Muscongus Bay Lobster Smack by JacquesCousteau - Model Shipways - 1:32 - Rescaled and Modified

[Keith Black]

 

 More examples of small hand operated 1900's bilge pumps.

 

 

 

[Stubby]

I love the level of research you are putting into your build! Looking great Jacques!

[JacquesCousteau]

Thanks, @Stubby, I enjoy research about as much as building! And thanks, @Keith Black, for the pump examples!

 

More work on planking. I've been able to get a little better at lining up the top line of the plank joints.

 

One issue I've had is that, due to the different plank widths and strake lines of my model compared to the kit design, I haven't been able to use much of the kit-designed prespiled planks. It feels like a real waste--it's a great feature of the kit, but it doesn't really work if you go with lapstrake planking. So I was happy that, for the next strake, which is the one below the sheer strake, I realized that I could make it from the kit-supplied sheer strake, which for whatever reason was slightly too short to work as the sheer strake on mine. (Maybe my transom extends a little farther aft than it should? Or I screwed up something in the scan and laser cut process?)  It's a lot wider than the normal planks, so I could spile from it, as seen below.

 

At this point, there's very little bulkhead to clamp to, so I've had to be a bit creative with rubber bands.

 

 

I now just have the sheer strake left to add. I feel like, for a vessel of this size, it would probably be best to make it from a single piece, although I'm not looking forward to the complex gluing process that will entail. I'm pleased with the lapstrake planking so far. Before painting, I think I'll add a coat of shellac to help seal and strengthen the wood so I can touch up any stringy/ragged visible edges.

 

 

 

Elsewhere, I've begun work on the rudder and mast. The mast is made from two layers of basswood, which mitigates against the relative weakness of basswood as a mast.

 

Before I round off the mast, I need to decide whether it should be round all the way through, or squared-off at the deck. My initial thought was that, on an unstayed mast, a square cross section low down would keep it from spinning around. I began cutting the mast step partners square, but accidentally made them bigger than they should be, so it doesn't quite fit like it should and I'll need to take care when I step the mast. Moreover, it looks like Chapelle's plan shows a round mast at the deck, so maybe I should just round it all. I'm also trying to figure out whether to use brass rod or wood for the rudder shaft.

[Rick310]

Great job!!

Rick

[Paul Le Wol]

Fantastic job on the planking Jacques!.

[Keith Black]

 That planking is uber fantastic, Jacques. 

[Kenchington]

Just wonderful planking JC! That would be a great job if you had used the kit-supplied carvel planking. For a conversion to lapstrake, it's incredible!

 

You pondered:

58 minutes ago, JacquesCousteau said:

the mast, I need to decide whether it should be round all the way through, or squared-off at the deck.

I wondered about that but decided to stay with circular-section throughout. Chapelle's version was one reason but I wasn't keen on trying to re-shape the round hole in the kit's deck either.

 

Trevor

[wefalck]

First of all, I would like to echo the others on the planking job 👍🏻

 

On decked boats (as on ships), I think the mast would be round, where it passes through the (upper) deck, as a round opening would be easier to keep water-tight, though usually a tarred/painted 'manchette' of canvass would be put around it, tied to the mast and nailed down onto the deck.

 

A square or rectangular tennon fit into the keelson would prevent the mast from turning. However, whether this would be sufficient in the case of an unstayed mast, I don't really know.

 

[Stubby]

Echoing what others have said - the planking looks fantastic. I notice that you skipped installing the deck, which in the kit directions comes before planking. Does this affect the hull fairing at all? Are there other considerations for the planking meeting the deck height?

[JacquesCousteau]

Thanks, @Rick310, @Paul Le Wol, @Keith Black, @Kenchington, @wefalck, @Stubby, and all those who have checked in with likes and page views!

 

@Kenchington and @wefalck, I agree that evidence seems to show that the mast was round where it left the deck. I hadn't considered that a round opening would be less prone to leaking than a square one, but it makes sense. Interestingly, the lancha chilota (my last build) did have a squared off mast at the deck, so I approached this build with that in mind. Unfortunately I already squared the mast step and accidentally made it a bit large, so I'll need to figure out how to build it back up a little. Which is tricky with the hull already planked in.

 

@Stubby, I decided to leave the deck off so I could remove the visible bulkheads from the cockpit and add frames after planking. This left the bulkheads a little flimsy for fairing, so I added a bunch of internal supports. I'll be planking over the kit-supplied deck, so it's not the end of the world if the hull planking doesn't fully join up exactly with the side of the deck. I had to take into account the thickness of the deck while setting up my planking runs and the width of the sheer strake. Even taking that into account, I'll be making the sheer plank a bit excessively high and sanding it down once the deck is in place.

