USS Constitution by usedtosail - FINISHED - Model Shipways - scale 1/76

[Modeler12]

Tom, you and i (and lots of others here) take and show lots of good pictures of our progress.

There is an old saying about a picture . . .. But I really think for our logs it is important to keep those visuals going all the time. I even post some for my own interest (even though they may not be to others).

I refer to some of those old pictures many times as I go along.

I have gotten to a point where I have a separate folder (and sub folders) for all I do on this modeling thing.

What I do, though, is to save each picture reduced in size so they don't take up tons of space.

I probably am preaching to the preacher.

 

Your model is really interesting and you are doing a great job. Keep it up.

 

 

[usedtosail]

Don't worry, Jay. more pictures are coming. I just haven't had time to get them off the camera yet.

[usedtosail]

Now that I have the two holes through the bulwarks for the cat heads, I needed to add the details to them. I started with the sieves in the ends. My first attempt was to use the same method I used for the bitts - drill two holes for each sieve and connect them with an awl. Once these were painted black, they really didn't look good, so I went in another direction. I used a slitting disk in the Byrnes saw to cut three slots in the end of each cat head.

 

 

I then cut small pieces of thin wood and glued them into each slot after rounding the ends. You can see one of these pieces next to the cat head in this picture, but this cat head has all three pieces already in place.

 

 

I then put some thin CA on the slots to strengthen them, and used the True Sander to sand the ends down so the slots were the correct length. Some of the slots were long in the other direction, so I filled the extra length with wood filler. I then capped the end of the cat heads with a small piece of wood.

 

 

When it was dry, I sanded the wood piece to sit flush with the sides of the cat head and thinned it a little bit, and also sanded the wood filler.

 

 

I then repainted them black, and here is how they came out.

 

 

I should have taken a picture of the first ones to show the difference, but the sieves in these new ones look much better to me.

 

I tried last night to carve two cat head figures onto some strip wood to add to the ends of the cat heads, but the results were laughable. I will give it another go tonight with some different tools and maybe some different wood.

 

I have also finished installing the rail pieces and touched up all the black and green paint around them, and I am in the process of adding trim strips over the plank sheer at the open waist. I was going to leave these natural but after making them I think they will look better black, like the rest of the rails. I'll have a picture of these after I finish painting them and installing them.

 

Next up, after adding the rest of the details to the cat heads and installing them, is the head rails and trim boards.

 

[usedtosail]

Thanks for the likes.

 

I added some trim pieces over the open waist just to cover the long joint at the plank sheer. I made these from the same material as the rails and also painted them black like the rails.

 

 

Continuing with the cat heads, I did manage to get something that looked like a cat face for the ends (if you squint hard enough). I painted these gold and glued them to the ends, then sanded the edges flush and touched up the gold and black paint. I also added the small cleat on the sides, using a piece of wood that I sanded to the rough shape, then filed into the final shape after it was glued on.

 

 

 

This cat head is just set in place and not glued in yet, because I still have to add the eye bolts. I will also have to touch up the joints and black paint around these after they are glued in, although one of the head rails will hide the underneath joint.

 

The plans show five eye bolts on the forward side of the cat heads and two on the aft side. The aft two are for the anchor tackle, so i can just add them empty for now. I checked the rigging plan for what is attached to the five on the forward side, and three of them have bulls eyes and two of them have blocks, all for lines that go to the bowsprit. Instead of trying to strop these to the eye bolts later, I added them now, after cleaning up the blocks so they looked better.

 

 

I am not happy with the size of the beckets on the blocks, so I will probably redo them to make smaller beckets.

 

I also decided that now was a good time to add the hammock boards to the ends of the open waist, although I have not decided whether to use the laser etched version or carve my own. In any case they will be shorter than the tallest supplied laser cut pieces. I will play around with them next week. I think I am stalling on starting the head rails  but I do need to tackle them soon.

 

No work in the shipyard this weekend - we are moving my daughter into her own apartment in NH, since she just got a really good job at a big hospital there. She is getting very close to being off the books. 

 

 

[Jparsley]

Looking good my friend Have a great weekend and congrats to your daughter

[usedtosail]

Thanks J and for the likes.

 

We are not quite done with the move in - more to do this weekend, but I did manage to get some time in the shop this week. I ended up re-stropping the blocks for the cat heads, with slightly better results. I then glued the various eye bolts with either blocks, bulls eyes or plain into the cat heads. I then glued the cat heads in place and touched up the areas around the holes with some wood filler and black or green paint. Here are the results:

 

 

 

 

I have also been working on the hammock boards that will go on the ends of the open waists to close off the bulwarks. I cleaned up the kit supplied boards and gave them a coat of oak stain and a coat of wipe on poly. I will glue these on a take some pictures after they are dry.

