HMS Diana 1794 by Ray - FINISHED - Caldercraft - A 38 gun Heavy Frigate

[mort stoll]

Same here, same here.

 

Mort

[mobbsie]

Hi Ray,

 

Thought I would drop in and check on your progress, wow have you ever done well, lovely fix on the bulwarks and the rails look great. Well Done.  

 

If you look at my signature I have Dianna down as a possible build, your making a perfect reference for me, thank you.   :)  

 

mobbsie

[Ray]

Hi Guys Thanks for the comments Diana is coming along very well, nice that so many will use this build as a reference for future builds, lets hope there many of them, it is a great model a I am surprised that there are so few building her.

 

Mobbsie we might be reversing projects as Aggie is the front runner for my next build.

[Barbossa]

.... it is a great model a I am surprised that there are so few building her....

 

 

 hear, hear  

 

Hi Ray

 As been told by so many : great job on those open bulwarks

[fnkershner]

Ray - I would like to add my voice to your build log. I am a bit saddened that it has taken me so long to find this log. As of this morning I have finally caught up and read the whole thing. You are doing a wonderful job, and I look forward to much more. It may be the series of novels that I am currently reading that turned my attention to this build. I am now up to book 17 of the Alan Lewrie series. and He is now Captain of just this class of ship. You build has helped me to better understand the layout of his ship.

 

Again Thanks!

[Polux]

She is looking great Ray.

Nice work on the planking

 

Regards

 

Polo

[paul carruthers]

Can anyone supply pics of a step by step for the deck planking joggle process, thanks

[aliluke]

Been a while since I looked and posted on your log Ray. Your Diana is looking fantastic. You have mastered so many skills that I battle with but it is very informative and encouraging to follow your progress and learn from it (I still refer to your Pegasus log for the same inspiration). I still marvel at your gun deck planking which we can now hardly see .

 

I'll keep up with your work on Diana from now on.

 

Thank you,

Alistair

[Ray]

Hi Guys Christian, Floyd, polo, Alistair Thanks for the comments I will post some photos of the completed planking soon, its been a golf and fishing week, making the best of the weather.

 

Paul , Joggling you need a waterway or margin plank to joggle into, and start where it starts to curve a lot and cut across about a third of the plank. If you GOOGLE joggle deck planking their are several descriptions of how to do it .

[Ray]

Below are some photos of the completed upper decks.

 

Next I will finish a few bits on the sides such as the entry steps and then turn my attention to the bow and the cats heads.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Beef Wellington]

Beautiful shots Ray, boy there's a lot of deck area! The colours and wood tone really look fantastic coupled with your really clean workmanship.

[Blue Ensign]

Congratulations on completing the basic hull Ray, you have made a splendid job of her, well done

 

B.E.

[Ray]

The bow Section

 

Next I started on the head rails and all the bow details including the cat heads. The bow frame head timbers were dressed and glued together and the fit adjusted to the bow. The curved cheek rails were then fixed to the side of the bow frame together with the cheek blocks,the head timber assembly was bevelled as necessary to aline with the main rails and the bow frame, and the slots for the decorative strips were filed out the the assembly was then glued to the main bow frame after painting.

 

I rememberer at this point that I only had three lengths of the decorative strip (340) which sits in the slots on the timber head and goes up to the bottom of the cat head and I would need four lengths I must have been one short as I had not wasted any around the stern, I e-mailed Jotika and they posted me two lengths the next day a very good service indeed.

 

The main rails were painted and added I cut notches into the rails on the hull rather than filing the main rail sides to get a nice fit, so far so good.

Next make the cat -heads and finish off.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Beef Wellington]

Very neat and tidy Ray.  Starting to get a real sense of how the front end will look, should be really impressive.  I can't help but notice a lowered #2 cannon, hope that it is nothing serious?

[realworkingsailor]

Yeah... headrails.... everybody's favourite head-scratching, how-the-he** moment.

 

Nice work you've done.

 

Although... that second canon.... sorry to say.. but...uh.... he seems to be aiming a bit low......

 

Andy

[mort stoll]

The head rails look great so far. Interesting everyone raves about Caldercrafts customer service. I emailed them 1 month ago and snail mailed them 2 weeks ago and have not heard a thing.

 

Mort

[Ensign]

Hi Mort, my kit for Diana was missing quite a few parts, the shop where I bought the kit dealt with Caldercraft on my behalf and although it took a few weeks they supplied all the missing parts and then some. Maybe this is the best way to tackle the issue, if you can go through the supplier.

 

BTW I had also sent an email to Caldercraft enquiring about a kit and not received a response.

 

Gary

[Ray]

Hi Guys thanks for the comments.

 

 

Firstly Jotika/Cladercraft I e-mailed them and this is the guy who responded John Wright a Director    johnwirght@jotika-ltd.com  so this approach might be worth a try .

 

Secondly head-rails, they are difficult  to get our head around,  but I found them not as difficult as on Pegasus, as that was my first time, building up a head rail bow section, and  this time I could look back on how I did them on her. So I have tried to go through this part step by step to give a guide and will post the next part in a few days when I have sorted out the Photos (and taken the admiral Xmas shopping).

 

Thirdly there is no problem with the cannons they all move up and down,handy if knocked or caught when moving her about,I must try and remember to set them all up before photos.

[realworkingsailor]

Thirdly there is no problem with the cannons they all move up and down,handy if knocked or caught when moving her about,I must try and remember to set them all up before photos.

Now that's a smart idea! Moving canons.... Very cool

 

Andy

[mort stoll]

Hi Guys,

 

Interesting my Caldercraft parts arrived today. No problem. They were postmarked 10/28/13. I did not realize it takes that long for snail mail to arrive from England. They must have mailed them to me as soon as they received my snail letter. 

