HMY Britannia 1893 by malmoerik - Mamoli - Scale 1: 64

[malmoerik]

Hi

Just started my second build, King George's Britannia. She was the predecessor of the famous J-Class and the British King actively raced with her. In the 30s her rig was converted to a Bermuda rig.

A replica is under construction and on its' website there are some fantastic original photos, do have a look, k1britannia.org.

[malmoerik]

That's the easy part...

According to the instructions the part of the bulk-heads above deck shall simply be broken off after planking has been done. Then the support for the planking is obviously gone but I assume that with two layers planking that won't be a problem. I'm a bit afraid about the "breaking off"-part, so before I mounted the bulkheads I sawed half-through them, to make the breaking easier and not risking to destroy anything. This is the first picture.

[The Sailor]

Hi Erik, nice to see a Britannia build log. I look forward to following with big interest.

[malmoerik]

Thanks, don't forget to post more pics of your Endeavour. I'd be happy to see more close-ups of details like how you join the starboard and port planks at the bow for example. Not to mention how you're going to paint the hull. I painted my Endeavour in several layery, sanding in-between and then thinning the paint for every layer. Don't know if that was necessary though. One thing that I've noted on the Britannia is the deck. The instructions tell you to "blacken" the joining long-sides of all deck planks to better see the contours, looks nice on the pictures on the box.

Erik

[Sailor1234567890]

I think HMY Britannia was one of the prettiest single stickers ever. The king was an avid racer. She truly was a masterpiece yacht. Of all that type of boat, she's the one I'd want to build. 

[Mike Y]

Watching with interest!

Does Britannia build going to be more advanced then the previous one (Endeavour)?

[malmoerik]

Yes I find her a bit more complicated, but it's also a different manufacturer than the Endeavour kit. I've just started planking and the first layer is made of 1.5mm thick strips. I did the first two planks without soaking and that was problematic. Today I soaked 12 planks and then nailed them into preliminary positions without glueing. And when dry I happily concluded that they have adapted the new shape which will make the planking easier. Will post some pictures. The strips were a lot thinner in the Endeavour kit and I didn't have to soak or do anything like that. These thick planks also mean that I need to shape the long side of the planks in order not to have small gaps. Since the hulls of racing yachts have a lot of shape (keel for example) the planking is a bit tricky. Did a lot of misstakes on the Endeavour, I'm curious about whether my result on this one will be better :-)?

Edited January 3, 2014 by malmoerik

[malmoerik]

Planking well under way. I think it worked quite well to soak the planks, fit them and let them dry, remove them and then glue them. So far I haven't tapered any of the planks but it's time for that now.

 

By the way, maybe my method for planking the bow is a bit unorthodox?

Edited January 5, 2014 by malmoerik

[demonborger]

Your method looks very effective, 

[The Sailor]

Hi Erik, I agree with demonborger. This method is very effective and interesting for planking a bow.

[malmoerik]

A few more planks in place, now the tapering has started. No idea why, but the bottom part of the keel is not planked (not with first layer at least), instead two solid pieces of wood are attached that will later have to be shaped.

[Sailor1234567890]

Awesome.

[malmoerik]

I'm doing something wrong, help would be appreciated.

 

I started with the 1-planks in the picture. I didn't taper any of them but I had to bend more and more the further down the hull I came. I then mounted the 2-planks in the picture, without neither bending nor tapering. 

 

And then I filled the gap between 2 and 1, starting from 2 working towards 1. And this is where the problem is. It looks ugly, see second picture. The red square is misleading, the ugly part is below it, where the tapered planks meet the 1-planks. Makes the hull look divided into two sections. 

 

I too realize it's not the end of the world, there will be a second layer of course, but for this mahogany layer I'd like to do it right. And the effect is less striking once sanded, see further pics. Would the right methodology however be to taper the 1-planks too in order to be able to work with full lengths planks all the way down to the keel so that a gap like the one between 1 and 2 does not arise? 

 

I've read the planking guides where they talk about measuring the hull etc, but to me that seems a bit harder to apply on a sailing yacht hull.

 

 

 

[The Sailor]

Hi Erik, I think following the planking guides is the best way to prevent this problem. It's necessary to taper the strip ends but before glueing the stripes you should draw all the lines onto the hull. It's a lot of work, but if you don't want to paint the hull it's the only way to get a planking without any 'meetings'.

[malmoerik]

Richard, I really don't see how the tapering is to be done. This is what I did:

- First I placed three planks, without any bending at all, on the hull, dividing it into 4 sections. 

- The planks correspond to to the red lines 1-3 in the pic, with resulting sections A-D.

 

If you look at section A it is hugely wider at the middle than towards stern and bow. Hence this can't be planked simply by tapering then ends of the planks. I will need a lot of drop planks and then I end up with "meetings" as you refer to it.

 

If I move line 1 closer to the deck, so that the width at stern/bow is roughy 1/2 of the distance at the middle, then I could plank this section simply by tapering. But then section B will look like a lemon (poorly illustrated by my blue line). So then I have just moved the problem from section A to B.

