HMS Speedy by Theodosius - Vanguard Models - 1:64

[Ronald-V]

Man that looks really sharp! You did a mega job on that little boat! It's so small!

[Theodosius]

Thank you all for the likes! 🙂

 

@mugje, thanks dude, but there is still a lot of room for improvement 😉

I was not sold on the white oars:

 

 

So I repainted them, even if it was not so easy as the first time, when they were still on the sprue. Nevertheless, like the brown a little bit more, fit out the rest and but it on the boat for a photo shooting:

 

 

Because I did'nt paint the hull, I could not use the photetchparts for the rudder. Instead I faked the hinges with paper strips. Only the macro shows the shrotcommings of this:

 

 

Some final views before the launch will be get stored to prevent damage during the rigging:

 

 

 

Perhaps the both securing-lines are too thick (0-6mm). If there are more lines on board from the rigging, eventually I will use some thinner one here.

 

And its very possible, that I will tune down the bright yellow, if I look closer at the photos...

 

Edited Saturday at 12:02 PM by Theodosius
reupload pictures on msw

[Quimp Slattery]

On 9/7/2023 at 9:36 AM, Theodosius said:

there is still a lot of room for improvement 😉

 

There will always be ways to improve, that's what makes the modelling hobby so compelling.

 

However, I can see nothing wrong with your work at all. To me it all looks excellent. I've enjoyed reading this build log today as well as admiring the boat. It has been very entertaining and helpful. Thank you.

[Theodosius]

Thank you all for your thumbs up, much appreciated :-).

 

@Jack-in-the-Blue:Thank you too! And yes, it's all about the jurney and not the goal. But the curve for what you aim for is allways steeper than the curve for what you have learned allready :-). But otherwise this hobby would'nt have such a good long time motivation, has it not? :-).

Anchors next. No problems, but I'm not sure, if it's realy worth to serve the rings? Ok, for storage reasons I will dissassemble the anchors again. Yust sain, because they need some touch up work, cleaning exessive glue and black paint, that comes then during the final assembly on the ship after rigging.

 

 

 

 

I totaly forgot to ask: is the PROXXON DB250 the powertool of choice, when it comes to the masts and spars? Thanks for your help! 🙂

 

 

 

Edited Saturday at 11:58 AM by Theodosius
reupload pictures on msw

[Theodosius]

Thank you all for looking in and for your thumbs up, much appreciated! 🙂

 

Ok, back to fun (work :-)), I have another question:

 

I started with the masts, nothing to see jet, but still a first insecurity regarding the plattforms(?):

 

 

My reference here is Longridges's "The Anatomy of Nelson's Ships". I know that the book is about HMS Victory, and not HMS Speedy, but they are from the same navy/time/area, so similar building rules must be used. Am I wrong here?

In the book there are severel drawings which shows very clearly, that the top timbers (ribs?) on top of the plattforms are tapered from the hole in the middle to about half or a little bit more of the length.

I tryied to mark it in this picture:

 

 

My marks are very thin, I hope you can see 'em :-).

 

So my question is: is it the right way to taper all the top timbers the way I marked one of em, or is it all bul*sh*t, and I can spare that work?

 

I did'nt found anything in my Speedy-plan-sheets regarding this, so perhaps the easy way is the right one, but I want to be shure of that. Now it would be quite easy to file them all down.

Thank you all for your help! 🙂
 

Edited Saturday at 11:54 AM by Theodosius
reupload pictures on msw

[TBlack]

I'm looking at Druxey's instructions on building tops for Swan Class in his book, volume IV. He doesn't mention anything about tapering the battens (ribs).

Tom

[Theodosius]

@TBlack, thank you very much! I have started this disscussion again the the section for masts and rigging in this forum, perhaps there we can get more input :-)

[TBlack]

OK, I read the entry by Allen. Taper it is!

Tom

[Theodosius]

Thank's to the great advice I got here on the "Masting, rigging and sails" section from @allanyed, @TBlack and @druxey, I taperd the timbers and cut some adds to enhance/enlarge the ribs:

 

 

Glued em on and filed em flush to the outsides:

 

 

Problem here: some of them would lock the cut-through for the deadeys iron bands. So I looked again more careful at the drawings that @allanyed had pinned into that fred, I also need to decide what shape my enhancemends need to get.

 

Damn: My plattforms don't have that sandwich construction, that would match the drawing, especialy at the backsinde. You can argue with some enlargemants at the fromt but not at the back.

It would make total sense to rebuild the plattforms with all the neded layers. In the lack of materials and to-scale drawings for this particular model, I decided against a new build. But this could be something to do for my next build.