 

I apologize,

Mort

[Ensign]

Hi Ray, I just want you to know how much we appreciate your efforts with your build log, I am relatively new to wooden ship building, although I've built models most of my life. I have just finished my second wooden ship, the MS Clipper Flying Fish and she has turned out very nicely, I think. I have HMS Diana and Victory waiting so your log is an invaluable resource. Thank you so much.

 

Gary

[Bill Hime]

Ray,

I spent the better part of a 12 hour shift last night reading through this build log. What an amazing tutorial! This is one of the best logs I've seen here on MSW. This log could be a companion book for the kit.

I know that the HMS Diana is definitely on my list for the future, largely due to your presentation. Thank you!

 

I'll be pulling up a chair for the rest now, and taking notes

 

Warm Regards,

 

Bill

[Ray]

The bow Section continued

 

I then taped the two parts of the grating together to see how it fitted in the space between the rails and the head timbers, it sat rather high so I cut and ground down the tops of the head timbers so that the gratings sat below the top of the main side rail.
I then made the cat-heads as per the instructions, the cast decorative rails were then shaped and added, after painting, and I cut them off where they turned flat onto the hull. The cat-heads and their support timber were glued together and fixed to the hull using cyno, and a couple of pins, the second part of the cast strip was then shaped and joined to the cat-head support and the strip on the hull. I then made a pair off second support timbers as shown in The Anatomy of ships Diana and added them, and to finish off fitted the timber covers over the side of the timber heads where the cast rails run through them, the sides of the timber heads did need a bit of fettling to allow a neat finish to the covers. Lastly the whole job was painted and touched up where necessary.

 

 

Decorative rail and timber covers fitted

 

 

The grating was finished next, I made a frame to fit inside the space which did not match the plan, but the space, I added the seat`s of ease ( the use of these  must have a bit tricky at night in a gale )and then fixed the assembly in place. I added a gold lines down the covering timbers (it looks much better in real life than the photos) a final paint touch up, and the gold painted decorations were added, the only thing left is the stanchion rail and netting which I will add later.

 

The grating

 

Ready for finishing off

 

Bows finished

 

 

 

 

 

[Blue Ensign]

Very nicely done Ray, I like the shape of the headworks you have achieved.

 

I find myself slightly puzzled by that open space behind the False Rails, it looks a little awkward, there might have been a second set of seats of ease intended for that space afforded a little privacy by the False rail, otherwise I can't believe the grating arrangement wouldn't have followed the line round to the hull.

 

The other point to consider is how you are going to rig the Gammoning, can you get the line between the gratings? and one of the things I had to check on Pegasus is whether the boomkins when fitted cleared the seats of ease.

 

I found it useful when building the gratings to temporarily fit a bowsprit dowel and boomkins to check out these points.

 

Cheers,

 

B.E.

[Barbossa]

Nice work Ray,

 

I second B. E. 's opinion regarding the seats of ease, therefore I haven't fixed them yet.

At present,  Mrs. Barbossa and me are going to spend a few days on the Belgian coast but I'll post some pics about this concern next W.E. on my own log.

 

[Ray]

Hi Guys   And B E and Christian

 

 

Thanks for the interest and  to B. E. I had completely overlooked the gammoning when sorting out the grating, as said it was altered to fit the space, which included trying to not have the boomkins pass right over the top of the seats of ease, the grating does not wrap right around the hull as shown in the photo of the plan, I have now added one more plank to extend the grating which I hope makes it look a little better. I have also cut away the grating to make two slots which will allow the gammoning. Back to the grating it has been a real pain to do, I now wish I had scratch built it, I originally moved the grating as far forward as I could to move the seats of ease out of the path of the boomkins, I have added some photos to illustrate this. Diana s boomkins also point down a quite an angle, much more than on Pegasus where there is also a large gap between the boomkins and the top of the rails.

 

I sill might cut it all out and do it again !!!

 

Plan

 

Boomkin it will enter hull where the rail is

 

Shows boomkin under a traced copy of the plan

 

Shows the slots for the gammoning and the extra plank (varnish still wet)

 

[Blue Ensign]

Looks better with the Gammoning slots Ray, and it will surely make life easier for rigging the Bowsprit.

 

Regarding the boomkins on Pegasus I'm not sure they got the arrangement completely right and of course  gratings and seats of ease were not included in the plans.

 

http://modelshipworld.com/index.php?/topic/332-hms-pegasus-by-blue-ensign-victory-models-enhancing-the-kit-a-build-log-of-sorts/page-2

 

I made some modifications, and as you can see in this link (bottom of page) the Boomkins should curve steeply down and be secured in the notches in the False Rail.

 

Cheers,

 

B.E.

Edited November 13, 2013 by Blue Ensign

[Ray]

With the bow section now completed minus the stanchion rails and netting it was time to decided  which part of the build to do next. The choice was to do the deck fittings or the sides, I decided to complete the ships sides details,I first looked at the position of the channels and chain plates to make sure they did not interfere with the gun ports the fore and main mast channels needed moving by about 5mm to allow the links from the dead eyes to run at the right angles with out passing over the gun ports, I had plenty of the slotted rail to replace the now short ones rather than infilling with small bits, the mizzen channel will sit above the gun ports on the main deck and on top of the rail. I also decided to make new gun port lids as seen in the photos, so far then I have fitted the channels drilling them and adding pins, plus fitted the oar ports and vents,one side done and about half way through the other.

 

Rails removed

 

Channels dry fitted

 

 

New gun port lids

 

First side done minus the support brackets

 

 

[Bill Hime]

Ray,

 

TheChannels look great. I especially like the strapping on the gun port lids, nice bolt details.

 

 

 

Bill

[ZyXuz]

very nice work on the rail, Ray