Le Chebec by Yvesvidal - CAF Model - 1/48

[yvesvidal]

If I told you that I have had an indigestion of frames, would you believe me?

 

Seriously, I just finished building 84 frames with just 4 more to go on the stern. The rear frames were by far the most difficult to remove from the plates, sand, adjust on the keel, fair and verify. Here are most of the tools I used to build these 84 frames:

 

 

The Dremel...? Indispensable. Oh and some sand paper to finish before oiling and waxing the wood.

 

Below is Number #74 to #79:

 

 

Then, #80 to #84+

 

 

Dry fitting:

 

 

 

 

 

 

Of course, not all frames are perfect. I do have some misalignments and I am hoping that once some planking is in place (inside and outside), things may recover nicely. Also,  there are four gun ports that I did not build yet and I will address these once the deck beams are in place and the hull a little bit sturdier.

 

Now is time to glue it all and "Commit" !!!

 

Yves

 

[Matt D]

It looks amazing, Yves!  I hope your gluing goes well.

[Kevin]

that all looks very nice and tidy

[yvesvidal]

All the frames have been glued and the keelson finalized:

 

 

 

That cradle is quite practical, and it allows me to store the ship away from my bench, quite easily:

 

 

It is a large model but nothing comparable to the humongous size of the HMS Bellona.

 

Happy Holidays to all.

Yves

 

[yvesvidal]

This is where we stand, at this moment. As mentioned before, the frames cannot be removed from the cradle until the deck beams and the inside of the hull have been built:

 

 

 

Yves

[James H]

That really does look excellent, and your work is so clean.

[yvesvidal]

On 12/27/2024 at 10:16 AM, James H said:

That really does look excellent, and your work is so clean.

Thank you James. Coming from you, it means a lot.

 

Yves

Edited December 28, 2024 by yvesvidal

[yvesvidal]

Moving on with tedious and extremely delicate tasks. I decided to tree nail the wood pieces. It helps bonding with the frames, as the holes go inside the frame. Not sure I will do that everywhere inside the hull, as it will be barely visible.

 

 

There is no way to hold the planks internally and you have to maintain them with your fingers, while the glue dries. Not exactly practical.

 

 

 

The tree nailing is very subtle, which I prefer a lot.

 

 

Yves

[yvesvidal]

I am starting to blend Session #1 and Session #2. Like most CAF Model kits, this ship comes in two sessions.

 

The first session is all about the cradle, the hull and frames, including the stern.

Session #2 is everything else.

 

I did not complete the stern as it would impede easy access into the hull, for installing, nailing and sanding the inner planking. I will return to the stern (end of Session #1) at a later date.

 

For now, I am trying to do the following:

 

 

As indicated before, it is very difficult as there is no room for clamps, since the hull is stuck in its cradle and cannot be removed, yet. The long timber pieces have to be formed by hand, soaking them in alcohol and them bending them by hand, until they have reached the approximate desired shape. Gluing is then done in sections, using CA glue, and maintained with your fingers while drying.

 

 

Below, you can see how the open stern helps with the internal access.

 

 

 

The tree nailing is done as much as possible like on a real ship. The holes are actually crossing all the way into the frames, and the toothpicks soaked with glue are actually connecting the parts. It adds a little bit of bonding into some areas which are not possible to glue easily.

 

 

Yves

Edited January 2 by yvesvidal

[Greg Davis]

This is beautiful work - I've often been tempted to try this model! 

 

Out of curiosity, how well does the glue - both Titebond and CA - hold on your oiled and waxed pieces of wood?

 

Greg

[yvesvidal]

Greg,

 

So far the parts are holding very well. Oiling and Waxing (combined in one product) are done mostly after gluing. However, some parts are oiled/waxed before gluing and to be on the safe side, I wait a day or two for the wood to suck all the chemicals before gluing. It seems to work fine and it is pretty strong. Thank you for the compliment.

 

Yves

[yvesvidal]

Working on the bases of the masts. First the main mast. If someone could explain to me what are these small yellow dots on the mast shims, I would appreciate it. The shims have not been sanded and I will finalize the base, when building the main mast.

 

 

 

The base is not glued yet:

 

 

Yves

Edited January 2 by yvesvidal

[hamilton]

Feel like I just took a short nap since last I checked in on your log, Yves - and now look! This is another huge one from CAF....looking really great so far!

hamilton

[yvesvidal]

Base of the front mast:

 

 

 

 

Nothing is glued yet:

 

 

 

Yves

[Veszett Roka]

Don't forget to put a coin under the mast, Yves. Neat work.

