Norwegian sailing pram by Kenchington – Model Shipways – 1:12

[Kenchington]

I am one of the many working my way through the Model Shipways beginner's series. There were already many and excellent build logs for the banks dory and I had nothing to add to those, until it came to scratch-building the fishing gear. I doubt that anyone will want to follow me down that path, so I did not prepare a log for that build. Now it's time for the pram and I think that, this time, I will have something to contribute. If nothing else, I can offer a sailor's perspective. I'm not the only one here who can do that, but I see that some people come to the kit without experience of small, traditionally rigged boats. That can be limiting, considering the abbreviated (not too say "deficient") instructions.

 

It will be a little while, maybe as much as a couple of weeks, before I put craft knife to basswood. However, I have started preparations, so this is probably the right time to start a log.

 

First, I figure that it's a good idea to have a vision of where you want to end up before starting out. I may be unique but the dory meant something to me, emotionally, and was always more than a learning and building exercise -- though it was that too. In contrast, I can't feel much affection for the pram. I can and do love small, traditional boats but I love them in full-scale, for sailing. I just don't feel much interest in them as subjects for modelling. Maybe I will one day scratch-build a miniature of my own pride-and-joy (a Drascombe Longboat, if anyone cares) but I just can't get excited about recreating another man's recreational toy. So the pram kit will be learning exercise only, for me. I'm not aiming for any embellishments, just a stand-alone display model. That's a shame in a way as 1:12 is a common dollhouse scale, and those so inclined could dress up a finished pram with any number of accessories (wine bottles keeping cool under the sternsheets, perhaps?), as well as figurines of humans and their pets. That's not for me, though.

 

Still, there's no denying that the prototype is a pretty little thing -- much prettier than the plywood pram that was my first boat, a lifetime ago. So I aim to emphasize her prettiness in a finished model. To meet its objectives, my dory needed a good thick coat in a shade still known in this part of the world as "dory buff", but it hurt to hide all the woodwork that I had sweated over under that first coat of primer! So I aim to give the pram a clear finish, which means that she has to be built without glue stains or filler (save for a little white glue and sawdust mix, if necessary). That will add to the challenge and hence to the learning experience. Or I hope so.

 

Enough preliminaries. Next: Preparatory steps.

 

Trevor

[Kenchington]

Preaching to the choir here, but my initial step was to read right through the instructions, underlining key points. Looking at other people's build logs, I get the impression that some got rather lost amongst the wording and, in retrospect, I can understand why. The only full-size boat I ever built was a plywood kayak but I've been maintaining and studying boats for most of my life (even owned a traditional lapstrake hull at one time). With that background, even a first read-through made enough sense to put the whole build into shape in my head. I figure that will be a big help going forward. Maybe I'll be able to communicate some of it as this log unfolds.

 

Next, I worked through every build log for this kit that has already been posted on MSW. I've always seen a lot of value in the adage: "Learn from the mistakes of others. You won't live long enough to make them all yourself". More positively, those logs contain a lot of very good ideas from a lot of people -- most of whom were learning as they went along, strangely enough, rather than those more experienced dipping in with aid and suggestions. As I went through, I noted the good ideas, special challenges and possible solutions to them, all scribbled into spare space in the kit instructions. The end result looks something like this:

img20250303_14125545.pdf

I didn't even try to keep records of who had contributed each bright idea, so I'll apologize once for all but I won't be able to acknowledge you individually when I use your techniques.

 

Nobody else could follow my notes and I won't be making a fair copy as some sort of improved instruction booklet, even if I had any right to something so presumptuous. At each step of the model construction, however, I'll merge my notes with the text offered by the kit designer. In a sense, I'll be building with the combined weight and experience of MSW at my back. And that's encouraging when taking that first leap into the unknown. I'll try to explain what I've done in this log. Then everyone will be able to see what a mess I've made of it!

 

Now: Time to order a bunch of tools. Lee Valley does such a lovely line of miniatures, just right for shaping those pesky gains in the plank ends!

 

Trevor

[palmerit]

Otto Frei (https://www.ottofrei.com) also has some descent tools. I bought my Optivisor from them (lots of knockoffs on Amazon) and got my tiny metal files from them. In one of the orders I placed, I also bought a couple of tiny squares, some tiny drill bits (the .5 and .6mm ones that break so easily), and some 100-packs of scalpel blades. They make stuff for jewelry but those tools can be used for model ship building too.

