Black Falcon by danwind - Mantua

[danwind]

I bought the Mantua Black Falcon on eBay, mostly because the price was reasonable. I also liked that it was laser cut, figuring that the bulkheads should be fairly accurate, especially since I don't have the facilities to cut out the bulkheads and keel from the thicker wood. And last...the 12 year old boy in me loved the idea of building a pirate ship. I had just finished building a Chinese kit for the HMS Victory in 1:200 scale and was ready for something different. The small Victory kit turned out to be much more involved than I anticipated, so the Black Falcon looked like a good follow up.

This won't be a true build log, as I've already built the model and just have a very few small details to finish. I took a few photos during construction, and will take some of the finished model to illustrate a few things.

The kit is my first Mantua kit and looked pretty interesting until I started looking a little closer. It was unstarted, so I hoped all the parts and pieces were there.  The packaging was nice, and the plans looked very nice. I didn't look closely at the instructions except to see they were in 5 different languages. I'd seen this sort of thing before, so went through and crossed out all the other languages to prevent confusion. The really interesting part was when I started to assemble the bulkheads onto the frame and noticed that the instructions at the back of the book showed bulkheads that didn't match the bulkheads in the kit. It had drawings and instructions on how to cut off the little ears on top of the bulkheads and prepare for a 2nd planking. I finally realized that these were obviously for a different kit, so I just ignored them and just followed the plans. I later learned these instructions were for Sergal kits, which I found out when I started to later build the Sergal President. After this kind of start I was a little concerned about what I might find in the rest of the kit, but it turned out that for the most part, I enjoyed building it. I made a few changes and additions, but nothing very drastic.

I'm attaching just a couple of photos to start, to see if there's any interest in this build. I'm showing my high-tech workbench, which is a glass top dining room table from Ikea, because when I worked in hobby shops, a common complaint was that they didn't have a workbench to work on. I had no sympathy for this argument.

Last...I know this certainly isn't an accurate model, but that doesn't concern me. I have neither the time nor the desire to do research. I enjoyed the build process and like the finished model. 

Edited Saturday at 09:22 PM by ccoyle
corrected log title

[danwind]

Once I actually started to attach the bulkheads to the keel everything went smoothly. I had to do a little filing and sanding in spots for a good fit, even though everything was laser cut. I used a small machinist's square to make sure the bulkheads were square to the keel before gluing and followed the plans with no problems. 

I installed the decks next, again with minor sanding in a few places. Now it was time to plank the hull. I've used a simple plank bender for a few years that works very well for me. It was listed as an Amati when I bought it, but I just checked eBay to see the current price and availability and was surprised to find only a couple of listings for it, neither of them Amati. There were a lot of various plank benders listed, most of which were the electric bender. Evidently the one I use is rather hard to find, and is kind of expensive, with shipping fees.

A pack of dye powder is included in the kit for staining the wood, but I stain everything with Minwax Golden Oak. I like the color, and it stains each board with just enough difference in color to give a nice sort of texture to the hull, while also showing that it really is individual planks. I tried Minwax Walnut but thought it was a little too dark.

I've found that my limit for planking is two planks on each side of the hull. After I do the four planks I work on some other part, like cannons or deadeyes, just to break the monotony.

The plans are very nice and were an absolute necessity in constructing the model. The instructions manage to take essential information that should probably be spread out over a couple of pages for clarity and readability and cram them into a tightly spaced paragraph. This is definitely the weak point of the kit.