ancre Le Rochefort by No Idea - 1/24th Scale - First POF Build

[No Idea]

Take 2!

 

Well at last I have an update 😀

 

I just couldn't leave it and I have now had another go at the ceiling.  I'm really glad that I did this as I have improved my techniques and I'm much happier with the result this time around.  The joints are much tighter than before and the overall look is what I was hoping to achieve the first time around.

 

Removing the work that I had already completed proved much harder to do than I thought that it would.  I think this is because I try and completely fill my joints with glue.  It just required patience and some acceptance that the frames were going to suffer a little damage no matter how I did it.

 

The next job is to complete the nailing on the ceiling, clamp, keelson and breast hook.  The scantlings say that the heads of the nails for the planks should be 1/5 of the thickness of the planks.  The planks are 1.6mm thick so that means I require 0.3mm nails.  I've found some 0.3mm carbon rod and I've made up a test piece that I think looks ok.

 

Once again thanks for all of the help and encouragement from you all

 

Mark

 

[Tonphil1960]

Great clean work indeed

 

[druxey]

Well done. That ceiling work inside is not easy to achieve neatly.

[Hubac's Historian]

I’m blown away by your patient resolve and the beautiful, clean work you are doing.

[No Idea]

On 5/27/2022 at 11:16 AM, Tonphil1960 said:

Great clean work indeed

 

Thanks 👍

 

On 5/27/2022 at 11:48 AM, druxey said:

Well done. That ceiling work inside is not easy to achieve neatly.

 Thanks druxey - It was harder than I thought it would be in all honesty!  For some reason in my own mind I thought that it would be easier planking the inside of a the hull compared to the outside.  I was very wrong.

 

On 5/27/2022 at 1:13 PM, Hubac's Historian said:

I’m blown away by your patient resolve and the beautiful, clean work you are doing.

Hi HH - I think we all have different levels of skill but when you know you've not done your best.....well I guess we start again.

 

So I've now completed the nailing as described above.  The only change that I made was to make the nails 0.5mm instead of 0.3mm.  I had to do this because I just kept on breaking drill bits at the 0.3mm size as I really needed a micro drill tool to do the job.  I can't justify buying anymore tools at the moment so I just used what I had to hand.  Once I moved up to 0.5mm I didn't break one drill bit.

 

So I think there's about 1000 nails and the one's in the larger parts are 0.8mm in diameter.  Its not as subtle as I wanted on the planking but it doesn't stand out too much either so I'm happy with the results.

 

So now the next job is to fair the outside of the hull 👍  I've been looking forward to this part of the build for a long time now and there's a lot to do to pull it straight and fair.  I also think that this may be a good time to mark out and cut the top timbers to length as well.  If anyone has any thoughts on this please let me know.

 

Cheers Mark

 

 

[albert]

Great beautiful work 

[No Idea]

1 hour ago, albert said:

Great beautiful work 

Thanks Albert 👍

[Hubac's Historian]

At scale, I’d say the nailing effect is very pleasing; large enough to be seen, but not at all too large.

[No Idea]

On 5/29/2022 at 5:23 PM, Hubac's Historian said:

At scale, I’d say the nailing effect is very pleasing; large enough to be seen, but not at all too large.

Thanks HH but it would have looked a little better had they have been slightly smaller.  I'm trying to source some cobalt drills for the job for future nailing.

 

So she's faired 👍  This is such a milestone for me as I always thought that when I began this build, if I could get this far I can definitely finish her. 

It took a while as a decided to fair her completely by hand without using any power tools.  I just couldn't take the risk of messing this up and let's be honest how often does a builder actually get to do this job.

 

I did have a one low frame which was the same on both sides.  I had obviously made this frame slightly incorrectly which then meant that I chased this low point up about the next 7 or 8 frames to pull her fair.  The dogs legs are also now a bit slender but not to the point of weakness.  Next time I'll leave more on everything so that I have more to play with.

 

I'm so happy with the way this little ships frame has turned out and its better than I hoped for.  I also hope that some of the fantastic kit builders on MSW who's builds I follow who often talk about how they would like to try scratch building see that if I can do this then so can they.

 

So the next job is to mark out the top timbers and cut them to length which will make her look even better.  A few pictures below - Cheers Mark

 

 

[Hubac's Historian]

Mark, I am enjoying your sense of milestone achievement because I know that feeing when you finally get past what you initially estimated to be a huge hurdle, and you stick the landing without any lean or falter.  Congratulations, Man!  This truly is an inspirational log and certainly one I will be referring to, down the road.

[Nunnehi (Don)]

Mark, that’s beautiful and so precise! Extraordinary work!

 

Don

[Tonphil1960]

Beautiful clean work.  I know Ill use your build as a reference when I start mine. Framing the hull I'm dreading a bit but once i get rolling it should go smoother. 

[No Idea]

Thanks for the comments and the likes 👍  Tonphil1960 I'm sure that you will enjoy building this ship!

 

Ok first the good news - the top timbers are now cut and I would like to thank Gerard Delacroix again for helping me understand the drawings correctly.  There's a few pictures below and she's looking smart now in fact better than I hoped.

 

Now the bad news - if you've followed my build you will know that I find my mistakes when I need to move onto the next part of the build.  So this time it's the transom that I have made incorrectly.  When I made these parts I really didn't understand how all of the combined parts of a ship hang and work together to make the whole.  I learn by doing things and now I know better for the future but I'm left with a problem right now.

 

The transom filling pieces do not line up with the wing transom rabbet.  It's so obvious to me now but it wasn't back then and now I need to fix the issue.  I've attached a few photo's for you to see my error and having emailed dvm27 (thanks again Greg) I think I have two options.