 

I also bought some stuff from J. Stockard Fly Fishing (www.jsflyfishing.com) - some nice scissors for cutting rigging, a whip finisher (we'll see if that actually works - it was pretty cheap), a bobbin holder that might help with rigging (we'll see), and some very fine thread.

 

If you ever opt to get some Quad Hands, order directly from them (www.quadhands.com). Seems like a lot of them on Amazon and elsewhere are knockoffs. 

 

Early on, I bought some nice tweezers from Tamiya (they had more in stock than some of the places online that see them).

 

If you're doing airbrushing, and use Vallejo air paints, www.scalehobbyist.com has the best prices and selection that I've found.

 

I also bought the Lee Valley micro trio. They are nice. I also visited a Lee Valley store in Niagara Falls when visiting family.

Edited Monday at 07:19 PM by palmerit

[Kenchington]

Thanks, Palmerit!

 

I avoid Amazon unless I know exactly what I intend to buy. They bombard me with irrelevant ads, then confuse me with the mass of dubious alternatives. The other day, I tried to get acid flux for soldering stainless steel. I was showered with listings for cheap, Chinese products that had "stainless steel" in their titles but were normal flux, not the special acidic stuff. Amazon did sell the proper thing but I had to find a manufacturer and the right product name, then go back into Amazon. Even then, the alternatives on offer were the wrong kind.

 

I get some useful tools in the local hardware stores, though the smallest they sell are at the upper end of size for ship models. Next is the one local hoppy shop (Great Hobbies -- a Canadian chain, I think), then Lee Valley. Its local outlet is awkwardly placed for me, on the other side of Halifax Harbour. Beyond those, it's internet orders with shipping costs often more than the items I am buying. But that's the price to be paid for living in this corner of paradise!

[robert952]

I agree: research is a must before you cut a single piece of wood or use a single drop of glue. Even if you only read through the instructions a couple of times. 

 

I will add a software that I am beginning to use more often: OneNote. If  you have Word/Excel/PowerPoint you likely have access as it's part of the Office 365 suite. I use this to organize my notes (Sails, build log links, magazine articles). OneNote has a good OCR (Optical Character Recognition) that will copy text from an image that you  can paste into whatever software (including OneNote).  Here's a screen shot of my Maine Peapod file (Sails Tab).  Just c;ick and drag images, weblinks, etc from websites. Great way to organize notes and research. 

 

 

Edited Tuesday at 01:45 AM by robert952
clarification

[Kenchington]

Round 1, Step 5 ... as in my first round on the pram but Step 5 of its kit instructions.

 

Before I begin: Apologies for the large size of the images. I have reduced the file size but I don't know how to stop the MSW software from filling the page!

 

 

I wasn't supposed to start for a few more days but I've run out of dye for the leatherwork project that I should finish before starting on this model. Until I can get back into the city for more, here's a very good way to fill my time! Rather than get stuck in to the transoms, however, I've prepared the building board.

 

To my eye, the most serious gap in the banks-dory kit's instructions is their lack of any emphasis on the critical importance setting up the building board and moulds accurately and carefully. That's OK for me. I've read through enough guidance on full-size boatbuilding to have the requirement hammered into my skull: If you start off with even a minor error, it will grow as the build proceeds until it ruins the whole. Working through build logs on MSW reinforced that lesson but in a bad way. It was sad to see so many efforts fail almost before they began, because enthusiastic people starting their first model weren't told to take care of the initial set-up. The pram's instructions do nothing to fill that void. 

 

Other people's dory build logs did offer some ways of getting the set-up straight and square, so I tried those. They worked for me and I have repeated them for the pram.

 

First step was to strike a centreline, with a sharp pencil. That's the centre of the boat-to-be, not necessarily of the building board, so it's drawn from the centre of the bow notch to the centre of the stern one. Next, with set square and ruler, I drew perpendiculars at the mould slots:

When I did that with the dory, I found some slots nice and square, some skewed left and some skewed right. This time, the forward slot was very nearly square but the after one noticeably off. However, both were too narrow to take the tongues of the moulds. While filing the after slot wider, I worked down the after edge of one side and the forward end of the other, fixing that problem. So far so good.

 

Next, I took out the two moulds and marked their centrelines too. Then I traced around one side of one mould, flipped it over and traced the other side:

My first effort only proved that I'm not good at drawing centrelines. After checking and adjusting, the mould is confirmed as nicely symmetrical. No problem there.

 

The instructions say not to worry about the char on the moulds but other people have found that it marks wet planks when they are laid on for bending. As I'm aiming for a clear finish, I sanded off the worst of the char, then re-checked for symmetry. Still OK.

