New member, old modeller

[Eurus]

Hello!

 

When I was seven, my father gifted me with my first "big boy" book: Moby Dick (picture that). Yes, I read it all; and multiple times, in fact. This had two consequences: I became a voracious reader for life, and I fell in love with the sea. At some point I even sought to become a naval aviator. However, after some introspection I found that what I craved was the fallacious experience of adventure onboard a tall ship, not really the life of a modern sailor. So I became an engineer, and still had lots of fun with airplanes—but the sea was forgotten.

 

Fast forward three decades and now I have rediscovered one of my passions. Each year I spend the winter months in Veracruz, Mexico, and this has brought me back my memories and the sea. Before the pandemic the missus surprised me with an unusual birthday present: a wooden model ship. It was one of those that are delivered piecemeal, by subscription. She probably thought that would make the task less overwhelming.

 

I had worked with plastic models in my youth, mostly warbirds, several F-14's and even an aircraft carrier, but those days were long gone. I thought it would be a nice challenge, since I had never built anything with wood. I bought several books on the topic—Mastini's, Roth's, etc.—watched some tutorials and put hands to work. Soon I noticed it would not be an easy project,  and I decided to buy a small, cheap, entry-level model that I could mess with and learn the ropes without destroying something important. So I bought the Artesanía Latina 1:25 Providence Whaleboat and started with that instead, putting the big ship on the back burner.

 

This was the result:

 

 

 

I have the whole process documented in pictures, and if anybody is interested I could post it somewhere or make a gallery.

 

I had so much fun building it, and felt I was ready for more complexity. It turned out to be challenging indeed, but not as difficult as I had previously believed. As you can see from the pictures, I did not follow the instructions to the letter: the out-of-the-box model is not exactly historically accurate (I know my stuff about whaling) so I decided to augment and customize. I did what I could with the materials at hand, and even scratch-built some additional pieces, like the lance, the lion's tongue, new harpoon tips, cleat notch and kicking strap for the harpooneer's position, steering oar strap and brace, peaking cleats for the oars and reefers for the main sail. All nautical knots and hitches are purpose-accurate.

 

I know it's not perfect, and errors might be evident, but please remember that this was my very first project.

 

After Providence, I feel I'm ready for the next one. I am looking forward to learning from all of you!

 

 

 

[amateur]

Be welcome!

We are looking forward to your build log. (And always happy sharing knowledge and tricks)

 

Jan

[allanyed]

Welcome to MSW Eurus (AKA Greek god of the east winds -- I had to look it up😃)

Your opening struck a nerve.  I too wanted to be a naval aviator but it was not to be so I headed to sea as a merchant marine engineer and so my romance with the sea began.   

 

I love that you started with something manageable for a first go at ship modeling.  As you move forward, if you are going to forego scratch building and go with kits please read everything here at MSW on the many kits that are out there.  There are quite a few that are top quality and yield beautiful and historically accurate results.  There are also some that create a ton of agita for the builders because of poor instructions, poor quality materials and many with out-of-scale and/or inaccurate parts, and so forth.  

Also be sure to read the forum here on piracy.  There is a list of kit pirate manufacturers to avoid and build logs on kits by these manufacturers  are not permitted here.

 

Know that you have a huge library of previous posts at MSW from which to learn as well as more teachers/helpers than you probably want.  

 

Cheers,

Allan

 

[mtaylor]

Welcome to MSW, Eurus.   I can't add much to Allan's post except be sure to enjoy the journey.

[JeffT]

Welcome to MSW 

[Snug Harbor Johnny]

'Just love the boat - the thought you put into it shows.

 

[Jim Lad]

Hello Eurus, and a warm welcome to the forum from 'Down Under'.

 

John

[bruce d]

Hello Eurus,

Welcome to MSW from the UK. That is a good looking whaleboat, and it doesn't look like a first attempt: well done!

 

Bruce

[Ryland Craze]

Welcome to Model Ship World Eurus.  You are off to a good start in this hobby.  Your whaleboat looks nice.  I look forward to your future builds.

[Eurus]

Thanks everyone for such a warm welcome!

 

I will post the build log for Providence, just let me gather some pictures (there are lots of them, spread over several places, including three cellphones) and do a little research as to where in the forums it would adequately belong.

 

Also, I did not tell you before, but the next project is the ARM Cuauhtémoc, the Mexican Navy's school ship. I have been on board several times, and I hope I know her well enough to build a passable replica.

 

And there is also another one, which I recently found in a yard sale and it was simply too attractive to ignore. It is in excellent condition and the picture speaks for itself:

 

 

New and unopened 😃

 

 

[Eurus]

I forgot to mention in that last post: the ARM Cuauhtémoc that I'm building is based on the OcCre kit for the Deutsche Marine's Gorch Fock, which can be found here: https://www.occre.com/model-ship/ships/gorch-fock.html

 

It is a little-known (at least to me) Spanish manufacturer and after thoroughly reading MSW's guidelines I believe it is legit. It is not on the blacklist and apparently it is OK. Please don't ban me 😓

[mtaylor]

Occre is good and there are many Occre builds here at MSW.   Looking forward your modified build.

[Opalin]

Grüezi aus der Schweiz ,ich möchte fragen was ihr für ein Modellschiff Forum seid ,habt interessante beiträgte.

Kann man als Gast sich einloggen bei euch um ab und zu reinzuschauen?

Ich habe auch nicht rausgefunden wo ihr euren Heimathafen habt.

Gruss vum Walensee CH 

Christian Grontzki

[mtaylor]

Christian,  this forum is an English language forum.  Could please use Google Translate or one of the other translators?   Thank you.

[HardeeHarHar]

Welcome aboard MSW.  That is an extremely nice first build and I I believe it would be nice to have your pictures showing the techniques and process you applied to arrive at the final whaleboat available for others to reference.  Looking forward to seeing your next build log as well.  It looks like you will be right at home here!

[Eurus]

On 7/18/2021 at 8:29 AM, HardeeHarHar said:

Welcome aboard MSW.  That is an extremely nice first build and I I believe it would be nice to have your pictures showing the techniques and process you applied to arrive at the final whaleboat available for others to reference.  Looking forward to seeing your next build log as well.  It looks like you will be right at home here!

 

Thanks for the warm welcome!

 

As for the build log, I have already started, and you can find it here: