HMS Diana 1794 by CTDavies - Caldercraft - 1:64th Scale - as built - first wooden ship build

[CTDavies]

Even if the hatches are barely visible, and I think they will be, I would still want to do better here than just paint the deck in walnut brown.

 

I started working on my Diana early December and I still haven‘t reached the end of the first chapter in the instructions manual yet 🤪

[CTDavies]

First the idea was to plank the deck. Then I thought, I might just as well do the hatches too.  Then I read about the Evergreen Fir outside of the Binding Strakes. Then I thought I‘d try caulking...

But really this is also a test prior to planking the upper decks

chris

[CTDavies]

4 hours ago, Gregory said:

I'm no expert, but I think the cardboard between planks looks a bit wide considering the scale..

I think I‘ll try dark grey paper next, see how that looks. My brother also agrees that the cardboard is too wide.

[teloo]

Looks great so far. I like the Diana.  

[Beef Wellington]

Hi Chris, think its definitely worth planking the lower deck, I think the only hatch that will only be slightly visible is the lower fore-hatch, the center one in your layout.  I did add this myself, even painting black it takes some craning to glimpse it once the companion ladder is in place.  The lower main hatch is totally obscured by the main hatch ladder.  Definitely agree with the lighter caulking.  Starting to come together now, looks good.

[CTDavies]

Thanks for your comments Beef and Teloo, very kind. I‘m not sure yet if I‘m heading the right direction. A few lessons learnt on this latest sample: first, the deck planks must be sanded smooth before planking and the caulking paper strips must stand proud of the deck planks before sanding everything flat otherwise things just get too uneven. So, the caulking is a lot less conspicuous than before which is good, but I had to give the sample a few light coats of grain filler with an airbrush but now I‘m getting a slight shine which I would rather avoid. Is a wax layer and honing a solution?

 

Edited February 7, 2020 by CTDavies

[CTDavies]

I think I finally might be heading the right way.

Third sample: first of all, dark grey paper caulking stands proud of the deck planking.

 

After I had trimmed down the caulking I had realised that the planking strips were of a different thickness. The wider strips which should represent the king plank and the binding strakes were thinner than the others. Just an oversight on my side. Mental note for the next time, or real planking: check the planking strip thicknesses before glueing!

The wood here is oiled. Looks much better than the airbrushed grain filler and is much easier to deal with. 
So, I‘m happy with the caulking and the oiled planking strips. Might be getting there soon after all.

Chris, in Germany

[Vane]

Why darker planks in the middle?

[CTDavies]

1 hour ago, Vane said:

Why darker planks in the middle?

Tosti writes in his Naiad books that the planking outside of the Binding Strakes was done in Evergreen Fir, but only on the lower deck as there wasn‘t much wear there as it was where the crew slept and there were no heavy cannons to move around.

Today I spent the whole evening sanding the deck planks smooth. Although this isn‘t right. I think the strips should only need some light sanding prior to planking but the saw marks are quite noticeable.

tomorrow I can start glueing and caulking.

Thanks for stopping by,

Chris, in Germany

[CTDavies]

Halfway there. I want to add some more Fir strips and nothing has been oil stained yet.

I‘ve had that Coldplay song in my mind all morning: “Nobody said it was easy...”

You don’t have to thank me for the ear worm 😁

[CTDavies]

The rest of the Fir planks have been added, at least as far as I want to go with them.

Test to see how it all fits.

The first layer of oil (or wax or whatever it is) has been applied.

On the bottle it says: apply one layer with soft brush (did that), wipe away excess with clean cloth (did that), repeat three times. Leave one day between each coat/layer.

Ho-hum...

...I think I’ll go and watch Master and Commander

[CTDavies]

Yes! Getting close now!

The cardboard strips were cut down to the deck planks with a small narrow Stanley knife, but still had to be sanded down to get them really flush. In the end I used 40 grit wet’n’dry stuck to small square pieces of three ply as everything else was just too tedious. Yesterday I applied the first coat of oil and let it set for 24 hours. I found a blog on the internet (in German) where someone really went into the details of using this stuff and wrote that using 240 grit towards the end leaves a matt and 360 a shiny finish. So today I used 240 grit and I‘m happy to say that I‘m very happy with the results so far. It‘s easy to see (maybe not on thevpictures) that the sheen actually comes from the wood and not just a varnish or lacquer that was slammed all over it. I am getting very close to that surface finish I‘ve been hoping to find. Tomorrow I‘ll try 360 grit to remove some last blemishes and (hopefully) get an even smoother finish.