 

Next check was for the mould centreline to match the building-board line, when the mould is in its slot. One was good, the other not:

Out of focus on the critical point but you can see that slot and tongue are quite markedly off. That only needed a few strokes of a file but they will make all the difference later.

 

A few build logs for the pram have mentioned that the kit's building board isn't stiff enough. I cut up the outline of the sheet from which the board came and glued two longitudinals to the board's underside. Maybe those are optional but I also put cross pieces where they will support the transom holders. I don't see how those could be firm enough without some support beneath. The end results looks like:

The dory's moulds were also the model's frames and so had to come free from the building board when the planking was finished. The pram's instructions for its moulds likewise say "Simply slot them in place" but there's no reason to be so cautious as no part of the model gets glued to the moulds. I glued them down, so adding to the stiffening of the set-up.

 

Each centreline was carefully aligned, the moulds pressed fully down to eliminate any sideways misalignment and their fore-and-aft squareness checked with a mechanic's square. Unlike my dory's moulds, both of the pram's went in nicely square, without adjustment. To keep them that way, I resorted to the Lego-blocks-and-masking-tape method that had worked for me last time:

Note the slight gap under the mould. I had to remove the Lego after taking those pictures, press the mould down more firmly and repeat the squaring up.

 

The bow transom holder went in straightforwardly. As others have found, the slot in the building board was too wide but a sliver of business card filled the gap and pressed the centre of the holder almost exactly onto the marked centreline:

Also like others, I broke the stern transom holder while extracting it from its sheet. The problem seems to be that the laser cuts are very narrow and the sheet rather thick. As I tried to push the holder free, after successfully cutting its tabs, it split along the grain. Another time, I would cut where I have drawn a red line, then extract and discard the piece in the slot, after all was removed from the sheet:

With two pieces of scrap glued on as butt straps, whittled away from any obstruction of the slot for the transom, then sanded to just reach the top of the building board, the whole thing was glued in place and will be much stiffer and stronger than the kit's intended arrangement:

Speaking of the two transom holders, the instructions say "Only glue the bow one in!" but there's no need to remove the transom from its holder until the pram comes off its building board and, at that point, I'll simply cut away one or both holders. 

 

And that's it for today. Judging from what others have found, I'll need to add shims to the building board to stabilize the transoms but those must wait until I have something to stabilize! Otherwise: Step 5 completed.

 

[SaltyScot]

I am going to hop on board here and follow along, Trevor. I am intrigued as to how this will turn out, I have no idea what a sailing pram is and, to be honest, I don't want to even research it. I would like to see it unfold before my eyes right here. 

[Kenchington]

I am honoured to have you along for the voyage.

 

Trevor

 

 

As your signature block reminds us that "Dogs do speak, but only to those who know how to listen", I'll add that horses do too. And so do sailing prams.

[SaltyScot]

4 minutes ago, Kenchington said:

And so do sailing prams.

 

Bought a smile to me face ye did, sir  

[Kenchington]

Steps 1, 2 (in part) & 3 (completed)

 

Not much progress today -- more retrograde movement, if anything! My best excuse is that, with confidence in the properties of yellow glue (born of building the model dory), I tackled a repair of a piece of 18th-Century furniture that I had put off for years, terrified of messing it up. Nice cross-over use of modelling skills.

 

In truth, after all my verbiage yesterday about the need to set up the pram's building board properly, I began to think that I had not done well enough. Foolishly allowing excellence to become the enemy of good, I took the moulds off, ready to try again -- then split the tab on each of them. Bah! I'm rebuilding and it will end better than it was, but I can only reconstruct one mould at a time.

 

Otherwise, I got on with the transoms. The instructions call for first shaping one knee for each transom, then putting those aside and starting on the bow transom, then turning to the lower stern one, then the bow one again, then the stern ... Sounds like far too much chance to lose or damage small pieces, so I started with the bow transom, then added its knee and only when that was finished did I start on the stern transom.

 

Incidentally, for those who, like Mark, "have no idea what a sailing pram is", the definition lies in the bow transom. A small boat with a flat forward end, rather than a pointed stem (or anything else), is a "pram" or "pram dinghy". I don't think that the term would be applied to larger vessels, even ones with flat fronts. I thought that it was derived from the "praam" or "pram", a form of river and coastal barge once used in northern Europe, but the etymologists seem to say no. I can only guess that somebody once looked at a snub-nosed boat and drew a parallel with an old-fashioned baby-carriage.

