US Brig Oneida 1809 by rlb - The Lumberyard - 1:48 scale - POF - Lake Ontario Warship

[Roger Pellett]

A beautiful and interesting model

[rlb]

Thank you, Roger.

 

Some activity in the shipyard!!

 

Euryalus has left my living room and has come upstairs to join Oneida in the workshop.  This displaces Oneida to a smaller area, but I think that will be okay--

 

 

 

The carronades have been glued in place--

 

 

 

 

 

Next, they will all be "stowage rigged" as the one third from the right on the starboard side in the photo.  I just have to remember how I did that one--about 10 years ago.

 

The rudder has been glued on--

 

 

 

 

 

That's all for now,

Ron

Edited January 23, 2022 by rlb

[smotyka]

Awesome!!!

[Ebomba]

Great to see her again and to see you back in the shop, exceptional !

 

Best,

Ed

[Wintergreen]

As we have waited!

 

Just kidding, great to see an update on your lovely build. 🙂 

About the stowage rigging, at least you have physical evidence. It would have been much harder to figure out if you only had some scribbled down notes from a decade ago...

 

Keep it up!

[rlb]

Thanks all for looking in, comments, and hitting the like.  

 

Continuing with the rudder work, here are the rudder chains, and tiller parts--

 

 

 

The chains are test for the length and drape--

 

 

 

And after blackening, attached--

 

 

 

I cringe at the poor planking of the transom (some shrinkage gaps), and my less-than-precise painting!

 

After gluing the tiller to the rudder head, I realized I need to drill some holes for eyebolts for the tiller rope.  Of course, this should have been done before gluing the tiller on--

 

 

 

Here are the eyebolts and tiller ropes attached--

 

 

 

Then threaded through the blocks on the bulwarks, and back through the blocks on the tiller--

 

 

 

Ah, but what to do with the loose ends?   In the Charles G. Davis illustration that I followed for this, the ropes go to a ship's wheel.  But there is no wheel in this case.  I reasoned that there should be cleats on the bulwarks to fasten the ropes to.  These had to be added--

 

 

 

I'm not sure why Lieutenant Woolsey decided to take a nap during this work.  Maybe he overindulged last night.

 

After tying the rope off to the cleat, a rough coil was made by wrapping the rope (wet with diluted PVA) around a drill bit--

 

 

 

This was draped over the cleat, with much massaging and rewetting, to try and get it to hang sort of realistically--

 

 

 

 

After finishing this (of course), I remembered that one of Bernard Frolich's brig models with a tiller may have shown me what to do here.   I checked, and yes, there are cleats on the bulwarks.  However, the arrangement of the blocks and rope is a little different, and it looks functionally superior to what I did.    

 

Here is yours truly working--

 

 

 

Ron

Edited February 5, 2022 by rlb

[Wintergreen]

1 hour ago, rlb said:

After gluing the tiller to the rudder head, I realized I need to drill some holes for eyebolts for the tiller rope.  Of course, this should have been done before gluing the tiller on--

Yes, of course, but now you got the opportunity to show off your drilling skills 😉 

[Thistle17]

A "selfie" to go with your good works Ron. Good to see your recent work so well executed. Very nice work indeed.

Joe

[Roger Pellett]

A spectacular model!

[Vladimir_Wairoa]

Amazing model. 

[michael mott]

Hi Ron, your model of the Oneida has come along really nicely. The thing that always amazes me is how long these models take, and at the same time it is one of their joys, there is no rush, in my mind because it is all out the journey.

 

Michael

[rlb]

Thanks everyone for the compliments!  Yes, Michael, you said that well.

Ron

[CiscoH]

Ron I have been slowly working my way through your entire build.  Simply amazing, and goes to show you can do high end work with basic tools.  Thank you again for reposting (and editing)  your pre-2013 work it is very helpful to us beginners.

 

cisco

[archjofo]

Hi Ron,

you are doing a good job.
This will be a very nice model.

[rlb]

Thank you cisco.  Thank you, Johann--your model is extraordinary, and I can only aspire to the accuracy and detail that you are able to accomplish!

 

I have been working--very slowly.

