San Francisco 2 by DesertWolf - Artesania Latina

[Mike Y]

Congrats on a new tools!

Nice model, that contrast of dark hull and very bright deck looks interesting!

[Vivian Galad]

She´s nice, I have to say. Beautiful work till now, and gratz for the tools!!

[augie]

She's certainly standing proud.  Beautiful work, all around.

[DesertWolf]

I haven't posted an update in a while.  I will try to upload some pictures in the near future.  I'm busy scratch building all my deck fittings and I completely underestimated how much effort it will take, but it's great fun.  I also spend a lot of time on building a stand (well, building many stands until I found one that I was happy with).  Watching far too many soccer games during the world cup didn't help the build speed either.

[DesertWolf]

I'm busy scratch building all of my deck fittings.  Most of the things I have to make 2 or 3 times over before I'm happy with the result - but I'm learning as I go along and it will certainly be easier going forward.

 

Deck ladders - still dry fitted

 

 

Pumps - still work in progress

 

 

My second attempt at making the sides of the gun carriages for the canons.

[DesertWolf]

Thanks to everyone who dropped in since my last post and the encouragement through your 'likes'!

 

 

I am jumping around a bit while I try to build most of my deck fittings and I am almost working on all the fittings at once.  It will probably go faster if I focus on one thing at a time.

 

 

I finished the pumps.  There are one or two things I will do differently in the future, but I feel the end result is still better than the kit's metal pumps.

 

 

 

The tiller included in the kit is also made of metal.  I finished my scratch built version from some Chen Chen Rose wood.  It turns really nicely.

 

 

I am working on the top rail for the stern gallery.  The kit's version is plywood that you have to cover with veneer.  It actually worked pretty well, but I messed it up by staining it too dark.  So I decided to make a new rail.  It is always tricky to make more than one piece of something where all the pieces must be exact copies of one another.  I usually do it by sticking masking tape on the one side of the wood from which the item must be cut.  I then glue the taped sides together and let it dry completely.  I then cut and shape the piece and when I am done I simply separate the individual pieces by cutting through the masking tape.  That way you end up with pieces that are all perfectly similar.

 

 

 

Top rail in progress:

 

 

 

I have spent hours on the gun carriages.  I threw away more prototypes than I can remember.  I ended up using Chuck's plans that are available on this website.  I know it's not representative of carriages in the 16th century, but neither are a lot of things in the SF kit.  At least they look good!

 

Making the sides - I attach the rings first while it is still easy to hold and work with the side piece:

 

 

I created a jig to glue the carriage sides to the axles - to ensure that all the carriages will ultimately be symmetrical:

 

Adding the transom to the front axle

 

Next, the wheels and the wire on which the carriage bed will rest

 

Finally I added the carriage bed and the cannon.  One down, 9 to go!

 

 

[Vivian Galad]

Hey, Wolf. Nice improvement on the fittings. Great idea with the masking tape - I´ll possibly addopt it in some step . As for the carriages, think when I get my San Francisco under construction I´ll throw a lot of time at researching them cannons and carriages since I want to make she look a bit older (try to build an older galleon, something like the first ones to be built - still don´t know if it´s possible and that will be part of my research - sure thing my San Francisco won´t be the San Francisco  ). Your carriage looks great enough for the late 1500´s.

[augie]

Your efforts here have resulted in a vast improvement over the kit-supplied items.  I know how difficult creating these 'fiddly bits' actually is.  You've done a great job.

[themadchemist]

Thanks for the masking tape idea. When making gratings by hand I glued the stock together and found soaking the pieces wasn't quite effort to get the pieces separated without break nearly half of them. Of course there is the issue with removing the glued tape, but it would make separation easier and I image the tape scrapes off easily.

 

Nice work on the bits and pieces, its all those little things that eat up the time, at least for me. They add so much to the finished detail though, plus its just plain fun.

[jburchfield1@wowway.com]

I also like that masking tape idea for duplicate parts.  It's going in my little black book!  

[lamarvalley]

Good day Wolf…

 

Your San Fran is superb… truly the one to watch and learn from for past and future builds.

Your nice and patient approach yields beautiful well thought-out far improved parts over the junk AL supplied. I love watching what happens next. 

