Wappen von Hamburg 1669 by Katsumoto - Corel SM28 - scale 1:50 - convoy ship

[Katsumoto]

The convoy ship Wappen von Hamburg 1669 - Corel SM28, scale 1:50

Hi everybody,

I'll guess I'm going to attempt to build a Dutchmen, which is a first time. Some folks may read "Hamburg" in the title and think (Dutch?), Hamburg lies in Germany and not in The Netherlands. And you are absolutely 100% right, however this ship has been built by a Dutch master shipbuilder is by Dutch design. So welcome to my buildlog of this imposing Frigate and kit.

The punk kid story...
I remembered when I was a little kid, my parents took my sister and me out for shopping for clothes and stuff in the city of Rotterdam - The Netherlands. Living outside the city, my father always seem to parked his car just outside the shopping area, which means my sister and I had to walk a couple of blocks to reach the area where all the shops were. Passing certain streets and shops, one always grabbed my attention. It was a very small and old school wooden ship modeling shop. That means that the shop itself only sold wooden ship model kits and accessories for wooden ship modeling. When you entered the shop, the smell of woodworking was always around and the lights were dimmed a bit. On the shop's window the name of the shop was painted with a classical font and behind that the most beautiful historic ship models were displayed. Always 3 or more completely built models were displayed with one big model in the middle. The centerpiece so to say! My eyes rolled over the many decks and guns and couldn't get enough of it. The owner was a very pleasant and friendly "old" guy and was building the models himself in the back corner of the shop. It apparently made a "big" impression on me. My mother told me, that I was a bit young for building models like that, but perhaps when I'm older and still be interested, I could have a go with it. She was absolutely right!
One day, passing the shop a new centerpiece ship was placed in the shop's window. It was the Wappen of Hamburg. An imposing vessel, big, lot's of guns, figures on the stern and with removable decks. Can you believe that, I mean, I'm talking about the mid / end '80's of the last century, that was unheard of in a kit! I was hooked and my parents had to drag me away from the window. I could stay there all day long imagining, dreaming building that model. I was 8 years old.

The kit from Corel
There is one wooden kit from the Wappen of Hamburg from 1667 - 1669 and that's Corel SM28 before Movo Milano. It's one of Corel's flagship kits and is a very luxurious edition. Corel stated that a lot of research went into designing this kit and that some of the unique selling points of this kit is it's historical accuracy, the high quality figures and ornaments, the choice of having removable decks, gratings and with a lot of shown interior features, all cannons are on carriages on all decks. That means full decks on all levels with real gun ports and lids.
 

 

Size and measurements
Length: 43 inches or 1100mm
Width: 18 inches or 460mm
Height: 36 inches or 910mm

Scale: 1:50
On the box scale 1:40 is mentioned but all the drawings are in 1:50 scale which is the correct scale for this kit.


The box and it's content
When newly purchased and untouched, the box and it contents are displayed in the pictures below. As been said, it's a luxurious kit with a lot of high quality "walnut" wood and die-cast ornaments and figures. The die-cast metal ornaments are really beautiful and detailed. It's really impressive to see how good they are looking.
 

The history of the ship and her destiny
At the end of the Hanseatic trading period, which was a military trade group by origin, the Hanseatic city of Hamburg did not have its own warships. These ships were actually needed to protect the merchant fleet against the ongoing and growing threat of pirates and competitors. The idea of having own warships to protect the fleet, arose in 1663. These ships would be built by a Dutch master shipbuilder and according to Dutch designs. At that time, the Dutch were the most dominant trading nation in the world which prospers the shipbuilding activities. The plan was to start with two ships, so called sister ships called the Leopoldus Primus and the Wappen von Hamburg. However it appeared that there was a lot of disagreement over financing responsibilities and after a long period of debate the Hamburg Admiralty finally decided in 1667 to start construction of these two ships. Both ships were commissioned in 1669.