 

The Model Shipways kit is of an elegant, lapstrake pram, one example of a type developed in Norway. I have no idea when they emerged, nor what they are called in their own country. Stubbier prams became popular in the 1960s because it was possible to home-build a boat with even the longest pieces cut from 8-by-4 plywood sheets, and yet have as much usable internal space as a 10 or 12-foot boat with a pointy bow could provide. They also take up less space, either on board a cruising yacht if used as a tender or else in a garage at home. Some designs remain very popular, notably the Optimist dinghy, fleets of which are raced by determined pre-teens, dreaming of America's Cup glory.

 

To return to the model pram ...

 

The laser marks on the transoms are on their outboard faces, showing bevelling lines. The knees that brace between the transoms and the keel plank are necessarily on the inboard faces, so the first task is to mark the bow transom for the position of the knee. Past build logs included the excellent idea of marking each of the two small pieces while they were still attached to their sheet -- especially excellent for the bow transom of my kit as it had been cut square to the edge of the sheet. Very easy to pencil in a perpendicular centreline, doubly so as the laser also cut a centreline bolt hole. Adding guidelines for placing the sides of the knee was only a little trickier. I did have to first remove some char that had "leaked" onto the back of the sheet but no problem there.

 

If I was building such a boat full-size, I wouldn't be satisfied with the finish until I could run my fingertips over it and not feel any blemish, so the greatest roughness in the model should be 1/12 as large as something that can't be felt. That's probably unattainable but basswood does get silky smooth when polished with a very-fine sanding stick. Hence, all surfaces that will be visible in the finished model, including the inboard face of the transom, will get that polishing. With that done, both the bow transom and its knee could be released from their sheet:

The knee got the usual treatment: Its two faying surfaces were sanded against a square, to clear the char without losing the shape. The curved surface, which will be visible, was gently cleaned of char, its ends rounded off into neat toes, then the angular edges of that curve softened. Polished the flat sides of the knee to a satisfying smoothness and it was ready to be glued in place.

 

No problem knowing which leg of the knee goes on the transom, as the longer one is nearly as long as the transom is high. Keeping it accurately aligned was challenging but at least it is not too critical to get the knee's angle exactly at the edge of the transom: Although the instructions don't say so, there will have to be a fillet between the knee and the keel plank. (More on that when I get to fitting the bottom planks.) Outcome was OK, though the photo shows that I should clear a bit more char:

 

I left that for a few hours, to be sure that the glue was fully set, as the next step could put more stress onto the construction than I would wish.

 

The demanding task was bevelling the edges of the transom to receive the planks -- bringing the outboard, forward face down to the marks, as the last of the char is sanded away at the edge of the inboard face, in the usual way. There will be 8 planks directly attached to the transom but the two bottom planks lie flat, side-by-side, so there are only 7 bevelled surfaces. Four of them are small enough on the full-width, inboard face of the transom but tiny where they meet its outboard face.

 

I followed the instructions' advice and mounted the transom in a vice (gently, and with protective card between basswood and metal jaws), then went at the task carefully. I did wonder why the instructions say to glue the knee in place before clamping everything in a vice. It seems a cack-handed thing to do. However, the surface of the knee that will later touch the keel plank (or would if no fillet was needed) is an excellent guide to the angle of the critical bevel -- the one that takes the bottom planks. (As the instructions say, the other bevels can be adjusted a bit later on, to match the positions of the previously-added planks. The bottom planks go on first and the broad bevel for them needs to be right.)

 

There are two dangers that the instructions don't mention and which have led to trouble in some builds shown on MSW. First, although each plank curves along its length and most twist too, they always remain flat across their faces. Thus, each bevelled surface should be flat too -- angled in 3 dimensions relative to the transom but flat within themselves. That calls for firm wrists, stiff sanding sticks and lots of care. Second, the laser marks make the broad, central bevel for the bottom planks as wide as those planks can be. There is a problem (one that I'll return to later) in the design of those planks which too easily produces an ugly gap between them, where they pass across the transom. If the bevelling is taken beyond its marks, its width will increase and the gap get harder to cope with. Even a tenth of a millimetre extra width could cause trouble. In particular, there is no need to sand down until the bevel is flush with the knee, if that got glued on a little away from the edge of the transom, as a fillet will be needed no matter what.

 

The final step in preparing the bow-transom unit is to extend the laser-cut bolt hole in the transom itself through the knee. It has to pass through a tiny piece of basswood and other people have reported trouble with splintering. I followed the suggestion of first wrapping the knee with masking tape and then, being gentle with the drill bit and pin vice, had no trouble.

