Clipper d'Argenteuil by G.L. - scale 1/15 - POF - SMALL

[G.L.]

The mast step holds also the goose neck fitting.
Sawing a piece of brass plate for the fitting.

The goose neck fitting is attached to the mast step with four heavy screws. Imitating those screws:
-Drilling four screw holes and knocking a brass nail in each of them.

- Cutting the nails and filing them flat.

 

- Sawing a (screwdriver)groove in each of the screws.

- Soldering a piece of brass pipe on it as goose beck holder.

 

The goose neck fitting attached to the step of the mast (The pale piece of wood at the bottom is a temporary spacer).

In front of the mast stand bits. They consist of a fork shaped piece of ebony.

Filing the heads of the bits

 

The bits are placed against the second forward deck beam.

To allow the mast to tilt freely from vertical to horizontal position, the lower part must be able to pass through the deck. An opening is provided for this in the foredeck.
The carlings for the opening:

Round the opening come small coamings. A bit hard to see on the picture.

Just behind the mast stand two sheet bits with each thre sheaves to guide the sheets to the holes in the front of the cockpit coaming.
I laminate the bits from three thin ebony slats to obtain a straight groove for the sheaves

The cap of the sheet bits also contains two sheaves and must be folded into shape.

 

 

 

The arrangement of mast step and bits.

The whole will not yet glued definitively in the hull at this stage.

 

Thank you very much for reading this log, for your likes and for your comments.

 

Till next week!

 

Edited August 8, 2021 by G.L.

[G.L.]

15. Bulkhead

The cockpit area and the stern section are separated by a bulkhead. As my model is half anatomic, I will make a half bulkhead: from starboard side to midship.
On the pictures you can see that I removed the thwart and the cockpit coaming arrangement, that is also the reason because I didn't  glue the different sections in the hull yet.
In the bulkhead, a panel, below the thwart gives access to the stern section.

 

[G.L.]

16. After deck beams
Time to finish the deck beams behind the bulkhead.
The deck beams round the helm port are reinforced with some carlings.

The last deck beams are laid.

 

 

Thank you very much for reading this log and for your likes and for your comments.

 

Till next week!

[jlefever]

Nice metal work. She's coming together well.

 

Jim

[G.L.]

On 8/26/2021 at 9:27 PM, jlefever said:

Nice metal work. She's coming together well.

 

Jim

Thank you very much, Jim.

[G.L.]

Unfortunately I have to put my project on hold for a few weeks. My son has asked me to help out in his company full time for a few weeks. However, full time for him means seven days a week, so there is no time left for model building for the time being. I hope to be able to continue with my clipper during October.

[Wintergreen]

Well, great that you are able to help out. What a recource for your son.

 

We will wait here til you come back 😉

 

 

[EricWilliamMarshall]

We are still waiting. Nudge, nudge. I hope all is well.

[G.L.]

All is well with me, Eric, nice of you to inform.

My clipper has been standing untouched for more than two months. Most of my time has gone to another project. My son has a sound and lighting business for major events, festivals, conferences, parties, etc ... He ownes a 300m² warehouse to store his material. In recent years, the warehouse has become too cramped. Due to the covid pandemic, the entire event sector has gone on hold; he wanted to use this time-out to increase the storage capacity of his warehouse. The building has an interior height of nine meters; the plan was to build in a floor at a height of four meters, supported by a system of steel beams.
 In order to maintain an income and to be able to pay the investment of the renovation, my son worked temporarily as a freelance maintenance technician for several large companies during the day. In the evenings of the working days he prepared the steel beams: cutting at the correct length, drilling holes where needed, welding flanges, ... During the day it was my job to paint all the prepared beams and during the weekends we both worked together to put them in place.

 

It's also my job to install the floorboards. I'm about half way through with that. The work was stopped for a few weeks because we had to wait for the next delivery of floorboards. For me this was an opportunity to work in my garden that had been neglected for a long time. On the right of the photo below you can see the freight elevator that we installed.
When the work is finished, storage capacity will have almost doubled. I'm afraid that in a few years there will be too little again.

In the meantime, festivals and events have been allowed again (for now anyway). Good news for my son because many orders are coming in again, but bad news for the availability of the alternative storage place where he was allowed to store his material during the change works.

Last week we had our delivery of floorboards so I can complete the work next week. Then I can move on to other important business, such as building my clipper d'Argenteuil.

[TBlack]

Major construction work! Most impressive. Also, the highest compliment when a mature son asks dad for help. And your work on D'Argenteuil 

continues to amaze me. You are obviously talented on many different levels.