 

1.  I can build up the lower transom filling pieces by laminating some wood onto them.  I think that this would be best achieved by building up thin layers of wood over a period of time.  I have no doubt that this will look pretty bad but I would get the correct shape that I require.

 

2.  I could bodge it by cutting the wing transom rabbet deeper and change the shape of the stern of the ship a bit.  I would need to blend the trailing edge of the wing transom into the planking.  I could minimise this by using thicker planking at this point in the ship and blend it in as well.

 

As always your advice and thoughts are more than welcome and hopefully I will come to a workable solution.  I really need to keep in mind that this ship is and always will be a way into learning ship building skills.

 

Cheers Mark 

[Hubac's Historian]

Hi Mark,

 

I see the rabbet in the wing transom, but I am having trouble understanding exactly where you went wrong, here.  Should the rabbet be more shallow, so that thicker tuck planking can fair into thinner counter planking?

[Hubac's Historian]

Or is it that the counter planking runs into that rabbet and it isn’t a fair transition from the curvature of the counter into the rabbet.  I can see, maybe, how the round tuck planking fays up beneath the wing transom?

Edited June 12, 2022 by Hubac's Historian

[No Idea]

19 minutes ago, Hubac's Historian said:

Or is it that the counter planking runs into that rabbet and it isn’t a fair transition from the curvature of the counter into the rabbet.  I can see, maybe, how the round tuck planking fays up beneath the wing transom?

Hi HH - yes the counter planking should run straight off of the transom fillers into the rabbet on the wing transom.  At the moment the planking will hit the wing transom before the rabbet as the filler pieces should be more full towards the stern.  I could get away with this for about half way along from the sternpost but then the gap is far too big and does not line up at all.

[No Idea]

Here's another picture which exaggerates the problem somewhat but probably explains it better.  I've also attached a picture of how I marked out the line of the top timbers for those who may be interested.

[Hubac's Historian]

Ah, okay - I get you now.

[druxey]

With all due respect, the rabbet on the wing transom should not be anywhere as deep, if a rabbet is required. It should only be the depth of the thickness of the bottom plank.( By contrast English ships did not have a rabbet there; the planks attached to the aft face of the wing transom.)

[No Idea]

9 hours ago, druxey said:

With all due respect, the rabbet on the wing transom should not be anywhere as deep, if a rabbet is required. It should only be the depth of the thickness of the bottom plank.( By contrast English ships did not have a rabbet there; the planks attached to the aft face of the wing transom.)

Yea something else for me to think about. I do seem to like making things difficult for myself.  I think that lamination of very thin strips will probably be my way forward. I would rather that it looked a bit messy but had the correct shape and it’s going to be planked over anyway.  I’ll keep you all updated as to how it goes. 

[No Idea]

I've now started the lamination process and now that I've gone back to the drawings I can see that things are not as bad as I thought.

 

My issue is that I squared off the top of the top transom filling piece but the rest is pretty much all ok.  I've checked the rabbet dimensions are they are correct at 2.3mm x 2.6mm but the one thing that I never did was to cut the rabbet corner radius into the wing transom.

 

Now it's very often that I get a lucky win but on this occasion I have, as this radius makes things so much better in terms of the transom pieces all lining up.  As you will see in the picture the radius goes about 2/3 through the width of the wing transom.

 

The lamination strip I'm using is just 0.5mm Castello and it bends very easily at this thickness and I only need to build up about 3 laminations to get the correct shape.

 

Cheers Mark

 

 

[Tobias]

Excellent work and a great result.  Greetings Tobias

[No Idea]

On 6/23/2022 at 8:24 PM, Tobias said:

Excellent work and a great result.  Greetings Tobias

Hi Tobias and thanks for the comment 👍

 

The laminating is finished and sanded into the correct shape.  I've also cut the radius's at the end of the wing transom and I think I've pretty much got away with it.  It now all blends nicely together as it should of in the first place and actually it doesn't look as bad as I thought it would.

 

I'm glad that I've now got this sorted as at least the transom is the correct shape now and the planks should lay on them nicely too.  My mantra for my next build is "leave some extra wood on until the fairing stage".

 

Its also been like Xmas as I've been stocking up on some Castello - 6 planks that are 13mm thick so that will keep me going for a while.

 

I'm off away now for the next 4 weekends, 3 of which will be on holiday in Corfu 😁 so the build will have to wait for a while but when I get started again on the whale I'll get another update up on here.

 

Cheers Mark

 

[Tobias]

Great result and well solved, then I wish you a wonderful holiday and lots of rest.

[French Mr Bean]

Well done, it looks smooth as silk.

[dvm27]

Very skillful repair and a great stopping place for your vacation.

[No Idea]

23 minutes ago, French Mr Bean said:

Well done, it looks smooth as silk.

Thanks  - By the way I think your forum name is great 😀

 

23 minutes ago, dvm27 said:

Very skillful repair and a great stopping place for your vacation.

Thanks Greg and cheers again for pointing me in this direction to sort it out 👍  We've never been to Corfu and its 32 degrees at the moment - we can't wait!

[French Mr Bean]

2 minutes ago, No Idea said:

Thanks  - By the way I think your forum name is great 😀

 

 

It's hard to be famous..... 🤣

[Hubac's Historian]

Nice save, Mark!  The repair looks great and will mot be noticeable, in the end

[Tonphil1960]

Mark, very critical question. On page 53,55 and 57 in the Ancre book it says line 6 should be moved up by 7.5mm. What is this ? What did you do with this ?  Seems a very important measurement to just have notes on the page for it. 
thanks Tony