USS Constitution by The Bitter End - Model Shipways - 1:76

[The Bitter End]

Not a terribly exciting or informative post today...

 

I I took a break from marking up the false keel as I needed to produce the hull planking to see what thickness I could consistently produce. I then churned out about 600 planks of 4.5mm x 1.5mm and will sand them back to their correct thickness as I need them. Because they are cut from raw trunks there is alot of wastage so there will be a fair amount of culling happening.

 

While I was in the "big" workshop I also cut some pear wood planks of 6.7mm on the table saw and simply traced the outline of the provided keel components onto those planks being sure to avoid any knots and major inconsistencies in the wood. I then cut close to the line with my 1970s delta rockwell 14inch bandsaw with a blunt bent blade and then sanded back to the line on the belt sander and with a dremel. This has produced reasonable results and with a bit of tweaking one can get a nice neat fit on the false keel. I hope all this extra work pays off. It is not that obvious in the photos but the pear really is a beautiful wood once it has been given a little bit of attention 

 

It is probably worth repeating the warning that the parts provided in my kit were very fragile and broke exceptionally easily. The kit i have is apparently at least 15 years old which may have played a role in this fragility.

 

These parts still obviously need cleaning up and fitting but here are the rough cuts

 

 

[JSGerson]

Planks are typically no more than 12" (30 cm) wide at midships and with an average length of 40’ (12 m). That means at scale of 1:76.8:

·       Max width: 5/32” (4 mm) (This what is provided in the kit)

·       Average length: 6” (15 cm)

When approaching the bow or stern, the planks will narrow. Do not narrow more than ½ of the original plank width.

 

Jon

[The Bitter End]

10 minutes ago, JSGerson said:

Planks are typically no more than 12" (30 cm) wide at midships and with an average length of 40’ (12 m). That means at scale of 1:76.8:

·       Max width: 5/32” (4 mm) (This what is provided in the kit)

·       Average length: 6” (15 cm)

When approaching the bow or stern, the planks will narrow. Do not narrow more than ½ of the original plank width.

 

Jon

Thank you Jon

 

I think I made a bit of an error and forgot to mention that I meant the planking for the deck. It sounds like you are referring to the hull planking. 

 

Haiko 

 

[JSGerson]

Deck planks were about:

·       20’ (6.4m) long

·       8” and 10” (20 cm and 25 cm) wide

At 1:76.8 scale:

·       3¼” (8.25 cm) long

·       7/64” and 1/8” (2.5 mm and 3 mm) wide

 

Jon

[The Bitter End]

10 minutes ago, JSGerson said:

Deck planks were about:

·       20’ (6.4m) long

·       8” and 10” (20 cm and 25 cm) wide

At 1:76.8 scale:

·       3¼” (8.25 cm) long

·       7/64” and 1/8” (2.5 mm and 3 mm) wide

 

Jon

Outstanding! I owe you a beer

[The Bitter End]

Hello Ladies and Gentlemen

 

I apologise for the rather scattered approach to this build log, I hope things will become a bit more linear in the near future.

 

Here are the next few glacial steps I have taken.

 

Once I had photocopied the relevant keel section drawings I placed the matching wood section over the image and marked where the reference line started and ended then simply joined the 2 marks using a pencil.

Next I took a strip of my home made keel planking and used it to raise the bearding line by its thickness. I hope that this strategy will result in the double planking of the hull fitting correctly but we will have to see.

I then cut out the paper template using a ruler and scalpel and held each cutout onto its matching keel section and traced the bearding line along the edge of the paper with a pencil.

It made the most sense to me to rough cut the bearding while the sections were separate, giving me more control and reducing the risk of breaking something. Technically speaking the rabbet is too narrow for the double planking due to the width of the false keel material provided but I am hoping to address this by sanding the last few strakes a little thinner on both layers of planking to allow them to fit flush. I achieved the rabbit cut with a combination of a small hand plane, some knives and a bunch of sanding.

I then glued the three sections together, clamped them to the cutting mat and waited for them to dry. Its worth pointing out that I did not install the reinforcements recommended by various please at this point. I felt it would make my life difficult as the protruding wood would prevent me from laying the false keel completely flat onto my work surface. Careful observers will also see that I inserted a small spacer on the lower forward tab where sections 1 and 2 are joined. This was to correct for sanding that had to be done to get everything aligned and had the added benefit of tightening up the fit while holding everything together.  This was followed by neatening up the bearding line so it ran from bow to stern without any stepping between sections.