 

The instructions say, cryptically, that we should "drill a #55 hole". That may be a reference to the drill bits sold by the "Exacto" or "Excel" company (which do list their drill sizes that way), though it has been said on MSW that the "55" is a reference to AWL -- the American Wire Gauge. If so, #55 should mean 1.32 mm diameter. As my kit came with a set of metric bits, I used 1.3 mm and it seemed right.

 

With that done, the bow-transom unit could be set aside. I then made a start on the stern transom but only as far as gluing its knee, before leaving that to set well. As the stern construction is a bit complex (and very poorly explained in the instructions), I'll wait until it is finished before explaining what I have done and why.

[SaltyScot]

Wow, that is a LOT of prep work and execution for that one piece, Trevor. That being said, it is a key piece in the build (at least that is what I gleaned from reading through your text here) and messing it up would naturally have a negative effect on what follows.

 

33 minutes ago, Kenchington said:

Incidentally, for those who, like Mark, "have no idea what a sailing pram is", the definition lies in the bow transom. A small boat with a flat forward end, rather than a pointed stem (or anything else), is a "pram" or "pram dinghy". I don't think that the term would be applied to larger vessels, even ones with flat fronts. I thought that it was derived from the "praam" or "pram", a form of river and coastal barge once used in northern Europe, but the etymologists seem to say no. I can only guess that somebody once looked at a snub-nosed boat and drew a parallel with an old-fashioned baby-carriage.

 

Thank you for this. Funnily enough, as soon as I saw the word "pram" yesterday, my mind went back to the big boxy "pram" my brother and I (we are twins) were carted around in as toddlers (our mum took a lot of pictures and kept them for years). Looks like I wasn't far off after all  

[Kenchington]

My mum put me in one that was an antique even then!

 

But I'm not sure whether there's a lot of work in the kit or just a lot of verbiage on my part. The transoms do serve as the most important building moulds and yet are rather prominent, external features in the finished model. The dual role probably complicates things a bit.

[J Snyder]

I will be following your build also. The work you did on the fishing gear for the Dory is fantastic.

[Kenchington]

9 hours ago, J Snyder said:

I will be following your build also. The work you did on the fishing gear for the Dory is fantastic.

That goes too far, sir! I have to admit to being pleased with the dory, as a first attempt at a model boat (teenage and earlier plastic ships excepted). But one big advantage of not posting a build log was that the scratch-built fishing gear in the final product distracts a viewer's eye from the errors in my assembly of the kit.

 

Trevor

[Kenchington]

Gradual progress today, in between working for my living. I have the keel plank bent and drying over the moulds overnight. But it's late and a proper report must wait until morning!

[SaltyScot]

8 hours ago, Kenchington said:

But it's late and a proper report must wait until morning!

 

Well here's hoping you got a good nights sleep, Trevor.

[Kenchington]

Steps 1, 2 & 4 completed

 

I advanced the build in three ways yesterday. Best to explain them separately, starting with the stern transom -- which has been confusing to many of us progressing through the Model Shipway's trio.

 

Transom-sterned boats usually have a single, smooth (but raked) transom. However, the designer of the (full-size) pram went with two planks that overlap at mid-height, creating steps both inside and out. I can only guess why: It would be hard to find a tree large enough to provide a single-piece transom and edge-joining two pieces would be challenging for an amateur builder. So two pieces are required and the kit copies that. The resulting step on the inside is used as a support for the sternsheets. The outboard step is just a nuisance.

 

With that introduction, the lower part of the transom was prepared as for the bow transom. I accidentally marked the centreline on the outboard (laser-marked) face, before marking the inboard face as required for fitting the knee. Although not intended, that will probably prove useful when aligning everything on the building board.

 

If the two pieces of the transom were simply glued together, the inboard step would be perpendicular to the raked transom, rather than providing a level surface for the sternsheets to sit on. So the first step after removing the piece from the sheet is to bevel its upper edge, removing wood from the inboard (unmarked) face. Rather than drawing a guideline for that bevelling, the kit provides a wood guide, shaped as a segment of a circle. All that is needed is to lay sandpaper on a flat surface, hold the guide firmly on the sandpaper (keeping the guide upright, at right angles to the paper), then stroke the transom piece across the sandpaper while pressing it against the guide. That is "all", except that it is critical (1) to press the outboard, laser-marked surface against the guide, not the face marked to receive the knee (2) to stroke the long, top edge of the piece across the sandpaper, and not (of course) the edges that will be bevelled for the planks, (3) while keeping it square to the guide and (4) applying even pressure along the length of the piece, so that the sanding is even, then (5) continuing until the last of the char is just removed. That proved much easier than it sounds, though the task was not something to be casual about.