 

I rearranged the shop so now I have a bench in the middle of the room to hold the model, which I can walk around. I had it on a smaller table on a lazy susan, so I could rotate it, but once I install the bow sprit that would be asking for trouble, since if I rotated it the wrong way the bow sprit would hit the wall. I also put in some nicer shelves for storage, since we found some nice wire shelve that were reasonably priced while looking for shelves for my daughter.

 

It is now time to stop stalling and tackle the head rails. I stared at the plans last night for a while and I think I know how to start, so hopefully I will have some time on Sunday for that.

[Burroak]

Tom your ship looks great my friend. I hope my Conny turns out as nice.

 

 

Greg

[usedtosail]

Thanks Greg. Do you have a build log? I'd like to follow along.

[Burroak]

Tom I have just started mine and I guess I'm just afraid mine won't live up to the quality of the work I see on this forum. It's my first build. Thanks for asking

 

Greg

[GLakie]

Greg

 

Most of us here are going through the learning phases.  Don't be bashful about posting your log, as it could mean the difference between getting valuable input or not. If you don't post, no one can see what you're referring to when you ask a question. 

[usedtosail]

Greg, I was worried about that too, but I have received some really good advise by doing it. And it is a great feeling knowing that folks like yourself find it useful. I am sure you are doing a great job.

[Burroak]

Thank you George and Tom for your encouragement. I have been taking pictures as I go so I will try to start a build log. I guess it's like stepping on stage for the first time.

 

 

Greg

[JSGerson]

I know exactly how you feel Greg. Take a look at the second paragraph of my very first post for my Rattlesnake:

 

Jonathan

[NenadM]

Njce work you are doing here. Let the force be with you

[usedtosail]

Thank you Nenad. I love what you are doing on your Cutty Sark, especially at that small scale.

[Burroak]

Tom I have a question about when you applied your decking strips. Did you pre-sand the wood strips before you installed them.

 

Thanks

 

Greg

[usedtosail]

Hi Greg. Thanks for all the likes.

 

For the decking planks, I gave the planks an initial sanding before installing them. I actually sanded the full length supplied wood strips before cutting off the lengths I needed. I made sure the sides were sanded smooth and straight, and gave the tops and bottoms just a rough sanding. Then I sanded the tops flat after they were all installed.

[Burroak]

Thank you Tom!

[usedtosail]

I glued the hammock boards to the bulwarks at the ends of the open waist. I won't add the small boards that go on top of the rails until I add the hammock cranes much later in the build.

 

 

I finally got a start on the head details. I started with the cheek knees as suggested in the instructions. I made manilla templates of the parts that sit on the hull and the inside edge of the stem, then cut the top starboard one out of some sheet basswood. I sanded it to get a tight fit on the hull. I then made manilla templates for the two pieces that sit along the stem, but these were too flimsy, so I used the edges of the trail boards to mark the inside edges of these pieces, then the templates to mark the outside edges. I cut them both out roughly on the scroll saw, then sanded the top piece in both directions to get it close to the final shape. I used Jay (Modeler12)'s suggestion to use plywood for these pieces so they don't break while sanding, and it worked out very well.

 

 

 

For the inside curves, I used the largest sanding drum I have, but I used it by hand instead of in the drill press.

 

 

I will sand the other piece tonight and make the bottom piece that goes along the hull, then repeat on the port side.

[Guest Tim I.]

I have a strong aversion to working on head timbers. I keep avoiding them on my PdN. I will be watching your process closely.

 

Nice work!

 

- Tim

[usedtosail]

I know the feeling Tim. It is hard to wrap my head around all the different curves and angles. The functionality somewhat escapes me too.

[usedtosail]

Having made all the pieces for the cheek rails, I gave them a couple of coats of white paint before final assembly on the model. I went with all white for these because I want to use the color scheme on the Hull model for the head rails. I still have to cut the long pieces to length to fit around the trail boards. It is hard to see in this picture, but I did carve a groove down the edges of all these pieces and rounded the outside edges. I would usually use a scraper to make this detail, but the long pieces change widths along their lengths so I thought that would be too hard to keep the scraper centered. So, I used an X-Acto knife to score a line down the center of the edge, then used files to open and deepen the groove, first a triangular file then a round file. What I really should have used is a small V gouge, which I do not own, so that is now on the Christmas list.  Sorry for the ugly painting stand in the background.

 

 

So, since I need the trail boards to install the cheek rails, it was time to try painting them. My back up plan was to cut out paper versions of the white parts and glue them on, so before I started painting I put the trail board pieces in my computer scanner and scanned them. I then used some image editing programs to get black and white versions that I could print and cut out. I could have just copied the plans too, but I thought the lines on the plans were a little too thick. Anyway, I think it was a precaution that is not going to be necessary.

