New Bedford Whaleboat by Kai F. - FINISHED - BlueJacket Shipcrafters - scale 1/3"=1ft (1:36)

[Kai F.]

First build of a wooden model. Inspired by a visit to the New Bedford Whaling museum and the USS Constitution museum.

Started Dec 2020, finished Feb 2021.

used a electric plank bender which was extremely helpful and fast (did not soak planks overnight, just wetted)

used regular wood filler to fill gaps, worked great

came of the formers without too much trouble despite being glued on in some parts. Best to use  saw to remove from base if needed and then remove remaining pieces.

Used a paper template with the required distances marked, which could then be copied on to the model. The tricky part is having the starboard and port sides align perfectly. It will matter later for the thwarts, which will have cutouts for the frameheads and should be as symmetric as possible.

made the oar locks as per the instructions from the supplied brass wire and soldered too smoothen, but probably not necessary as they will be almost flush with the gunwale.

Decided on matt black and white for outside of hull and gray inside (simple hobby acrylics)

stained thwarts with cutouts 

to make the centerboard functional was tricky. I ended up sanding the inside of the trunk and the centerboard thin to get enough space for it to move up and down.

rudder pintles made from brass wire and the gudgeons from flattened brass wire

Wile building this model, lot of surfing on this website and elsewhere to understand the functionality of the various parts of this boat, which is fascinating

coming together...

oars, rudder, lance, tiller

found an old sewing machine to help with this, but this was difficult. Regular white Elmers all-purpose glue for the reefing lines worked well.

curling of the ropes again with the help of some regular all purpose white glue.

Painting the lines on the oars was tricky. I used good masking tape to try to keep the lines as clean as possible

rigging and mast in place

all done. This was a lot of fun.

thanks for visiting.

[BobG]

Congratulations on finishing your first model. It looks great! Now that you've got that one under your belt, what's next?

[Kai F.]

Thanks!

I think I will work on the Bounty launch next.  3500 nautical miles in an overloaded open small boat, quite something...

[MrBlueJacket]

Well done!  Your customer file has a note in it that you will get 10% off the next kit you buy from us.

[GrandpaPhil]

Well done!