[DesertWolf]

What I like most about this site is the encouragement you get from fellow modellers.  It really carries one though the day when you have been crawling on the floor for 5 hours to find that part that dropped or you have to remake a part for the umpteenth time because you measured it wrong - AGAIN.

 

Vivian, you have probably seen Caroline's (Vulcanbomber) SF build log.  I think her cannons are true to the period.  They are beautiful indeed. 

 

Augie, thanks for all the nice comments and encouragement. Much appreciated. 

 

Keith, there is no need to scrape the masking tape off since you don't glue the masking tape to your wood.  You stick the masking tape on the wood and glue the masked sides together with PVA.  Just make sure you wipe off any excess glue so that you don't accidentally glue your pieces of wood together  (...yep, I've done that before...)

 

Below are photos of the steps of my boarding ladders.  I wanted to round the edges and to get carbon copies of one another, I lined the side of each step with masking tape, glued all 12 steps together, shaped the sides, separated the steps with a blade and simply pulled the tape right off.  (and then probably spent 5 hours looking for one piece on the floor...  )

 

Taped steps

Steps all glued together and shaped

 

Randy, good to hear from you again.  Thanks for taking the time to show us your completed SF.  It is a magnificent build - something you can be truly proud of.

 

Thanks Lawrence.  It's true what you say.  It's hard enough finding the time to do some actually building, let alone reading all the wonderful build logs on this site and keeping your own one semi up to date.  I cheat by following your logs on my phone whenever I have a spare moment, but it limits the commenting that I can do and that irks me.

 

 

 

 

[themadchemist]

Wolf,

Hum, I figured the tape would stick more where glued to the wood, I guess the tape doesn't stick as well.

plus gratings are so fragile anyway...

[DesertWolf]

Amazing how one can get side-tracked during a build.  After completing the first cannon I wanted to measure the length of breeching rope needed.  This made me wonder if any of the bulwark-end eye-bolts will interfere with the pin racks.  While fiddling with the position of the pin racks I started wondering if all the running rigging will actually run clear of my tops – since I planned to scratch build mine.  So instead of just cutting a piece of rope I ended up making the whole fore mast, top and caps.

 

Making the top

 

 

 

 

I took more than one attempt to finish the first cap.  Lesson learnt – first drill all the holes and then shape the cap.  Else, keep some Band-Aids ready.

 

Fore mast with everything dry-fitted.  I can see that one would need to be very careful that nothing ends up crooked when you glue it all together.

 

 

 

 

I finished some more deck fittings and the stern gallery some time ago.

[augie]

What an improvement over the supplied cast items.  And thanks for the tip on pre-drilling !

[Vivian Galad]

You keep doing great on scratchbuilding the fittings/metal cast parts supplied!

[NAZGÛL]

Nice work on all details wolf! The little boat came out beautyful!

 

Thanks for showing the masking tape trick, that will definately come handy someday.

 

 

 

/Matti

[Ferit]

Above comparison...Your scratch parts over kit supplies... Great...

[DesertWolf]

When I made the ship's boat a year ago I used the size of the metal boat that came with the kit as a reference.  I never thought to check if it is appropriate or not.  My scratch build was marginally bigger in the end, and to make matters worse I fixed the boat's rudder to its hull (the kit plans show the boat's rudder stored inside the boat).  Although my boat fits on the deck, it looks out of proportion.  With the rudder fixed to the hull the boat simply takes up too much space on the deck - leaving almost no space for the pin racks in front of main mast.

 

 

My first thought was to remove the rudder, but even then the boat would still look out of proportion to me.  I knew it would bug me every time I looked at the model and I would never be satisfied unless I started over.  So instead of making masts and yards this holiday season, I worked on a new boat.

 

 

The new boat is about 15% smaller than the previous version.  I still need to install the thwarts, knees and oar locks, paint the hull outside and add the rubbing strakes.  At the speed I'm going that will probably take another month   

 

 

 

 

 

[DesertWolf]

 

 

 

 

[DesertWolf]

 

 

[augie]

That's really unfortunate --- the old one looked great.  But you're right.......if you had a problem with the overall size you would be unhappy every time you looked at her.  Brave move!

