Lexington by Davy Jones - Mamoli - 1/100 - American Brig

[Davy Jones]

Well it's time to get this build log underway. Thanks to mtaylor who put the idear into my head. I bought The Lexington American Brig by C.Mamoli kit back in 2013, I started it then ran into some real life problems.  I started on the Lexington, and soon ran into my 1st problem as the instructions in my mind are awfull. I have made a lot of plastic models, ships, tanks etc. but never a wooden ship.  So as per instructions i start with adding the bulkheads to the keel,

 

 

once that was done i started on the mahogany deck sheet.

 

Then added the transom where my 1st problems started. So i fixed that with a bit of cutting and sanding but never thought of measuring so it ended up slightly off as you can see from the pic.

 

After the Transom I started on the 1st layer of planking where my real life problems started. This is the point of the build where i was stuck and mothballed the kit until i sorted the real life stuff and researched alot about planking and looked for all i could find on the Lexington, which puzzled me a bit because I found that there were a few versions of the ship. Some had 4 windows above the 2 gunports in the transom, some had 2. Mine has just 2 gunports.I also found 3 build logs here and 2 of them are different to mine I know The Lexington was renamed from Wild Duck to Lexington and was re-fitted to be a war ship in the continental navy.

So the years passed and i forgot about the ship, Then came covid 19. So took her back out and with the research and some help from you guys I started again.

So i finaly finnished the ist layer of planking. Which i can say was a chore but an enjoyable one. I found i did'nt need much filler as the planking came out quite good.

 

[Davy Jones]

After the 1st planking I made a start on the deck planking. For this i followed the plan instructions. 50mm long 3mm wide 0.5 thick, for the calking i used a 4b graphite stick.

This went well

 

As you can see from the above picture i have no sides to the ship above the sheerstrake, which i removed to make the planking of the deck easier for me. little did I know this would be a challenge to put back as i already cut the tops off the bulkheads. Now the deck is planked a bit of a mess at the transom end of the deck, but I have 1mm x 1mm walnut to cover any mistakes.

Now its just a case of making the edges nice ready for the sides to go back on

[Charles Green]

Davy Jones:

 

You are on the way to a fine looking model.  The battle history of the Lexington is fairly well documented; it has a remarkable record for a vessel its size. 

 

I find the history of plans for its modeling no less interesting, if not down right intriguing.  Charles Davis made public the first set of modeling plans for the Lexington in his book from 1933, The Built-Up Ship Model.  While this seems to be where it started, I have correspondence from Harold Hahn where he states he had drawings from Davis of the Lexington predating 1933, that were quite different.  I regret not having pursued that bit of information from him to ask for at least a description of the earlier plans.  Hahn and most other authorities agree that Davis "dreamed up" the plans for the Lexington that appear in his book.

 

Chronologically, George Parker and Clyde Leavitt are next in line with Lexington plans.  I have a set of Parker's Lexington plans dated 1947, revised in 1975, and additional plan sheets dated 1976 and '79.  Parker authored Five Historic Ships From Plan to Model in 1980 and his Lexington appears in that book.  Clyde Leavitt published an article on his construction of a Lexington model in Mechanix Illustrated in 1947.  This article was reprinted in a MI modelers handbook in 1950.  Full-sized model plans were made available from this article.

 

Rolf Hoeckel, an Austrian, published a monograph on modeling the Lexington in 1950.  I have a set of his plans based on this monograph dated 1985.  All internal fittings (the cook's oven, cabins etc.) are featured on these plans.

 

In the early 2000's, Clay Feldman published a Lexington construction practicum featured in Ships in Scale.  The NRG offers this practicum in CD form. 

 

In the current NRG Journal is yet another article on the Lexington! 

 

This is all remarkable to me since no one really knows what the vessel looked like!  Parker's and Feldman's plans show a vessel with a raised quarter-deck.  None of the others have that feature while the bow-sprit on Parker's version shows considerably more steeving than the others.

 

I have no conclusion to this post- as there seems to be no end to the Lexington's story!

 

  

[Davy Jones]

Thanks Charles.

Thats very interesting Charles. You guys realy know your stuff. I would love to see the plans,  just to see the diferences between the kit i have and the others. This is one of the pictures i found which has the 2 windows above the gunports.