 

Naturally, it is essential to stop every few strokes and check on progress. I managed a really dumb error after one check by flipping the piece around and making a couple of strokes with the wrong face against the guide -- thereby removing the very char line needed to judge when the job is finished! Fortunately, it was late enough in the task that I could estimate how much more sanding was needed, while the sternsheets will be glued down over the error!

 

With that done, the lower stern transom and the corresponding stern transom knee could be prepared and glued together exactly as for the bow transom. The knee has a transverse, laser-cut hole, which does not seem to have any purpose but does prevent confusion over which knee to use. The only real problem is that the angle of the knee must be very accurately aligned with the bottom edge of the transom (or there will be trouble with the keel plank later).

 

Next comes a step that is very delicate and very poorly explained in the instructions. Throughout their lengths, the three lowest planks (keel plank and two bottom planks) are all horizontal, as seen in transverses sections of the hull (though bending fore-to-aft), while the keel plank overlays the other two. It follows that they need parallel bevels on the transom, with two steps either side of the keel-plank's bevel -- raising that (with the boat inverted on the building board) by the thickness of the bottom planks. It is a very, very small step, seen here in the laser-cut piece and its marked bevel line:

Anyone with a (fine grit) right-angled sanding block might choose to shape that step while bevelling beside it. The instructions, however, call for a cut (each side) with a razor saw. So I did.

 

It's a nerve-wracking task, taking a big saw blade to a delicate piece of basswood, made no simpler because the cut has to be strongly angled, to reach the marked bevel line on the outboard face of the transom as it just reaches the last of the char by the inboard face. I'm glad to say that it proved simpler than I expected, though it only needed a single draw of the saw across the wood, pulling for less than two inches. The resulting cut is tiny. A standard-size business card inserted in it looks like:

The photo in the instructions shows those cuts being made before the knee was glued to the transom, which would simplify holding the work in a vice. Once I realized that, I regretted adding the knee first. However, that proved to be a necessary guide to the angle of the saw blade (which must exactly match the plane of the bottom plank, hence also that of the keel and so that of the knee too). I would certainly fit the knee before cutting if I had to do the job again.

 

There is another point to note here: Several build logs remark on a gap appearing between the keel plank and the combination of the (bevelled) bottom of the transom and its (aligned) knee. That is a result of the step in the edge of the transom being less than the thickness of the bottom planks -- either because the two cuts were not made quite deep enough, the bevel for the keel plank was sanded a little too far or perhaps the laser cutting was a little off. I did wonder about adding a fillet before sanding the keel-plank's bevel but, in my case, the various bevel marks did match the plank thickness. Just. Still, it is something to watch for.

 

With all of that said, the lower transom can be bevelled for the planks. There will 9 of them (one more than at the bow, as the keel plank does not touch the bow transom) and each has its own bevel. However, the two for the sheerstrakes should not be shaped until the two halves of the transom are glued together, as those planks span the joint.

Nothing especially difficult in that bevelling. Nothing not already said for the bow transom anyway. The end result looked like:

 

The upper piece of the transom is a lot simpler to prepare. The instructions call for its lower edge to be bevelled, though that is really only for decoration and symmetry. If it is done (and I did), it is the outer face that must be sanded away, so the inner face (without laser marks) that is pressed against the bevelling guide. Not a problem.

 

Joining the two parts of the transom should not have presented any difficulties -- except that it is important to overlap the two pieces by no more than the 1/8 inch stated in the instructions. Several build logs have remarked on the upper edge of the sheer strakes ending too high on the transom and reducing its height with a wider overlap won't help.

 

In his build log, DonB showed a jig that he used, with stops to ensure that the 1/8 inch was exact. I tried using his idea but the sharply bevelled edge of the lower transom slid under my stops, so I had to glue to a marked line instead. Sadly, the alignment slipped off -- probably when I placed weights to hold the pieces together, instead of using clamps. I decided that I could do no better with a second attempt and, anyway, the slight angle between the transom pieces compensated for a slight angle I had put into the top of the lower piece while bevelling it! So I carried on and bevelled the combined transom for the sheerstrakes.

 

That gave me:

All that was left was to remove the centreline mark from the inboard face of the upper transom piece (as it will not be visible while the boat is on the building board but would be all too obvious in the finished creation), then a final touch with a fine sanding stick and the stern transom was done!