 

In the end I removed my enhancemnd but the ones at the front, taper them and call it a day:

 

Perhaps I will remove the surviving ones also and pack it under the money for nothing category 🙂

Edited Saturday at 11:46 AM by Theodosius
reupload pictures on msw

[Theodosius]

Still dissatisfied with my fighting tops (?), I looked closly at the drawing provided by @allanyed again to find something to improve. Don't get me wrong here, there is absolutly nothing wrong with the provided plattforms by the kit. I just want 'more' :-).

 

So I added filler pieces at the front and the gunwale at the aft of the plattform.

 

As you can see, my woodworking skills needs to improve further, but at least I have done something just with drawings as a source, that was very satisfieying :-):

 

 

 

 

 

As allways: the errors are in the macros are much more prominent than in 'real life', but, that's just a poor excuse for poor work, lol.

 

Main problem: as you can clearly seen, my filler pieces don't look that good, because I sanded the chamfer in lack of propper tools. Well, piece of wood in one hand and a sanding stick in the other: the outcome of that setup is clear visible...

 

Well, I have another plattform to do, so I will improve my work there. Because I still not have a planer, what would propably the right tool for the job, I used my disc sander instead:

 

 

Wow, muuuuch better:

 

 

Still not perfect, because I was not able to bring an even force over the whole length of the strip to the sander, my strips became a little bit of a trapezoid (?). Does'nt matter at all, because I have to cut the strips much thinner then I needet them to be able to put em on the sander.

 

But if I need at some point longer strips than just a vew cm's, I need a different approach.

 

Edited Saturday at 11:42 AM by Theodosius
reupload pictures on msw

[TBlack]

Intricate work. Most impressive!

[Ronald-V]

You are really going the extra mile! Looks great!

[Theodosius]

@Thukydides: thanks for your thumbs up! 🙂

 

@TBlack: thanks for your comment, much appreciated! 🙂

 

@mugje: thants for your nice words! I think I need more tools... 🙂

 

Bending the chamfered strip:

 

 

The finished result:

 

 

And both plattforms together:

 

 

I tryed to cut the round holes in the gunwale to a square again. Well, more practise needet :-).

 

The second plattform is better than the first one, I think on my fifth or seventh ship, then they may turn out good :-). 

 

Nevertheless, it was fun to make this little addons.
 

Edited Saturday at 11:35 AM by Theodosius
reupload pictures on msw

[Thukydides]

21 minutes ago, Theodosius said:

on my fifth or seventh ship, then they may turn out good :-).

That is how I feel about most of my work. But to make matters worse, the better you get at it the higher your standards get, so it is a never ending cycle of disatisfaction 😃.

[Theodosius]

@Thukydides: so true! When I was junger, I did dancing as a competition and there we said: I still can't spinn properly, but on a much higer level 🙂

Hello and a happy new year!

 

Still fightig an infect, but lately I could start again building the model.

 

I thought I could go with the bow sprit. First time I needet to taper some dowels. Even though I baught the proxxon DB250, I had my issues to get it right. The end of the dowel, that has to be held by the tip/spike gets wobbly during the tapering process, because the hole from the tip became bigger and the dowel now was not hold any more. Addional to that, the tip of the dowel brokes because of that, when the tip became to thin.

 

Any help/idears how I can improve this process for all the other spars that are still to do?

 

I used sanding sticks and sand paper for the tapering process.

Nevertheless, in the end I could fabricate the three dowels for the bow sprit (three with the flying jig-boom(?)). The thickes one, I managed to get an very slight oval form on the tapered end because of my lack doin it properly. Ok, it is barley to see, but is something I would like to sort out before I proceed with the booms and yards.

Needet some filler on the block, but it will be get painted, so no problem here. The seven-degree angel in the block and the dowel was done with a disk sander, where I could put the tapble with the right angle.

Enough words, some photos:

 

*problem: my old picture host might not proceed in the distant future, so I try to upload them here on the page. Don't know if this works...

 

 

HELP: the picture are muuuuch toooo big! How can I change this? Thanks a alot!

 

Edited January 6, 2024 by Theodosius
help because of picture size!

[Thukydides]

The pictures resize to fit the screen of the person viewing. I have never had an issue, I just upload them here and insert them.

 

On the issues with tapering I can't help much as I do it using a drill so there is all sorts of wobbling going on. That being said I have seen people using guides that you allow your spar to go through which might help. Have you tried searching the problem her on the forums, I often find if I am having an issue, I am not the first to have done so and searching often turns up the answer.

[jereremy]

Just jumping in to say what a lovely build this is. Currently tackling the Flirt as my first model, and it is inspiring to see what you've been able to achieve with your first. Reading through your trails and tribulations with the plywood bulwarks sounded very familiar.

