21ft English Pinnace by Mike Y - FINISHED - Model Shipways - 1:24

[Mike Y]

Now the progress is really fast!

 

[Mike Y]

Internal planking completed:

 

Now - the caprails!

Chuck recommends to make them flush with internal planking, but let them hang on external side.

But I'm thinking maybe it would look nicer make a caprail symmetrical, evenly hanging a bit from both sides? Will try and see. Luckily there is enough wood in the kit for experimenting with different shapes of caprails

[MEDDO]

I took advantage of a sale and this kit just arrived in the mail.  Look forward to building it.  Your build is very inspiring.

[Mike Y]

Thanks Michael! Hope you will enjoy that little delicate kit

Are you going to build it with a stock basswood, or with a wood upgrade from HobbyMill?

[ianmajor]

Mike,

 

You are producing a very nice model - excellent work.

 

I was interested in your photo of an actual boat's frames and that they were very thin. I was in my local library looking at Lavery's "The Arming and Fitting of English Ships of War". On page 212 he refers to the two types of planking (if I understand correctly) as:- 

 

1) "Clinker" is where the planks over lap. He states that in this case the planks were assembled on a mould and the frames were added after - the frames were very thin - as in your photo.

 

2) "Carvel" the planks did not overlap. In this type the frame was assembled first and the planks added. In this case the frames were thicker.

[Mike Y]

Hi Ian, 

 

Thanks for info, yes, that boat was exactly the clinker boat!

[Mike Y]

Swedish follower asked about paint and polish brands, here is what I used:

 

Stain was mixed with water, 2 parts of stain for 3 parts of water.

Poly was used as is, one coat, applied with micro fiber cloth (same as used to clean the glasses, it do not leave any fibers)

[Mike Y]

Finished one caprail. Turned out to be unexpectedly tricky to make a proper templates, so I just glued a Big Ugly Something and then sanded it down to name it a caprail. As you can see, right caprail looks legit, left one is just a piece of wood:

 

Remined me of a childhood, when I was locked up in a summer house for a month, and was so bored that made a solid hull ship about 25cm long, carved from a single piece of wood using one chisel and a sharp knife (that were the only tools available, apart from the garden shovel and a hammer). It is just a matter of time required to sand...

 

 

Speaking of mistakes, now a bit incorrectly aligned frame is very visible, one side of the hull have a wrong shape. Unfixable on a current phase of the build. Always always align your frames perfectly! Lesson learnt.

 

Chuck, do you recommend to cover a panted parts with a wipe-on poly? Is poly compatible with acrylic paints like Galeria that I use on your advice?

[Chuck]

It wont hurt anything.  I do it all the time.   Its coming out just great so far.  Well done!!!

[Mike Y]

Thanks Chuck!

 

Finished caprails, and finally painted everything. This time I mixed the paint with a bit of water, so it was more liquid.

I was very very paranoid to avoid the paint stains, so covered everything that should not be painted with a masking tape:

 

Next lesson - instead of smoothing the surface, paint highlight all imperfections and a wood grains. Since on a basswood I could not remove the hairy wood fibers even with scratching or 1200grit paper - now I see lots of them

And turned out that I did a poor sanding job on internal planking, it is far from being sanded flush. Shame, truly a shame, but to fix it - will need to remove lots of paint, and it would turn the model into a messy thing. So - next time, on a next model. Better sand more then less.

 

 

 

Tomorrow, when paint would be completely dry, will add a layer of wipe-on poly, maybe that will hide some nasty wood fibers.

Edited April 13, 2014 by Mike Y

[fnkershner]

Mike - As with most of us you are very critical of yourself. I think you have produced a very nice model. I only hope my Longboat turns out 1/2 as well.

[mtaylor]

Mike,

 

You are being hard on yourself, as Floyd says.  You've done a beautiful job and also, part of the charm and joy of wood is the imperfections.   You might give some thought to a sanding sealer before the final sanding and and then painting.  However, even then, there's no guarantees because it's wood and it sometimes has a mind of its own.

[Mike Y]

Mark, Floyd, thanks for a warm words!

 

Also I have a plan to build a Longboat with boxwood, waiting for a parcel from HobbyMill to arrive. Hope to use all experience with Pinnace to build a Longboat close to perfection

Edited April 14, 2014 by Mike Y

[fnkershner]

 Mike - I just got my Boxwood upgrade kit recently. So this coming weekend my local club will begin to build the longboat. For me it will be an experiment with box wood, never used it before, and a great clinic in Planking.

