USS Constitution by fletch944t - Model Shipways - Scale 1:76 - 1812 Era

[robnbill]

If you can get the Mahogany to cooperate for such small pieces, the grate and combings might look good in contrast with the deck. My decks are Tanganyika, coamings out of walnut and the grate is basswood (maybe). The areas around the ladders were cutouts. So below and around those areas I painted dark green. Underneath the main hatch and other gratings, there were no cutouts. For these I painted the deck black before gluing the hatch assembly down to the deck.

[russ]

Mahogany is not the best wood for scale modeling. It has a rather coarse, open grain with which it is often difficult to get a smooth finish. Walnut generally has the same problem.

 

Russ

[fletch944t]

I too am going to fabricate the gratings out of boxwood. Some of the pieces for the coamings are indeed very small but, since they're for the most part straight with no intricate detail, I might be able to get away with making the coamings out of mahogany.

 

Heck, I can at least give it a shot. Worst case scenario is I'll have to re-do them out of some other material. But, at least we'll all know if it's achievable.

[fletch944t]

I've been working an hour or two here and there on the model over the last week. Things at work are crazy right now and I simply haven't had a lot of time to devote to the model. However, I'm getting ready to have a few days off and will be able to post some pictures of what I've accomplished recently.

 

I did get the stern filler blocks done and attached to the boat. I still have some work to do on the counter but, I decided to work on something different for a while.

 

I cut and shaped the stem filler blocks, attached them to the boat, and completed a good portion of the stem framing. I'll  likely finish up the stem framing this weekend.

 

I also cut and installed support blocks between all of the frames at gun deck level. Not only will this provide for the bulkheads but, for my build it will also provide additional support for the gun deck planking. I know that some folks don't install the bulkhead support blocks but, after doing it myself, I highly recommend it. One of the benefits of installing the blocks is that it allows you to see if your bulkheads are square in relation to the keel.

 

When I started measuring and cutting the blocks to go between the bulkheads I was finding that the distance between the bulkheads was not the same on both sides. The odd part is, I was extremely cautious about making sure the bulkheads were square when I glued them to the keel. I cut pieces from aluminum channel which I used with clamps to square the bulkheads when I glued them and I still ended up with this problem. But, installing the support blocks allowed me to true everything up.

 

Finally, I've started working on hatch coamings, primarily for the gun deck. I cut some strips of mahogany to use for the hatch coaming framing. Then, I started cutting grooves for rabbet joints in the mahogany to assemble the coamings. It was at this point that I came to realize just how out of practice I am at working with the router. I had done a lot of router work in the distant past but, never with anything this small and I've discovered that I'm going to need a lot of practice and patience to get the coamings cut correctly. Fortunately, I have a lot of scrap wood to practice on.

 

Again, I'll post some pictures in the next day or two.

 

Fletch

 

 

[fletch944t]

Finally got around to taking a few pictures of the progress.

 

Stern and bow filler blocks.

 

 

[fletch944t]

Spacer blocks between bulkheads.

 

 

[fletch944t]

Cutout in keel for gun deck hatch opening to berth deck.

 

 

[fletch944t]

An attempt at a hatch coaming for the gun deck.

 

 

[GLakie]

Looks like you're making some good progress Fletch! The coaming looks great to me.

 

Cheers

[fletch944t]

Gun deck sub-floor with forward hatch coaming.

 

 

[patrickmil]

Fletch, the progress is looking good. The partial berthing deck is yet another step I have to add to the long list. The coaming looks great BTW.

[fletch944t]

Thanks Patrick.

 

The only place I plan to do any of the berth deck is for the hatches that will have at least one opening with a ladder going down. For example, the next hatch aft which is directly below the aft end of the spar deck main hatch will have two ladders going down. So, I'll try to model some berth deck planking there. However, the forward-most hatch on the gun deck is really just a scuttle. So, I'll have a hatch and hatch grating there with black paneling underneath.

