Perseverance 1807 by Isaiah - FINISHED - Modellers Shipyard - Colonial Brig

[Isaiah]

Hi all,

 

I’m 17 years old and this is my first ever model ship I’ve built. I thought I would share my progress.

 

I wanted to build a model ship for a while but didn’t know where to start. I eventually settled on the Colonial Brig Perseverance 1807. It seemed like the right amount of difficulty while still being enjoyably challenging.

 

I also bought the DVDs from modellers shipyard which have helped.

I posted all these photos in one go up until I fitted the deck furniture. Up to

that point it has taken 4 months.

 

If there’s anything I’m doing wrong please let me know.

 

Bulkheads glued, some of them were the wrong size so a bit of building up and shaping was needed.

 

Fairing complete.

Transom blocks glued.

Shaping the transom blocks.

 

Gluing upper transom blocks

 

First plank being fitted.

 

Temporarily clamping the plank in between the two planking bands for measurements.

I just used the boiling water method for bending.

 

First band complete.

 

 

 

 

 

More planking.

 

Second band completed.

Commencing the third band of planking. 

 

First layer planking finished. It’s far from perfect, but I’m pretty happy with the result for the first time.

planking all filled and sanded ready for second layer planking.

Starting the deck planking, this is where I make my first big mistake.

 

Somehow I forgot that the deck strips I was placing down were not lined up with the bulkheads. I only realised this after the deck was finished so I wasn’t going to remove them.

 

I now know how to plank the deck properly on my next one.

Starting second layer planking.

 

I started off using PVA glue but it was too hard to hold while the glue set.

 

I then moved to CA glue which was a pain to apply and also seeped through the grain making it stick more to your fingers than the ship, which pulls the plank away.

 

I had a look at contact cement but seen too many bad reviews for model ships. So I just continued with CA glue but just adding a bit as I went.

 

it also didn’t help that the mahogany was so brittle either.

Any recommendations and/or tips would be much appreciated.

 

 

Got there in the end. I definitely could do better as there are small gaps here and there but overall I thinks it’s ok.

 

I definitely will not be using mahogany for planking ever again.

 

Lightly sanding by hand.

I applied 3 coats of sand-n-seal, then 5 coats of satin varnish.

Transom cap steam bent and planked. It’s only planked on the inside for this moment. I didn’t know how to attach it other than nails. Once I glued it on I planked the outside.

Gun whales and posts in place.

 

Rudder attached.

I made a mistake with the transom cap. I think it was supposed to be fitted at the same angle as the rudder post, if not it’ll hit the transom cap. I just added an extra piece to make it fit at a 90 degree angle.

Figure head and transom decoration painted gold and fitted.

Cargo ports cut and ready for frames.

Cargo port frames installed.

Bowsprit in place.

Gluing most of the deck furniture.

Cat heads in place.

 

Anchors and cat head rigging finished.

 

This is my progress so far. 

 

 

[ccoyle]

Welcome aboard! Very nice work so far!

[RossR]

Very nice work on your planking.  Impressive for an experienced modeler.   Really impressive for a first time modeler.  Looking forward to the rest of your build.  

Edited May 17, 2023 by RossR

[Isaiah]

12 hours ago, RossR said:

Very nice work on your planking.  Impressive for an experienced modeler.   Really impressive for a first time modeler.  Looking forward to the rest of your build.  

Thank you! 
 

I hope to be posting more photos in the near future.

[Isaiah]

I know I’ve messed this log up by posting all the photos in one post because I have no clue what I’m doing.

 

I am thinking of making a new build log and starting again, but then it might be too confusing.

 

I don’t know, please let me know if I should make a new one or just leave it as it is.

[Dr PR]

Isaiah,

 

Very nice work, especially for a first build! I don't know how you managed to bend the walnut around the tuck at the stern! Most experienced modelers do not consider walnut to be a good wood to work with because it is so brittle and splits!

 

As far as I can tell the only thing wrong you are doing is worrying about doing it wrong!

[Ferrus Manus]

I added my follow. I am 18 years old, and have been building model ships since i was 14. It's wonderful to see people like me in the hobby. I started out on, and am still doing, plastic ships. The SR-71 is also one of my favorite aircraft! 

[Ferrus Manus]

What's honestly quite impressive is the fact that this is your first model ship, and i can't see a single error you've committed. However, if you do do something wrong, there is an entire army of modelers a whole lot more skilled and experienced than me, to prevent errors, catch them when they occur, and help you remedy them and/or stop them from snowballing into a much larger problem. 

Edited May 22, 2023 by Ferrus Manus

[Ferrus Manus]

4 hours ago, Isaiah said:

I know I’ve messed this log up by posting all the photos in one post because I have no clue what I’m doing.

I've been here for the better part of a year, and it took me almost the entirety of that time to figure out how to name a build log. 

[Isaiah]

On 5/22/2023 at 3:38 PM, Dr PR said:

Isaiah,

 

Very nice work, especially for a first build! I don't know how you managed to bend the walnut around the tuck at the stern! Most experienced modelers do not consider walnut to be a good wood to work with because it is so brittle and splits!

 

As far as I can tell the only thing wrong you are doing is worrying about doing it wrong!

Thanks for the kind words.

 

I used mahogany for the second layer planking, but it’s still just as brittle as walnut. I don’t know how I managed to do it to be honest. It was the most challenging part for me.

Edited March 23 by Isaiah

[Isaiah]

1 hour ago, Ferrus Manus said:

I added my follow. I am 18 years old, and have been building model ships since i was 14. It's wonderful to see people like me in the hobby. I started out on, and am still doing, plastic ships. The SR-71 is also one of my favorite aircraft! 