Good night,

Chris, in Germany

Edited February 17, 2020 by CTDavies

[ccoyle]

I think the caulking looks good, but I do think that the dark planking in the middle looks odd, regardless of whether it is historically correct.

On 2/16/2020 at 6:48 AM, CTDavies said:

I‘ve had that Coldplay song in my mind all morning: “Nobody said it was easy...”

You don’t have to thank me for the ear worm 😁

I don't know any Coldplay songs, so no problem. 😉

[CTDavies]

I know what you mean ccoyle,

but the darker wood (oiled or waxed pear wood) is actually more authentic as these ships were built from oak. I like the look of the darker wood as it is just as I would imagine that oak would have looked back then. The gun deck will also be done in waxed pear wood with dark grey paper caulking.

I‘ve seen so many nice looking models with lovely box wood deck planking which actually isn‘t authentic. Also, the hatch coamings are then done in walnut to make the whole thing look like a gorgeous furniture piece which is IMO totally wrong. IF I am correct everything was done in oak back then so I‘m going to do everything in oiled pear wood

Edited February 17, 2020 by CTDavies

[CTDavies]

Update!

The sides of the other hatches have been lined with thinned pear wood strips to conceal the ply deck which was nearly white. The main mast partner was made from one piece of 3mm pear wood. I use a technique from the plastic model guys here, panel line scribing, to make it look like several parts. This will probably work here as it will be hardly visible tucked away in the catacombs of the lower deck. One or two more coats of oil are still needed here.

This is when disaster struck. The wood oil had settled down to an even but matt finish after a week so I decided to give the deck one more coat. Without really looking I grabbed the can of grain filler and only noticed it when I had finished. Duh! The whole deck was sanded down again but the filler had still penetrated the wood to some degree, so after another coat of oil the finish was not as smooth and even as it used to be. I‘ll leave it for another week to see how it looks then.

Going through Beef Wellington‘s thread I saw the deck beams, parts 7a, 8a and 9a. These are shown on the drawings but not mentioned in the text so I nearly missed them. They are, however, not all the the correct locations. They should line up with the ends of the hatches and two need to be added at the centres. For this new attachments needed to be made. I‘ve ordered 5mm pear wood to replace the plywood beams.

Some tweaking is still needed here

Thanks for looking,

chris

[CTDavies]

So just a little over four years ago I decided to put my Diana by the side for a while as I realised it might be a project too large for my skills. Also, the studs for planking the bulwarks (for lack of a better word) kept breaking off which was a royal PIA. To top ist all off, I was trying to pull a plastic model kit from out of the stash which was on the shelf above the Diana, which ended up in the whole stash coming down with some kits hitting her and breaking off four or five more studs in the process. I carefully retrieved her, glued the studs back on as well as I could and totally disheartened put her away again.

A simpler kit was definitely needed to gain some more experience. So I bought an Amati HMS Fly which was supposed to be built out of the box, but I struggled here on the second planking, as I was trying to invent my own procedures instead of adhering to the recommended ways here, which in the end didn't work out well. So the decision was made for another step down and I bought the wonderful Erycina kit from Vanguard Models together with their Saucy Jack. Erycina's hull is very slim as she was built for speed and I decided to work on her first. Success! The hull turned out beautifully as can be seen on a thread here.

 

The Saucy Jack had a more bulbous hull which, as I had expected, was a bit more of a challenge, but I got it done, and I am very satisfied with it. My second success!

The Diana and the Fly had been watching me from the distance the whole time, but I wanted to do another simpler and smaller boat before I get them back on the building board. The next project was the Amati Lady Nelson. By this time I was fairly confident with planking hulls, only this time I decided the shape the individual planks for the second planking by soaking them and bending with a bending iron and also shaping the planks laterally with a flat iron (for the required banana shape). The whole world changed! This is definitely the way to go, the Lady Nelson's hull is the best I have built so far and she turned out very well.

I have not tackled the rigging yet on any of the models, as that is the next step I need to learn.

Here you have part of my little shipyard at its current stage (I've need to learn again how to upload images here so I hope this works).

The Diana urgently needed some attention as studs were coming off again and she started to look a bit sorry for herself.