[lmagna]

I agree with many others that the Davis Lexington is not really a good representation of what the real Lexington looked like, and the Parker and Feldman's plans are much more likely. The Davis bears to many similarities to the British Cruiser class Brigs of the early 19th century. It also appears that Mamoli used his concept for their model by the same name. In my humble opinion if I was going to call any Mamoli kit the brig Lexington it would be the Blue Shadow kit. To me at least that kit is much closer to what I would think the Lexington or any American Brig of the time would have looked. It is also much closer to matching the looks of the ship you posted above except for the quarter galleries I don't think the Lexington would have had them.

 

No matter what you call it and what flag it ends up flying, I really like the quality of work you have accomplished so far.  

[Davy Jones]

I have finished the planking on the outside of the transom. Its starting to look more even now.

 

Now for some of the smaller parts like the transom supports

 

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Then the lifeboat bracket for the stern of the ship also walnut, and the sides of the transom above the sheerstrake.

Then the blocks which come square so they need rounding off to make them look a bit like the real thing. All 152 of them, this took me a long time to do.

 

I found the best way to do this was to use a cocktail stick or a pin to hold them down then a small file to round them and a v shaped curved file to cut the grooves.

 

 

[Charles Green]

Feldman shows a stern gallery of five windows at what would be deck level with the captain's quarters and no gun-ports, while the only opening in the stern of Parker's Lexington is one chase port, centered at the level of the quarter deck.  Feldman also shows one window at each quarter.  Parker shows none. 

 

Parker's plans show three gun-ports in each side of the quarter deck.  Feldman shows none. 

 

Davis and Leavitt show two transom chase ports.  The windows shown in your painting are chase ports.  No need for gun port lids on a weather deck at that height above the water.  Chase ports were commonly left unarmed until needs be when guns from the vessels side ports would be temporarily placed in them.

 

The bow sprit in the painting you have provided shows a yard for a sprit sail and a dolphin-striker.  Someone correct me if I am wrong, but I believe these features are from different time periods.    

[Davy Jones]

Now some deck stuff. I think their called belay pin racks or somthing like that, I'm not realy up to scratch on my nautical terms yet.

 

I think they need a little more fine sanding but their getting there.

[Davy Jones]

I love my Archimedes drill.

Well thats them done

I have finaly stuck the 1st planking and the handrails back on that i removed erlier to make the deck planking easier. I also started on the gun ports

 

Now to make a start on the outer planking above the sheerstrake. I thought about gluing a whole plank from bow to stern but i thought it would have been a waste of wood, so I did it in short planks. Its not going to save a rain forrest but it helps. I would love to know how you guys do this, do you use a whole plank from bow to stern, then cut the gunports out afterwards. Or use small strips.

then the inner planking. Also the consoles at the stern of the ship atached to the bullwarks, and 2 1.5mm x 2mm strips of walnut to cover the top of the transom.

 

 As this is my 1st build log. Please leave comments if you think i'm doing something wrong or if there is an easier way of doing something. any help will be greatly appreciated.

Davy.

 

 

[Charles Green]

Fact or fiction, the Lexington persists because it's such a beautiful vessel.  Yours looks great - stop worrying!

[Voyageur]

Looks great! You do excellent work. I look forward to seeing your progress on this.

[Davy Jones]

Thanks guys thats reasuring to know.

Today i start the belaying pin racks for the inside of the bullwarks under the handrail

 

 

next the smaller size ones. As for the 2 on the bow Mamoli didn't give me enough wood to do those so i had to order more wood, so I'll finish those 2 in a couple of days.

 

[Davy Jones]

I just finished the transom handrail and the walnut waterway and the gunport frames. It was a fiddley process but its done

 

 

[Davy Jones]

Transom supports done and I think their called bullwark stansions either side of the gun ports

 

 

 

And the lifeboat

 

 

I think the next thing will be the 2nd layer of planking , not looking forward to this because i know there a a few different techniques. I just have to find the easiest way.

 

Davy.

 

[Davy Jones]

My wood arrived this morning, Thanks Cornwall model boats for your prompt service. so i finished the 2 bow belay pin racks.

The pencil line in the 1st pic is how much overhang the handrail has so i know how far out to drill the 1mm holes.

 

 

 

Now to start the second planking, I have no idear which technique to use so I'm just gonna wing it. my idear is to start from the top and work down then from the keel and work up as far as i can tell if I shape the plank nearest the keel i think is called the garboard strake. As long as the bow end of the garboard strake does not curve upwards and isa level the rest should just fall into place.

This is a little jig I made to hold the planks so i can bevel and shamfer them.

 

 

 

 

 

Well thats 2 done. I'm going to leave it there for today, but so far so good.

 

Davy.

 

[Voyageur]

Nice!

[Davy Jones]

Now on the 5th plank. so far so good.

 

 

 Next i will start from the keel up.

Davy

 

 

 

[Edwardkenway]

Very tidy planking, looks like you've got the hang of it, good job 👍😏

[Davy Jones]

Now at 6 planks up from the keel. Seems i read something in one of the posts or seen in a video that if you get the, I think its the garboard strake shaped and fitted good then the rest of the planking will be ok, and so far so good.

 

 

 

 

 

 I can see that there is a lot of space between the middle hull planking and the bow Planking.

 

 

It looks like I need to research more to see how i can fill this gap.

 

Davy.

 

[Davy Jones]

Well i was up till 4 am this morning. so my brain hurts now. but i have worked it out ( I think ) I have a 4 plank width on the bow and an 8 plank width in the middle of the ship, so if i shamfer the planks to half the width which is 1.5 mm. My planks being 3 mm wide i should theoretically < ( Big word for today ) be able to fit 8 in the bow at 1.5 mm width and the stern will get the usual Fill the gap treatment with triangular pieces. this is the point i am at after 4 am this morning. I think the hardest part of this build is going to be finding a big enough bottle to put this in lol. But seriously this I think  the 2nd layer of planking is going to be the most difficult part of this build as I have never done it before.

 

 

What I have noticed this Tanganyika wood.

 

There are a lot fo splinered edges it also has a tendancy to splinter very easily on the edges even with slight bend. I found the solution to this is to run a little bit of CA glue on the edge then quickly wipe it off with my finger that seems to cure the problem. As these planks are only 3mm wide I could not aford to sand much

 

 

 

This is when you bend.

 

Befor glue.

 

 After glue.

 

Then Sanded.

 

 

As a side note when i bought the lexington in 2012 I thought it was going to be easy,  just before i realised how hard it was going to be I purchased another kit I bought the HM Brig Badger 1/64 by Caldercraft.

 

 

 

This will be interesting

 

Davy.

[Davy Jones]

Just finished the 2nd planking. which did'nt realy go acording to plan but its done. I had a bunching problem in the bow and did the best i could to limit this.

Its my 1st time planking a ship.

 

 

 

 

 

Looks a bit wobly in places.

 

Davy.

[Davy Jones]

Now to do the Hull planking below the transom. THis was easy enough apart from the 45 degree angle around the edge.

 

 

 Now to cut the rudder hole, sorry not sure of the term for this.

 

 

Now to do the keel covered with 0.5mm walnut strips, the bow part of the keel has horizontal strips as per the instructions

 

 

 

 

 

I dont realy like the look of the bow part of the keel but she will be painted so not to much to worry about.

 

Davy.

 

 

[Davy Jones]

Finished the keel. I think it looks ok now its sanded.

 

 

 

 

I also attached the rudder This was quite fiddly, it took alot of fitting the re-fitting but all went well I had to be quite carefull with the rudder Gudgeons i think thats what they are called, These are made out of a lead type metal and marked very easily.

 

 

 

 

Davy.

[Edwardkenway]

It's looking good, very nice planking. 😃 

I like the natural wood finish 👍

[Charles Green]

Nice job on the stealers.  

[Davy Jones]

Thanks for the replies Edward & Charles. I to like the natural wood effect and the stealers were quite hard for me as this was my 1st go at it, but thankfully with time and patience it went better than i expected.

Now I think this is the figure head, basically just a curl on the bow of the ship. They supply you with a gold colored metal curl, but i don't like it very much so i made my own out of walnut. As you can see the right side of the curl's base is missing and the detail is not very good.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

To me the new one looks better.

 

Davy.

[Charles Green]

At that scale of detail, you'r near what walnut's porosity and grain characteristics will let you do.  And, you don't have to settle with your first attempt.    

 

Your tools must be super sharp.  Keep a strop or extra-fine stone at hand and use it before you think it's necessary. 

 

You may want to grind your own tiny carving tools with specialized shapes.  The shank-ends of small drill-bits work well for this.  

 

 

[Davy Jones]

Now to tackle the deformed gun carriage. Thankfully this is the only bad one.

 

 

 

 

 

All Done just got to add a filter now to darken them up a bit. Next up will be the cannons.

 

Davy.

[Eddie x2]

⛵

[Martin1980]

Can I get a building manual for this kit somehow? Bought the set without....