 

First, I realized that I need to remove the carronades to make the breeching ropes.  Unfortunately, I had glued them to the deck!!  Fortune smiled though, and the upper part of the carriages were NOT glued to the lower bed (except for one), and I was able to remove the carronades--

 

 

Here they are, with breeching ropes partly done.  They need to have the correct knot and iron ring attached to each end of the rope.  The first five (including the one carronade that I had to forcibly remove from the deck) are done.  Beyond those are the rest which have the first end done, then the line threaded through the breeching ring, and the beginning loop of the second knot lightly glued to hold it for seizing--

 

This is my method for completing the breeching knot after the first seizing is done.  Using a short piece of line, and tweezers, form a simple overhand knot--

 

Get it oriented correctly--

Position it at the right spot and pull it tighter--

Finish up by giving it a good tug--

 

The loose ends are then wrapped a turn around, and glued with a dab of white glue.  After dry, the ends are snipped close.  It's a shortcut, I know, but looks fine.

 

Now the carronades can be reinstalled, and the eyelets glued into predrilled holes (done many years ago now!!) in the bulwarks--

 

 

Next, I will need to make about 30 more of these training tackles--

 

Closing with a couple photos of Oneida--

 

Ron

 

 

 

Edited May 8, 2022 by rlb

[Ebomba]

Ron, always a treat to see your work, great attention to detail and excellent photography, Thanks for sharing

 

Best,

Ed

 

[tlevine]

Thanks for the update, Ron.  Love the breechings.

[stuglo]

Beautiful work. I made this as a first move from kits to scratch. You have done justice to this project.

[src]

Ron,

Getting reacquainted with your build. As always outstanding work! Why, over the years watching you build, have i thought this is a much larger build???? Well done indeed.

Sam

[hamilton]

Beautiful work as always, Ron! Love to see this beauty moving along!

hamilton

[rlb]

My recent work on Euryalus has actually given me some motivation to do some work on Oneida.

 

I am in the middle of stropping blocks for the carronade tackle, and it's not a task I enjoy.   I need 64 blocks, 32 with hooks, and 32 with a hook and loop. (I don't remember the correct term.  I'll look it up and edit this later.)   There's a photo of a pair in post #645.

 

So I can only do a few before losing patience.  I decided to work on the masts; specifically the crosstrees and tops, to break the exasperation of the blocks.  Here is Chapelle's spar drawing for Oneida--

 

Not much detail. It looks like the crosstrees, but without the platform?   I'm taking the crosstree dimension, which happens to be 6', and using that to size everything else.

 

Using Petrejus' book on Irene as a guide, I've scaled the top to the size I need, and cut some strips for the platform floor--

 

These were glued, and now they need to be filed (I can't think of another way I can do this) so they are "let into each other with a half and half dap."  Easier said than done considering how thin these are.

 

Here's a shot of the floor planks glued together into the four groups, (not yet "dapped" into each other), my small but growing number of stropped blocks, and the materials going into this work--

 

Ron  

Edited March 25, 2023 by rlb

[Ebomba]

A joy to see you continue on this project, I have gained a lot of knowledge following this build not only your many lessons on how to do things but on your quest for perfection Please continue

 

Best

Ed

 

[rlb]

Thanks, Ed, for the encouragement.  I can't predict when the urge to work takes me, but it's on for the moment!

 

I continued on with the top.  Both the main and fore top will be the same.  I ended up using a very small chisel to pare down the glued up sections of the top, so they would interlock as Petrejus described--

 

The photo below shows that I have some more work to do before the overlap sits flush--

 

Once I was satisfied, I glued the pieces together--

 

After the floor of the top was one piece and the straight areas trimmed, I rubber cemented the pattern to it, to sand down the curved areas--

 

After sanding the curved area--

 

This is about 1mm thick--

 

Just a note on the color of these pear wood strips.  For the first time, I've cut my own strip wood.  The darker streaks are burn marks from the saw blade.  Another learning curve to master.  The tops are going to be stained black in the end, so it's okay.  In fact, once it's stained I don't think you'll be able to see that there are 20 individual pieces making up this floor.  Petrejus says there are 65 pieces in the finished top. 

 

I didn't make any more carronade tackle blocks!

 

Ron

 

 

Edited March 25, 2023 by rlb

[rlb]

I purchased Chuck's ropewalk a couple years ago.  I put it together at that time, but was too intimidated to use it (and I didn't have a pressing need for any line).  With my fresh shipbuilding vigor, I decided now is the time to take the plunge--

 

 

I figured I would have many failed attempts before I got the hang of it, but it worked out great!  Maybe beginner's luck, but on the first try I actually ended up with a decent rope--

 

I think it could have been a little tighter, and it's not any particular circumference or diameter that I need, but I'm confident now that I can make what I will need for Oneida's rigging.

