Speedwell 1752 by dvm27 (Greg Herbert) - FINISHED - Ketch Rigged Sloop

[SJSoane]

Greg, your work sets an exceptionally high standard. Is this the same project I saw several years ago at your sail-making workshop in Baltimore?

 

Mark

[dvm27]

That's it Mark. Just trying to button her up for rigging.

[sfotinos]

Any updates on Speedwell?  Or the book?

Asking for a friend...

Shawn

[bobcat]

Hi,

Speedwell volume I is on press now and is scheduled for release Feb 1 I will announce it on this site and on the SeaWatchBooks site. Stay tuned.

 

Thanks,

Bob Friedman

[dvm27]

So what do you get PopPop on his 65th birthday when he already has everything he needs for his hobby? A paper on bulkhead model made from the pages of his own book. They even bought their own copy for the artist to make the model from the plans. If you look closely it has all the details of my model. Definitely one of the coolest gifts I've ever received!

[BANYAN]

That is a great, innovative and very well considered gift Greg; you rare rightfully proud.

 

cheers

 

Pat

[MEDDO]

That is AWESOME!  What a outstanding gift.  Definitely pride of the fleet.

[Ryland Craze]

That is a nice birthday present, something you will cherish for the rest of your life.  We can tell that you are a proud PopPop.

[the learner]

Interesting! are you going to case it? a paper case perhaps

[druxey]

A dust jacket would be more appropriate, The Learner.

[Rustyj]

That is just one of the greatest ideas I’ve ever seen! Very nice! 

[mtaylor]

9 hours ago, druxey said:

A dust jacket would be more appropriate, The Learner.

And the ship should be displayed in the library.

[the learner]

LOL 

[dvm27]

Been awhile since my last update. Currently busy turning deadeyes and preparing for rigging. I had a form tool made for my by Sherline and it works beautifully for both the 10" and 7" deadeyes. Ideally I thought the form tool would part the finished deadeye precisely as both shoulders were formed but, in actual practice, the pressure resulted in the deadeye chain snapping off prematurely. I suspect this would not happen if the material was brass but wood just cannot handle the deflection. No problem though as I just shortened the parting portion of the form tool. Each deadeye was then parted off with a razor saw.  Drilling was also a breeze using the rotary table on my mill. No holding jig required - the jaws keeps them in perfect position (thanks for the tip Ed).

 

Later this month Speedwell heads up to Canada where David Antscherl will provide his carving magic. We have a detailed bill of carvings from the original so they should be very accurate.

[SJSoane]

Hi Greg,

 

Fascinating, I did not know Sherline would make custom cutters.

 

So you chuck them in the three jaw chuck on the rotary table, and turn them 120 degrees? Clever!

 

Sorry I cannot join you in the carving workshop. Next time!

 

Mark

[davec]

Hi Greg - great looking deadeyes, and awesome cutter.  I spent a long time trying to grind one by hand, and still needed to do a lot of the rounding of the edges on the lathe.  

 

Not sure if you had the same experience as I did loading the deadeyes in the chuck for drilling. I found it was hard to do with one hand while I tightened the chuck with the other, and it was tedious to load it level.   I ended up standing a short dowel with lightly less diameter than the deadeye in the chuck.  It gave me a little platform to rest the deadeye on so I could  tighten the chuck with two hands, and made sure that the deadeye was always level for drilling.  Turned it into a few second process, which helped a lot given the number of deadeyes.

 

Dave

[dvm27]

Had some trouble loading at first Dave but then started loading deadeye with a curved hemostat (right hand) and tightening the chuck with the left hand. Only required finger pressure tightening to hold the deadeye in place. No bars required to tighten or loosen.

 

Mark, the form tool cost was only $35 and included one on each end. I imagine they could make form tools for the muzzle, reinforcements and ball of a cannon. They are cut on a wire EDM machine (whatever that is) and are incredibly precise.

[Hubac's Historian]

Well, this is a good one!  I will happily follow along for the remainder of the project.

[chris watton]

On ‎7‎/‎9‎/‎2017 at 7:07 PM, dvm27 said:

As many of my favorite modelers are posting updates this weekend I thought I'd share some recent progress on Speedwell. She is now sporting her copper cupola (say that three times quickly!) which arches over the steps to the "Great Cabin". I use that term in quotes because, after the lockers are installed, there is little room for the commanding Lieutenant. But this little vessel was designed for shore duty and was seldom used for sleeping. The cupola was shaped from a square of holly, hollowed out then spray painted with a hammered copper finish followed by matte varnish.

