Cathead Lifeboat by Brad NSW - FINISHED

[Brad NSW]

Bought this kit to replace a lifeboat on my Constellation that suffered from moves to Hawaii, Monterey, CA, Scotland, San Diego, Bahrain and now Colorado.  1st pic is of the destroyed cheap pot metal boat that came with the Artesia Latina kit.  2nd pic shows the best result I got with the cheap basswood in the kit, next to the basswood, is thin laminated pear strips in a jig.  3rd pic shows the laminated pear wood ribs glued on the forms, in the frame spacing jig provided with the kit.

[Brad NSW]

Here's a photo of planking.  I'm using thin strips of pear wood.

 

Like  Cathead, I found the 1st frame way too big and impossible to fair in.  Instead of omitting it, I moved it back into one of the slots I created between each of the 4 frames.  Placing it here, seems to give a fairly decent bow profile.

[Brad NSW]

One more plank to go

[Brad NSW]

Planking complete.  I gave it a light sanding and then oiled with WATCO Natural wood oil to make the grain of the pear wood pop a bit.

[Brad NSW]

Next step is to add four additional frames into the already formed hull.  Seems odd/harder to do now, than if they had the forms and you put them in before planking.  Guess that's what one gets for following directions.  We'll see how this works out.

 

I laminated three of the thin pear strips, over the same jigs I made for the middle three frames.  I narrowed the bow jig considerably and we'll see how that fits tomorrow, after the laminated strips dry on the jig.  In the below picture, you can see: 1) a frame taken off the jig and added to the interior of the planked hull. 2) The three additional frames drying on their respective jigs.  

 

I can already tell from the first one I glued in, that they will all need to be sanded to get a similar thickness as the ones that were faired before planking.

[Brad NSW]

Additional frames went in with no problems.  It did take some sanding to get them even with the four original frames.

 

I added some floorboards (not in the plans but shown in the photo below), as I believe the flatter portion of the bottom would have had some sort of flooring.  Either grating or planks like I added.  You can also see the seat rail clamped in place.

 

 

[Brad NSW]

I added the seats, resting on the "seat rail".  At this point, the only original kit parts are the keel/frame spacer, the bow bulkhead and stern bulkhead.

 

[Brad NSW]

Here the gunwales are being formed, sanded and test fit.  Same with the bow compartment cover and helmsman seat.  Tomorrow, I'll place them, stain the model and work on a custom rudder assembly, as the one in the kit is cheap basswood that will take little or no detailed forming.

[Brad NSW]

Gunwales are in place and stained with WATCO Dark Walnut.  This oil was also applied to the seats, the floor rails and rudder assembly.

 

Close up of the rudder.

[Brad NSW]

I cut some leftover brass into strips, which I molded around the hull to simulate a carrying cradle.  Below those are the blocks I'll use and finally below the blocks are the new catheads that will hold the lifeboat out behind the stern.  On the right is one of the old catheads and on the left are two new, beefier ones I'm fashioning out of pear wood.

 

[Brad NSW]

Completed and hung on the stern, replacing the cracked and rotted metal boat that came with the Artensia Latina Kit.  Did no research, so it's probably a bit out of scale, as well as not an accurate depiction of the type of boat during the 1770-90s.  It was fun and the back of the ship needed something and 99% of the folks who look at it will not notice anything.

 

I will probably load it up with pennies for a week or two, to try and get the lines to "look" like they are supporting a heavy boat.

 

Bottom line: 

1) Kit was under $20!!

2)  It would have been hard to do using the soft basswood supplied in the kit.  

3)  Photo's on the instruction are terrible and show no details that the instructions were discussing.  I had to go online to find others who had built this to see pictures with any useful details.

4.  Frame #1 (closest to the bow) IMO was way too wide to even attempt to fair in.  I moved it halfway between the precut Frame #1 slot and the Frame #2 slot.  I.E. to the intermediate slot they instruct you to cut for the four additional frames.  This worked for me and gave an acceptable bow profile.

5.  Fun kit but not recommended for beginners, as the result won't be pretty.  BUT, with decent hardwood, one can substitute for all teh cheap basswood.  AND,  i believe some more advanced tools (I.E. thickness sander, micro table saw, jewelers files, clamps, etc) are needed to make this come out well.