Barque Stefano by robdurant - MarisStella - 1:63

[robdurant]

Hi all,

 

A little update. I've cut and glued all the uprights (top timbers?) along the edges of the deck (the bulwarks). About 160 of them in total ... all checked with a spirit level to try and get them vertical to the waterline. Now I just need to finish cutting them back to the tops of the bulwarks.

 

 

 

 

They were slightly adjusted where necessary to clear the holes that come through the bulwarks. 

[BranPie]

Might be a little update...but I'm thinking that wasn't a little bit of work 😲

[robdurant]

On 5/27/2021 at 8:16 PM, BranPie said:

Might be a little update...but I'm thinking that wasn't a little bit of work 😲

 

Hi @BranPie - you're right. This took longer than I was expecting. It's the first time I've done top timbers like this, and it takes perseverance... But no more than a deck full of guns, or a shroud full of ratlines  The main challenge is to neatly cut the walnut to the correct angle for the deck both at the bottom and the top without knocking the corner off. I did this by using a scalpel to cut through the grain on the far side to prevent it splitting out, but it doesn't make it more time-consuming.

 

Once they were all cut down to size carefully, with an xacto saw, I added the pre-cut parts that form the rail. These parts fitted beautifully.  No adjustments were necessary - just care to ensure they were glued with a 4mm gap on either side of the hull. This was achieved using plasticard as packing. Weight was applied to get the parts to follow the curve of the freeboard. 

 

I pre-painted these parts, leaving a small gap on the under-side where it fixes to the freeboard. I didn't fancy trying to cut the paint in along the toptimbers!

 

Here are a few photos of the process.

 

First, the parts were tacked together at the joints with masking tape, and laid on top of the hull to check the layout. The parts were left in place while the individual parts were glued to ensure they would eventually fit.

 

 

 

Then the parts were painted, and glued in place one by one, with the packing around the sides to ensure they were lined up with the freeboard...

 

 

Because the walnut has quite a lot of grain, the parts were sanded and then painted again a few times to smooth them out, and to knock off the very sharp edges. This is especially important where the end grain meets the edge. Sand with the grain, not against it... otherwise it could splinter out.

 

I worked from the stern towards the bow.

 

 

And here's the end result...

 

 

There's a little touching up to do, but I'm very pleased with how it's come together... The contrast between the white and black is very striking, along with the tanganyika and walnut of the deck. Onwards and upwards!

 

Rob

 

 

[egkb]

Wow Rob.. She Looks A Treat !

 

Eamonn

[robdurant]

Thank you Eamonn

[robdurant]

I've been pondering for a while (analysis paralysis!) how to get the rubbing strake round the stern without it standing proud, and with enough contact for it to glue well... Planking the hull proved that trying to find any shortcuts here would cause pain down the road... so... here's my attempt.

 

It's 4x1.5mm walnut, and pretty sturdy, so I thought why not bend it to shape, then bend another plank to width to go inside round the stern, and then sand the taper caused by the counter into that double width so it ends up single-width by shaped... 

 

Something like this...

 

 

Clearly that cross-section would need to be tapered as it went round to the sides.

 

I was concerned that it would be hard to get that inner-taper right, so I used a plank with less height on the inside at the bottom, to make tapering easier. (1.5x1.5mm)

 

Some pictures follow...

 

1. Rough shaping the parts...

 

 

Painting before gluing in place...

 

 

3. Gluing in place with carpenter's glue... (and checking the gap is 18mm from the top of the main rail, to the top of the rubbing strake)

 

 

 

 

And checking that the decoration would fit at the bow... 

 

 

4. And a few photos of the result... 

 

 

 

 

Because the stern piece goes right round, the other side should be much easier by comparison.

 

Anyway - thanks for looking in, and happy building

 

Rob

[robdurant]

As a little side note for anyone following in my footsteps, the rubbing strake literally runs along the top of the water run off holes in the side of the hull, so it's worth taking extra time to make sure those go in the right place. Thankfully they proved to be right for me. At least for the port side!

[Beef Wellington]

Great solution Rob.  I think you state some very wise words, important to understand the various sheer lines that features that follow, either the sheer of the deck or the sheer of the wales.