 

The rudderhead cover was also shaped from a holly plug which was then hollowed out. The panels were added to each side. Each one was a different dimension and all are hand fitted.

 

A little more work on the inside and outside of the hull and Speedwell, Volume I, will be off to the press!

 

• 
•  

Very nice work, a true scale model.

 

Regarding the cupola, was it common for these to be copper, or specific to this particular class, do you know?

[druxey]

I believe that, on many vessels of this size, where there were compound curved entryway covers over the companion to the not-so-great Great Cabin, these were of copper. The RMG model of Speedwell has such a copper hood. Lead would be too soft for this purpose.

[chris watton]

1 minute ago, druxey said:

I believe that, on many vessels of this size, where there were compound curved entryway covers over the companion to the not-so-great Great Cabin, these were of copper. The RMG model of Speedwell has such a copper hood. Lead would be too soft for this purpose.

Thank you, learnt something new!

[dvm27]

Speedwell is up in Canada receiving her carvings so not too much to report from the shipyard. Her deadeyes are dyed with Fiebings brown stain and a new tiller created. The old one was built up from hollow square tubing and round tubing but I never quite liked the way it looked. So I replaced her. Basically, I started with oversized square stock and turned the round tapered handle on the lathe. I then cut each side of the square stock on my Byrnes table saw with slitting blade until the matched the round stock. The small ball was silver soldered in place and the new tiller blackened. Much improved!

 

To forestall building the masts and spars I decided to build a binnacle. David Antscherl designed a simple version which would be appropriate for the sloop. I built three because...why not. But only one has a compass.  I would be happy to give the other two away to anyone who can provide proof they purchased our Speedwell book (a photo on your desk will suffice). Just send me a PM.

 

[SJSoane]

Greg, Sweet tiller! How, exactly, did you hold it when you trimmed it in the Byrnes tablesaw? Before or after it was bent?

 

Mark

[dvm27]

12 hours ago, SJSoane said:

Greg, Sweet tiller! How, exactly, did you hold it when you trimmed it in the Byrnes tablesaw? Before or after it was bent?

 

Mark

The bending was done after cutting the square sides to their final dimension, Mark. Remember that the over-sized square stock was chucked in my four jaw holder with a live center. So essentially I had a round tiller piece emerging from square stock. One of the square faces was then placed against the table saw fence and the opposite face was cut to the outside diameter of the round portion. The piece was rotated 180 degrees and the opposite face cut. This was repeated with the other two faces.

[SJSoane]

Thanks, Greg, that makes sense. So you chose to start with stock larger than the diameter of the round portion so that you could trim down exactly to the diameter, rather than trying to cut the round part to the exact dimension of the square portion.

 

Mark

[davyboy]

Hi Greg,

The binnacles look very nice indeed,hopefully a plan will be included in Vol.2.

 

I started on the POB version a couple of months ago,I've much to learn. This will be only my 3rd build the previous being a Caldercraft kit of HMS Cruizer followed by a 95% scratch build of Chucks' HMS Cheerful. I look forward to seeing what she will look like when David adds the carvings. He did say in some correspondence we had that there will probably be a set of cast carvings in the future. I hope so anyway.

 

Kind regards,and I wish you a pleasant week.

 

Dave 

 

[mtaylor]

Dave,

Do give some thought to a build log.  You get some help and also help others who wish to build her.

[dvm27]

On 9/16/2019 at 2:37 PM, davyboy said:

Hi Greg,

The binnacles look very nice indeed,hopefully a plan will be included in Vol.2.

Dave 

 

Yes, we are including the detailed plans for our binnacle. Keep in mind that the binnacle is less than an inch in length so those extreme close-up photos magnify every flaw a gazillion times.

[SJSoane]

Greg, I understand old Hollywood actresses always had their photos taken with a softening filter, to ease away the imperfections. You would never see the imperfections in real life, but in artificially close up photos, the imperfections showed. I wonder if ultra close up photos of the old Admiralty models would show greater imperfections than we see with the naked eye. If so, I think the model ship building community should use softening filters for all of our ultra close up photos. Fair is fair...😀

Mark

[GrandpaPhil]

Yep