 

Not to derail the conversation, but waaaaay back in the first couple posts there was a discussion about how useful it would be for the bulkheads to have etched lines showing how far to pre bevel them before assembling, and it was mentioned that the Flirt would have that detail. My Flirt kit does not have any additional lines on the bulkheads, even though the manual does make mention of them. I've run across a couple other minor inconsistencies between the manual and the parts, so perhaps some changes were made to the kit over the years?

 

Edit: Oh, and the photos in your latest post look normal to me on a desktop browser.

Edited January 7, 2024 by jereremy

[Theodosius]

@all for your visit! And thank's a lot for the thumbs up! :-)

@Thukydides: yeah, the pictures are fine as they are, my fault! I'm happy, that it is so easy to use the forum also as a picture host for the build-logs! :-)

I tried to search for similar tapering problems here on the forum. Found something, but not exactly what I was looking for. Don't look hard enough, I think! Perhaps it's also just a fact of not enough practice on my side.

@jereremy: thank's a lot for looin in and leaving an nice comment! I remember the discussion about the 'to-taper-lines' on the bulkheads. I think missing them is a little bit of a beginners thing. It would have helped me, but when one take his time during the fairing process, the outcome does not differ because of the lines being there or not.
Often enough I was just afraid of, I could damage something, what I could not repair later. So mostly I sandet not enough and not to much. But better this way, I think :-). Oh, and sorry, I don't know at what time this has changed during a revision of the kits from @Chris Watton.

Continued, but not much. Addet the pe-parts to the bow sprit and also addet some paint:

Now, I have a problem with the measurings of the fore- and mainmast:

 

I have read in some other Flirt/Speedy-build logs (but for some reason can't find the right places any more), that the tops are on both the same, and therefore the plans are not right. @Chris Watton wanted to correct this for the kits for Flirt/Speedy still to come, but mine has not the corrected ones.

 

So my question is: is in my plans the foremast with the right measurments, or is it the mainmast? 

 

Thank's @all for any help! :-).

 

Here are two pictures of the questionable areas:

 

 

[Theodosius]

@Thukydides & @KARAVOKIRIS: thank you both for your thumbs up, much appreciated 🙂.

 

As allways, health status is an issue, but model building helps a lot, at least with the mental health :-).

 

I could sort out my problem with the PROXXON DB250 during the tapering process of the dowels.

 

So I finished the masts from the woodworking point of view. They may look a bit wonky in the pictures, because there is nothing glued jet, even the plattforms are still loose. I have finished the flying boom, but I might not use it because of display/storage reasons. But this is not finaly decidet jet.

 

[Theodosius]

Milestone reached: all the spars are ready from a wood working point of view. That means, the 'building' is finished, but the complete rigging is to do next.

 

Some inbetweens:

 

Some spars taperd and the 8-sided, äh, 'things' are worked out:

 

Two points about the next pictures. First, I ran out of PE-cleats(?). A short email dialog with Chris brought clarity to my fault: he very politly pointed out, that the use of pe-parts at this point was overhoult, and I should use the plenty of wooden parts. Damn! The wooden parts looks much better than the pe parts, and I could not figure this out by myself. Only excuse I have is, that in the plan sheets I only found references to the pe and not the wooden parts. Well, to much use of blinkers on my side :-).

 

Second point: I lost one of the holsters for the additional smal spars on top of the main spars. Sorry for my lack of propper nautical terms. I made a new one out of the black paper and stiffen it with ca-glue. It is more bulky than the orginial pe-part, but if you don't know, only on the second view, so I hope I'm ok there.

 

 

 

All spars ready for rigging in front of the boat:

To give me an idea of how it might look in the end, I put all together, but only with the pins and no glue, so all is still wonky:

[Theodosius]

Puh, dusty here, isn't it? 🙂

 

Thanks a lot for all your likes, much appreciated :-).

 

I see, that my old picture host doesn't exist anymore. I still have all the pictures, and I will reupload them on this side, but that will take some time.

 

Well, I found some motivation and went into this 'rigging'. 

 

And it is much the same as it was with the hull when I started this projekt. What I would like to achieve, and what I'm able to achieve are just two worlds. Here is a full new set of skills required and to learn, so it feels a Little bit like start all over again.

My respect for some of the shown projekts here on this forum has risen tremendously :-).

 

Some of the main Problems I run into:

 

Serving the ropes is much more difficult than it Looks like. Especialy serving the lowest diameters of ropes. I buyed the smallest Guterman ropes I could get my hands on and started to serve this for the blocks.