[rwiederrich]

On 2/26/2021 at 11:39 AM, robdurant said:

First planking

 

First I should probably say that I went back and added a rabbet at the bearding line, as on Ethalion, as I figured that would give the best chance of a neat termination for the planks at the stern post, once the second planking was in place.

 

The lime wood planks provided with this kit are lovely - really well cut and nice and easy to shape... even so, the stern transom of this ship is a challenge... 

 

Using an app called conecalc, I worked out the radius the plank would need to be bent to laterally to sit flat round the stern... it's pretty severe, and my first few efforts at bending the plank like that were dismal. I ended up using 3x1.5mm beech I already had in the end so that I could get the bend. And even with soaking, and using a rib-bending iron, it was still quite the task. 

 

The planks were added with superglue, and once the whole hull was first-planked, I painted watered down carpenter's glue (Aliphatic resin) over the hull to stick the planks together. This seemed to give a really nice solid base.

 

 

The rib-bending iron is great... in a matter of seconds, you can get something like the the result below (and the wood is dry from the heat before it goes onto the hull, so it isn't going to shrink, either...)

 

 

With carefully edge bending using the rib iron, and gently teasing the planks, I managed to plank half way down the hull, and also the garboard  strake and the two planks above without tapering any of them...  The rest was then filled by letting the planks lie as they wanted to.

 

 

Once the hull was closed up on both sides, a liberal coat of wood filler was added, and the hull sanded back to get a really smooth finish, ready for the second planking. The sternpost, and the strip that adds onto the bow? were also added now that the sanding was mainly done and they wouldn't get damaged.

 

 

 

 

 

After taking these photos, I went over the whole hull and sanded it down further, as I realised there was more filler left than I wanted, but it gives an idea of the result. It'll do for a first planking.

 

I've begun the second planking, but no photos to show yet. So that's me up to date.

 

Thanks for all the likes and for looking in.

 

Rob

I know I'm kinda late coming in here...but what kind of wood filler did you use...if I may ask?

 

Rob

[robdurant]

3 hours ago, rwiederrich said:

what kind of wood filler did you use

 

Hi Rob (@rwiederrich),

 

Not too late at all... I discovered this wood filler, which I find a massive improvement over normal DIY filler. It's much more sturdy once it dries, almost odourless, doesn't seem to shrink at all, and easy to sand to a nice finish. It's also available in much larger quantities than most hobby fillers, so it's much more cost effective for smoothing a whole hull.

 

 

 

This (fairly small) pot was more than enough for the whole hull (and a few diy jobs around the house, too!)...  I'd recommend it over the tube of the same product, which I found dried out very quickly, and got to the point where I couldn't get any more out of the tube.

 

Hope that's helpful.

[rwiederrich]

2 hours ago, robdurant said:

 

Hi Rob (@rwiederrich),

 

Not too late at all... I discovered this wood filler, which I find a massive improvement over normal DIY filler. It's much more sturdy once it dries, almost odourless, doesn't seem to shrink at all, and easy to sand to a nice finish. It's also available in much larger quantities than most hobby fillers, so it's much more cost effective for smoothing a whole hull.

 

 

 

This (fairly small) pot was more than enough for the whole hull (and a few diy jobs around the house, too!)...  I'd recommend it over the tube of the same product, which I found dried out very quickly, and got to the point where I couldn't get any more out of the tube.

 

Hope that's helpful.

Thanks Rob

[dunnock]

Well thought out solution and neatly done.

David

[robdurant]

Okay - so updates here have been a little less frequent, as I got distracted helping my son get stuck into warhammer and with those flying things - a refreshing change for a little, and a work in progress... 

 

 

I'll be back onto Stefano soon

[robdurant]

Okay. The plane is all skinned and radio-controlled and ready to go. I'm just waiting for the battery charger

 

 

So... time to go back to the bigger project.

 

I've ummed and aahed and wondered how to best go about the topgallant bulwarks, and eventually I just had to bite the bullet and get on with it. And it turned out to be not so bad. I used styrene square section as shims on either side, and pre-bent the parts using my rib-bending iron. They were glued in place with carpenter's glue (Alphatic resin), and left overnight to set really solid.