The construction of both ships was carried out under the supervision of the Hamburg Admiralty under the direction of an unknown Dutch shipbuilder. The flagship of Lieutenant-Admiral Maarten Tromp which was a famous Dutch admiral, called Aemelia from 1632 https://nl.wikipedia.org/wiki/Aemilia_(flagship) is mentioned in professional literature as an example and model for both ships.

The Wapen von Hamburg is the first of four convoy ships to bear this name. She was built at the Theerhof shipyard in Hamburg. The ship was not allowed to have excessive draft, otherwise it would have problems safely passing the shallow parts of the River Elbe, and especially the Altona sand. Because the shipbuilder knew, based on the knowledge available at the time, that a wide ship with low masts had more stiffness and strength to keep itself upright in a turbulent sea, and a narrow ship with high masts, on the other hand, sailed faster, the Wappen von Hamburg opted for a combination of both properties. This gave it a good compromise between stability and sailing speed and could pass the Elbe river.

In the evening hours of the 10th of October 1683, a fire broke out for unknown reasons in the lower room of the ship's forecastle. This expanded rapidly and, despite all efforts, could no longer be adequately accommodated by the resources on board. The crew tried to get to safety in the lifeboats, but was ordered by Admiral Karpfanger to return to the fire and to try to extinguish it. At the same time, signal shots were fired to signal surrounding ships to send emergency firefighting teams. When the fire spread through the deck to the foremast and immediately set fire to the rigging and sails due to an unfavorable wind, the rowing helpers kept a safe distance for fear of an explosion of the gunpowder room. Karpfanger had his son, who was traveling with him, taken off board, who had earlier appealed to his father to leave the ship with him to keep both lives safe. However, Karpfanger did not want to consider the loss of the ship just yet. It was suggested that they shoot a puncture in the hull and allow the ship to fill with water and sink to the seabed - but Karpfanger refused. Finally, he agreed to try to beach the ship and had the ship's anchor ropes cut so that the ship could run aground near the shore. Abandoning ship was in any case out of the question for Karpfanger: he saw himself bound by the oath he had taken on the 14th of July 1674 before the Senate of Hamburg, which instructed him to "stand manfully in defense of the fleet entrusted to him and rather to to use good and blood, to sacrifice life and limb than to abandon her and his ship.

As the convoy ship slowly drifted towards the coast, the fire below deck moved increasingly towards the stern, where the gunpowder room was also located. Towards midnight the fire reached some of the guns at the stern, which ignited themselves and fired volleys. At the same time, some grenades on board also ignited.

An hour after midnight, after the ship had burned for five hours and Admiral Karpfanger, true to his oath, was still the last man on board, the fire reached the gunpowder room, which eventually exploded. The back of the ship, which was broken in the middle, flew into the air, the front lay on its side and began to sink. Debris rained down from a great height. The accident resulted in 65 deaths: 22 soldiers and 42 ships men, as well as Admiral Karpfanger were killed. His body was found floating in the water on an anchor line of an English ship in the harbor of Cadiz on October 11, 1683.

On the picture below the Wappen von Hamburg (left) and the Leopoldus Primus (right) is displayed.
 

Luxurious but notorious
This kit is famous and notorious at the same time. The quality of all the components are superb and the features of this ship excellent. However when you look at the "building" aspect of this kit and the way the modeler is being "guided" by the help of the construction manual and the dozen drawings does has it's challenges. It's an old kit. developed in the late 70's and never updated as far as I can tell. Corel expects that the builder of this kit knows all the basic things to make a model ship and to craft all the items needed. Little or no step by step pictures are added with this kit. The drawings are of good quality but it shows only parts of the ship, not the complete process on how to actually build her. That means that a lot of questions will arise for the modeler. Perhaps that's why there are so few finished buildlogs on the internet. People strand a lot during the build of this giant, and it's developed a reputation of a hard to build ship. When a modeler decides to pick a new project and looks at the variety of ship kits and compare the prices of these kits, the Wappen von Hamburg is at the very top of the range. With the bad building reputation it has, a high purchase price and the abundant choice of other kits, it's lost her glance and popularity. I think this is a sad conclusion and hopefully with this buildlog I can inspire others to build this unique and magnificent ship.

