HMS Beagle by Penfold - OcCre - 1/60

[Penfold]

So, I’ve bitten the bullet and plumped for a model of HMS beagle by OcCre. Having done the Bluenose 2, I’m now looking to have a go at an older ship, and one with some square rigging.

It was a toss up between the Beagle or the Endurance, with both ships having fantastic history attached to them.

Out of the box, things look pretty good. 

[Penfold]

The laser cut pieces look pretty good. The keel has tiniest of bends in it, but nothing to keep me awake at night.

[Penfold]

The wood strips all look good, with no obvious problems. The sails look well made, though probably a bit thick to be considered in scale. The stitching on the edges is certainly better than the AL sails on my Bluenose was! I think I’ll be rigging this one without sails anyway.
The thread for the rigging looks OK, though not as nice as the Caldercraft stuff I’ve used before. We’ll see how we go on that aspect. May need to replace.

The pre-printed on A3 sheets instructions look clear and fairly comprehensive, and with videos on you tube I hope things will be clear.

 

Edited April 7, 2021 by Penfold
Added detail

[Penfold]

If I do have a quibble, it’s with the blocks and dead eyes etc. Whilst each is perfectly formed, they do look a bit too plasticky for my liking and I think I’m going to have to replace with wooden ones.

Part list describes them as being made of ‘composite’ but I suspect that’s just code for plastic.

The die-cast metal pieces all look good.

lots of nails etc and the PE pieces look fine too.

Looking forward to starting the build. 😃😉

[PRS]

Thanks for this mini review.

 

Nice to see what's in a kit. are the deadeyes and block plastic or a wood composite?

 

I am almost finished my AL Bluenose II and now I can see that the blocks and deadeyes in my kit were horrible. (not to mention the sails)

 

Going to follow along.

[Cathead]

Lots of these builds ongoing right now, so there's an active community for you to share with! Looking forward to seeing how you make this one your own.

[Penfold]

On 4/7/2021 at 10:49 PM, PRS said:

Thanks for this mini review.

 

Nice to see what's in a kit. are the deadeyes and block plastic or a wood composite?

 

I am almost finished my AL Bluenose II and now I can see that the blocks and deadeyes in my kit were horrible. (not to mention the sails)

 

Going to follow along.

I didn’t find the AL blocks too bad. Some one of the holes in the deadeyes weren’t quite where they should have been, but even so, I think I prefer the natural wood of them over the very plasticky OcCre ones.

[Robp1025]

I'm doing a HMS Beagle build as well with a log here for support through my first build. Cant wait to watch yours progress!!

[Penfold]

34 minutes ago, Maliba1025 said:

I'm doing a HMS Beagle build as well with a log here for support through my first build. Cant wait to watch yours progress!!

Nice to have you along. I’ll tag along on yours too 😉

[Penfold]

Many apologies for the long wait, but I’ve finally found some time to begin the build of my Beagle.

I was fortunate in that my false keel was pretty straight. There was a very small curve to it originally, but a few months laying on a flat table with a book on it had sorted that out.

Once I’d numbered the prices and cut them out I dry fitted them . They all appeared to fit really well, with everything level to the top of the false keel. I then glued them together.

In order to keep the frames square to the keel I dry fitted the deck as the included little projections which fit into notches in the deck and it would be really important that everything was in the right place when it came to fitting the deck proper.

[Penfold]

I then set about planking the deck. Fairly standard stuff.

Do make sure you get the deck the right way up as it’s not symmetrical in terms of the holes in it where fittings will go.

I would also say to take care when cutting out the notches after planking the deck. Only some of the notches need clearing.

 

I went with a bit more of a random pattern to the planking (as per the instructions) rather than the rather boring regular pattern on the videos. I might have overdone the pencil marks for the plank ends and pins, but I’ll go with it.

 

When it came to glueing then deck to the hull I found that it had warped slightly after the planks were glued, so I had to take care and employ a bit of CA glue to ensure that everything was stuck down where it needed to be. I didn’t want to come back later and find that the wood glue had dried and fixed the deck in the wrong place.

 

Pretty pleased with how it’s going at the moment. The instructions are clear and the videos on YouTube help as well. The laser cut pieces seem really well designed and fit together very well.

[Spellapeaka]

Off to a great start there. I have an occre kit on the shelf "The Golden Hind". The kit looks nice and all but the directions leave some things to be desired. This looks like a real fun build though. Cheers!

[Robp1025]

Off to a good start for sure!! I would make sure to have some back up small parts like deadeyes and eyebolts ready. As I went through the build and am on rigging now I found I ran out of eyebolts and deadeyes. They also only provide exactly enough of the brass rods you will need so it would be good to get some extra of that as well. 

[Penfold]

Thank you Robp.

I’m thinking I’ll probably replace the deadeyes with wooden ones anyway, but thanks for the heads-up on the others.

 

[Penfold]

Hi All,

Got a little bit more done today.

I even managed to use the plank bender I bought for my BN2 but never used🙂

[ObviousNewbie]

If I remember correctly, when you request them, Occre will replace the plastic deadeyes with wooden ones free of charge. Best to contact info@occre.com for more details.  Build looks fantastic so far!

[Penfold]

On 10/5/2021 at 10:16 PM, ObviousNewbie said:

If I remember correctly, when you request them, Occre will replace the plastic deadeyes with wooden ones free of charge. Best to contact info@occre.com for more details.  Build looks fantastic so far!

That is really interesting … I might give that a go and see how I get on.

And thanks for the kind words, and to all who have been giving me the ‘thumbs up’.

[Dale Hallier]

Your build is looking great-glad to see your progress!

[Penfold]

Got some time yesterday and managed to get some hull work done

[Penfold]

I’m not sure about the bow!!

hoping lots of sanding and putty will sort that out

[The Gimps Chimp]

A good application of filler will hide a multitude of sins. The first planking is just a base for the second layer.

[Penfold]

Fingers crossed on that! I think it’ll look better once all the planks are in and the excess removed.

Edited May 9, 2022 by Penfold
Typo

[allanyed]

Some folks use the first layer of planking  as a learning cycle to properly plank the second layer rather than following the kit instructions.  Did you by chance study the planking tutorials here at MSW?  It would be a great help for you in the future, including the second layer of planking on this model.

Allan

[Penfold]

I have tried to read the tutorials but they won’t download to my phone… maybe that’s something the site could look at?

 

[Penfold]

Been doing a lot of sanding and it’s starting to look better… but still some nasty looking dips in the bow. It’s going to need some putty to build up the bulk a little.

[Penfold]

Adding the putty has enabled an much more rounded shape. I’m happy to start the second planking now.

[Penfold]

Second planking begun… 

Going ok so far. (I know I still need to remove the remainder of the strips over the gun ports.)

[The Gimps Chimp]

Hi Penfold,

Looks like you're making good progress.  I found the second planking somewhat easier than the first.  Looks like you're on track to making a very fine model  

Chimp

[Penfold]

Second planking on starboard side done

[Penfold]

Considering how the first planking went, I’m happy with that so far.