 

Once in place I painted the inside of the rail white, and tidied up a bit before the topgallant bulwark rail was stuck on. This is made up of laser-cut parts from the 2mm walnut, and as with the main rail, it was the perfect size and shape. So that was a relief. I glued it all together using masking tape to hold the parts together while they stuck, on the desk, and then glued the whole thing in place in one go. This allowed me to get a nice sweeping curve from front to back. Then I gave myself a big pat on the back, and THEN I realised it was glued too far inboard. So I've just unglued the sides, and restuck them further outboard, so the top rail ends at the same point as the main rail, as per the plans.

 

The thing that made me see my mistake was looking at the plans and seeing that the deadeyes are going to go on the main rail, and if the top gallant rail is too far inboard it leaves no room for them. I suspect they're going to be somewhat challenging to rig anyway, so I'm leaving myself as much room as possible to ease the process. It's only a matter of 2 - 3mm but something tells me I would have been rueing the day I chose not to bother moving it.

 

Anyway - here's a photo I took before I realised the rail was too far inboard.

 

Also in some of these photos are the mockups for the photo-etch cabins I want to put onto this model. Currently they're a bit heath-robinson, but they prove the concept, I think.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Happy building

 

 

 

[robdurant]

A little update. I realised that once I stuck the pin rails (parts 43) in place, I would restrict access to the deck to put in all the eyelets. So I printed out a scan of the deck plan on plan 3, stuck the parts together, and used it as a template for the holes. The plan was located using the mast holes to ensure the eyelets holes went in the right place.

 

Some 100 holes later, I began gluing in the eyelets (which are blackened rather than painted) with superglue. This was time-consuming, but after a good few hours, it's done.

 

There are eyelets included in the kit, but I used some which I already had blackened, and left over from a previous Caldercraft kit. They needed 0.60mm hole.

 

 

 

 

I'm going to replace the belaying pins that are provided with caldercraft ones. Namely, the 9x1.5mm ones, which are longer and thinner, and to my eye somewhat more to scale - I swapped out the HMS Diana ones for these, and was glad I did. These 9x1.5mm pins need a 1.2mm [edit: actually, I opened this up to 1.3mm later] hole, so the pin rails have been drilled out in readiness. In the instructions this is done after the pin rails are glued in place, but I didn't trust myself not to scuff the deck.

 

Now, I'm just wondering whether to strengthen the bond between the pin rails and the bulwark? I'm just not confident I won't knock it and end with a massive tangle of rigging and no way to get it back in place. I might try and put some pins in to help adhesion.

 

Hmm... have to think about it. Hopefully I'll be able to get some more done today.

 

Edited July 6, 2021 by robdurant

[robdurant]

Thanks for the likes.

 

Okay - I took the plunge. The holes for the belaying pins turned out to be a little tight, so i redrilled them out to 1.3mm, and then glued the pin rails onto the strake and the underside of the rail.

 

 

 

Now I'll leave it overnight and we'll see just how strongly the carpenter's glue has stuck the rails on. The contact area for the glue is pretty big compared to the pieces themselves, so I'm reasonably confident they'll be okay.

 

If this has worked, then next up will be the eyelets on the rails, deadeyes (which also mount on the rails, and the chainplates.

[BobG]

Nice work, Rob. This is going to be an impressive model!

[robdurant]

Thanks Bob. Yes it's a great kit, and a bit out of the ordinary which was part of the appeal

[Beef Wellington]

Looks great Rob.  Did you end up pinning the rails?  As you say, these look pretty long so are maybe less prone to damage, and with the trip piece above also helping push back against any strain from the rigging you are probably in good shape.  Must be nice not to have to worry about any armament 🙂

[robdurant]

Hi Jason,

 

It is refreshing - no gun ports, no gun carriages, no breeching ropes or gun tackle... No elevation quoins... And no worries about catching the barrel and sending it into the hull out of reach, either! 

 

I decided to glue it in, and with the 90degree angle between the strake and the underside of the rail it seems pretty solid. Given how narrow they are, I don't think the force on them should cause too much trouble. It'll be pulling them into the rail above. I'm in awe of the guys who could find the right belaying pin in a gale in the middle of the night with the deck pitching and waves washing over them. Especially when you realise these great machines were being operated by a handful of skilled crew! Brave stuff. If my model were going to go through that, I'd definitely want the rails pinned!