 

Edited 21 hours ago by Kenchington

[Kenchington]

3 hours ago, SaltyScot said:

 

Well here's hoping you got a good nights sleep, Trevor.

Thanks, Mark! Would have been better if I hadn't sat up, sipping single malt and drooling over some of the kits featured in manufacturers' websites.

[Kenchington]

But to return to yesterday's progress with the pram:

 

Step 5 (continued):

 

My repair of the first mould on the building board went well, so I repeated it with the other one. Lego blocks carefully aligned with the mould's position and firmly clamped down, rubber bands to hold the mould down tight, then more Lego and a second clamp:

Clamps and bands removed once the glue was set and the Lego then taped in place, to stiffen the right angle between mould and board.

 

While it set, I worked on the fitting of the bow transom, then that of the stern transom. The bow one is firm and secure, with two shims glue to the baseboard to stop it rocking sideways and one piece of printer paper to lock it in its slot:

The stern transom needed much more work. I had to widen the notch in the transom to accommodate my previous repair to its support. That's not the problem it may seem, as the whole transom top gets cut off later. Then I pared away some non-essential wood from the repair (being careful to preserve the shape of the support's original slot), as well as adding shims. It still needed a wedge, where my repair has left the slot more open than it should be:

 

It needs more work. The transom can't tip from side to side but it can skew, with one corner moving forward and the other aft. Worse, the whole thing can bend towards the building board. So: More work on that to be done today.

[Kenchington]

Step 6 completed:

 

At least the building board was advanced enough for me to bend the keel plank and leave it to dry overnight, so no time lost.

 

Under Step 6, the kit instructions have a discourse on plank bending -- which is all fine and proper. However, the text is general, not specific to the one plank on one model. Hence, it says "bend it around a curved form of some kind" and my first reaction, like that of others who have posted build logs on MSW, was to think of bending the keel plank around some handy bottle or jar. However, the plank doesn't need just any bend. It needs the bend of the finished model hull, so the proper thing is to bend it over the moulds on the building board (as the dory model's instructions made clear).

 

The pram's instructions also say "You need to over-bend the piece, as it will tend to spring back somewhat". That's true and I was considering putting shims on top of the moulds when bending. However, when it comes to gluing, we need that spring-back, so that the ends of the plank have to be pushed down to where they are glued at bow and stern. Otherwise, the over-bent and sprung-back plank would not be pressed against the moulds and would don't follow the proper shape. I decided to bend over the moulds, with no further complications, knowing that I could repeat the process with shims if necessary.

 

The simplest way had worked well for me with the dory model, so I repeated it: Fill a baking pan with boiling water, drop the plank in, weight it down with some piece of kitchen glassware, wait 5 minutes, then take the plank out and blot the surface water off. A few rubber bands served to hold the plank to transoms and moulds:

The only pre-wetting task was removal of char, as this keel plank will sit on top of bottom planks and all three sit level in transverse section -- no shaping required. The instructions make no mention of char in the dagger-board slot but I think I will sand that lightly, as the dagger-board trunk has to be glued to the inside of the slot.

 

Overnight drying left me with:

That only needs very light fingertip pressure to bring its ends down to the transoms, so I doubt that it needs further bending.

 

A light sanding of its raised grain and the keel plank can be set aside while the bottom planks are prepared.

Edited 21 hours ago by Kenchington

[SaltyScot]

1 hour ago, Kenchington said:

Thanks, Mark! Would have been better if I hadn't sat up, sipping single malt and drooling over some of the kits featured in manufacturers' websites.

 

Now there's a man after me own heart. What is your particular poison? This one is mine (also sadly just about empty )

 

 

 

[Kenchington]

1 hour ago, SaltyScot said:

 

What is your particular poison? This one is mine (also sadly just about empty )

 

An empty bottle of single malt is nothing more than a good reason to go and buy a full one.

 

Mine are the island malts: Ardbeg always on hand, Laphroaig as an alternative, Talisker from time to time, Lagavulin or Bowmore occasionally. Our provincial government has had a monopoly on alcohol ever since prohibition was eased, a century ago. They don't import the production of the smaller distilleries.

[SaltyScot]

I am beginning to see how this will come together, Trevor. 

[SaltyScot]

1 minute ago, Kenchington said:

Laphroaig as an alternative

 

You could offer me that for free and I wouldn't drink it, too acidic for my taste. I had a good friend from Glasgow who swore by the stuff. For me it smells and tastes like a "cure all" medicine my dear old departed mother used to spoon into us whenever we got sick  

[Kenchington]

Meanwhile ... Step 5 (building board construction) finally completed. A proper wedge made all the difference, though I have still placed two push-pins to control skew:

With that all inn place, I double-checked the centrelines on moulds and transoms. All good.

