PHOENIX 1787 by ccoyle - Master Korabel - 1/72 - Russian brigantine of the Black Sea Fleet

[Ian_Grant]

Few things that I have built did not contain a drop of my blood. I've had clients offer me band-aids during renovations.

 

Now the boat is truly yours Chris.

[Cathead]

All my models have customized iron deposits as well. A sign of dedication.

[ccoyle]

There are 13 planks below the wale on each side. So far I have done five on each side. Fortunately there is no spiling to do, but there is still the monotony of bend, glue, repeat. I max out at about four planks per session before boredom sets in.

 

[ccoyle]

Well, it was MLK Day here in the US, and I had the day off. So over the course of several sessions, I managed to get all of the finish planking on, except for another layer that will need to be added to the wales. Here it is in its rough state. It will need some sanding and a little filler here and there, plus a couple of plank ends broke and will need repair. But its a milestone, to be sure. As you can see, the kit design uses planks that overlap the bow and stern; these will need to be trimmed, creating slots for the keel and stem post.

 

[ccoyle]

Trimmed down the plank ends and dry-fitted the stem post, keel, and stern post. These three pieces all get veneers later.

 

[ccoyle]

Glued the pieces of the stem together and added part of the veneer. After this dried, the stem needed to be tapered from 3mm inboard to 2mm outboard.

 

 

And here we have the two stems, the keel, and the second layer of the wales added. This is a blistering pace of construction compared to my usual plodding. 😏

 

[Coyote_6]

Very nice work and a beautiful fit Chris!  Wow.

[ccoyle]

Time for the decks. The instructions recommend contact cement, which I opted not to use because contact cement allows absolutely zero working time -- make a mistake and it's permanent. I used wood glue and worked quickly. The edges wanted to curl up, but I held them down by clamping clothespins atop them along the bulwarks until dry.

 

 

Next I worked on the aft cabin bulkhead. It's two layers of veneer, with painted hinges and faux doorknobs made of cut-off brass nail daubed with white paint. Just dry fitted for now.

 

 

Cheers!

[druxey]

First bleeding, now blistering? You are a masochist, Chris! Seriously, that nice looking progress.

[ccoyle]

Once the decks are on it's time to start working on the inboard veneers. These are not as easy to work with as the concept might sound. The veneers are beautiful, but also thin and therefore brittle and prone to warping when wet, as when coated with wood glue. I learned this last bit through trial and error -- mainly error. I got the port veneer on in one piece, luckily. The starboard side had some fit issues -- only the first gun port cutout aligned properly; the others were off by about 0.5mm. So I did this:

 

 

I then glued in the forward piece and trimmed the second piece so it would align properly.

 

And then things went south.

 

The aft piece of veneer resisted not one but TWO attempts to glue in and seat properly thanks to the veneer's aggravating tendency to curl when wet. There's a narrow channel between the deck and bulwark that the veneer is supposed to be seated in, and curling didn't help. Each time I pulled the veneer off I had to scrape the cured glue out of the channel with a dental pick. Then I did this:

 

 

This allowed me to install the piece in smaller chunks. Things worked out this time.

 

 

The process is going rather slowly because I am first wetting, shaping, drying, and varnishing the veneers before installing them, so there's a lot of drying time added to the schedule.

 

That's it for now! Next up will be the quarterdeck veneers, followed by the covering boards.

[Coyote_6]

I can relate to the drying time aspect.  Looking good Chris!

[Keith Black]

 Perseverance is the name of the game in so much of what we do. It turned out looking right spiffy, Chris. 

[Glen McGuire]

That is very precise work with those thin veneers, Chris.  Well done. 

[ccoyle]

All the inboard bulwark veneers have been added, along with the covering boards.

 

 

After fixing some of the chipped second planking layer, here's where we now stand compared to where we left off last May:

 

 

 

That's all for now!

[Keith Black]

 The Phoenix has nice lines to her and you've done a wonderful job with her, Chris. 

[ccoyle]

The fashion pieces have been added. Like other parts, these were pre-cut (BTW, I found out that these pieces are cut from 'black hornbeam' -- since hornbeam isn't black, these pieces must have been dyed, as I previously supposed), but they did not fit in the allowable space. I needed to cut them into two parts, trim a little off of the curved section, and then glue the separate parts to the hull.

 

[Coyote_6]

Neat work Chris.  Phoenix has handsome lines.

[hollowneck]

Your work on this very nice kit is excellent, Chris.

It is truly unfortunate that we can no longer acquire this kit (or any others from this Russian manufacturer). I purchased a Master Korabel kit pre-Ukraine/Insane invasion; it was a superb kit that was developing into a very nice model when I suspended work on it (schooner Polotsk kit, 1788). The 1:72-scale innovative kit design came with high-quality materials throughout (laser cut pear and excellent P/E) as well as a decent visual, non-English manual.

