Planking calculator advice.

[John Murray]

Evening, I am starting to get close to 2nd planking on my Victory Models HMS Pegasus. I think I have the idea of a planking fan sorted out. Does this look a reasonable way to approach this? Do the calculated tapers seem reasonable?
I have seen other more involved methods but being my 1st wooden model in 40plus yrs, I think this will do for this one.

[RossR]

Impressive work on the calculations.  I am by no means a planking expert, so I will have more questions for you than answers.  
 

are you planning on edge bending your planks to achieve the required curve at the bow, or will you be cutting curved planks out of sheet stock?   If you are edge bending will you make the tapered planks based solely on you calculations?   
how will you handle the taper required from your last bulkhead to the bow or stern?  
 

I am near the end if my first successful planking project, so to repeat, I am not a planking expert, but you will likely need to adjust and fit these based on the hull and not just these calculations.   They will be a great starting point. 
 

 

[barkeater]

I measure the run of each bulkhead once the first planking is done and pencil them in on the hull at their appropriate bulkhead. I then do a run of 10 planks and remeasure allowing me to adjust plank widths ahead of time repeating every 10 planks. This prevents me from running into trouble and having to use a drop a plank or stealer. I do trenails and plank lengths in scale. To help facilitate this I may add false bulkheads where needed to allow me to stay below 20 feet to a plank in scale.

Rich

[Capt. Kelso]

There are a number of posts regarding the use of a proportional divider for calculating the number of planks. You might find the information helpful.

[John Murray]

On 5/15/2025 at 10:35 PM, RossR said:

Impressive work on the calculations.  I am by no means a planking expert, so I will have more questions for you than answers.  
 

are you planning on edge bending your planks to achieve the required curve at the bow, or will you be cutting curved planks out of sheet stock?   If you are edge bending will you make the tapered planks based solely on you calculations?   
how will you handle the taper required from your last bulkhead to the bow or stern?  
 

I am near the end if my first successful planking project, so to repeat, I am not a planking expert, but you will likely need to adjust and fit these based on the hull and not just these calculations.   They will be a great starting point. 
 

 

Hi, I will be edge setting and bending the planks as supplied in the kit. 
I plan to lay down 5 or so planks each side to thee size suggested and then redo the planking calculations based on new measurements. I plan to redo that every 5 or so planks. 
Regarding the taper from the last bulkhead, I plan on assessing those as I fit each plank. I have yet to come up with a solution so will assess on each plank.

[John Murray]

On 5/16/2025 at 12:03 AM, barkeater said:

I measure the run of each bulkhead once the first planking is done and pencil them in on the hull at their appropriate bulkhead. I then do a run of 10 planks and remeasure allowing me to adjust plank widths ahead of time repeating every 10 planks. This prevents me from running into trouble and having to use a drop a plank or stealer. I do trenails and plank lengths in scale. To help facilitate this I may add false bulkheads where needed to allow me to stay below 20 feet to a plank in scale.

Rich

Thank you for that. I plan on doing 5 or 6 and then remeasure the gap and redo the calculations.
The hull will be coppered but I do want to do the best I can to learn the techniques for when I do a hull that is not coppered.

[John Murray]

21 hours ago, Capt. Kelso said:

There are a number of posts regarding the use of a proportional divider for calculating the number of planks. You might find the information helpful.

Hmm, I haven't noticed any posts. I shall do a search. Cheers for that.

[Ronald-V]

I think it would be handy to line the hull off with some tape/string of to determine the run of the planks...at least that's what I have experience with. Not sure if you can do that without this and just calculate the total width.

 

I've used the method that Chuck Passaro outlined in his youtube videos.

 

But I'm curious if there are people who work without bands, and can shine their light on this

Edited May 17 by Ronald-V

[barkeater]

4 hours ago, Ronald-V said:

I think it would be handy to line the hull off with some tape/string of to determine the run of the planks...at least that's what I have experience with. Not sure if you can do that without this and just calculate the total width.

