Carcass 1758 by barkeater - scale 1:48

[barkeater]

The Carcass bomb vessel saw action in the Seven Years War as well as the American Revolution. Horatio Nelson served on her as a midshipman during the arctic exploration of 1773. The build will be double plank on bulkhead. Plans are from the National Maritime Museum. It will be as originally commissioned with mortars which were removed for the arctic exploration.

Rich

[Jim Lad]

An interesting ship to model - made famous, of course, by the painting 'Nelson and the bear'.

 

John

[AnobiumPunctatum]

Really interesting choice, Aetna of the revised Carcass design is on my ToDo list. So I will follow with great interest.

Edited April 12 by AnobiumPunctatum

[barkeater]

Rabbet line is done, and bulkheads have been cut out. I will trim them to fit the keel assembly as I go. Also next up framing out the stern assembly.

Rich

[barkeater]

The bulkheads have been installed as well as the sub decks for both the main deck and quarterdecks. There is a foredeck, but this is open to the main deck along its aft portion.  I will not do a subdeck but rather a single plank on beams. I found two slightly different sets of plans from the NMR. One has two masts while the other has three and the quarterdecks are different lengths. I went with the 3 masts as this is how she is depicted by John Cleverly the Younger on her Nordic expedition with the Racehorse. Next job is fairing.

[barkeater]

I've been working on the first planking. I thought I ordered natural strips but I either hit the wrong button or they sent me the wrong color. Doesn't matter as this will all be covered up. It does look though like it would glow in the dark at this point, however. Not quite sure yet how the planking is going to wind up at the stern. I may be able to continue or put in an additional piece. oh well, that's part of the fun figuring it out.

Rich

[barkeater]

First planking is done up to the deck which I marked with a black dyed plank for visual reference when I do the second planking. Next job is to frame out the gun ports and windows before I finish up planking to the top of the gunwales. 

Rich

[barkeater]

The gun ports have now been framed and the first planking completed. I have penciled in the gun ports on the aft portion of the ship. These will be depicted as closed on the finished model, so I did not need to frame them. I have left holes (1 each side) where the cabin windows will go. The window frames will be applied after the second planking. Also, the gun ports are slightly larger than will be present on the finished model as these will be lined in this case with red heart. Next up, a lot of sanding and a bit of filler. 

Rich

[AnobiumPunctatum]

Can you please show a picture from the stern? What I can see looks other than what I have expected from the drawings.

[barkeater]

Here are a couple pictures of the stern. The stern in this ship is unusual as I'm sure you noticed. Before I start, please excuse the appearance. I have a lot more work to do sanding and smoothing. I had two options in forming the stere. Either I steam bent a piece of plywood which I've done before or file the plywood down to give the proper angle, so I cut curve the stern forward. I decided to go with the latter. This meant that instead of running the first plank to the outer edge of the plywood I needed to tuck it in behind which is what 
I did. I've indicated on the side view how I will run the trim forward to give the appearance of a curved stern. The trim will be applied over the first planking, so I have a little leeway in fitting it flush and then I'll bring the second hull planking up to it covering any small gap. For the stern itself I'm thinking vertical planks in purple heart and yellow heart which should give a nice decorative appearance. For the upper stern counter, I have not figured out my plank pattern or color scheme yet.

Rich 

[barkeater]

I realized that I had not put up a good picture of the stern plans. On the pictures of the model, I have to curve in the upper bulwarks which I forgot to mention. Also, the reason I did not steam bend is that the stern has two windows which along their bottom just have a sill. I felt that my chance of getting a smooth curve throughout the plywood would be significantly decreased with the window cutouts. 

Rich

[barkeater]

The model is now ready for the second planking. Any rough or low spots have been filled and everything sanded smooth. I have penciled lines where the bulkheads are. These will be where the butts of planks are placed. I use trenails throughout. I also measure along each line to figure out my overall taper. I'll do 5 to 10 planks and then remeasure and adjust rather than breaking the hull surface into smaller divisions. This allows me to deal with any problem in tapering before it is apparent and so do a milder taper over a longer stretch.

Rich