It looks fantastic. The wood working is stellar.

I’m currently planking my hull. I hope to come close to the precision you’ve demonstrated. Stunning.

Chris

Lovely work Erik. Your work on the build shows the careful handling of the materials That sanded planking made me jealous, nicely executed indeed. The serving machine looks interesting, I'm curious to see it in operation or at least pictures of it in operation.

Michael

Thanks again guys! Chris, with how your longboat turned out, I don't doubt that your planking will look great. Michael, I'm looking forward to seeing how the serving machine works. It looks to be well engineered.

Erik

I did some actual work on my Cheerful today. First time in a year! I permanently glued on the bowsprit. I had made and fitted the bowsprit a year or so ago. It took a while since it was my first attempt at shaping a round spar from a square piece of wood. I don't have a lathe, so all my spars are made without power tools. A bit time consuming, but the results turned out decent.

Fitting the bowsprit correctly to the deck involves a fare amount of pain-in-the-assness (not a real word, but it's applicable in this situation!) My attempts to use small round and half round files to create the hole through the bulwarks was unsuccessful, so I wound up buying a round file used for sharpening chainsaws that was the correct diameter. This worked well, but I realized since my bowsprit was shaped by hand that it was not perfectly round where it exited the bulwarks. I did the best I could to make a snug fit without a gap, and I think the results are acceptable. The bowsprit is perfectly parallel to the keel, is at the correct vertical angle, and sits correctly in the bowsprit step. Gluing it all together was a bit tricky.

A note on the photos, since I use a very bright halogen bulb for photography, what looks like white on the black paint is just glare from the light.

Lastly, in my past photos of my canons/carronades they have looked black, rather than showing the rust weathering powder I used. The second photo of the installed bowsprit below shows a good likeness of how the simulated cast iron really looks. Woohoo!

Erik

Nice work on the bowsprit. The rust turned out great also.

C

It almost hurts my eyes (in a good way), such clean work Erik!🫨

Lovely work!

I'm still getting prepped to begin rigging. Over the last several days I made a bunch of thimbles, a new process for me. I'll need 4 initially . . . so I made 28. Haha. Some are pretty ugly, but I'll be able to get 4 good ones out of the bunch. Today, I served all the rope I'll need for the bobstay and both bowsprit guys. This was done by serving .025" dark brown rope. It was my first time serving rope. It's really pretty easy. The first couple of inches look rough, and it took a couple times doing the transitions of moving the 8" I completed over and starting again to get that looking seamless. I used a 50/50 mix of white glue/water applied and wiped off with my fingers to set the serving in place before I moved it over/took it off. I'll need about 27" of served rope total for the bobstay and bowsprit guys. I think I served 34" or so, so I should be able to select the most pristine runs of around 9" for use.

For some reason I was super nervous about serving the rope. Once I started though, it turned out to be much ado about nothing. Chuck has a good minute long video on the Syren Models website that shows the ideal tension and positioning of the serving thread while you are serving. I would recommend if you're serving a long length that you'll need to move over, tape the serving thread under tension (as seen in my photos), and apply the 50/50 glue mix and let dry before you take the tape off. That way the serving thread won't unravel at all.

Erik

You are starting my favourite part of making ship models. The serving looks good from here. I am sure given the quality of your previous work, the rigging will also be great.

Another excellent build of Cheerful for me to reference when the time comes for me to build mine. Do you remember the brand of red paint that you used?

That looks excellent...well done. Are you sure you havent been serving rope for years!!!

43 minutes ago, Aunt Emma said:

Another excellent build of Cheerful for me to reference when the time comes for me to build mine. Do you remember the brand of red paint that you used?

Not only do I remember, I have a photo! Haha. It's Vallejo 70.957 Flat Red. For the black I used Vallejo 70.950 Black. I highly recommend these paints. They are the best I've used for brush painting. What you see below was brush painted. Vallejo paints have a super fine pigment that does not leave brush strokes. I would squeeze out a little blob of paint on an old plastic lid, add a bit of water, mix, and then apply 3 or 4 coats to get the finish below. It's best to practice on a piece of scrap wood to figure out what works best for you.

Erik

Thank for the kind words!

Thukydides, I'm looking forward to this phase of the build. Aside, from rigging my longboat model, and the armament on Cheerful, this will be my first foray into rigging.

Chuck, the hard part was not zoning out as I was doing the serving. Once I got the hang of it, the couple imperfections were from momentary lapses in concentration! lol.

Erik

Wanting to at least get to the starting line with the rigging, I seized the lower double block which will be located on the tip of the bowsprit used for the bobstay tackle. I'm following Chuck's stropping blocks method he's shared with the forum here: https://drydockmodeler.com/index.php?/topic/48-a-tutorial-about-one-model-builders-simplified-method-for-stropping-blocks/ . It keeps the seizings from looking too bulky. I had ordered Quadhands last Sunday, that should be arriving tomorrow. My jury rigged helping hand can be seen below. It's not much of a help!

I realize one of my challenges with rigging will be how to hold things as I'm preforming the process. I feel like I'm all thumbs at this point, with things unraveling and popping apart constantly. Thankfully I live alone, so continuous cussing is not a problem. Haha.

Erik

Erik

That is a very convincing false splice on the end of the block. Very good for just starting out.

As Chuck said Erik, nice job with that 'false' splice,; looks very neat and tidy.

cheers

Pat

Erik- beautiful planking and deck furniture. Did you paint the black metalwork?

1 hour ago, CiscoH said:

Erik- beautiful planking and deck furniture. Did you paint the black metalwork?

Thanks for the compliments. Yes, the brass metalwork is painted. I then baked it under a halogen bulb about an inch away for 5 minutes or so. This makes the paint harder and less likely to chip. I then used a dark rust weathering powder which gives it a more cast iron look.

Erik

I did the first bit of rigging on my Cheerful (besides the carronades/cannons). It felt good. I'm still getting up to speed on making the seizings, etc. So these early attempts will be improved upon the more experience I get. But the results so far are pretty good for being a novice at this. I rigged the bobstay today and added the 4 blocks to the tip of the bowsprit. The bobstay is made up of .025" dark brown rope that I served a few days ago. The other portion of the bobstay is .012" tan rope run through a single and a double block and temporarily belayed around a belaying pin and cleat. I'll tension this and fasten it permanently when the rest of the rigging is done. I did notice in looking at the last photo below that the eye bolt on the right side of the photo (opposite side of the Bowsprit's shadow) is not inserted all the way, so I pulled that out trimmed the end a bit, and re glued in seated correctly.

Erik