[Stubby]

6 minutes ago, JacquesCousteau said:

I had to take into account the thickness of the deck...

@Jacques - I am planning on planking the deck of mine as well but still considering how to go about it. The kit supplied deck is 1/32" thick and the planks I am using are 1/16" thick. If I used both with no sanding that would make the deck 3x as thick as the kit allows - this would affect the coaming, the cabin bulkhead, and the side planks, as you noted. I'm still deciding how to tackle it. Obviously, some sanding will be in order.   

[Kenchington]

I wanted to plank the deck of mine but, even using 1/32 over the kit-supplied pieces, everything else would get thrown off and I didn't fancy making all the required adjustments. In the end, I went for scribing "seams" into the kit pieces. I made a poor job of it but other people could do better. The technique seems workable (with steadier hands than mine), though it did make the deck bulge upwards where the grooves were scribed and I did not fully solve that challenge.

 

Trevor

[JacquesCousteau]

@Stubby and @Kenchington, it will definitely be a bit of a challenge. Scribing the deck could work, but I haven't been very satisfied with my previous attempts at scribing. I'm planning on using 1/32-inch thick material for the deck planking. I'm not too worried about slightly raising the hull by an inch (at full scale), as there are a lot of hull forms for Muscongus sloops--notably, the hull of the Ranger seems a bit deeper than the Chapelle drawing the kit is based on. If I need to, I think I can also slightly raise the cabin sides and coaming. That said, I'm going to test fit first and see of it looks bad. If I does, I can use my mini plane to thin the deck planking down to 1/64-inch or so. It will certainly be an experiment!

[JacquesCousteau]

The sheer strake is a little more complex than I had thought. I initially tried to do it as one plank, but it was hard to get the curve just right. One issue with marking lapstrake planks is that the plane of the tape needs to follow the plane of the strake, which is propped between where it touches the frame/bulkhead and the edge of the lower strake. There isn't much contact area, and it's easy to accidentally stick it on the plane of the strake below, which slightly distorts the curves compared with the necessary plank shape. To get around this, I'm splitting the strake in two parts.

 

Meanwhile, I've been doing so much planking lately (and am about to start planking the Bateau de Lanvéoc too) that I wanted to take a break and do something different. I thought about things some more, and decided to go for the galvanized, possibly removeable pump, as I thought its compact size would be well-suited for the narrow confines of the cockpit. Initially I was going to use a thin dowel, but checking it, it still looked a bit thick.

 

Instead, I chose to use a toothpick, which I then built up slightly by wrapping paper around it (which also covered the unevenness of the toothpick surface). I tried with card first, but it didn't roll very well and seemed thick, so I ended up going with thin paper. I did use the card, though, for the funnel shape at the top.

 

I then coated everything in super glue, and tried to sand out any unevenness/overlaps once it dried. I also glued on the funnel and cut it down to a reasonable size. I then drilled out the hollow shaft from the top.

 

The outflow tube was also made from a portion of toothpick, sanded down and with an opening drilled out, after some failed attempts with paper. The handle is just a bit of thin stained basswood glued to a wire.

 

I was actually pretty pleased with how it turned out, although I'll need to cut the wire shorter.

 

To get a galvanized look, I painted it with Vallejo "metallic gray" (or at least that's the translation of the Spanish name, I don't know if it's gunmetal or something) and then a wash of white over it.

 

 

I then drilled out a hole in the cockpit floorboards and temporarily added it (and the portions of the benches I've made so far). I will probably add the pump body once I build the cockpit, but will leave off the handle until the end of the build, as it would be very easy to snag.

 

Thanks, all, for your helpful comments and suggestions on the bilge pump!

Edited 12 hours ago by JacquesCousteau

[Kenchington]

Lovely pump! Your cockpit seats look great too.

 

For the comfort of your miniature fishermen (when they come to life in the dark hours between midnight and dawn), I hope the pump handle is (also miraculously) able to be pushed down into funnel! When the wind dies and the oars have to be shipped, the man rowing will have to sit on the centreline of the bridge deck's edge, with his feet in the cockpit. A pump handle between his thighs would be distressing 🫢

 

Trevor

[gsdpic]

Excellent planking and pump!  I don't see many lapstrake boats here on MSW so that is a nice change of pace.

 

[Paul Le Wol]

That is a swell looking pump Jacques!