A picture below shows the inscription on one of the cast metal parts. This was cast in '78 by Movo!

 

The drawings and instruction manual are shown below. Although the drawings are of high quality, only the end result of a product to craft is shown. Then the modeler should somewhat guess where the crafted item should go on the model because the drawings are not always clear on that part. The written text in the instruction manual isn't always helping either so I think that there is a lot to win by Corel if these instructions and drawings are updated and brought to standards of today. I'm sure this will benefit the sales and popularity of this kit.
 

"Dutch Ebay" and plan A
On the "Dutch Ebay" called marktplaats (translation is marketplace) a second hand kit of WvH was offered. I wasn't really looking for this particular kit, but it came up and somehow I was triggered. I guess my childhood memories and sentiment took over. I reached out to the seller and apparently the hull was already completely built. He showed me a few pictures and at the beginning I hesitated to go on with the purchase. I have this principle that I love to rescue kits from Ebay that otherwise been thrown away, however the kit should be in pristine condition, unbuilt and "untouched" so to say. It's just that I don't like to continue other men's work with respect to the previous builder, I just want to start from the beginning to have the full experience. Call me weird, I don't mind... 

So the hull was built and again with respect to the builder, it didn't fit my expectations....take a look. Below a few pictures of the way it was built with a lot of gaps and cracks.

 

 

The kit was complete and everything was there. I was pretty honest to the seller, that it lost most of it's value due to the fact that the complete hull was already done. The owner almost gave it away due to the fact he inherited the kit and it was in his way. It took a lot of space in his house. So I decided to purchase the kit and had the idea to carefully demolish the hull, order new wood and simply start over! Hold that idea, it turned out a bit differently....

Arriving back home with the kit and the hull, (The Netherlands is a small country, so it was easy to drive to the seller and pick up the kit) I opened the box and inspected all the items inside. Beneath a few items I found some glue tubes which were almost empty. Epoxy glue, some UHU hard glue and the last one was CA glue.... Alarm bells went off inside my head! I could only think, "please don't let this hull being glued with this stuff"....boy was I in for a treat.....you probably are going to guess what's next?

The first try to get one of the hull planks of the bulkheads resulted in a mess. The glue residue was glass hard and it was used all over in a very abundance of amount. I think the previous modeler must have thought that it should be glued together forever...I don't know but the carefully "take it apart" approach ended into a total demolish and destruction of the hull.
I tried everything from using heat, chemicals like acetone, white spirit, hot water, glue remover etc. nothing worked!
With pain in my heart I had no choice and had to throw away all the nice hardwood used for this ship. The bulkheads that appeared underneath the hull planks were poorly placed and faired wrong. Also the bulkheads were beyond repair due to all the glue residue and wrongly fairing. These need to be replaced as well...
While closing the lid of the trashcan, I realized I also discarded plan A which lies with all the broken pieces of wood inside the trashcan.

Woodglue!
I would like to reach out to all my fellow modelers and advice to please use woodglue like the normal white woodglue. The stuff is made for this purpose and it's great. Sure, the people living in the USA also have an abundance variety of wood glue's and the easy access to yellow wood glue like Titebond. Both are great and more important easy to repair with afterwards.
By applying heat, the white and yellow wood glue becomes soft and so you can easily make repairs or redo parts afterwards. Normal white wood glue dries fast, has great strength and dries up transparent and glue residue can easily removed with a damp cloth. The brand I use is a local brand called Bison. After it had dried it holds some of flexibility, so when humidity let the wood of your model shrink or expand a little bit, the glue can cope with this and doesn't crack or let the wood crack.
CA glue can help, sure. I use it as a liquid nail on certain difficult spots, so to say but very sparingly. Sure, you can't glue metal parts with wood glue and perhaps an epoxy glue or CA gel would be best, not for wood on wood. Hell, I even use diluted wood glue with a syringe to apply it to knots on my rigging work. Works great! I'm just saying, I love my white wood glue.