 

Rob

[robdurant]

Hi all,

 

A small update. I've added the eyelets on the deck, drilling the holes using the template I made for the deck. This kind of worked, although in retrospect I would have gone back and neatened up the marks a little before I actually drilled them.

 

 

 

I've also completed the (faux) chain plates on the starboard side. These are attached like chain plates, but actually stop where they enter the underside of the rail. The deadeyes themselves will be glued into the rail on the top side. Careful comparison of the top down and side elevations were necessary to ensure these match up, and will look right compared to the mast position / pin rails, etc... 

 

This was done by overlaying the two elevations on the computer and printing out the resulting overlay to cut out and place on the model. The chainplates themselves are photoetch, and look very flimsy, but I was surprised by how sturdy they actually proved to be. They were blackened before fitting with brass pins (a 0.8mm hole was drilled to accommodate the lower pin for fitting, and then once fitted the position of the upper hole was marked and drilled. This ensured the two holes lined up as hoped.

 

Small sewing snips proved to be the best tool for removing the chain plates from the photo-etch sheet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

You'll notice that the remained of the belaying pins also arrived from Cornwall Model Boats, so those have been put into position. It blows my mind that I'd pre-drilled the holes for these wooden components before they arrived (to 0.6mm), and they were a gentle push fit when they arrived... every single one of them! I wish I could work with that kind of precision and consistency!

 

Happy building, all!

 

Rob

[robdurant]

I've finished the simulated chain plates, so I thought a few progress shots were due.

 

 

 

 

 

 

I ended up with one chainplate photo-etch part left, so do be careful with these parts (especially that you don't cut them too short, which would be easy to do if you forget to take into account the angle in towards the hull from the wale)  

 

There's a little painting to do at the stern to touch up where I've sanded down the detailing to make it flush with the wales, but otherwise Stefano's looking quite smart.

 

Next step, attaching the deadeyes to the main rails to complete the illusion that the chain plates pass through the hull.

 

Rob

[robdurant]

I've been working on the deadeyes. The instructions call for twisting wire to mount these to a 2mm eyelet. However, this seemed like it would leave a twisted wire at the top, or perhaps between the deadeye and the eyelet. Would this need soldering? And how would I blacken it, if so.

 

In sum, I wasn't quite sure how to neatly attach blackened wire to the deadeye, and at the same time be confident that it wouldn't come undone at an inopportune moment as I was rigging stays, or similar. So, I decided to forego the eyelets in the rail and directly mount the deadeyes using the cutoffs of the chainplates (as these were plenty long enough for the purpose). This way, the metal would look identical to the chain plates mounted to the side of the hull.

 

Here's my progress so far. They are (tight) push fit into a 1mm hole, but remarkably solid. If any so much as wriggle I shall glue them in place with superglue, but I have exerted a fair amount of force and they don't shift so far.

 

 

 

[gak1965]

23 hours ago, robdurant said:

They are (tight) push fit into a 1mm hole, but remarkably solid. If any so much as wriggle I shall glue them in place with superglue, but I have exerted a fair amount of force and they don't shift so far.

 

Looking great so far!

 

I would glue them in place personally. Otherwise I imagine when you are rigging the shrouds you are going to pull some of them out, or a year from now they are going to start popping loose. When you have a chain plate that is nailed to the hull and/or that flares beneath the chains the glue isn't a big deal, but in this case, I think you'll regret skipping it.

 

Standard disclaimer.

 

Regards,

George K

[robdurant]

1 hour ago, gak1965 said:

...I would glue them in place personally...

 

Hi George,

 

I really appreciate the advice... I've just finished the other side, and some of these have been glued in place, as the holes were not quite so tight, but I will go over them all again and try and remove them to stick them in place.

 

 

All things said, I'm really pleased with how they've come out. Here's the final sweep. (I'm also pleased that the drilling was much neater on the port side! - a little more care and attention in marking things up)

 

I have a few eyelets to put in place, and then it's on to the coppering! I anticipate buying a large number of superglue bottles over the coming weeks! And I'll need to dig out my vapour mask again.

 

Thanks for the likes, advice and support  Always much appreciated.

 

Rob

[robdurant]

Hi all,

 

Just back from a lovely holiday, camping up in the Midlands (of the UK), but before I went I did manage to make a little start on the coppering of Stefano. She now has four bands of the starboard copper tiles. I was wondering how I'd get on with this, as they have to be cut out individually, but it was fine. I used some little sewing scissors to cut the ends and then bent a row off the rest of the fret. The scissors were then used to separate them and trim excess sprue. They overlap beautifully (being -handed), and the whole process is well described on the plans.