 

I wonder if the company has survived the madness? IMHO, Russian and Ukrainian ship modelers are some of the finest in the world.

I'll be very interested to see your work on the rigging. Sails?

[ccoyle]

30 minutes ago, hollowneck said:

I wonder if the company has survived the madness?

 

I believe they have, only as you pointed out we can no longer purchase their kits here due to the present geopolitical situation. I'm sure we all hope that things will be resolved soon for the sake of everyone involved. We have modeling friends on both sides.

 

As for rigging, I am not planning to add sails. As I outlined earlier, I plan to replace ALL the rigging line in the kit, since the supplied rigging line is the kit's biggest weakness. Doing so won't be cheap, so I plan to economize a bit by adding only the standing rigging and minimal amount of running rigging, e.g. lifts.

 

P.S. I should add that this build will be taking another brief hiatus soon, as I currently have another project on its way here from Poland (which should provide a hint on the nature of the new project), but I won't disclose what the subject is until I get the build started. 😉

 

 

[hollowneck]

36 minutes ago, ccoyle said:

As for rigging, I am not planning to add sails. As I outlined earlier, I plan to replace ALL the rigging line in the kit, since the supplied rigging line is the kit's biggest weakness.

@etsinko 's Build log for MK's "Polotsk" is a reference I used for my (incomplete) build.

 

Near the conclusion of his build, he mentioned to me the following:

...there were a few custom parts involved:

1. I used aftermarket lasercut grating

2. I made my own ropes

3. I used aftermarket wooden belaying pins instead of brass one that came with the kit

 

Personally, I lament the inability to purchase scale-accurate belaying pins from Russia. The available brass ones that are close in scale work but one must paint or chemically treat them.

[ccoyle]

I have started in on the cap rails.

 

[yvesvidal]

Those cap rails  bring a feeling of completion.

 

Yves

[ccoyle]

32 minutes ago, yvesvidal said:

Those cap rails  bring a feeling of completion.

 

Yves

 

They do! There's a few pieces of veneer left to do on the keel and stem post, but the rough underlying structure is quickly disappearing from view.

[Keith Black]

On 2/6/2025 at 1:45 PM, ccoyle said:

as you pointed out we can no longer purchase their kits here due to the present geopolitical situation

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/235012417789

[ccoyle]

3 minutes ago, Keith Black said:

 

https://www.ebay.com/itm/235012417789

Well, we couldn't get them until Keith found an eBay seller I've never heard of. I'm curious about the seller's ID -- his or her profile tells us nothing about them, and they've only been a seller since November of 2022.

[Keith Black]

 Chris, I know nothing of the seller but what's stated by eBay, they have a 100% rating after 91 sales. Say what you will about eBay, they do take their seller's ratings seriously. 

 

 I'm not as active on eBay as I once was because you can only stuff so much in a five pound bag. Twenty five years ago or there bouts we purchased five cars off eBay and to date we have almost 500 purchases. I trust eBay because we've always had positive experiences, others may feel differently. Follow the old adage, buyer beware. 

Edited February 7 by Keith Black

[ccoyle]

1 hour ago, Keith Black said:

I'm not as active on eBay as I once was

 

Me neither, mostly because many years ago eBay sellers lost their collective minds and lost all sense of what used merchandise was worth.

[Keith Black]

39 minutes ago, ccoyle said:

because many years ago eBay sellers lost their collective minds and lost all sense of what used merchandise was worth

 Instead of a place where folks were trying to sell stuff they no longer wanted or had room for, eBay became a site where folks were trying to make a living. There are still items that come up for sale that are a bargain but you're right, Chris, prices for the most part have become pretty stupid. 

[ccoyle]

Cap rails all done.

 

[ccoyle]

As I was working on the cap rails, I noticed that the temporary gun port support strips (part of the outboard veneer) had disappeared from the photos. I don't remember reading about this in the written instruction, but I decided that now was as good a time as any to go ahead and remove them, so I did.

 

 

Now, this leads to a rather unpleasant task: cleaning up the gun ports. The ports are laser cut into both the inboard and outboard veneers, and I suppose that if one manages to line up everything neatly then nice, square gun ports should be the result. Apparently I didn't do the job neatly enough, because I don't have nice, square gun ports. The ports don't everywhere line up properly inboard-to-ouboard, and the linings are here and there off kilter.

 

There are limited options to fix this. One would be to simply file away the overlapping planking until it is flush with the port linings, but that would ruin the square shape of the ports. I only see one other option, and that is to add material to the linings until the new material sits flush with the inboard and outboard strips. That material could be putty, but then that would need to be painted and would thus ruin the all-wood look of the bulwarks. So the material will have to be wood, which will of course require more effort to fit and shape correctly.

 

But who doesn't like a challenge, right?

 

My package from Poland made it to Georgia today, so I'm hoping it will be here on Monday. 😮