Tom

[Roger Pellett]

This looks like a huge job!  Well done.

[G.L.]

On 11/14/2021 at 7:13 PM, TBlack said:

Major construction work! Most impressive. Also, the highest compliment when a mature son asks dad for help. And your work on D'Argenteuil 

continues to amaze me. You are obviously talented on many different levels.

Tom

 

On 11/14/2021 at 7:38 PM, Roger Pellett said:

This looks like a huge job!  Well done.

Thanks Tom and Roger and all who pushed the like button. Yes, it was a huge job, certainly because it was a two man job.

Last week, I finished the floor.

Now I have again some time for modelling. I will try again to give regular updates although it will take some effort to rejoin the routine.

[G.L.]

17. Assembly of the prepared sections
My work on the model ended in August with the completion of all structural parts to be built inside the hull.

The prepared hull sections can now be finally placed and glued. Before starting with that I stained the deck beam clamp in black.

The bottom boards. Some weights to give pressure while the glue is drying.

The center board case.

The foredeck section.

 

The mast erection installation. Before gluing it into place I splice the mast erection hall yard to the eye because I am afraid that it will be hardly accessible with all the deck beams in position.
 

The thwart.

The bulkhead.

The cockpit coaming and associated deck beams.

 

The helm port beams and carlings

And finally the remaining deck beams:

 

 

 

 

 

I am working on this again. Hopefully I can go on for a while now. Next job will be laying the deck.
See you soon!

Edited November 21, 2021 by G.L.

[Baker]

1 hour ago, G.L. said:

Now I have again some time for modelling

So it is true that people who are retired have little free time for themselves 😉 

Very nice work on the model and the warehouse.

[Wintergreen]

Good to see you back at the work bench GL!

I like the way you pre-attach stuff together and then "just" glue them into place. Smartly done 🙂

 

[KeithAug]

Not quite sure how I missed this build until now but it was a pleasure catching up. I think some of the build ideas are quite inspired and i particularly liked the "bow" for fairing the frames, the clamping of the frame laminations and the cutting of the hull planks. Everything is up to the usual high build standard. Well done.

[G.L.]

Thanks for all the kind comments Patrick, Hakan and Keith. Thanks also all who liked.

This week I laid the deck.

 

18. Laying the deck

The deck is made of mahogany, the caulking between the deck planks are ebony strips.

I make first the waterways. To determine the shape I turn the model upside down and draw the contours of the wale on a mahogany plank.

Then I draw the shape of the water way with a pencil with the help of French curves.

Fitting the sawn water way on the model.

Gradually the complete waterway takes shape.

 

 

I glue a strip of ebony on the inside of the water ways.

Gluing the waterways into position.

 

Preparing the deck planks with a strip of ebony, a bit thinner than those on the waterways

I scrape the ebony strip to almost equal thickness as the planks and plane the whole then to 1.5 mm thickness.

 

I start to lay the deck at midship on the after deck where I have the longest straight uninterrupted line.

Then it is just gluing plank after plank.

 

 

 

Drilling holes for the tree nails.

The three nail are toothpicks saturated with black stain.

 

 

 

The deck is laid, scraped and sanded.

 

 

After being varnished.

 

Thank you very much for reading this log and for your likes and for your comments.

 

Till soon!

 

[Baker]

A very beautiful result .

[Wintergreen]

What Patrick said above.

 

I notice that you haven't treenailed the coverboards and assume that that is intentional. Is it to keep details to an accurate but not overwhelming experience? I mean, treenailing the coverboards will detract interest from the nice deck. As it is now, both the coverboard and the deck stands out on its own.

Keep it up!

 

[wefalck]

Actually, neither of them would have been 'tree-nailed' on the prototype. On the real thing, the planks would have been screwed down with sunk screws and the borehole would be plugged to make it as invisible as possible. The plugs were not tarred, but perhaps covered in some marine glue before driven in. The plugs were cut from the same materials as the planks and with the same grain direction. In this way the deck could be planed absolutely flush before varnishing it.

 

I am watching this nice progress with interest !

Edited November 28, 2021 by wefalck

[Wintergreen]

That sounds reasonable wefalck. Countersunk and plugged, off course for a varnished surface.

[G.L.]

On 11/28/2021 at 1:18 PM, Backer said:

A very beautiful result .

Thaks, Patrick.

 

On 11/28/2021 at 7:41 PM, Wintergreen said:

What Patrick said above.