 

Here's progress so far. (I put a little card in using carpenter's glue to make up the over-narrow stern and prevent a dip in the plates... it'll all be invisible, so only myself and anyone who stumbles upon this topic will ever know 😇 ) I'm quietly optimistic about how this is all going to work out. At some point I shall need to put the rows along the top, but I thought I'd put this off for a little while as I got used to the tiles themselves. It's worth nothing that the top row has rivets along the top AND bottom... also, there are specific tiles to go under the keel. Again, with rivets on both sides, and I think they're a little narrower, perhaps. 

 

[Beef Wellington]

Looks great Rob.  I'd love to see the plates before they go on, that sounds like incredible attention to detail that they supply multiple different kinds of plates for the different locations.

[Eurus]

On 7/21/2021 at 3:00 AM, robdurant said:

Hi all,

 

A small update. I've added the eyelets on the deck, drilling the holes using the template I made for the deck. This kind of worked, although in retrospect I would have gone back and neatened up the marks a little before I actually drilled them.

 

 

 

I've also completed the (faux) chain plates on the starboard side. These are attached like chain plates, but actually stop where they enter the underside of the rail. The deadeyes themselves will be glued into the rail on the top side. Careful comparison of the top down and side elevations were necessary to ensure these match up, and will look right compared to the mast position / pin rails, etc... 

 

This was done by overlaying the two elevations on the computer and printing out the resulting overlay to cut out and place on the model. The chainplates themselves are photoetch, and look very flimsy, but I was surprised by how sturdy they actually proved to be. They were blackened before fitting with brass pins (a 0.8mm hole was drilled to accommodate the lower pin for fitting, and then once fitted the position of the upper hole was marked and drilled. This ensured the two holes lined up as hoped.

 

Small sewing snips proved to be the best tool for removing the chain plates from the photo-etch sheet.

 

 

 

 

 

 

You'll notice that the remained of the belaying pins also arrived from Cornwall Model Boats, so those have been put into position. It blows my mind that I'd pre-drilled the holes for these wooden components before they arrived (to 0.6mm), and they were a gentle push fit when they arrived... every single one of them! I wish I could work with that kind of precision and consistency!

 

Happy building, all!

 

Rob

 

What a beautiful ship! And such clean lines, superb attention to detail. Great job!

 

[robdurant]

Thanks Eurus, and Jason.

 

8 hours ago, Beef Wellington said:

I'd love to see the plates before they go on, that sounds like incredible attention to detail that they supply multiple different kinds of plates for the different locations.

 

You ask and we deliver 😁

 

My digital micrometer tells me I've been tricked by an optical illusion... the plates are all the same height. Nevertheless, there are right hand, left hand, and finishing plates. Here are some close-ups of each... 

 

Right-hand...

 

 

The Left-hand plates...

 

 

And the finishing plates (because they overlap you need plates with rivets along the top and bottom to finish off the effect...)

 

 

Finally, a comparison between these (amazing!) MarisStella copper tiles (on the left), and the Caldercraft ones I used on Ethalion (which I found fine, but are clearly not as refined as these ones). I don't have any Amati tiles to compare, but I've heard these are also very good. You can see that the rivet detail is much more pronounced on the Caldercraft tiles, and they also have rounded corners. Because they are not -handed, it's hard to overlap them, and so the rounded corners result in a tiny diamond gap where they are butted up against each other. I've also noticed, already, that the overlap makes it much more forgiving to go round curves with the MarisStella tiles. They're also a bit bigger, so they cover the area more quickly. All in all, they're an improvement. 

The MarisStella tiles seem to tarnish quite quickly, but I'm hoping if I'm careful with the superglue, and I give it a good clean when I'm done, over time this will result in a pleasing patina.

[Beef Wellington]

Those are very impressive, clearly a different size at pretty much the same scale.  I had the same experience with the CC plates on my 'Snake' build, I cleaned/polished the surface hoping for a patina which seems to be very slow developing, I wonder ifs the metal composition that causes that, the Amati plates seem to be much more copper rich.