It needs so much force in the Twist that very often it just open up again after I pulled the finished Produkt from the serving mashine. It becomes easier when the Diameter of the ropes grow. I did not look into the description of the plan Sheets carefull enough, so I started with to small ropes in case of the Diameters.

And even then I found it hard to get a smoth and evenly served layer onto the ropes.

 

When I finished the blocks for both of the masts, I run out of served smallest ropes, and for the remaining blocks of the bow sprit I made new ones, but now with the 0.25mm ropes as the core. This was much easier to serve, so I think I will stay wiht this, even if I have now different sizes for the same purpose on the model. And, as the plan sheets suggest to use the 0.25mm rope to tackle the blocks (at least the smallest ones), now the served 0.25mm ones are to big.

To help me not to loose my mojo to fast, I keep my inperfektions to achieve a little bit more Progress.

 

Another big Problem is, that during rigging the blocks and eye-bolts, often enough my serving open up again. Of Course most of the time when it was allready have build onto the masts or anything other. I replaced the worst, but kept some of the imperfekt ones because of reasons mentioned above.

 

So my conclusions at this Point: just take your time to learn the new skills. Found a way that is working for you. And, I can now understand why there are a lot of builds out there that uses brown ropes instead of the classic black ones. When there is all black on black, you won't see much of the effort of served ropes. And, the brown ones might be more accurate from an historical Point of view, but I do not participate in that debate, for me it is just personal preference. At the end, the black rope overall helped me to live with more errors, than a lighter and more prominent color would have allowed.

 

Ah,and before I Forget it: another big mistake I made: I used a to thick of a rope for the gammoning of the two spars of the bow sprit.

 

I enter now just a bunch of photos with no furhter description. There are examples of the better and of the worse stuff. Hope, you enjoy it.

 

 

 

 

 

[Thukydides]

Good to see you back at it.

 

Serving is a bit tricky. It takes time to figure out the twist and the tension. I found mechanically fastening the ends as well as glue helped. I would use a needle to run the serving thread through the rope being served with a very small bit of super glue on that part to hold it there. Also I found that magnification helps a lot.

 

If you are looking for ideas you can check out my alert log. I discuss much of this in detail there.

[Theodosius]

Thanks for all the thumbs up 🙂

 

@Thukydides: thx for your comment and help! I'm (again, :-)) reading through your magnificent build log of Alert! Will look carefully into your description of your rigging! And yes, twist and tension needs more praktice! 

 

If I understand it right, then you seal the whole length of a served rope with dilluted matt varnish, is that right? I will try this also on my ropes. Didn't do this till now, because I thought the rope would become to stiff to bend it properly with the hardened varnish.

 

In the meantime, I replaced the 0.6mm rope of my bow-sprit gammoning with  0.4mm. That looks much better. In the end, I should have done less circles, but I think it will work now.

 

[Thukydides]

41 minutes ago, Theodosius said:

If I understand it right, then you seal the whole length of a served rope with dilluted matt varnish, is that right? I will try this also on my ropes. Didn't do this till now, because I thought the rope would become to stiff to bend it properly with the hardened varnish.

I only did this after it was on the model. This was mostly to remove the shine of the poly rope and any super glue that was visible, but also helped protect and hold everything in place. If you do it earlier then you can make white bits of varnish flake off as you are manipulating it (not a good look).

 

If you are looking at my log then look at my later rigging work as opposed to the earlier stuff. I got a lot better as I went along and found better ways to do things.

Edited Sunday at 10:38 AM by Thukydides

[Theodosius]

Thank you all for your thumbs up, much appreciated 🙂

 

@Thukydides: thanks again for your advice! I read again through your log, full of good stuff regarding my rigging problems! I think I need much more practice, and I need also to try out more different approaches to find what fits to my skills. I struggle a lot to get a good and small serving aroung loops, blocks, etc. Still not found what works for me on that front. Most of the time I endet with a normal knot, done with the small Guterman string aroung whatever. And then I can not expand this knot into a good Looking serving-loop. Thats then allways the Point where I ask myself if it is worth trying with the small extra rope, or, just make a normal knot with the initial rops.

You can see in my examples, that I still try and don't go the very easy way with just knoting the initial ropes. But, it is so poorly executed, that it Looks always quite messy. Well, I close the loop with: need more practice here and need to try more different approaches :-).

 

Then, after finishing all the blocks on the masts and bow-sprit, there was the question: start the standing rigging now, or, finish all the blocks on the spars first. Well, I'm not feelin 'ready' enough to start the bigger tasks, so, at least, I will do the spars for the bow-sprit and the gaff(s)(?) first.