[yvesvidal]

I just finished installing the third (and last) set of inside planks. Even though the kit calls for 5 sets, I am limiting myself at that point as these are extremely difficult to set correctly, since you have to hold the planks with your fingers while the glue does its job. There is absolutely no room to fix the planks, with perhaps the exception of drilling a small hole and placing a few microscopic wood screws.

 

 

 

 

Again, all planks were tree nailed, with the tip of the nails protruding into the frames.

 

The next part of the assembly is very complex, poorly documented by CAF and very tricky. It will drive the rest of the assembly and I hope to not screw up royally on this one.

 

Yves

[yvesvidal]

As indicated by the picture below (Session #2), I have installed three sets of the 2x5 planks. I am stopping there.

 

 

Now, the dreaded prospect of gluing the 3x5 mm planks is coming. There are really no clear indication on how to do that, besides a little tick mark on the frames, that comes somewhat in the middle of the deck beams. It is really not precise at all. In addition, securing the deck beams supports (3x5mm - Green) is not an easy task, because of the lack of access due to the constraining cradle.

 

Instead, I decided to move on and install the deck beams central support as well as possible, making sure that it lines up with the deck beams and from there, determine where the 3x5mm supports have to be installed. It is going to be tedious but that is the only way I see it possible.

 

 

Once this assembly is in place, I hope by positioning a few deck beams, to be able to trace the exact position of the 3x5 supports, on the frames. That central assembly (3F-1 to 3F-15) is super fragile and requires a lot of care.

 

It is first assembled flat on a bench:

 

 

Then, many dry-runs are made to position it in the best possible way. One of the vertical holders is ending right in the middle of the mast base, which is not good. I will adjust this later. The mast base is not glued yet and will be glued later, when some of the major deck beams have been installed. There is a lot of conflicting information between the Monograph, one of the CAF plans and the other CAF plan (!) Not easy to figure out exactly where the main mast should sit.

 

 

 

Finally, the central support is installed and the CA is drying....

 

 

Wish me luck.... I really have no idea if that is going to work.

 

Yves

 

[yvesvidal]

While working and measuring multiple times for the installation of the deck frames supports (3x5 mm), I have built the ladders used by the crew to reach the lower level:

 

 

 

These parts are funny to build, with a small triangular file. The crew must have been very agile to use this kind of ladder, that literally requires your two hands and two feet to get to the upper deck.

 

Yves

Edited Thursday at 03:49 PM by yvesvidal

[DocRob]

Absolutely fantastic work on your chebec, Yves. It looks as if you were building the real thing. I also really like your neat photography and thorough description, which taught me one thing, I´m not up to such a kit right now and I had my eye on La Coureur for a while, but when I feel I am, I will seek out your log as a helpful source.

Cheers Rob

[Trussben]

7 hours ago, yvesvidal said:

While working and measuring multiple times for the installation of the deck frames supports (3x5 mm), I have built the ladders used by the crew to reach the lower level:

 

 

 

These parts are funny to build, with a small triangular file. The crew must have been very agile to use this kind of ladder, that literally requires your two hands and two feet to get to the upper deck.

 

Yves

They were called “ Monkey Ladders” for a reason.

[yvesvidal]

A quick update and a major milestone completed for me: the building of the deck frames supports in the hull.

 

The central support has been installed:

 

 

 

To position correctly the 3x5mm deck frames support on each side of the hull, I am approaching it in two ways:

 

1) An approximate marking using multiple deck frames. It gives me some kind of indications.

 

 

 

2) Using the plan, a precise measurement from the base of the cradle:

 

 

It is the line marked "4". I am using a measure every ten frames. When happy, it is time to glue, using CA glue and strong fingers pressure, since there is no easy way to position these 3 x 5 supports.

 

 

Once glued, I am drilling through the beam and into each frame. A real nail (pin of electronic components - 0.8 mm diameter) is inserted after coating the "nail" with CA glue. Then some sanding, oiling and waxing.

 

 

The nails are useful in places where the frames are not touching very well the beam, due to the poor fairing of the internal hull.

 

 

This is mostly the case in the stern (see above).

 

 

Both sides are now done...sighs. I hope it will be alright. There is no coming back.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Next, I am going back to the Session #1 and will try to finish the stern:

 

 

Overall, I am very happy to have this milestone behind me. It was not the most pleasant thing to do.

 

Yves

Edited 7 hours ago by yvesvidal