 

I notice that you haven't treenailed the coverboards and assume that that is intentional. Is it to keep details to an accurate but not overwhelming experience? I mean, treenailing the coverboards will detract interest from the nice deck. As it is now, both the coverboard and the deck stands out on its own.

Keep it up!

 

 

On 11/28/2021 at 7:52 PM, wefalck said:

Actually, neither of them would have been 'tree-nailed' on the prototype. On the real thing, the planks would have been screwed down with sunk screws and the borehole would be plugged to make it as invisible as possible. The plugs were not tarred, but perhaps covered in some marine glue before driven in. The plugs were cut from the same materials as the planks and with the same grain direction. In this way the deck could be planed absolutely flush before varnishing it.

 

I am watching this nice progress with interest !

 

On 11/28/2021 at 8:48 PM, Wintergreen said:

That sounds reasonable wefalck. Countersunk and plugged, off course for a varnished surface.

Hakan and Eberhard,

You are absolutely right. The planks were undoubtedly fastened with countersunk screws capped with a wooden plug, in the same wood as the decking. My dark tree nails are probably a bit overdone. On the real boats, the deck probably wasn't even varnished. I was guided by the example of Bruno d'Orsel, he also used dark tree nails, maybe they are a bit thinner than mine. It is not so much about giving an accurate picture of reality, but also about reproducing the atmosphere of a yacht model from the Belle Epoque. I purposely did not use tree nails in the waterways so as not to visually overload the whole.
I suspect that the mahogany decking will darken a bit over time and that the wood stain on the tree nails will fade a bit.

[wefalck]

As this is probably going to be a decorative model, you are surely on the right track! It's only good to be conscientious of the artistic licenses one takes.

[G.L.]

19. Rudder and tiller.
To make the rudder I start by drawing a saw template on paper. The drawing is drawn on both sides using carbon paper.

I glue mahogany planks on top of the drawing.

 

When the glue is dry, I saw out the rudder.

 

Presenting it into position.
The rudder stock is a brass tube of Ø 3mm.
I draw a paper template to saw the upper pintle. I draw first the one upper side of the rudder...

... and then the other side.

 

Sawing out the pintle:

 

 

 

Fitting the two pintles.

I solder nails through the pintles ...

... cut them off and file the inside of the pintles flat.

The rudder skeleton.

Gluing the pintles on the rudder.

The rudder rests on a sole piece that is incorporated in the keel. To neatly saw out the recess, I attach two metal guides to the keel.

 

 

Fitting the rudder:

The rudder stock passes through a kind of massive wooden 'deck passage'. Making that deck passage:

 

Sawing the groove which has to fit in the deck opening

The deck passage;

The deck passage on the deck with the rudder stock:

 

Thank you very much for reading this log and for your likes and for your comments.

 

Till soon!

 

 

 

Edited December 5, 2021 by G.L.

[G.L.]

Last thing to make: the tiller.
The tiller is made of metal. I saw the strip that I need from a 3 mm thick copper plate that is laying already for many years somewhere in my workshop.

I file the strip in the desired shape.

 

 

My tiller is now shaped but still straight, like this it cannot pass over the cockpit coaming. The tiller must be bent.
Therefore I make a wooden mold.

I heat the tiller to soften the metal.

I place the tiller in the mold and clamp it in my workbench.

 

The result: my tiller now has an elegant upward bend.

 

The rudder head soldered to the tiller.

The tiller on the rudder stock.

I believe I can close the second chapter of my log with this. Next time we will start with chapter III: Spars and rigging.

 

Thank you very much for reading this log and for your likes.

 

Till soon!

Edited December 12, 2021 by G.L.

[Wintergreen]

Nice work!

 

About soldering, do you use silver solder (hard soldering) och soft soldering?

 

Keep it up!

[wefalck]

Nice metal-working !

 

[yvesvidal]

Beautiful work. That tiller is superb.

 

Yves

[G.L.]

On 12/12/2021 at 4:08 PM, Wintergreen said:

Nice work!

 

About soldering, do you use silver solder (hard soldering) och soft soldering?

 

Keep it up!

Hakan,
You'll think I'm a dumbass, but to be honest I don't know the difference between hard and soft soldering. I solder as one of my modeling friends showed me with ordinary soldering tin that I buy in the do-it-yourself store.🥴

[G.L.]

On 12/12/2021 at 7:05 PM, wefalck said:

Nice metal-working !

 

 

On 12/13/2021 at 12:31 AM, yvesvidal said:

Beautiful work. That tiller is superb.

 

Yves

Thanks a lot Ebenhard and Yves.