Armed Virginia Sloop by ortho85 - FINISHED - Model Shipways - second model

[grayarea]

Looks great Brett. I'm guessing the hole and single fid are all about authenticity. Your solution looks fine to me, unless you're going to be showing this off to people with grounding-sensing radar who are going to judge your worth as a person by peering into solid wood. 

[ortho85]

Here's the mast resting in place.  It's not glued until some rigging is done.

 

 

 

 

Here's a view of the whole thing:

 

 

 

 

 

Somewhere around this time the practicum has you make the gaff, boom, and yardarms.  To me they look like versions of implements used by our indigenous hunters!

 

 

 

 

Now we're on to the rigging, with the bowsprit first up.  Here you can see the footropes and bobstay:

 

 

 

 

 

I'm still experimenting to try to find a good photographic setup!

 

 

Next on to the birds nest of mast rigging.  Here (again!) I found new ways to screw up.  The topmast went reasonably well, but I found the lower mast confusing.

 

I pored over the plans, instructions, practicum, and build logs, then dived in to the jungle of jibstays, forestays, spreader yard horses - and on the foreign language went, leaving me following blindly astern.

 

At last I had attached all the carefully crafted rigging to the masts.  Then I tried it on the boat, and my stupidity smacked me in the face.

 

I had put all the ropes round the bottom of the topmast, instead of the top of the lower mast!

 

Time to swear a lot, and fix up my errors.  Here are the masts after my (first) corrections:

 

 

 

 

Just to clarify (because many logs have too small images), initially I had fitted the ropes to the round section of the topmast, as shown by the red arrow:

 

 

 

 

You will note that I took no chances this time, and labelled the masts!

 

I was then instructed to glue the mast in place and begin connecting the rigging.  Unfortunately, at this time I realised ANOTHER stupid error.  In my defence, none of the documentation or logs show the detail clearly, but still I has misunderstood the positioning of the jibstay and forestay.

 

This is cut from the practicum, and makes it look like these ropes go around the top of the lower mast only, not the bottom of the topmast as well:

 

 

 

 

So that is what I had done, as you can see in this close up - the arrows point to the jibstay and forestay:

 

 

 

 

I can tell you it is NOT easy seizing ropes in tight corners, but I managed to reposition these two without totally disassembling.

 

And here's how the mess looks now:

 

 

 

 

Cats are no longer welcome in the room!

 

Cheers,

 

Brett

 

[HIPEXEC]

Very nice work!

[ortho85]

Nearly there!

 

Once again, a lot of fiddly stuff, rudely interrupted by life.  Slooooow progress at this stage of the process.

 

After lots of rigging, this was the status a couple of days ago:

 

 

 

 

 

 

And some different angles:

 

 

 

 

 

 

As you can see, I left the ratlines to the end - but that's for another time!

 

BTW, I never glued the hand cannons in, so removed them for the rigging stages.  As usual, there was a lot of re-doing of seizing and other mistakes along the way.

 

And, of course, the model fell over a couple of times, and needed minor repairs.

 

Soon I will post the finished photos - and a summary.

 

Cheers,

 

Brett

[GuntherMT]

Looking sharp Brett, very close to the finish line now.

[ortho85]

Well, as you can see, I got lazy with all the rigging.  I admire and envy all those builds with beautiful coils of rope everywhere.  However, my skill, eyes, hands, and patience meant that I cut corners!  Lots of short ropes and glue.

 

The same was true with the ratlines.  I experimented with the various options, then decided to use the needle method.  Even that proved a trial, such that I cheated, and just glued the final few tiny lines.

 

Here are the latest photos.  There are a few things I might go back and touch up, but, to be honest, I'm scared I will risk damaging the model.

 

So these are probably the final photos in this log:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

And, here she is sitting alongside my first build:

 

 

 

 

And so, as one of my favourite authors (William Goldman) said, on to the next!

 

I plan to post soon, with a summary.  At present it's too hot in Brisbane to do anything more active than play with models or computers!

 

Cheers,

 

Brett

[grayarea]

She looks beautiful. Congratulations and well done. 

What's next?

[ortho85]

Thanks, grayarea.  I'm about to post questions about my next project.

 

It's the Dorade, 1:20, by Amati.  There's a huge difference between that and the AVS!

 

Cheers,

 

Brett

[grayarea]

Very nice. No guns and no sweep holes.

[ortho85]

So, one year and one month after I started this model, what have I learned?  Here are a few random thoughts:

 

• Never buy a model whose instructions and supplies are in Imperial measurements!
• Choosing a model with no sails assuming it would be simpler is dumb.  Both require about the same rigging.  D'oh!
• No matter how much you try to read the manual or follow a practicum, there are still plenty of opportunities for mistakes.
• The plans and instructions that come with the AVS could be shortened to "here's the bits, now make the model".
• Bob Hunt's practicum was very helpful, but certainly not perfect. 
• I learned a lot about reading plans - by the time-tested method of screwing up and redoing things.
• Unlike my first model, this one came with plenty of excess timber and fittings.  A big tick there!
• Model rope has a mind of its own.  The best option I found was to soak it in hot water for 5-10 minutes to make it a bit more compliant.  Sections that wanted to twist could be somewhat tamed with a coat of diluted PVA.
• If you plan to put tension on seized blocks etc., use CA not diluted PVA to strengthen the seizing.
• Don't buy cheap drills bits from Ebay.  Enough said!
• Like any journey, the last 10% always seems to take the longest.

 

Finally, when all is finished, no-one else notices the faults, blemishes, deficiencies or asymmetries.  Probably they are just sick of being bored to tears by the model builder!

 

Cheers,

 

Brett