NRG half-hull planking project by CPDDET - 18th century merchant ship

[CPDDET]

8 hours ago, tlevine said:

Everybody has their own preferred techniques.  If I were designing this today, I know I would do certain things differently.  We never stop learning and honing our skills.

Thank you for the comment. I meant no disrespect toward you as the author of the practicum. This being my second attempt at this model, I just found it easier to change things up a bit. As stated, I'm not suggesting anyone else follow my lead. If it's ones first attempt at this build its probably best to follow the practicum as written.  And thank you for your dedication to this craft and helping us all become better at it.

[Cathead]

You're not the only one, I did a bunch of things differently, too. Diverging from the instructions is part of model-building!

[CPDDET]

7 hours ago, Cathead said:

You're not the only one, I did a bunch of things differently, too. Diverging from the instructions is part of model-building!

As long as one reads well ahead to avoid issues down the road. I have found when working on any step, I have to keep in mind the several upcoming steps.

[CPDDET]

All the frames have now been installed.

I didn’t feel like sanding or shimming the stiffening spacers between the frames that came with the kit and decided it was easier to make my own. I first cut a strip of scrap wood the same thickness and height as the kit pieces.

 

Using my caliper I measured the distance between the frames at their base and locked it in place.

After raising the blade on my saw, I rested the caliper on the fence and adjusted the distance to the saw blade.

 

Then lowered the blade and cut the strip to the proper width. This gave me very accurate pieces and assured that the distance between the base and top of the frames was equal.

 

Before gluing in the furthest forward and aft frames I held them in position and marked them at the rabbet / bearding line. Then sanded them, test fitting as I did so. Then glued them in.

 

Now Ill trim the top of the frames using my Dremel with a cut off disk and start the faring of the frames. I’m going to take my time with this and not screw it up like I did on my first attempt. I figure this might take several days.

[CPDDET]

I marked the tops of the bulkheads to align them with the topline using a machinist square as outlined in the practicum. I used a small Japanese pull saw to trim them.

 

After much shimming and sanding and test fitting planks I finally finished fairing the hull (or half hull).

This picture shows an example of how laborious this task can be; note the piles of sawdust and gaps that needed shimming. The process took about a week to complete, working an hour or 2 each day.

 

 

But I’m quite satisfied with the final product.

 

 

I also installed the transom and transom support piece, as well as the counter. I found using a piece of 1/16 inch thick basswood for the counter to be easier than using thicker wood.

 

 

Here is one mistake I made. When installing the support pieces between the bulkheads I ended up placing them in line with the plan markings for the wale. This sometimes blocked the use of my square when trying to mark the wale on the bulkheads. I was able to mark either the top or the bottom of the wale on most of the bulkheads, but not all. Not an insurmountable problem, but a bit frustrating. I really need to get better at looking beyond my current processes to see how they will affect future processes. This picture kind of shows the issue.

 

 

Moving on to the garboard and broad strakes.