 

As soon as I finish all of the hatch coamings for the gun deck and cut the sub-floor panels to accommodate them, I'll start planking the gun deck. I need to do that so that when I get one of the 24 pound long guns put together I can set it on the gun deck to determine the appropriate height of the gun deck ports.

Edited January 25, 2015 by Captain Silver Beard Jones

[fletch944t]

While I've had very little time to work on the model this week, I've made some minor progress.

 

I finished another one of the gun deck hatches and I finished the fore-most scuttle.

 

As far as I can discern, I have three more gun deck hatches to complete (unless I've missed a hatch or scuttle somewhere). Then I'll be able to start working on the gun deck planking.

 

I've yet to apply the acrylic satin sealant to the larger hatch or the scuttle. That's why the middle hatch is darker in appearance than the other two.

 

 

[GLakie]

Looking good Fletch! 

[fletch944t]

It's been sometime since I've posted but, the last few weeks haven't been a complete waste.

 

Just to give you a little history, it WAS my intent to construct the gun deck hatches using the same grating provided in the kit. I wanted the grating on the gun deck to appear identical to the grating on the spar deck. So, I contacted Model Expo and ordered two extra sheets of the grating sheet provided in the kit. As you can see from the previous pictures, I was already well into constructing the gun deck hatches using the kit grating. After constructing all of the gun deck hatch coamings, I started locating them on the gun deck and came to a disturbing realization. That being that the gun deck hatches were entirely too large.

 

I knew when I made the decision to go this route that the hatches were going to end up being larger than they should be. This was due to the fact that even using the smallest gratings available in the kit, the hatches would be larger than scale - even cutting some of the gratings down to a smaller size (which I didn't want to do). But, I made a conscious decision to go ahead and give it a shot. Well, had I gone through with the plan, there would not have been enough room for all of the gun deck hatches and it would have crowded other equipment on the gun deck. So, I reluctantly went back to the drawing board on the hatches.

 

I had previously printed copies of all of the Constitution deck arrangements from the Plans CD. And, I already had measurements of the gun deck hatches which I had converted to scale by comparing the main hatch measurements from the CD and the MS plans to get a conversion factor. This is how I knew my original hatches were going to be larger than scale.

 

So, I ordered boxwood grating material from Model Expo (1mm grating holes) and fabricated all new hatch coamings and gratings for the gun deck. This also required me to cut new sub-flooring for the gun deck and rework the hatch support framing. As a side note, I'll be using the same grating material on the spar deck in place of the grating provided in the kit (again for consistency in appearance).

 

 I've also completed the gun deck waterway, attached the waterway to the gun deck sub-floor, and painted the waterway. You won’t see it in the pictures yet, but I’ve also started planking the gun deck. One of the reasons that I decided to install planking over a basswood sheet sub-floor is so that I can plank the gun deck sub-floor with it removed from the model. I did this because I thought it would make the job of planking easier, especially with regards to using scale length planks. One problem that it does create is that the center line plank on one half of the sub-floor must overhang slightly to ensure the seam between the sub-floors is properly concealed (assuming all goes according to plan).

 

So, here are the pictures of the progress thus far. I’ll post pictures of the deck planking when I’ve made enough progress to take some decent pictures.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[Buick nut]

Ok I do have to say something about the fuss being made about the plans being off first I was an R/C airplane modeler building directly of the plans weather they were off in scale isn't and wasn't an issue if a person bought plans of this model and used the plans as patterns the ship will still come out the same I suggest using the plans as a guide and not take everything for granted that the plans are spot on being a modeler is having the skill and knowledge to work past it if you know the plans are off for the pieces you need to make from templates just cut the wood a little larger and custom fit them until they look and fit right. so may I suggest to getting back to ship building. Are you crying? There's no crying in model ship building. And no whining either lol

[Burroak]

To me there is no comparison between R/C modeling and scale wooden ship modeling. The plans do need to be as accurate as possible to get an accurate depiction of what the original ship would have looked like.