Harriet McGregor by Boccherini

[russ]

I agree. Excellent metal work. The finished product looks wonderful.

 

Russ

[captainbob]

Nice looking metalwork.  It's that sort of thing that makes a model really stand out.

 

Bob

[Jim Lad]

Excellent blacksmithing there.  Just a bit of advice - don't fit them permanently until you need to - they'll catch on everything within ten metres!  

 

John

[dgbot]

Impressive work. I would agree that you should no install them yet. It would be easy to snag them.

David B

[Boccherini]

Thanks for the comments gents. John, David, I appreciate the reminder of the snagging potential.

I was looking around for some brass rod to start making the double bollard sets, and found an almost endless supply of brass rod right under my nose.......spindles from tap top assemblies. I have a scrap bin from work loaded with these. They have a diameter of approximately 10mm (3/8"). Depending on the required diameter, they can produce up to 90mm (3.5") of usable brass. These have been rough turned down to 6mm prior to final shaping.

 

 

Grant.

Edited May 3, 2014 by Boccherini

[Boccherini]

Bollards. Some of the details/proportions for these are approximate/educated guesswork. The base plates are 14mm x  6mm x 0.6mm (approx 1/2'' x 1/4" x 0.024"); the bitts, 7mm x 3.5mm dia.. I have included a brief description of the process, this may be useful to those considering trying their hand at soldering.

I found the best results for soldering were obtained by putting some solder paste on the base of the bitts and pushing them down onto the base. The excess squeezed out around the bottom helped to form a fillet when the joint was completed. Same technique was used for the bar between the bitts, with the addition of some paste placed on at the ends.  If the assembly has been heated correctly, solder should flow out around the pins on the underside of the base (pic 5). The assembly needs to be heated with care due to the difference in the mass of the parts, too much heat on the copper could cause it to sag or melt before the brass parts are hot enough for the solder to run. Another complicating factor in heating is the difference in melt temperatures, brass is lower than copper.

 

 

 

Grant.

Edited May 13, 2014 by Boccherini

[Jim Lad]

Nice bit of blacksmithing on the bollards, Grant!

 

John

[dgbot]

Nice work. Soldering two different metals together is not easy.

David B

[Boccherini]

John & David....... thanks.

David, thanks for the reminder about different metals, I forgot to mention the difference in melt temperatures between brass & copper, now corrected.

 

Regards,

Grant.

[Erebus and Terror]

Excellent craftsmanship!

[Boccherini]

E&T, thanks for the comment.

I decided to solder the "bolts" to the bollard base plates, this process taught me something new about solder paste. When doing multiple joints on one piece, you need to heat the whole piece and do them simultaneously, or only put paste on the parts you are heating. I made the mistake of putting paste on all the bolt heads, then trying to do one end and then the other.....disaster. By the time I started heating the other end, the solder paste had dried out and would not make the joint. Had to pull the bolts out, clean off the crud and re-do them several times before realizing the cause and solution. This process messed the whole bollard assemblies up a little, they don't look as good as they might've. Probably would've been better to just push the bolts in after epoxying the bollards to the deck. Frustrating but instructive time.

After pickling and then scrubbing in acetone:

In place after chemical blacking.

 

 

Next project is the capstan base plate. The copper ring is from a piece of 1/2'' copper pipe. The inside was turned to the correct diameter with a boring bar, then the outside turned down to the correct thickness. Lugs were milled into the bottom of the ring, then the ring was half cut from the pipe at the correct height, the final separating cut had to be done with a jewellers saw. It proved impossible to separate the ring from the pipe with the lathe cut off tool, it collapsed due to the lack of thickness. This piece took 3 attempts to get it right, more instructive frustration. The base plate is 16mm (0.64") diameter. The pieces were then soldered together.

Another lesson re learned (I am still a novice lathe/mill user), if you are removing and replacing a work piece in the lathe chuck, always make sure it goes back in the same place in the chuck. I now have a mark on one of the chuck jaws (to differentiate it from the others), I file a small mark in the work piece where it meets the end of this jaw.

 

 

 

[Jim Lad]

More excellent work!

 

John

[captainbob]

Novice or not you did a fine job.

 

Bob

[mtaylor]

Beautiful metalwork, Grant.   And thanks for the step by step.

[pete48]

Hello Grant, I just have to say that you have done a beautiful job on this build . Excellent workmanship, well done

 

Best Regards,

Pete

[Boccherini]

John, Bob, Mark & Pete,

thank you for the kind words.

First attempt on the body of the capstan. I'm not sure the proportions are quite right, back to the drawing board.

 

 

Grant.

 

[HIPEXEC]

Amazing work!

[Jim Lad]

That looks really nice, Grant.  It's hard to tell from your photo, but just double check that the scale height is OK before you get much further along.

 

John

[dvm27]

Beautiful capstan and also execution of those joggled planks!

 

Greg

[dgbot]

Your capstain looks good.  How far off are you?

David B

[pete48]

Beautiful work Grant,  The deck is incredible

 

Best Regards,

Pete

[Boccherini]

Thanks for all your encouraging comments.

John, the scale height including the base equals 1.2m (4') actual height. I have started v2.0, which is equivalent to 1.1m (3'8") and has a different shape, more in keeping with the picture you posted several weeks ago in another thread.

Bob, I have no idea, my plans are vague/contradictory. It's down to "does it look right?"

 

Grant. 

Edited June 14, 2014 by Boccherini

[rpeteru]

Nice work from another who resides in the west.

[cpt. Tom]

Nice looking metalwork.  It's that sort of thing that makes a model really stand out.

 

Bob

Bob says the right words, absolut brilliant work.

[michael mott]

just catching up , Grant your metal work on the bollards looks great and the rest of the metal work is very clean and well executed. The locating pins on the bottom of the copper ring, is something I would not have thought of, because I would have machined it out of solid. That is what I enjoy so much about this site, all the innovative and creative ways to accomplish the same task. Those joggled planks really do look amazing.

 

Michael

[Boccherini]

rpeteru, Tom & Michael, thanks for your taking the time to leave a comment.

Michael, the idea of the locating pins is something I picked up from reading Underhill's books. I envy your machining skills to do that out of a solid metal piece, my abilities in that area are not up to that kind of work as yet.

I decided to experiment on this capstan with soldering the whelps on, being only 1mm x 0.5mm, I had some concerns of them melting before the solder ran. Everything worked out nearly perfectly first time. Nice to know this happens occasionally. First picture after "pickling", then after blackening.

 

 

[dgbot]

Nice capstain

David B

[Jim Lad]

Very nice indeed, mate!

 

John

[Boccherini]

Thanks David and John. Capstan V2.0 was worth the extra work, it's much better looking than the original. The whelps were made from some 1mm wire filed down to half its thickness, cut to length and drilled to take locating pins. Contact cement was used to hold the whelps to the capstan whilst drilling. The loop of wire used to make the pins made it easier to solder and gave me something to grip while finishing the shape of the whelps. I ended up having to use a full size oxy/acetylene torch to heat it up (my little butane torch was way "under powered"), I think it was slightly overcooked as the solder left some rough patches around the whelps. They have been mostly scraped/rubbed out, but are still slightly visible.

 

 

Grant.

[Erebus and Terror]

Excellent metal work!