Stern Decoration

I would hate to have to guess any many hours work have been put into the model at this stage, and I doubt I'm halfway through the build yet.

A lot of time was spent very early on in the build making sure that all the decoration etc was going to fit, I can not stress this enough it is far better to spend another week if needed to get things right at the beginning, than have to start taking things apart or altering things at this stage. Before gluing something in place have a look what fits to it or how it effects other things around it.

Take for example before gluing the brass moulding above the windows on the stern I checked to see that the coat of arms and crown would fit into place.

Various close ups of the stern galleries, as with all things on ship modelling there really is no quick way of achieving a clean look, other than patience and even more patience.

The decoration along the top of the coat of arms is actually cut into 2, the slight gap is under the coat of arms so as not to be visible.

I decided after looking at other peoples examples of the San Felipe to paint the coat of arms in red and white, it also adds a little colour to the model.

The openings under the gallery where the rear canons will be are to be blacked out at a later stage.

Now I painted the bottom gallery blue and started to fit the cast decorations, I started in the middle and worked either side. Four or five of the corner ones had to been curved in both directions, this was done over a shaped block of wood and gently hammered into the correct shape.

Gallery Detail

I decided not to paint the bottom gallery blue until later in the build when all the rest of the stern work had been completed, this would stop any glue etc getting on the painted surface while handling it to fit the handrails etc.

Gluing the handrails around the stern, I used alraldite rapid glue to do this, it is a 2 part epoxy resin that is very strong when cured. It also is a slight gap filling glue (as opposed to super glue that is not) It also allows a lot more working time (about 10 minutes)

Another view of the columns, the process can be seen more easily looking at the end section.

I had to make a few brass columns, I started with a 3mm brass rod cut over length, placed in a cordless drill and turned using various files, the column was then cut to length and then filed in half as it was to be used against the forecastle. They turned out very nice , I was more than happy with the results.

Painting Blue And Stern Detail

The line between the varnished hull and the blue at the forecastle will eventually have a brass moulding to bridge the line, this will be the same along the hull to the stern.

A close up of the detail on the stern

A view of the stern, the details around the doors and windows have been painted blue and then a gold applied, the stern was painted black in the correct place before gluing the windows in position.

The bow gratings, these were made with 0.5mm x 3mm lime strip and 1mm x 1mm walnut

A general view of the hull at this stage, I am very pleased with the construction so far.

I decided to leave the gallery unpainted (this will be blue eventually) for the time being while I worked on the rest of the stern, this will help avoid any marks on the finished surface.

Trying to decide on the shade of blue, I tried several types of paint both water based and enamel before I decided on the Mantua range, these are water based enamels, I mixed a blue with a white until I was happy with the colour. I made sure that I had mixed enough to do all the painting of the blue with some spare for touching up at a later date, hopefully avoiding the need to mix any more and trying to match the shade.

I decided to cut the rear supports for the balustrade's around the stern from solid as it was to tight a curve to bend successfully from 5 x 2 walnut. In the end this was a very wise choice and worked out very nicely.

Ballustrading And Side Rails

Another view of the forecastle, the large square holes are where the gratings will be positioned. The ends of the dowel will be eventually a thin piece of lime.

A brass decorative moulding was applied to the forecastle handrail, very difficult to do neatly as the brass moulding had to be bent in its width, and was very stiff indeed and took several failed attempts to get right.

It was very difficult trying to bend the brass moulding in the width, a very helpful chap on the ship modeling forum told me about this method. It evolves putting a series of screws and bending around the screws, this way the brass cannot lift and distort.

The front circular gun ports took a good few evenings to get exactly correct, 2 mm dowelling was used to form all the balustrade's, this was quite tricky as the balustrade's had to be square to the water line (or plumb) and not square to the handrail, much in the same way it is when you walk up a stair case.

Close up of the gun ports, the bottom 2 layers had to be lined out with 0.5 x 3 mm to mask the different layers of timber through the hull (lime / walnut ) the top layer did not need this as there are to be brass inserts placed into the openings. The circular gun ports have now been cut out this was done in much the same way and adjusted with a small rotary sanding drum used in my miniature drill. Inside the gun ports will be eventually blacked out. If you look closely (click on the photo to enlarge) you can clearly see the 3 layers of the hull construction in the top row of square gun ports (walnut / lime / walnut)

View from the stern, there is still 4 gun ports to cut out on the stern just above the moulding that returns across the back of the ship, that is one of the next jobs and will make it 108 gun ports that I have cut out !

An overall view of the hull with the side moulding in position, its finally starting to look something now, and each piece quite rewarding, in the early stages of construction you could spend a week on planking the hull and it did not look much different. Still years of work left but certainly broke the back of the monotonous work.

It was well worth spending a lot of time in getting the bending correct,it helped enormously when trying to glue the mouldings in place, you can clearly see the degree of the bend / twist in the photo above.

The blocks were glued into position before steaming and bending the side mouldings to shape, masking tape was used to set out a line were the mouldings would be applied, the mouldings could then be glued under the line of masking tape and then the masking tape removed.

The front blocks had to be carved to take a decorative brass moulding at a later stage, this proved to be very time consuming, I started with a square piece of American Black Walnut and slowly shaped it to suit the curvature of the hull, it then had to be shaped in all 3 directions, the only flat being where it is adhered to the keel.

Cutting Out Gunports

A close up of the tracing paper also showing the circular gun ports.The tracing paper had been very accurately cut to the shape of the top of the hull much in the same way that the cardboard template.

I then placed a fresh sheet of tracing paper over the hull and marked all the centre of the gun ports this would hopefully save working out the other side.

The light you can see behind the hull is a daylight lamp which is an absolute must for modelling it produces a very natural light while remaining very cool unlike spot lights that make you very hot while working under them. Made by the daylight company.

This proved to be the easiest way of removing the waste from the gun ports by drilling a series of holes about 2mm in diameter around the inside edge and then using a knife to join the holes up and remove the rest of the waste. It was then finally finished with a file.

You can see from this photo that the blocks for the dummy canons worked out very good for centre with only a couple being sightly to one side, but not enough to hinder the placement of the canons.

I will in due course black all the blocks out so as not to be visible.

It was time to mark out the the top line of gun ports, these had to be a different size to accept a brass casting, I also temporary made up a gun carriage to make sure the gun would be in the centre of the opening, this again proved to be quite good with only having to raise the opening about 2 to 3 mm.

The gun ports on the bottom and the second from bottom were lined with walnut .5 x 3mm this was almost as time consuming as cutting the gun ports themselves.

I found it much easier to lay a piece of masking tape over the hull to mark out the gun ports and were positioned in such a way that they were square to the water line.

The centres all worked quite acceptable with the blocks inside the hull for the dummy canons.

It was time to cut out the gun ports, I had already transferred the centre lines onto a sheet of tracing paper before sealing the hull with varnish.

I laid the template onto the hull and drilled a small hole through the centre of the gun port and then laid the tracing paper over the hull again and compared the centre lines with the drilled hole and adjusted to suit.