 

I've used the method that Chuck Passaro outlined in his youtube videos.

 

But I'm curious if there are people who work without bands, and can shine their light on this

Ronald,

Think of the hull as one big batten instead of dividing it up into multiple smaller battens.  I plank from the keel up. Now, I know at the top planking at the bulwarks, if I've cut out my bulkheads correctly, I will have a true or correct run of the planks. The needed taper of planks in between the keel and the top plank can therefore be calculated. Using the entire hull gives me the advantage that I can correct any tapers that need to be made gradually rather than having to make larger or greater corrections in a briefer run. This is especially useful along the stern where you can have an area where you need to increase your widths and have another area where you need to taper. I don't mean to disparage other methods, but this method works best for me.

Rich

[Ronald-V]

3 hours ago, barkeater said:

Ronald,

Think of the hull as one big batten instead of dividing it up into multiple smaller battens.  I plank from the keel up. Now, I know at the top planking at the bulwarks, if I've cut out my bulkheads correctly, I will have a true or correct run of the planks. The needed taper of planks in between the keel and the top plank can therefore be calculated. Using the entire hull gives me the advantage that I can correct any tapers that need to be made gradually rather than having to make larger or greater corrections in a briefer run. This is especially useful along the stern where you can have an area where you need to increase your widths and have another area where you need to taper. I don't mean to disparage other methods, but this method works best for me.

Rich

That's great! Everyone has his own preferred method...it's just what suits you, no wrong or right. It comes down to experimenting and practice 👍

Edited May 17 by Ronald-V

[RossR]

8 hours ago, John Murray said:

Hi, I will be edge setting and bending the planks as supplied in the kit. 
I plan to lay down 5 or so planks each side to thee size suggested and then redo the planking calculations based on new measurements. I plan to redo that every 5 or so planks. 
Regarding the taper from the last bulkhead, I plan on assessing those as I fit each plank. I have yet to come up with a solution so will assess on each plank.

Glad to hear you will be recalculating every 5 planks.  Please post updates as you go.  I would be interested in following along.

 

[John Murray]

23 hours ago, Ronald-V said:

I think it would be handy to line the hull off with some tape/string of to determine the run of the planks...at least that's what I have experience with. Not sure if you can do that without this and just calculate the total width.

 

I've used the method that Chuck Passaro outlined in his youtube videos.

 

But I'm curious if there are people who work without bands, and can shine their light on this

Cheers for that,

I am being flooded with information from youtube builds, a few of my books, and suggestions here. They all make sense. However, with this being my first build in 40+ years, I plan on this method to try and get just basic techniques down pat. I want to find out the shortcomings and then perhaps look at adapting what I did on this model and then adapt and modify what I did to the next model. 
I have seen 4 of Chucks videos on shaping the planks. Nice method but I do not have enough info at this stage to go further.

[John Murray]

18 hours ago, barkeater said:

Ronald,

Think of the hull as one big batten instead of dividing it up into multiple smaller battens.  I plank from the keel up. Now, I know at the top planking at the bulwarks, if I've cut out my bulkheads correctly, I will have a true or correct run of the planks. The needed taper of planks in between the keel and the top plank can therefore be calculated. Using the entire hull gives me the advantage that I can correct any tapers that need to be made gradually rather than having to make larger or greater corrections in a briefer run. This is especially useful along the stern where you can have an area where you need to increase your widths and have another area where you need to taper. I don't mean to disparage other methods, but this method works best for me.

Rich

I think this method makes sense to me. It may be what I do on my next model.

[John Murray]

15 hours ago, RossR said:

Glad to hear you will be recalculating every 5 planks.  Please post updates as you go.  I would be interested in following along.

 

I shall be posting updates as I go. I have a build log here. I am currently finishing the two layers of the 1mm x 4mm Wales in the kit. This is a problem area for me as I am trying to work out how the Wales finish and are shaped at the stern.