Flying Cloud - deck parts

Finally have all the deck parts constructed and ready for primer.

I knew there was a good reason why I kept those old lazy susans.

They make it easy to spray these parts from all sides.

This is just the primer coat.

May need another.



Flying Cloud - copper bottom

The old wooden ships were vulnerable to all the critters that live in the water and like to eat wood.  So the builders covered the bottom with copper plates.  There are a couple of different approaches to doing this on a model.  I decided to use the adheasive-backed copper foil tape that is generally used in stained glass applications.  Here's how it works.  The hull is nearly covered here:



The copper foil comes in a roll.

Roughly measure a length to install.

Then put the copper strip into a "jig" to hold it in place upside-down.

Next, cover it with a strip of wood that's a little narrower than the copper.

Then, use this handy pattern making tool to "dimple" the foil from the back.

The effect is almost looks like rivits.

Now, a little more detail every half inch.

Looks a lot like copper plates.

Peal off the paper backing and apply the copper strip to the bottom.

Use a sharp blade to cut off the ends.

After a few more strips, the bottom is completely covered.

Flying Cloud - Bending wood

Flying Cloud has a nice rounded stern which required some wood bending.

Wood bends easier when it's wet, so I built this "soaking tank" for long strips of wood.  It's filled with water.

Hook the wood strip with a handy clothes pin and drop it into the tank for a couple of hours - overnight is better for harder wood with tighter bends.

I cut a form in the shape of the stern and wrapped the soft wet wood around it and left to dry.

Now it can be glued in place.

1986 Corsair F4U-1

The Corsair F4U-1 was my second attempt at building a model airplane. The first had been a rubber-band powered Cessna 150 that came to a bad end when my cat thought it was "interesting." This is a Guillows kit that was fairly easy to build, even for the amateur I was at the time. Rather than using the fabric skin that came with the kit, I decided to use very thin balsa, making it heavier but stronger. I built it as a "control line" flyer and put a big motor in it. But after the hundreds of hour I put into building it, I could never bring my self to fly it.

1996 Golden Hind

Golden Hind was Sir Francis Drake's famous ship and seemed like a good choice for my next model. The kit is by Mamoli and was fairly well supplied. I did have to make many of my own parts since the delivered ones were just junk. I begain construction sometime in 1996 and took forever to complete, working only a couple of hours each night after work. I also discovered (invented) a better way of making the rigging and think the result looks much better.

1992 Spray

In about 1992, I had just read "Sailing Alone Around the World" by Joshua Slocum when I found a kit of Spray by Laughing Whale. The parts were very good quality - laser cut and nice wood. I though about Mr. Slocum as I constructed this model. The history is quite interesting and worthy of its own blog, so I'll stick to the model construction. I though it would look good with sails since the scale was not so far off as to make the cloth look stupid. So I sewed a suit of sails from starched cloth with small guage brass wire sewn into the edges to keep them straight.

1988 Le Hussard

My first attempt at building a wooden ship model began in about 1988. I purchased an Artisania Latina kit of Le Hussard a French naval training vessel. I was displeased to find that many of the parts were poorly cut and/or ugly in some respect. The instructions were also vague and incomplete. But I kept working - making many of my own parts as necessary - tucked away in a converted closet in our condo in Emeryville. Construction was completed several years later and the finished model is okay I think (for a first attempt).