Out of frustration I forgot to take pictures of the before stage of the hull....I'm sorry!
After the demolishment, I was just left with al lot of parts...
 

 

Plan B:
Because I left Plan A, it's time for plan B. I had this idea to remodel all the bulkheads from the plans and use new plywood for the bulkheads. Then I would replace the lost Walnut with swiss pear! Sounds like a plan to me and so I took a short trip to my nearest modeling shop and returned with all the needed plywood and some pear veneer.

I redrew all the bulkheads on paper. Apparently I was out of white paper and "borrowed" some pink and green paper from my kids stash. They wouldn't mind I guess....and again they were in bed sleeping at the time.
 

 

The cutting list
I made a list of all the missing strips of walnut to replace them with pearwood. On my Proxxon tablesaw I cut all the needed strips. It took me a while to work trough the entire list.
Let's say I made a lot of dust and the Admiral wisely said to do this outdoors instead in the living room. I guess I didn't need to push the limits here. Call me a wimp!
 

While working out this plan I had more and more doubts. I did not completely agree with the shape of the bulkheads and the lines of the ship. Besides I saw all kind of points for improvement to make the ship look “more Dutch”. In addition, replicating all the gun ports as Corel had designed would be a hell of a job with my limited resources. I eventually decided to throw this plan in the proverbial trash bin as well, which was already starting to become quite full... Because I was momentarily without inspiration, I decided to put the project on ice and think things over. Eventually I decided to completely left the project and started focusing on something else....

The rise and development of plan C
While working on my previous project (Xebec 1750) and I was already in the preparations (research) of a new project, the Wappen von Hamburg kept nagging at my head. Somehow I couldn't quite let go of the project and started searching the internet for some inspiration. During this research I came across a booklet by Wolfgang Quinger about the Wappen von Hamburg and ordered it out of curiosity. After a few days the doorbell rang and I received the booklet. It is an old book, pages completely yellowed and fragile, it even smells old and according to the publisher it was published in the former GDR, East Germany, in the early 1980s.
 

It was of course written in German and to my knowledge has not been published in any other language. In addition to a wealth of information, the booklet contained a completely different treasure, namely two large drawings printed on both sides with, yes, a complete plan of all the frames on a scale of 1:75. Quinger himself describes in his book that he has consulted many sources, mentions and praises them all. Some well known sources are N. Witsen, C. van Ijck, R. Hoeckel, H. Winter, W. Mondfeld, F.H. Chapman, R.C. Anderson. He himself says that the reconstructions of some well-known ships liken the Friedrich W. Zu Pferde, Derfflinger and Roter Löwe, among others, designed by Hoeckel quickly gained name and fame, but that the very thorough research of Mr. Friedrich Jorbergs led to more than 80 adjustments to Hoeckel's earlier reconstructions. One of these adjustments was that Hoeckel used the Amsterdam dimensions (Amsterdam foot) and Jorbergs the Rotterdam dimensions (Rotterdam foot). Later in this report I will explain why this is important and is essential for the lines plan and proportions of the ship!
 

Quinger made a new reconstruction of the lines plan based on all the information he gathered. With his plan he explains that he had made a compromise between Hoeckel's plan based on Amsterdam dimensions and Witsen's. It is a shape that could well have suited this ship and is therefore more truthful than the shape that Corel has chosen for the WvH. The more I immersed myself in the design, the more it started to appeal to me. Slowly a new plan formed in my head….Plan C!
 