I just had a look at some of your work, looks very nice. Is that Spanish galleon plastic because if it is you’ve done a great job to make it look like wood. 👍

[Isaiah]

Might make a start on the lifeboats in the next few days.

 

Edited May 22, 2023 by Isaiah

[Ferrus Manus]

11 hours ago, Isaiah said:

I just had a look at some of your work, looks very nice. Is that Spanish galleon plastic because if it is you’ve done a great job to make it look like wood. 👍

It's the paint! You can thank @kirill4 for that. If you REALLY want to be blown away, check out his galleon.

[Ferrus Manus]

11 hours ago, Isaiah said:

Might make a start on the lifeboats in the next few days.

 

That's a good assumption, and anyone who's relatively new to the scene would make it as well. However, those are not lifeboats. The boats on a ship were primarily used for utility purposes, hauling materials and men, assessing various things, repairing/repainting the outside of the ship, sending messages, etc. Their use as lifeboats would be possible in an emergency, however. 

 

Either way, each boat has it's specific name, and none of them are lifeboats. I called them the same thing until someone corrected me. As you'll find out, every single thing on a ship has a specific name, and absolutely none of those names are what any reasonable person would expect them to be called. 😂

[Isaiah]

Yes I shouldn’t have called them life boats, I didn’t I know what the specific names for them were. I know the one hanging off the stern is a Jolly boat, used for transporting crew to and from shore, but I don’t know what the other two are called. The manual just calls the other two “boats.”

 

And why are the crane things called a cat head? 🤔

 

Edited January 11 by Isaiah

[Ferrus Manus]

Likely because there was an earlier tradition of carving a cat's head onto it. Don't ask me where that came from, either, as i have no clue. The other boats are likely the ship's launch or longboats. You have to take into account the fact that a lot of these terms come from the distant past, when the term meant something practical. However, languages and traditions changed, but the names were so cemented into nautical terminology that changing them would've been disastrous. A lot of terms also have origins in different languages. The term "poop deck" comes from the latin word puppis, meaning "stern". It has nothing to do with what you think it does; the toilets on a ship are actually located at the bow. the etymology of ship terms is insane, which is why a lot of the terms themselves are equally so. 

Edited May 23, 2023 by Ferrus Manus

[Ferrus Manus]

So, just simply referring to them as "boats" is completely reasonable. 

[Ferrus Manus]

The term "halyard" which is any line used to raise something on a ship, literally means "haul yard". This term made perfect sense, until the English language changed and things other than a ship's yard needed to be hauled. Now, we are left with a term that hasn't changed since the 1400's, and makes precisely zero sense in its current use. 

[Isaiah]

Here’s the other two boats on the completed Perseverance from modellers central.

Edited May 23, 2023 by Isaiah

[Ferrus Manus]

Oh, so you finished the ship? Why don't you post the images! 

[Isaiah]

Good to know.

 

I will call them boats for now until I find out what they are actually called. 

[Ferrus Manus]

By the way, i did the research, and we have no idea whether the term "cathead" came after the cat's head carving tradition, or if the carvings were in response to the term. However, the first known use of the word was in a 1623 dictionary published in England. 

[Isaiah]

4 minutes ago, Ferrus Manus said:

Oh, so you finished the ship? Why don't you post the images! 

No no, this is a photo from the website I bought the model from, not my ship.

Edited May 23, 2023 by Isaiah

[Ferrus Manus]

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ship's_boat

 

On the different types of ship's boats.

[Ferrus Manus]

I can tell from the picture that that's likely the ship's launch, with a pinnace on top. 

[Isaiah]

Yes I think you’re right. 
 

here’s a better photo from the manual.

[Dr PR]

Ferrus is right about the nautical jargon. Much of it is meaningless today. It originated in old European languages that no one speaks any more. Or as one fellow said "Shakespeare is impenetrable to the modern ear."

 

A good reference is Falconer's"Universal Dictionary of the Marine" from 1769. You can find it on line as a PDF.

 

Most naval jargon meant something in the day. But not everything. For example, the ship's galley smoke stack is called "Charlie Noble." This is true to this day on modern vessels. A century or two back there was this English merchant Captain named Charles Noble who was an obnoxious twit about polished brass. Everything made of brass on his ship had to be polished, and the smoke pipe from the galley was brass. Polished brass and salt spray are not a good combination, and the pipe had to be polished regularly. So Charlie's name is forever linked to the galley stack and meaningless work.

 

I can relate to this. We had an obnoxious twit XO (Executive Officer - second in command) with a fetish for polished brass on one ship I served on. He walked around with a pocket knife scraping paint off every piece of metal he found, looking for painted brass. Woe be to the bosun in charge if he found painted brass! The crew had to follow him around and paint over his scrape marks to prevent rust and corrosion.

Edited May 23, 2023 by Dr PR

[Isaiah]

One of the Boats half assembled with a coat of primer.

 

as you can see there’s a few chips on the edges. The hull is made of three pieces of ply wood that requires shaping. I broke nearly every piece which I had to super glue. 
 

This was quite a difficult task and didn’t turn out as good as I hoped. If you have any suggestions on how to patch up the hull please let me know. I tried wood putty but it just breaks off.

 

I was going to just glue the top piece with the thwarts ( I think that’s what they’re called) and then try to fill the gaps.

[Ferrus Manus]

Ya know those videos where people fix stuff with putty and ramen? Just build up some putty in the chipped area, then sand and scrape it into shape. Might take a few attempts. 

[Isaiah]

I might try the putty again but with the top plywood piece, it’ll give the putty more stability and hopefully won’t chip off.