 

Taking a great idea from someone else's build log (sorry: No notes on whose it was), I crudely shaped a block of balsa and put that under the stern transom knee to resist the pull of the rubber bands that will no doubt be holding the planks down while glue sets:

The neat extra is that the curve in the knee allows the effective height of the support to be changed by just pushing the block closer to the transom or away from it. That also saves any need to carefully control the size of the block.

 

 

[Kenchington]

7 minutes ago, SaltyScot said:

 

You could offer me that for free and I wouldn't drink it, too acidic for my taste. I had a good friend from Glasgow who swore by the stuff. For me it smells and tastes like a "cure all" medicine my dear old departed mother used to spoon into us whenever we got sick  

My argument for Laphroaig has always been:

 

If you're going to drink benzene, it might as well be strong benzene.

[Kenchington]

And back to the pram ... Step 7, preparation of bottom planks

 

This should be easy: Pop two pieces out of their sheets, sand off char, a bit of bevelling and into boiling water. Would it were so!

 

I have hinted in previous posts about one of the problems and it is this:

These are the two planks as they came from their sheets, laid as they will be in the model. They have to meet at the bow transom, where the keel plank goes on top of them (top while the boat is being built upside down) but they are spread apart at each mould and the stern transom. Inevitably, there is a V-shaped gap just behind the point where they touch. Now, the instructions don't mention this and they suggest letting the planks overhang the bow transom, then trimming off later. The consequence, seen in several of the build logs on MSW, is that a gap appears between the two bottom planks (with the transom below and the keel plank above), as soon as they are trimmed for length. Not a huge problem if the plan is to use filler and then paint the model, but a major issue when planning to use a clear finish. Holes in bows of boats do not look promising.

 

The obvious answer is make slight diagonal cuts, so that the two planks meet along the centreline of the transom. Trouble with that is that these planks are already very narrow for the space to be filled. Trimming away at them is dangerous. Still, I think it has to be done, though I will delay until I have them bent and can get an accurate, untroubled measurement of just where to apply a knife.

 

The above image also shows why I have said that there will have to be a fillet on the bow transom knee. These planks sit on the foremost end of the knee and the keel plank sots on them, so the V-gap opens a space between knee and keel plank. In full-size construction, the knee would likely go in after and would be trimmed to fit. That's not viable at 1:12, so a little triangle of 3/64 basswood will be needed.

 

That much I had figured out before starting. What I had not counted on can be see in the above image but better with the two planks reversed, outer sides together, as in:

One or both bevel marks is/are badly misplaced. The instructions declare "There are laser etched lines 1" in from the outer edges" of these planks -- which would be difficult as they are less than a half-inch wide. Others have noted that the text tends to jump between quoting a dimension on the full-size prototype and one of the scale model, with insufficient notice of which is meant. This proved to be one such case but that couldn't be certain.

 

Fortunately, the angle between the bottom planks and the garboards is consistent throughout the length of the boat, so I traced the profile of one of the moulds, got out an old protractor and checked. Both sides of the mould gave me 30° (with far better accuracy than I can bevel such thin lumber). Muddled my first attempt at trigonometry (perpendicular over base is tangent, not sine!) but finally concluded that producing a 30° bevel in 3/64 stock does indeed mean sanding back to 1:12 of 1 inch, or 2.1 mm.

Maybe I should have had the courage of my convictions and scribed new bevel lines on both planks but I reasoned that I wasn't supposed to bring the bevel to a knife edge, so I dragged out my old drafting gear and added a line to the one plank so that it matched the other:

 

After all that, bevelling was straightforward, followed by the usual routine of boiling water, filling a baking tray and waiting 5 minutes for the wood to get soft. Now the bottom planks are over the moulds, strapped down to the transoms and drying overnight:

Next step, maybe tomorrow, will be gluing the three planks into place!

Edited 15 hours ago by Kenchington

[druxey]

That does look as if the sheet moved during laser etching. Those pieces should have been accurate mirror images of each other. Your methodical approach will pay dividends!

[SaltyScot]

I can remember thinking that once I left high school I would never need trigonometry again. Oh how wrong I was. I still use it to this day and here is a classic example of good problem solving with it too. Nice brain work there, Trevor. 

[Kenchington]

Thank you, gentlemen! Still hoping that the pram will work out well in the end.

Edited 1 minute ago by Kenchington