 

 On to the top(s).  I cut and glued up the floor for the second top, and started on the piece that overhangs the edges.  No problem on the straight pieces, but the curved front is a challenge.  I don't have an easy way to make a piece large enough, at the thinness required (about 1" scale) to make it in one piece, so I thought I'd do it this way--

 

Very tedious, but I think this will work, if it doesn't disintegrate when I shave it down to match the curve of the top.  This (and the straight pieces) need to overhang the floor halfway--

 

 

I also completed another pair of carronade tackle blocks.  My goal is to do one pair a day.  If I can do that, they'll be done in another couple weeks!

 

Ron

Edited March 26, 2023 by rlb

[rlb]

The front border of top #1 was shaped, and the same procedure followed for top #2.  I did reduce the number of sections in the curve-

  

 

The light pencil line was traced from the BOTTOM side of the top, just as a check to make sure the pieces would fill in the curve correctly.  Next, it was glued to the floor along just the curved edge.  While that was weighted and drying, a paper template was placed on the floor within the rim of top #1, and the locations of the radial cleats was marked--

 

Here the front edge of top #2 has been sanded--

  

 

The line of the back edge has been drawn by eye in pencil, and the piece is scored lightly with a knife, repeated a few times, but not cut all the way through--

 

 

The waste is cut away with a chisel because I felt I had more control and didn't want to cut into the floor below, as I knew there would need to be some refinement of the shape.  There is no glue under the waste area, so once the chisel cuts through, the pieces detach easily--

 

The width was checked with a caliper, and further shaped where needed with sanding on the outside edge, or the knife and chisel on the inside edge.

 

Here is the current state of the two tops (one upside down)--

 

Oh, and I did today's pair of carronade tackle blocks.

 

Ron

 

Edited March 27, 2023 by rlb

[Chuck]

Excellent rope.  And on your first try.  You will never buy another package of rope again.  The model is looking very good indeed.  I am enjoying your progress.

[rlb]

Thanks Chuck.  And thanks for making the Youtube videos.  I would have been lost without them.  Tying the thread to the eyehooks with somewhat even tension took longer and was trickier than making the rope itself!   We'll see if future attempts go as smoothly.  I need to make anchor cable, and I have to figure out (maybe by trial and error!) which direction to twist everything. 

 

Ron

[JohnLea]

1 hour ago, rlb said:

The front border of top #1 was shaped, and the same procedure followed for top #2.  I did reduce the number of sections in the curve-

  

 

I can't tell you how mucI apprecuate this information.  Thanks again.

 

[rlb]

Thanks, and you're welcome, JohnLea.  I hope that what I have here is useful for others.

 

With that in mind, more progress on the tops.

 

I had a very slight warp in one of the tops.  The front part curled upwards maybe a millimeter, or a bit less.   I've been keeping it under a weight most of the time, but that hasn't helped.  Getting the idea from Blue Ensign's log on HMS Indefatigable, I tried a heat gun on the piece.  I wasn't sure I used enough heat, I was a bit nervous about it.  But it seems to have worked, and it is flat now--

 

I cut a bunch of blanks for the radial cleats--

 

And glued them together with the barest bit of glue at each end, so they can be uniformly shaped--

 

They first needed to be sanded flat on one side, and the aligned ends squared-- 

 

Then, with knife, chisel, and file, I made a shallow notch on one end.  A good mill would have done this well, and though I sometimes use my rotary tool in the stand as a mill, I felt it was going to be too difficult to be as precise as I needed to be here.  The pieces are so lightly glued that they didn't stay together, and now I have four groups.  You can see how the notch fits over the rim of the top--

 

 

As I began to shape the tops of the cleats, one broke off, and I shaped this one individually, as a master to guide the rest--

 

My procedure ended up being to file the rounded part at the 'big' end first, and then chisel and file down the flatter part.  It's not exactly flat, it does have a slight taper to the end--

 

A few more groups broke apart, but here they are shaped and lined back up--

 

Into the bath of isopropyl alcohol--

 

I'm very impatient with this alcohol business.  I've never been able to wait until pieces just fall apart.  After a couple hours the glue was weakened enough that I could pry them apart with my fingers, without worrying about breaking them--

  

 

Out of the bath they dried quickly and they were test fit to the tops--

 

I did not anticipate that the severely skewed pieces along the back of the top, especially the corner ones, would need to be different, with the 'big' end lengthened (and/or the notch underneath cut farther back).   I'll see if these are salvageable, but I may have to remake a few cleats.

 

The big ends are just a bit taller than they will be when finished.  There are chocks that will need to be fit between each cleat, on top of the rim, and then when all is glued up, the rim will be finally sanded flat to the correct height.

 

Ron

 

 

 

Edited March 30, 2023 by rlb

[tlevine]

Patience?  What's that?  Seriously, the tops look great.