HMS Beagle by LucienL - OcCre - 1:60

[brunnels]

Those extra whale boats look fantastic, I was debating on adding them to my beagle as well, but I don't think I am skilled enough yet to do them from scratch.

[LucienL]

Hey brunnels. Thanks for the comment. I doubted my abilities a lot going into it. I think I am quite lucky with the way it turned out. Adding these whaleboats ends up concealing quite a lot of detail so it's definitely a choice to consider.

[Firs49]

Hi there. Your build log has been really interesting to follow. I am really impressed with your hammocks and was wondering whether you would mind sharing what materials and methodology you used? Thanks 

[LucienL]

Thank you for the comment. I’ve realised now that I didn’t actually include very many details of how I did the hammocks in this log.

 

I used a thin piece of fabric similar in texture to the sails used in the kit. I’m not sure where I found the fabric. I would cut a 1 cm by 1 cm square and roll it as tightly as I could. I would then use a bit of CA glue to seal it and then fold the roll of fabric in half  (with the edge of the fabric facing inwards) with some CA glue again to hold it in place. Then I cut the roll with fabric scissors. The dimensions ended up at 0.3 cm width (the width of the space in the rail) and 0.38 cm long. There was some quality control where I would throw out the ones that didn’t look quite right. Then I would place them in the rails and check with a ruler to ensure that there were the same number of hammocks on each side of the ship, some squeezing or adjustment was necessary with tweezers. After the rails were full, I brushed some varnish over the hammocks to help keep them clean.

 

I hope this helps, I tried a few different things including using wire to help with the rolling and holding them in shape but eventually found that it wasn’t really necessary.

[LucienL]

Okay, so next steps were to fit all the boats to the ship. I made the chocks for the whaleboats out of the Sapele supplied in the kit. I had to fit them to the boats and add an extra layer of wood to make it level with the skid beam over the main deck. I also placed the davits and added the support beam found in AOTS

 

After placing the boats, I realised that they are a little large. They are to scale, but I suspect that the deck in the occre model isn’t quite the right proportions for 1:60, which makes them seem a little big and makes the quarter deck a bit crowded

 

I then went and did the anchors. I chose to keep the bower anchors with the iron stocks from the kit. Two of the bower anchors in the kit are given a ‘wooden’ stock that is actually a cast metal piece. I chose to replace these with wooden stocks that I made from sapele. I made some iron bands out of a thin masking tape that I painted black.

 

I made up some new blackening solution. This time, I had access to lab grade copper sulfate and sodium carbonate, so I was hoping the higher degree of purity would mean I could add a bit less copper carbonate. The ratio was 0.5 g of copper carbonate to 20 mL of household ammonia. It basically worked as well as the homemade copper carbonate, it still took around 30 minutes to blacken the chain after cleaning with vinegar.

I then fit the anchors onto the boat. I added some additional lashing as suggested by AOTS. I also fed the rope holding the chain through a hole in the bulwarks to tie off to some belaying pins. I can see that is what has been done in the model built for AOTS so I decided that it was worth it. I’m not sure how authentic this is or how anchor lashing would normally be tied off.

 

 

 

 

Edited June 22 by LucienL

[Firs49]

On 6/21/2024 at 1:20 PM, LucienL said:

Thank you for the comment. I’ve realised now that I didn’t actually include very many details of how I did the hammocks in this log.

 

I used a thin piece of fabric similar in texture to the sails used in the kit. I’m not sure where I found the fabric. I would cut a 1 cm by 1 cm square and roll it as tightly as I could. I would then use a bit of CA glue to seal it and then fold the roll of fabric in half  (with the edge of the fabric facing inwards) with some CA glue again to hold it in place. Then I cut the roll with fabric scissors. The dimensions ended up at 0.3 cm width (the width of the space in the rail) and 0.38 cm long. There was some quality control where I would throw out the ones that didn’t look quite right. Then I would place them in the rails and check with a ruler to ensure that there were the same number of hammocks on each side of the ship, some squeezing or adjustment was necessary with tweezers. After the rails were full, I brushed some varnish over the hammocks to help keep them clean.

 

I hope this helps, I tried a few different things including using wire to help with the rolling and holding them in shape but eventually found that it wasn’t really necessary.

Brilliant. Thanks for sharing your approach. I am still quite a way off reaching the hammocks but will definitely give your method a go.

[LucienL]

After finishing the anchors, there were only a few small things before the deck details and the second stage of the build was finished.
I secured the whaleboat and the gig onto the davits and coiled up the excess rope. I’ve upgraded my thread to the rigging cord from Syren now, it does look much nicer.

I also noticed that there is a lot of detail around the bow included in AOTS that I had not included. This includes the all-important shitting hole or more tastefully; the “seat of ease”.

After that, I took some more photos of the completed stage 2.

 

The close ups really show how dusty parts of the ship have become. Looks alright from a distance, but I might need to have another go at tackling the dust. Parts of the ship have been sitting for three years now.

 

Next up is masts and rigging.

 

 

[Snug Harbor Johnny]

  You've done a SUPER job on the Beagle with keen attention to detail and execution - KUDOS.  I like how the deck planking turned out, and reviewed your build from the beginning to see the process how you dealt with the trouble many have with pencil graphite getting the deck dirty.  Perhaps the varnish 'sealed' loose graphite, so it cleaned up after scraping.  I also saw how you later scraped off the deck some more to remove the dark 'dots' at the butt joints - with further improvement in appearance. (Holystoning with glass !)

 

  I may experiment with applying graphite to planking edges and then just sealing the edges sparingly with varnish applied with a mini swab often used for fine paint details.  That might pre-seal the edge before planking and prevent graphite getting on the surface in the first place ... but this is only in the 'idea' stage and untried.  We know that trying to 'paint' plank edges with anything risks 'bleeding' into the plank itself - something that can't be fixed.  Some have used the black thread between each plank method - again, something I have not done yet.  But your method of glass scraping is way cool.

 

  'Also looked at your coppering process - and there are many methods shown in the forum.  Yours did well on the Beagle.

[LucienL]

Thank you for the kind comment Johnny. Yes, I remember having much trouble to get the deck right. I think after re-doing things enough times I sort of lucked into something that looks okay. I've also seen the method with black thread, which definitely sounds interesting and could work quite well.

[LucienL]

Okay, now onto stage 3 of the build: masts, rigging and sails.

 

First was the bowsprit. I built this primarily using AOTS rather than the kit instructions. This is an ongoing thing as the kit seems to deviate quite significantly from AOTS for the rigging likely for simplicity and ease of construction here. The rigging is doing my head in a little bit at the moment.

The chain gammoning was an absolute pain. The hole in the bow to fit this was a bit to small and it was extremely difficult to thread chain through it multiple times to secure the bowsprit.

Next were the masts, the ship is finally going vertical!

I used a slightly thicker dowel for the fore and main masts, I think 8 mm.

I found the spider hoops to be quite difficult. These were made by bending a 2 mm brass strip into two rings to go around the mast and the trysail mast. I then drilled holes in this brass strip to take the rings for the belaying pins. The rings for the belaying pins were cut from brass tubing and then I drilled holes in them to take nails and secure them onto the mast. I also used a trick from @brunnels with heat shrink tape to make all the mast hoops, which worked out great thank you!

Deadeyes still kind of a pain, but I got there. I used chain to secure them rather than rope.

Mizzen mast was mostly the same as the kit.

 

I’m working on the standing rigging now. It’s a long process but just need to take it one rope at a time and I’ll get there. Maybe I will actually end up finishing this thing. Although, the final major hurdle that is sails is on my mind.