim all gunports before can move up....

 

 

 

[Vane]

I dont want to turn my buildlog into a long discussion on planking methods, but here are some of the things that has improved the result for me. This is the 5th hull i am building so I have gone from boiling water and thousands of pins to a much better and faster strategy thanks to this forum. But I got still much to learn and I dont claim to be any expert in this. 

 

So here are my main tips:

1) First planking  is mostly about shape. PVA, plankbender and pins works for me. I dont care how the result looks. It needs to set a strong base and the shape needs to be formed right

 

2) Carefully select and sort out what stripes to use and when. Dont pick them randomly. The colour and grain will effect the end result. Avoid getting your hull look like a checkers board in places that are visable. There is always the option to buy better stripes or change the wood. It comes to a cost but considering how much time you will spend on a wooden ship i think its worth to work in good material. I will likely never build a ship in walnut if the wood is not painted.

 

3) Cut short stripes rather than try to cover full lengths. Its more accurate to the scale and also easier to work with.

 

4) Pay alot of time to shape the strip. Testfit sand testfit sand testfit sand.

 

5) Edgesanding with a rund inner edge. This will make it easier to avoid any kind of gap. 

 

6) Prebending (aka Chuck method). I use a  heatgun and a simple rig with clamps . I just put the plank in place and make a mark where the gap is widest to know where to bend.

 

7) CA glue. I know some people think it messy but once you get the hang of it you will be much quicker and there will be no pinholes. I use it together with warm water which makes it easier to stick fast and to immidiately to clean. CA should be fresh for best effect but with water i think even old bottles work.

 

😎 Finally its sanding time again. 

Edited September 12, 2021 by Vane

[Thunder]

Hi Vane,

 

Was wondering how you are getting on with the stern gallery? That part of your build is at the same stage as mine and i am having real difficulties lining everything up. I have come to the conclusion that it is a fault with bulkhead 17 and that it is set too high. Unfortunately this not only effects the stern gallery but also effects everything at the stern including the quarter galleries, wale, planking of the stern etc. I believe everything is 4mm too high.

[Vane]

I have many parallell build so I am not working on Diana for the moment and it will take a while before I start working with the stern properly. I looked into the question earlier and what I could see from studying several builds is that the hight seem to end up in various places. Keep in mind that Diana is a rather old kit so its much up to the modeller to line up things. Nowadays Chris is much more precise in his designs with a huge number of lazercutted pieces that fit exactly where they should. But in the 90s it was different. 

So the questions is how to line up it in the best way? Here I wouldnt focus too much on one single issue, instead focus on the overall lines of the ship. If you want the windows exactly in line with the decks you will likely get other dimensions that may be completely wrong so I think I will try to go for some kind of compromise  where the most lines feels fine. Does that make sense?

[DaveBaxt]

Vane. Thank you for your tips on planking. It is always nice to hear different ideas on how to go about this piece of work. Hope you return to building the Diana in the near future as I look forward to your progress. I am considering building the Diana as I have mmanaged to get my hands on the AOTS book for this ship so it will be interesting to see if there are any differences in the kit. The other reason I wish to build here is I fancy doing one of the big ones but I am still not sure where to put her. You have a huge project on your hands there , so I will wish you good luck and remember to keep us all posted. Best regards Dave

[allanyed]

Hi Dave,

Just an FYI, hope you don't mind.  While the fictional ship Surprise (based on the Rose) would have had her name on the stern due to the time period, and while most kit makers have the name on the stern of every vessel (which is usually not appropriate) , Diana 1794 would not have her name anywhere on the ship.  As you have been so meticulous so far, in case you did not already know, I thought you might be interested as there were no names on British warships except between 1780 and 1790, and then they were painted on, not made of wood. They were typically found on the counter below the lights (windows), not above the lights as shown in the photo in the post from last year.   

Cheers

Allan

[Vane]

I was supposed to work on my carronades on my Snake... but ended up here planking instead 😛

[Beef Wellington]

Looking very nice Vane!

[DaveBaxt]

I have really enjoyed your log so far and has been a great help with the gun ports and what to expect when I eventually get around to that part. I started building the Dianna a couple of months ago and currently working on the the lower gun deck so probably a good while before I get to the current stage you are at. Good to hear your health has rerturned and arer back to working on your models. Your Diana is coming aolng niicely and I look forward to your progress. best regards Dave

[Vane]

Some progress on my Diana. 2nd planking almost done on both sides. Did some small mistakes but overall happy how it turned out. Gunports are not perfect. Difficult to get them right when everything needs to be scratchbuilt. Chris has definitely improved his solutions in the kit design since he did this like 30 years ago when everything is up to the builder.  Cant wait to do another hull with MDF and build it like Lego 🙂 . 

I cut the upper deck in 3 parts. I think it will require too much tweeking to get it in place in one piece. 

I am not yet sure how if I am doing the quarterdeck with walls or open rails which looks more beautiful but requires some scratchbuilding. 

As I said before, progress is slow due to numerous of parallell projects. In summary:

Hms Victory: rigging started

Hms Snake: yards under construction

Hms Speedy: rigging to begin

Hmbv Granado: deck details and guns

...and various plastic kits in different stages.