 

The problem is reversed in section C, there the mid part is thinner than bow and stern parts.

 

Does this at all sound familiar?

Edited January 20, 2014 by malmoerik

[Mike Y]

Probably the easiest way would be to find a photos of original planking. I tried to google them, looks not easy really

Was in Sjöhistoriska museet this weekend, unfortunately they have no good yacht models or photos. The one they have are made with a solid hull, no planking.

But they have a quite big archive, maybe you can send a query?

[malmoerik]

Here's an update on progress.

I still haven't figured out exactly how to manage the curvature but am a lot happier with result than in my first build. Especially the keel came out better. 

The last picture shows how I taper a plank. I squeeze it between two pieces of wood, then it's easy to make a clean cut, especially since I can sand the edge too. Has worked out quite well for me.

Edited February 27, 2014 by malmoerik

[malmoerik]

Planking done - at last. Will be interesting to see what she comes out like after sanding.

[Mike Y]

Wow, that is a very clear planking, properly levelled, no gaps, amazing!

[malmoerik]

Thanks Mike, it was all for nothing though because I ruined the whole thing.

 

It almost to embarrassing to tell in an open forum like this but here goes. After that last picture I thought I'd use some kind of filler for the tiny gaps. But to ensure that the filler would have the same colour I decided to make it myself. So I collected the dust when sanding the hull and mixed it with glue and applied it. Then it struck me that this mixture could actually be used to seal the pores in the mahogany to make an even smoother surface. So without thinking I happily made a new batch of my magic (evil) potion and smeared the whole hull with it. The problem is that when you start sanding glue it turns soft, like chewing gum, so you can't really get rid of it. I put on one coat of varnish just to see how it would look and it looked awful. On some small patches where I had actually managed to sand it away properly the glow of the mahogany was beautiful, the rest of the hull looked dead. I spent hours sanding, hoping I would be able to salvage it, but only with the result that I would sand through down to the first layer of white wood. 

 

So now I have ordered new mahogany and will plank it again. On a positive note, I have an idea about how I will plank it this time. I have always thought you shouldn't bend planks if it could be avoided. And with bending I mean in the horizontal dimension if you place the plank on a table, understand what I mean? If you don't do that, then you end up with tons of stealers which I did this time too. But if you bend, and you need to bend a lot on a shape like this hull, then I think you can get away with just a few stealers and the planking will look a lot nicer. Some tapering will be needed but not that much. No idea how hard it is to bend 0.5mm mahogany strips? Will soak them properly and be careful. 

[Mike Y]

Ouch! Testing in production but it only means that next iteration wou,d be much better. Look on Dubz, he screams the word DECONSTRUCTION every now and then, re-making some build steps again and again, and result is incredible!

That planks should bend quite normal, I used an iron to heat them, and soaked in a hot water for an hour before bending.

But be careful with the direction of a wood fibers, mahogany strip will break if you bend it along the fibers... And also dry the planks before installing, they absorb skme water while soaking, and then shrink back. If you glue them while they are still soaked - nasty gaps will appear.

Good luck!

[malmoerik]

New start. This time I'm bending the planks. I did this by soaking 20 of them in boiling water, then layering them on top of each other, between two pieces of wood for stability. Then I bent them and left them to dry. Worked great.

[malmoerik]

I tapered the top 8 planks, from deck line, at stern to get a nicer line. By using the bent planks I didn't have to use a single stealer.

[malmoerik]

Varnishing done. Now time to paint her black above waterline.

[malmoerik]

Got the black paint on. Red waterline is missing. Before I turn to that I decided to giver her another coat of black paint, just to be sure I did everything I could to have an as nice as possible surface. So I didn't sand in the basement in order not to have dust in the air. And after I painted her I put her in my kids' playing tent (they don't mind do they?) to protect from dust flying around. And I closed windows as well. If that doesn't do it...

 

By the way, I decided to ditch the deck as included in the kit, standard 4mm planks... Instead I bought 1x1 mm planks to create a deck that is closer to the true scale. I actually don't mind the gaps between the planks, they emphasize the contours (I keep telling myself).

[Mike Y]

Interesting deck planking pattern, with surprisingly narrow deck planks. Is it purely for aesthetic reasons, or such planking is more practical on a yacht?

 

The paint looks great, nice glossy effect!

[malmoerik]

That's how decks are laid on racing yachts. Thin planks starting from the edge working its' way to the middle. See pic from a modern replica of Endeavour.

[Keith_W]

She's beautiful, coming along really nicely. BTW the earlier photos of your build log are missing.

[malmoerik]

Thanks Keith.

Eventually it will look nice with a red waterline and a thin gold line on black background. Right now it doesn't. Need to figure out how to achieve that ultra glossy finish. All clues are welcome.

 

Regarding the deck, also a bit disappointed. I do have quite a few gaps. Maybe I'll try out some filler?

 

It would also be good if I somehow managed to remove the two center planks and sand down to make room for four planks. The reason being that the joins are not so exact.

[Mike Y]

Sand them away with a rotary tool, trim edges with a knife, remove remainings of the glue with water or alcohol, depends on type of a glue? Should work nicely!