Edited June 2 by CTDavies

[CTDavies]

Where I had left of on the Diana I was in the process of rearranging the upper deck beams as the bulkheads with their appropriate beams didn't line up with the hatches and ladder ways. The beams on bulk heads 8 and 9 were ommited and 4 other ones placed around them

I also added a doubler to the rear side of beam 6 (on the left here)...

...as a large hatch for the fore hold was missing on the kit and this would be the ledge needed for the coaming carling.

 

This is where I'm at now, a nice evening's worth of modelling. The front hatch between bulkheads 6 and 7 has been added.

My wife wants her dining room back

Edited June 2 by CTDavies

[CTDavies]

The person I had bought the kit from had cut the plywood lower deck in half, which makes sence as fitting it in one piece would be extremely difficult. There is support where the deck is glied along the centre line keel part but for the other areas I glued small tabs to both halves which interlock for more support here.

the tabs are tapered at therir tips to help final assembly

the coaming carlings were glued to the lower side of the ply deck and painted white like the deck beams. There are a few gaps at the joints but these will be fixed with white filler later when the deck has been put in place

plenty of construction notes and guide lines for glueing on the deck

[CTDavies]

The lower deck looked a bit bare, so to add a bit of business, I put some pillars where I expexted some would be. The AotS didn't show any but there were some on the Pandora drawings from which I could make an estimated guess. I also looked around a bit to find some information on the colour the could have been, and while Victory, Tricomalee and Unicorn are all pretty much the same here, the Victory's pillars were painted black as well as the coaming carlings. Problem with the pillars being black is, you can hardly see them once the gun deck is on. Oh well, I know they're there... I'm glad I didn't add any ladders here.

[CTDavies]

I was a bit disappointed to see that the black pillars got totally lost under the upper (gun) deck so I painted the middle section yellow ochre hoping this would improve their visibilty a bit. Also, I still needed to add some gratings to the lower hatches that needed to be scratch built as the kit doesn't provide any materials for this. For them I ordered some generic items, which compared well size wise with others I have for 1/64th scale boats.

At least the pillars are now slightly visible, heaven knows how conspicuous they will be under five or so jolly boats, though. But to get the gratings more conspicuous I painted them (or airbrushed them is more correct as most painting I do is done with an airbrush) gloss black. The reflection of the gloss paint helped them being more visible and, although they might be too glossy as they are right now, I might just leave them this way to prevent them from getting completely lost under the upper (gun) deck and boats and wotnot.

I was thinking of adding anchor cables, but after some studying I realised that they were up on the gun deck. Question here is, would the messenger be in place all the time or would it be removed while the ship is out at sea? The anchor cables probably disappear down into the orlop deck holds through the very front hatch, but what about the messengers? Please tune in...

[DaveBaxt]

An excellent example of HMS Diana by Caldercraft and very fine workmanship. She is coming along nicely. I look forward to following your progress .Thanks for posting.

[CTDavies]

Thanks Dave, that was a very kind comment. I'm hoping I will post much more in future, although progress really takes time.

I wasn't really happy with the pillars even in yellow ochre as they also got lost in the depths of the lower deck, so I decided to go all out and paint them white, at least the upper half of them. From what I have read the ship's captain had the right to 'personalise' his ship and paint it including its interior as he felt suitable. From brousing through books I couls see that on the Victory they were dark brown or black, on the Trincomalee also but on old pictures of the Implacable I could see two colour tones, so from this I assume there wasn't a strict code to adhere to. So mine are now white, at least the upper half of them is.

I also painted the gratings gloss dark brown so that they remain conspicuous once everything has been buttoned up. Not 100% accurate but at least they can still be seen from the top, but only just.

 

I started on the ladders just to see how they all fit into the scheme of things. Maybe a bit too chunky?

 

The gun deck gratings will eventually cover everything up here, but I will leave the hatches open as if the ship is being loaded right now.

 

A PIA was me being ham fisted all along and breaking off the the extensions on the bulkheads for the bulwalk planking and quarter deck beams. I decided it was time for a real fix here.

Oh yes, extending the front main hatch as described in my previous post was wrong. So this was reversed.

 

Edited July 26 by CTDavies

[CTDavies]

From our short holiday in Den Helder, north-west Holland. Previously know as Willemsoord, this is where the Dutch Royal Navy was stationed for the past 300 or so years. This is the No.1 dock there, where the (ex HMS) Diana was destroyed in a fire. This place is a lot like the historic docks in Plymouth and I’m going back tomorrow to check some of the historic buildings there.