 

Plan C
After extensively studying the frame plan and the rest of the drawings, I decided to use parts from the Corel kit on the hull shape of Quinger. The advantage for me is that Quinger's design fits more with all the points that I would have liked to adjust from the kit. It solves many questions and puzzles for me, but it also brings completely new challenges for me. Quinger's drawings and therefore also the plans are on a scale of 1:75 and the Corel kit is 1:50. This means that I have to convert the drawings to a different scale and then completely scratchbuild all the frames. All things I've never done before. My interest in seeking out the unknown and taking on the challenge grew more and more... I can't wait.

In short, this means the following work:

- Increase the frame plan from 1:75 to 1:50

- Reconstruct keel plate, keel, transom, decks, guns and bow according to Quinger's plan;

- Use a different design for gun ports and bulwarks.

- Change wood from Walnut to Pear wood

- Cutting all hull planks, deck planks, deck beams, wall planks, knees, gunwales, arrangements, carriages, gun port lids, etc to size.

- Underwater ship hull planking in a “Dutch” manner

- Ornaments and decorations partly according to Corel with additions from myself;

- Rigging and sails according to Quinger's plan

- Flags according to Corel



My overall conclusion so far is that a lot has ended up in the trashcan....

Chapter 1 - plan of scale 1:75 expand to 1:50
Due to the fragility of the books plans, I copied the plan of the lines of the hull by using plain A4 paper and a pencil.

 

To enlarge the plan to the desired 1:50 scale, I need a bigger piece of paper. In this case, A3 format will suffice. Clamping is easy by securing the corners of the paper with tape. I made sure the sides of the paper are parallel to the lines on my cutting mat. This will help against the paper from sliding all over the place and I can use the grid of the mat to use for my horizontal and vertical lines. Having a professional drawing desk with the right equipment will make the job much easier. However I have to do it with a more primitive solution.



I begin with drawing the grid on paper. Then place the dots on the paper where the lines of the plan crosses the grid. Eventually I connected the dots drawing the lines by hand.
The more accurate I am in this stage, the less corrections I have to do on the actual bulkheads when fairing in a later stadium of the build.
I start with the view on the bow, which is the right part from the middle. The left is the stern view.

Both drawings next to each other. 1:75 on the left, the 1:50 on the right!




Chapter 2 - the stern drawing
Quinger made a nice drawing of the stern of the ship. I decided to copy that and to learn and experience the difference between Quinger's and Corel's design.

 

On my computer I played around with some colors and this will give me an idea how the stern fully painted would look. It's a draft and I probably will change some things, but it just gives me an impression. Nothing more, nothing less.

And that's it for the introduction and first few babysteps into a new project. I hope you will like this new endeavour of mine and hopefully you will follow me along.

It's not that I aim for 100% historical accuracy, but I would like to build the ship the way I like it.
I would really appreciate that due to the fact I'm in uncharted territory and can use all the help I can get to finish this project.

Until the next update, see yah around,

Peter

Edited September 23, 2023 by Katsumoto

[Theodosius]

Wow, wow and WOW! I like the dutch influenced ships, and this one is particular beautiful! Thanks a lot for this great start and your story from childhood to this model! I will sure follow this build, even though I'm not so consistent in leaving comments :-).

[Cathead]

Peter, this looks like an amazing and unique project. Thank you for the thorough introduction.

 

One question: I'm not sure if this is just a problem for me or for others also, but none of the images you've linked using "modelbrouwers.nl" are loading within MSW. They all have broken link errors. If I right-click and open them in new tabs or windows they load fine, even if I click on them directly they work, but they're not loading naturally within your post. Can you perhaps check how you're linking the photos? You may even not be able to check this directly because maybe they load fine in the Netherlands but not here in the US. But it would be a shame to have to separately load every photo in what will be a fascinating build log.

[Katsumoto]

55 minutes ago, Cathead said:

Peter, this looks like an amazing and unique project. Thank you for the thorough introduction.