 

I started painting the trail boards by giving them a coat of thinned white paint inside the decorations. I used the smallest brush I have which is shown in the following picture.

 

 

It reminded me of paint by number kits I did as a kid, but the results looked promising. Of course, this was only one half of the painting and I could deviate from the lines a bit since I could still see the lines after one coat. So I then gave the white areas a second coat.

 

 

A bit more promising, so I hit the shield with some blue and red paint. I didn't really have a brush small enough to get around those tiny stars on the shield, but a toothpick worked a bit. I may repaint those stars with a brush I cut down to a few hairs. I then went for the gold and painted the starboard side trail board black sections around the other painted sections. I took my time and think it came out pretty well. I have a few areas I want to touch up and I will also give it a second coat of black, but overall I am really happy with the result so far.

 

 

Now, as usual, I just have to reproduce the results on the starboard side.

 

Happy Thanksgiving to all of you folks in the US.

Edited November 25, 2015 by usedtosail

[_SalD_]

Tom the trail board painting looks great, nice job.

[GLakie]

Excellent job on the head-rail Tom.  Have a Happy Thanksgiving yourself.

[CaptainSteve]

Exquisite paint job, Tom !!

[usedtosail]

Thanks Steve, Sal, and George, and all the likes. They are much appreciated.

 

I finished up both trail boards so they are ready to be installed with the cheek rails.

 

 

I also started working on the longer head rails that fit under the cat heads. I started by making two pieces that will go under the cat heads. I did the port side first and basically started making the shape from different pieces of wood. I was able to use it as a template for the starboard side piece, which I was able to make from a single piece of wood. I may go back and remake the port side piece with the blank shown in the pictures, but this one fits really nicely so I am going to wait to see how it looks painted.

 

 

 

I am also soaking some strips to use for the rest of these head rails. I am going to try to bend a single piece in two directions for these, but if that doesn't work I will make them from two pieces. I made some templates from the plans for these two rails to make sure I get them the right distance from the stem.

[usedtosail]

This long weekend has been great. I have had lots of time to spend in the shop, as well as with the family.

 

I worked on the two middle head rails, making the end pieces first then the rest of the rail from some tapered stock. I had already made the end pieces for the lower of the two rails and tried bending the rest of the rail in a jig, which worked OK in one direction, but not the other. 

 

 

So, I resoaked the pieces and used my electric plank bender to bend them in both directions at the same time. This worked great.

 

 

When they dried, I trimmed the large ends and cleaned them up, then carved the groove into the outside faces and rounded over the top and bottom edges. I then glued them to the end pieces, using a piece of wire in holes I drilled in the ends to hold them together, along with some CA glue and wood glue. When these dried, I sanded the joint down, carved the groove into the end pieces, rounded over there outside edges, and gave them a coat of primer.

 

 

I made the end pieces for the upper middle rail from some sheet stock, then tapered two pieces for the rest of the rail, soaked them and bent them in two direction with the plank bender. That is where I am now.

 

[Landlubber Mike]

Great work Tom on what looks to be a complicated set of timbers.  Very nice job!

[Burroak]

Looks great Tom! Look forward to your next post

[usedtosail]

Thanks Mike and Greg, and for the likes. I find building these rails one of the hardest parts of this kit so far.

 

First, a new tool in the mix. I found these 1.5mm carvers which work great. The V shaped chisel is perfect for carving the groove in the rails. I also picked up a straight and a skew, which should come in handy later.

 

 

I finished making the top middle rails by gluing the two pieces together for each rail and sanding the joint. These now need a coat of primer and two coats of white paint.

 

 

For the cheek rails, I positioned the trail boards temporarily on the stem and used them to get the lengths of the long pieces of the cheek rails right, then I joined the two pieces of each of the four cheek rails together, using wire as pins to hold the two pieces together with medium CA glue. When that dried, I sanded the joint areas and repainted the white paint around the joints.

 

 

These are getting close to be ready to install.

 

I also started making the hawse boards which will hold the hawse pipes, which are supplied as white metal pieces in this kit. I cleaned these up using small files and will paint the outsides black and leave the insides unpainted because the white metal looks like lead. I drilled two holes in each trail board while they were still part of a larger thin plywood sheet, then cut them off after filing the holes to the final diameter. I will probably remake these as I think the holes are a little too far apart, but it was good practice.

 

 

Once the cheek rails are installed, I will fit these hawse boards to sit between them along the hull and drill holes into the hull for the backs of the hawse hole pieces to fit into. I think I will be drilling into the solid wood filler block so I am not sure how deep to go to make it look realistic, but I am thinking probably pretty deep. I will be masking off the trail boards during this process too because I don't want to mess those up now.

Edited December 2, 2015 by usedtosail