[malmoerik]

Cool, you're getting there! I like how thin and delicate the hull looks. 

[Mike Y]

Applied wipe-on poly. I used an optic cleaning microfiber cloth to apply the poly. But still got lots of small particles from that cloth, poly is very very sticky.

Is there some special cloth for wipe-on poly, or minwax poly that everybody use is not so sticky?

[Mike Y]

Poly dried overnight, and I got back home early enough to make a few photos with a natural light. Looks so much better!

Good effect of a poly, it is now a bit glossy, but not too much. Just enough!

Plus it mechanically protects paint layer.

But I wonder how to apply it properly, without a cloth that leaves a fibre particles that are stuck in a sticky poly. Or maybe a proper poly is not that sticky?

 

Sorry for lots of photos. But hey, good build log should have more photos then words, right?

 

 

 

 

[malmoerik]

Fantastic Mike. Really nice.

[Mirabell61]

What a beautiful build Mike,

 

this is a real gem you have made in high skill way

 

Nils

[Stuntflyer]

Mike, I use lint free 100% cotton cheese cloth to apply the Wipe-On Poly. The Min Wax Wipe-On poly in the satin finish works great. On stained wood it will soak in so use a dry area of the cloth to wipe off the excess and let it dry overnight.

Edited April 16, 2014 by Stuntflyer

[Mike Y]

Thanks Erik, Nils and Robin! 

Stuntflyer, thanks, will try that cloth.

[MEDDO]

I have always used old t-shirts for the wipe on poly. (I basically have a lifetime supply from my time in the military). They seem to work great and don't ever produce the "fuzz".

[S.Coleman]

Wow, looking amazing! Looks very symmetrical and sharp. Good work

[Mike Y]

Received a boxwood upgrade package from HobbyMill!

 

 

Technically speaking, it is for longboat (next build), but it has three big sheets of different thickness, and I milled a few strips from 1/32 sheet to make a nice decorations for my pinnace. Newly purchased table saw from Proxxon helped with it, surprisingly decent accuracy if push the sheet accurately without twisting. It is far from being a precise machinery, but for $120 it is more then good!

 

I tried to make a moulded strips for interior panels, but can't get an accurate edge on basswood strips. You can see it on thwarts, mould looks crappy.

 

Totally different story with boxwood! It is my first experience with it, and I am totally happy! Nice color, very solid, holds a nice edge, now I see why it is so popular! Sorry for a bad photo, that is the best I can get with an iphone camera...

 

Let's see how the result will look like! Now I can't whine about bad wood anymore

[Mike Y]

Started interior panels. Feeling like a jewlery master, they are sooooo small! I cant make it without a magnifying glass, any attempt to photo them without it fails.

 

Boxwood behaves perfectly, no splitting, no cracking, and tweezers do not leave any traces on it!

 

That is how one panel looks through a magnifying glass:

 

2.5 hours later, and I just installed bottom parts for all panels on one side of the boat... Looking forward for a weird weekend

 

I wonder how I was supposed to make them with a basswood from the kit? Tried it, just for fun, it is close to impossible, the wood grains are too big.

Edited April 19, 2014 by Mike Y

[ianmajor]

Mike,

 

Beautiful work. You will definitely need to rest your eyes after completing those decorations.

[gjdale]

Very nicely done Mike. Isn't it wonderful to work with some quality timber?

[Mike Y]

Grant, Ian, oh yes! It is a new amazing skill, I never thought that wood could be that solid.

[Mike Y]

Killed around 10hr on inboard panels, and not sure if they make things nicer or not. Probably, I should have definitely skipped the panels on the rear part of the ship.

Very hard to get a proper precision with such small things. Even if they are nice on micro scale, under magnifier, on a larger scale panels are not perfectly aligned together:

 

Also finished a rudder tiller. It have two pieces - carved part and turned part glued together. I am very happy with boxwood, so strong wood and so easy to carve!

On that photo, one cell is 5mm (1/6 inches):

 

Now will try to cover all that small particles with wipe-on poly and install to the model.

[gjdale]

Those molding panels look superb Mike - well done! Your tiller is also very nicely done.