[Vivian Galad]

Well, happens. Good side, though, you have a boat model! And we can never forgive ourselves for letting something like that to pass. Great recovery.

[DesertWolf]

Thanks Augie & Vivian.  Certain things you just can't hide with the "wall side"    Whatever model I build next, I will make sure it is a model of an actual vessel for which I can find some proper scaled plans.

 

In the end I did have some time to finish a couple of things over the holiday season.  I finally assembled all the cannons.

 

 

 

 

 

My SF II as she stands in the shipyard today.  I started exactly 3 years ago.

 

 

None of the mast pieces are glued yet.  I first have to figure out how to glue all the sections of a mast so that they are perfectly aligned (not that hard I guess) and then how to step & glue the masts so that they are perfectly aligned from stem to stern and at the correct rakes.  I will probably take a detour and build Frank Mastini's jig for this purpose, unless I can find an easier way (perhaps a jig that uses cheap laser pointers or something)

 

 

 

I also finished all the yards.  I've actually been busy with yard making since late October.  I ignored the plans that came with the kit and decided to base (loosely) my mast and yard dimensions on the information given by Anderson in "The rigging of ships in the days of the spritsail".  I believe it makes the whole model look more in proportion.  I struggled most with the "arc of a circle" tapering of the yards.  It's quite difficult getting the taper even on both sides of the yard (as all the failed attempts lying in front shows!)

 

[augie]

She is one very, very neat looking vessel.  You deserve a moment to stand back, look at her and be proud.  Your finish on the cannon is well done.  Did you paint or blacken?

[DesertWolf]

Thanks Augie, much appreciated!

 

I blackened and finished it off with a coat of varnish.  I experimented with some black spray paint, but the results did not have the "natural look" that I was hoping for.  I don't think I have the patience to spray paint small stuff like eyebolts and rings either.

[DesertWolf]

Augie,

 

I agree with your comments on the gun tackle that you made in your log. I tried rigging the cannons with more tackle but it looked horrible on this scale. The blocks are too big and the rope too thick in the scale I'm working on. That is why I will shamelessly copy your way of attaching the breeching ropes and leave the other gun tackle in this build.

 

[DesertWolf]

I made some oars for the ship's boat a while ago.

 

I started by cutting blanks of the appropriate thickness.  Then I removed some wood to end with a square shaft.

 

With the blade already part of the shaft blank, it was too difficult to turn the shaft in a lathe, so I used the usual "stick it in the drill" trick and rounded the shaft with fine grit sanding paper.

 

Finally, I shaped the blade with some needle files.

 

To get my masts aligned,  I decided to use a self-leveling laser.  I chose a rather inexpensive one that throws a self-leveling cross (visible on the right in the pic below).  I leveled the ship on my bench and then aligned the laser so that the vertical line runs through the center off all three mast holes in the deck.  

 

By aligning the mast with the vertical laser line, the mast is now perfectly vertical (doesn't lean to port or starboard) and all 3 masts are perfectly in line when viewed from stem to stern.  You just need to set the desired rake by using a protractor.

 

I also finished rigging and installing all the canons.  I decided to rig the breaching rope only.  I did many test runs with the full set of rigging, but the proportions of the rigging line and blocks just didn't look right to me and it ended up looking overcrowded and unnatural.  (Thanks Augie for your tip on how to tuck away the excess breaching rope when the canons are out - I really like the way it looks)

 

The ship's boat is finished and mounted.

 

I don't like the blocks that came with the kit.  Sure, they are mass-produced and will never look like Chuck's, but I'm sure all mine were made on a Friday afternoon 3 minutes before factory closing time (on the start of a long weekend).  I'm going to try and make my own blocks.  Below is a comparison of my first attempts with some kit supplied ones.  Not a 100% happy yet, but it's a good start.

[augie]

Those sweeps look terrific --- as does the ship's boat.  She's really coming alive now.  Pleasure to watch.

[ortho85]

Hi Wolf,

 

I'm just starting this model, so I'm only now reading your log.  I love the idea of laser aligning the masts.

 

Yet another great idea to try to remember!

 

Cheers,

 

Brett