 

One question: I'm not sure if this is just a problem for me or for others also, but none of the images you've linked using "modelbrouwers.nl" are loading within MSW. They all have broken link errors. If I right-click and open them in new tabs or windows they load fine, even if I click on them directly they work, but they're not loading naturally within your post. Can you perhaps check how you're linking the photos? You may even not be able to check this directly because maybe they load fine in the Netherlands but not here in the US. But it would be a shame to have to separately load every photo in what will be a fascinating build log.

Hi Eric, that's really weird. Let me look into it. The pictures are on my personal folder of a Dutch forum and should be seen here in my log.
Did you had that same issue with my previous log? 

[Landlubber Mike]

Amazing start and backstory Peter!  Looking forward to watching this one come along.  

[Cathead]

Peter, it must have been a temporary problem on my end because they're all displaying properly now. I had no trouble in your previous log. Sorry for the distraction; I've never seen that happen before.

[md1400cs]

Hi Peter,

Just logging back in to MSW. I SO need to post comments re: your just completed awesome log. WOW!!  will do...

At least I got front row seats for this one. You will, again build a masterpiece. 

 

PS: just went back and read your intro to this project another WOW!!  

 

Cheers,

Edited September 22, 2023 by md1400cs

[Paul Le Wol]

Peter, I am looking forward to the continuation of your new build log. What a great start!

[Baker]

Great start.
You have one more very interested follower 😉

[CiscoH]

fascinating Peter

add another follower

[Ronald-V]

Great first post, and a serious project ahead!

 

I always liked the "Wappen von Hamburg" but never dared to buy it, because of all the reasons you said...and I just don't like the Corel kits in general due

to their quality. But in your capable hands i'm really curious how this is going to turn out! Your Xebec is just magnificent!

 

Succes!

[Barbossa]

Good luck with this challenging project.

Google and to be more specific, Wikipidia show us an interesting image of a Wappen von Hamburg shipmodel emplaced in a church (?)

Never understood why Corel did not use this model as a starting point to commercialize their kit.

[Theodosius]

Hi Peter, 

 

it would be a pitty, if you would'nt move on with your log also here on this forum, I will miss your build! Of course I can understand, that it is a lot more work to maintain more logs simultaneous 🙂

[Katsumoto]

On 11/14/2023 at 6:20 PM, Theodosius said:

Hi Peter, 

 

it would be a pitty, if you would'nt move on with your log also here on this forum, I will miss your build! Of course I can understand, that it is a lot more work to maintain more logs simultaneous 🙂

Thanks for your interest and support! 

Don't worry, I will, I just haven't got the time really due to a heavy schedule at my daily job. Just keep watching this topic and a new update will be placed soon. 😉

Edited November 24, 2023 by Katsumoto

[CiscoH]

Peter- how did you transfer transfer your points from 1:75 -> 1:50?  Did you just eyeball where each line crossed a grid?  or maybe use a measuring device like an architectural ruler?

 

thanks cisco

[Katsumoto]

On 11/24/2023 at 1:29 PM, CiscoH said:

Peter- how did you transfer transfer your points from 1:75 -> 1:50?  Did you just eyeball where each line crossed a grid?  or maybe use a measuring device like an architectural ruler?

 

thanks cisco

Hi Cisco, 
I use a Burmester curved ruler set for connecting the dots. They are cheap and easily available like on Amazon...

Aristo AR5039 Burmester Curved Rulers (3 Pieces, Various Sizes and Designs) Orange-Transparent : Amazon.nl: Stationery & Office Supplies

 

 

[Katsumoto]

Hi Guys,

A small update and continuation of the WvH project. I had a lot to think about the construction of the bulkheads and partly frames construction with the approach of the Quinger drawings. I'm still figuring out some things along the way, but the main picture is ready.

One of the main aspects that I wanted to keep is the construction method of the hull designed by Corel. It's a nice system to gain an easy access to all the deck levels during the build.
Firstly I have to make all bulkheads from the drawings and 4 of the total 20 are not included or needed. This is bulkhead 7, 9, 11 and 13. I decided to make them anyway!
 