On the keel section side of things I finished the shaping of the components, tapering the stem and stern sections and cutting the joints to fit. The instructions are slightly unclear on how much to taper and from where to where. If anyone thinks I have done this incorrectly based on the photos below please let me know. Things are still a bit rough but I will do final sanding once the hull planking is in. I then added keel sections using a series of rubber bands and clamps. I have begun using titebond original for the first time(it is not a common glue in south africa) I love how the product behaves, creating a pretty firm grip on the material in very short time, freeing up clamps for use elsewhere.

 

Unfortunately I am not yet very adept at cutting parts from scratch and I ended up with a gap in of of my keel joints that I was not happy with. I attempted to fix this with a filler strip but didn't bother to match the wood colour, producing an unsatisfactory result  once everything was assembled. I then realised the only way to fix this issue would be to cut out that area and try to patch it. I must say I dont love how the repair came out but its better than it was before.

The final step up to this point was to glue the reinforcements onto the joints. Something which I feel is best left to last but I may be wrong. THe pear wood I am using for the keel sections is also significantly stronger than the wood provided which may have played a role in keeping everything sturdy enough to leave the reinforcements for last.

 

Thats it for now.

 

Does anyone have any advice on making my keel joints neater?

Should there be tree nails in the keel?

What can I do to improve what has been done so far?

Are there any mistakes which I should be addressing at this point?

 

TBE

[The Bitter End]

I am having a little trouble with the stem of this vessel. Due to the fact that I am not painting this model the wood of the keel will be visible. Iwould therefore like to scribe the lines of the stem section into the wood. Despite the great information offered on here by various members I am really struggling to decide on how to lay out these divisions. the images available differ dramatically and none of the stems shown are exactly the same as the stem provided with the kit. I have also crossed the rubicon in terms of changing the design of the stem entirely to match one of the drawings available.

 

Any help on this would be hugely appreciated. I tried to sketch up a possible layout on a copy of the plans but it still doesn't sit quite right with me. Please take a look!

 

[JSGerson]

I would take the drawing you made in your last post, copy it and copy again in mirror image (port and starboard). Make a template by cutting the whole image as a whole out of the paper and with rubber cement, glue it to the stem on the model. With a sharp blade or using pin points, imprint the "puzzle pieces" into the wood. Then you can peel off the templates and finish embossing the lines into the wood.

 

Jon

[The Bitter End]

1 minute ago, JSGerson said:

I would take the drawing you made in your last post, copy it and copy again in mirror image (port and starboard). Make a template by cutting the whole image as a whole out of the paper and with rubber cement, glue it to the stem on the model. With a sharp blade or using pin points, imprint the "puzzle pieces" into the wood. Then you can peel off the templates and finish embossing the lines into the wood.

 

Jon

Hi Jon

 

This is a great method, thank you. I will give it a try this evening. Do you have any views on the template I made, I wont take any offense i promise! I partially made it up as I went along and I don't know if I made all the right choices.

 

Haiko

 

[JSGerson]

The stem that came with the kit was never meant to be seen without a covering of copper plate and paint so Model Shipways wasn't concerned about the individual pieces that it was comprised of.  As such, the silhouette of the stem reflects closely what the ship looks like today so I am not surprised it doesn't match the old plans.  You are trying to envision the ship as she was commissioned which nobody really knows what that looked like, other than some historically based educated guesses. Your stem plan looks plausible, but probably not historically accurate. I don't have any drawings of the stem earlier than 1927. Plan 14705 shows what the stem looked like prior to the 1927-31 restoration.   So, if you were to try to me be more historically accurate, I would try to make the stem look more like what the 1927 plans show. Here are the plan numbers I have. If you can't find all of them at the museum, let me know. Here is the earliest know photograph of the ship showing her stem during her restoration in Portsmouth, Maine 1858.

1927 - No.: 14705

1927 - No.: 25006

1927 - No.: 25026

1929 - No.: 24779

1972 - No.: 25007

 

Hope this helps, Jon

 

 

 

[The Bitter End]

Thanks to the help of @JSGerson  who sent me copies of some additional stem plans this is the second version I have come u with on layout. It involved some compromises as the blank stem shape provided is not identical to the outline on the plans but I think its as close as I can get.

 

If anyone has any suggestions they are as always most welcome. I have also attached my 2 reference drawings incase I have misinterpreted something on them.

 

 

Edited 10 hours ago by The Bitter End

[The Bitter End]

OK Final stem design...I think.

 

I looked at what was apparently the layout of the stem prior to restoration. This original layout appears to have had far more individual pieces than the restored stem, It was incredibly difficult to see where the divisions lay due to the wood grain patter drawn on the plans. Hopefully I can transfer this design to my Stem in an acceptable manner. I have also realized that the only way to get this layout to work is to cut out 2 small sections of the stem which I have marked with hatched pencil on my drawing.