Albatros by AndrewHenwood - OcCre - 1:100

[AndrewHenwood]

In my imagination I see a man ,  surrounded by those basic woodworking tools we have used for thousands of years.  The Romans had planes just like ours, and an artifact of turned wood has been discovered dating from 3000BC.  I can see that this man is a shipbuilder. He is laughing;  shaking his head and laughing at me, as I dip my toe in the water and begin to learn the art of planking.  As you can see from my illustration, I have made a dog's breakfast of it so far.  But hey, tomorrow is another day, when I shall first file off the pinheads and sand the hull smooth, next make peck marks on prow and stern and at each bulkhead, then measure and carefully cut and plane each individual new plank with appropriate taper to bow and counter so that the second layer, if not perfect, may at least be a lot better .  Thanks for the help already received.

[ccoyle]

Don't fret over your first layer. It's just an underlayment and will be invisible when your model is finished. Second layer is where you get marks for proper technique.

 

Cheers!

[Ian_Grant]

First layer aesthetics don't really matter. Yours looks clean and fair, so it's great!

[Knocklouder]

Yes it's the next layer that counts, if you look in the Data base here on MSW, the three bars at the top of the page will get you there. It shows you how, I have never mastered it yet, but I am still trying  lol.

 I will follow along , but be forwarned I can't spell and make many mistakes,  lol 

GOOD LUCK on your journey.   

Edited April 3, 2023 by Knocklouder
Typos of course lol

[WizardOfOs]

I’m eyeing this kit as a potential future project and excited to see some live progress on it. The first layer of planking looks good from the images here!

[Haliburton]

Looks like a great start Andrew. 
Scott

[JeffT]

Hello Andrew. It looks like you had two logs for this build. I removed one of them so post your updates here.

[AndrewHenwood]

When I built my bench in 1972 and began to accumulate woodworking tools, it was for the purpose of making furniture for the new home we had just moved into. So although I have yet very few tools for model-making, things may be adapted.  Here, to hold 'Albatross conveniently for planking,  I am using a couple of four inch C clamps I made fifty years ago, and resting the hull on a piece of soft foam.  Perfect!

[Papa Duke]

Was curious to tree nail or not on my albatross. Looking at yours, I believe I'll tree nail as well. Question what technique did you do, baboo , colored putty, or I have seen one man use black fishing line .  

[AndrewHenwood]

I used the steel pins from the kit, but treenails is a great idea, and when I searched for that somebody said 'toothpicks'. Brilliant solution!   Filing down those tiny brass-plated steel pins is a real pain, and using toothpicks, since they are tapered you can choose for yourself what diameter holes to drill for them. So next time I'll do it that way.

Now, as to filling the seams, or should I say caulking, OcCre doesn't suggest that, but in my mind that would give me a better surface to receive the second layer of plank. So I made up a slurry of my brown acrylic 'cabinetmakers' glue and wood powder, by which I mean the finest possible wood sawdust, which I harvest from inside the top felt bag of my over/under shop vac. I forced that slurry into the seams using my artists' putty knives.

 

Next will be to proceed to the second layer of planking.  Bearing in mind that we are trying to adhere to the scale of 1:100, I am not so happy with using the kit planking, which is 5mm wide and .65mm thick.  Multiply 5mm by a hundred and you have 50cm = more or less 20 inches. Ouch!  Happily, I have a stash of cherry strips which are one eighth of an inch (3.18mm) wide and .5mm thick, so I shall use those.

 

I have other another commitment every morning, so I usually do my shipbuilding during the afternoon watch.  By the time the dog-watches roll around I'm too tired, so my progress will be slow.

Andrew

Edited April 7, 2023 by AndrewHenwood

[ccoyle]

Hi, Andrew. You created a duplicate build log for this project; I have merged the two for you. You can continue to add updates to this topic.

 

Cheers!

[AndrewHenwood]

The hull has now received its second layer: cherry strips 1/8" wide by 0.5mm thick. The stem, stern post, keel parts and rubbing strakes are in place.

  I was not happy with the mast steps in the kit; they seemed to me insecure. Instead I made two sleeves about 33mm long out of ¼" I.D, (5/16"O.D) brass tubing. I closed one end of each sleeve by gluing in a small disc cut from a ¼" dowel.  I let them down through the mast holes and  glued the bottom closed end of each of these sleeves to the false keel.  I made sure to set the sleeves at the rake suggested on the plans.  This allows me now to simply drop the masts in, leaving them loose in the sleeves.  I though it might be interesting to rig this model in two ways.  Firstly I will follow the kit and rig her as a schooner.  But I plan to to build an alternate rig, that of a brig.  With the mast mounting as I have described, I should be able to swap the rigs around from time to time.  Admittedly, this may be impractical, considering all the rigging that has to be changed, but I thought I might try.