Second I give a view of the system that I am going to use. The picture below isn't 100% correct it's only to show how the system is going to be.
Each frame / bulkhead (green) is connected to a central part (yellow) which has the same height on all frames. This will give me sturdy system to plank the hull on the outside. In a later stadium after planking the outside hull, I will remove the inner yellow part on each frame and only the green part will remain. (I will change this system a little bit later on during construction)
 

The central plate is next to figure out. It's not 100% correct, I need some adjustments to make on some of the slots. Each slot will accept a bulkhead later on.
 

 

 

 

 

 

The plans I'm working from arn't perfect, there are errors. The heights of the 1st deck level for instance is incorrect on the line drawings.
By going slow, re-measuring things out of frustration curiosity, I see the errors upfront and fix them so I hopefully safe myself a lot of trouble later on in the build phase.
Below the current state. I'm drawing each frame and checking it against the false keel and the other drawings I have. I marked the bulkheads yellow so you guys can see the bulkheads better. There isn't very much to show at this moment.
Above the 1st deck, the bulkheads are developing into frames.
 

 

The second part of the drawings are to devide each bulkhead into three parts. Each bulkhead becomes like a jigsaw puzzle. The connection between the inner and outer parts of the bulkhead is a strong joint.
I used two colors on the drawings to simply show the process. The inner part is yellow the outer parts are green.

After completing 20 or so frames / bulkhead it was time to cut them out. I used a simple hobby exacto knife to do this. For the green outer parts I left a lot of paper surrounding the frame so the shape remains true to the plan.

With a simple glue stick the parts were glued on the plywood.







I used a plain hand jigsaw to extract the parts from the plywood plate and after that use my Proxxon disksander to shape the parts.

Some area's can't be reached by the sander so I used my needlefiles to get the job done. Yes this seams like a lot of work and it is!



The yellow and green jigsaw pieces ready for assembly. 

Just for indication purposes a dry-fitted a few parts to check if I made any errors along the way, At first glance everything looks fine so far and the shape of the hull becomes reality.
I need to extract a lot more pieces from the plywood, but that will be for a next time!

Thanks for following this log and please feel free to ask me questions if you have any!

Peter

[Hubac's Historian]

This is all completely fascinating, Peter, and your idea to divide each station into three parts is ingenious.  I have one curiosity, though.  The side parts of each bulkhead, that taper into frame shapes above the lower gundeck - why not make these from solid timber like maple, boxwood or pear?  Is it mainly a consideration of radial shrinkage of solids, joined to stable plywood?

[Katsumoto]

36 minutes ago, Hubac's Historian said:

This is all completely fascinating, Peter, and your idea to divide each station into three parts is ingenious.  I have one curiosity, though.  The side parts of each bulkhead, that taper into frame shapes above the lower gundeck - why not make these from solid timber like maple, boxwood or pear?  Is it mainly a consideration of radial shrinkage of solids, joined to stable plywood?

Good question! I considered to make these out of solid wood (pear) to be exact, however these parts of the bulkhead are completely covered by planking. Inner and outer planking, so the pearwood will not be visible.
I found it more usefull to simply use plywood. The spaces between each bulkhead will be filled with solid wood, probably basswood or something similair. Hopefully I will create a solid hull by doning so.

 

[Katsumoto]

Hi guys,

 

This weekend I managed to get all the bulkheads out of the plywood sheet. I assembled them all and placed it on the main plate to give you a overall impression how it's going to look. 🙂
It was a pretty laborious job to get all the parts neatly fitted to one another, but it's done. Still in a dry-fit placement so nothing has been glued yet!
The aft frame / bulkhead is not positioned correctly and sits a bit too low on the main plate. I need to correct this, but hadn't the time anymore, so this is for the next update.



For the next update I need to check all bulkheads and then glue all the parts together to get 20 completely assembled and glued bulkheads. After that I can line out all the bulkheads and glue them in place on the main plate.

Until next time!

 

regards,
Peter

[AnobiumPunctatum]

Really interesting project. I know the book and used it many years ago during my build of the Revell kit.

I wish you a lot of fun during your journey and will follow with great interest.

 

Are you sure that you have enough meet on the upper parts of your frames? It seems that they are to thin for the necessary curves.

[Katsumoto]

44 minutes ago, AnobiumPunctatum said:

Are you sure that you have enough meet on the upper parts of your frames? It seems that they are to thin for the necessary curves.

 

Hi Christian,

 

This is were you are probably right and thanks for warning me. I try to "work around" the problem by filling up the empty space between the upper parts of the frames with solid wood to create a complete solid shell.
This should give me more stability and more wood to work with. I'm not sure will work out, it's all a big experiment for me. 

 

Thanks again,

Peter

[allanyed]

Looks like a really nice kit.   I noticed belaying pins in the box and wonder why as they were not used by most European navies until mid to late 18th century.  Were the Germans ahead of the British, Spanish, and French I wonder?   

 

Regarding the frames, they actually look pretty good to me as the heads of the top timbers were likely about 5 inches in and out, maybe less,  so about 2.5 mm (0.10").  For a little protection I would add a temporary harpin or two with PVA  so it is easy to remove them later with a little water of IPA.   Maybe also some temporary beams on each bulkhead, up high, which will also maintain the breadth when adding the planking which might squeeze these members inboard a bit.

Allan

Edited December 4, 2023 by allanyed

[Theodosius]

Just wow! Thank's for explaining in details your approach to get the propper hull! 🙂 

[Lee J H]

hello. I also gave up on making this kit. I'm glad you made this because I think it will be of great help to me.

 

HAPPY New Years.

[BobG]

Hello Peter, I somehow missed seeing you had started this amazing build after following your incredible Xebec build log. Any further progress on this one? Hope all is well.

[Katsumoto]

1 hour ago, BobG said:

Hello Peter, I somehow missed seeing you had started this amazing build after following your incredible Xebec build log. Any further progress on this one? Hope all is well.

Hi Bob all is well, thank you. With you the same I hope!

The project will continue, however at this moment I’m going slow. I’m working 24/7 and have no time or spare time for modeling.

Thanks for posting Bob and see you later! 
take care,

Peter

[Hubac's Historian]

Peter, you must be in the midst of the middle phase of your working life, when it is most demanding on your time.  Well, fear not - we will wait for you, when you are ready.  This build is too good to simply forget about.

 

Best,

 

Marc

[Katsumoto]

49 minutes ago, Hubac's Historian said:

Peter, you must be in the midst of the middle phase of your working life, when it is most demanding on your time.  Well, fear not - we will wait for you, when you are ready.  This build is too good to simply forget about.

 

Best,

 

Marc

Thanks for the encouragement Marc, you’re spot on with your assumption! 

anyway, thanks for following and leaving a message.

Peter

[Katsumoto]

The battle continues, gluing bulkheads and reinforcement of the construction

Hello everybody, yes I'm still alive and kicking. 

My professional work, called a career gets in the way sometimes.  I'm just sorry for my absence lately but choices.....you know what I mean...
This weekend was a weekend I claimed for modeling. I have glued up all the frame / bulkhead pieces and then glued them to the center plate.
The construction was way to flexible in ships length so I had to reinforce the construction. Luckily I had a walnut dowel laying around which did the trick just fine and so I used my saw and chopped it into a lot of pieces. Glued all the pieces between the bulkheads and the thing is solid!

The upper part of each frame / bulkhead are very very fragile. So I decided to glue small pieces of basswood (10x10mm) between the frames to create a shell.
I used my table saw to saw some 10x10mm sticks and luckily the weather was nice this weekend here in The Netherlands. I'll bet the admiral wouldn't like the noise of the table saw and all the clouds of sawdust into the living room.... 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Well, that's it for this update, until the next one.

Regards,
Peter