did you remove some material under the flange of teh hull or on the back of the bullwark piece to fit it inside ? I have a lot of material in that corner...

Hello TBowman,

Just found your build page. Congratulations on getting a SC&H ship. These ships are by far the coolest looking ships on the water. I see your posting that your shipyard is in San Jose. Your only 21 miles away from where I berth hull #20 HMS Surprise in San Leandro / Castro Valley. I do not have the skills that you and the others here have for the build. I was so lucky to have talked and met FormerParatrooper and his first mate Renee. They are a great couple and I am now the new Captain of his beautiful USS Surprise.

I hope to be able to sail with you one day soon. I have been looking for local Captains in and around Cailfornia. If I can be of any assistance and I am not sure what I have to offer but support, please feel free to send a howdie anytime.

Again, Congratulations and I will be enjoying following you here on your build.

Gary

Looking good Tim. Looks like you're going for the six plank look on the inside bulwarks. Did you have to cut any slits in the back to get them to bend flush to the hull piece?

Hi meatbomber- I will remove the top, back edge on the bulwark 45 degree angle to allow for that radius on the hull's inner top corner. This is the next step along with scribing the planks and locating all the gun hardware at each gunport.

Hello Gary - I am so glad to hear from you. After reading Paratrooper's post of the sale and it's new home, I was hoping that someday I would be able to find it's new owner. It will be some time before mine is ready for sail but any input during th build is much appreciated. Hope we can meet at some point and one day sail them together!

Hi Andrew - I haven't done anything to the bulwarks backside yet. I didn't plan on scoring them, only heating them in the sun as recommended by Philip. Should be able to get them completed this weekend.

best regards to all
Tim

Hey Tim,

I too will enjoy running into you sometime.

This will be a bit off topic, I will not do this often.

With that said, I would like to invite you to a event held in San Francisco called Wooden Boats on Parade. A chance to meet and share tricks on builds from many of the local best builders. This event is held by the San Francisco Model Yacht Club once every other year. Folks come from near and far to display and show off the museum quality builds that they have lovenly built and in many cases over years. I will have the HMS Surprise moored for display. I have been given a prime spot to show her. This will be held this year on September 30th on a Sunday. It starts at 9:00a.m. and will go to 1:00pm and beyond.

This is a large event and a must see. I have been a member of the SFMYC since 2008 and they have something going on all the time and something special at least once a month.

Forgot to say where. Its in Golden Gate Park at Spreckles Lake at the corner of 36th ave and Fulton St

Hope you can make it.

Gary

Hi Gary

Thanks for the information. I'm going to try and make it up there. Always good to look at cool models. : )

take care
Tim

Hi everyone

Withe the scribing done on the bulwarks, My impatience got the best of me. Decided to fit the bulwarks and mark the gun ports to get the openings roughed out in the hull. Will follow up with the smaller, oar holes.











corner holes are drilled


openings are cut out with a dremel




check alignment once again






everything seems OK. The holes are still slightly undersized so some room for minor adjustments before they are cleaned up. Starting to look like a ship of war. : )

Tim

Deck check







more soon
Tim

Tim,
Beautiful work.
Tip - lay out all the below deck stuff and do a temporary "check" installation before permanently installing the deck.
Consider moving the battery from the suggested forward position to behind the mainmast. I found Syren bow heavy and moved the battery back.
I used auto body Bondo (the 2-part stuff - green color and with fiber content making it thick and less "runny" than epoxy) to fix and seal along the under-deck seam. Used rubber gloves and fingers to spread the Bondo. Also used sticks shaped like paddles (made from scrap wood) to reach farther inside to bow and stern.
Deck install and sealing was the hardest part of the build for me.

Gary put me on to your build so I have tagged it on my machine to keep up with your work. I noted that all the old hands are on board.

These are the best ship kits. I thoroughly enjoyed my build and learning to sail. Even though I am off Empire Building now I still enjoy watching some of these threads.

I might add to Dan L's suggestions and advise you to consider winch servos rather than the arm type. I found on Surprise the first time I tried the arm type that the servo had a tough time holding the wind line if I had a lot of canvas up. I changed over to drum winches as Dan designed and I found that I was able to get a whole lot more travel on the yards as well as holding them on the wind line.

If you can--get over and meet Gary. Some of the models in their club are fantastic.

I am looking forward to seeing your progress.

RG

Might the 2-part putty type epoxy work under the deck? You can roll out a worm of it and push it in with your fingers making a fillet.

Thank you all for the interest and great tips.

I plan on finishing all the dirty work on the outer hull (gun port clean up, scribing the planking etc.) before gluing the deck in place. This will give me plenty of time to work on the drum servos and their layout per Dan's good advice. I will admit, I'm not looking forward to the "deck gluing" part.

The stern gun ports are marked and I'll get those cut out today so I can fabricate the inner, stern bulwark. Will also get the oar ports opened up.

Happy Sailing
Tim

Paratrooper- Happy to see you here still. The work I have seen on your new hobby is amazing. I've had the pleasure of seeing many of those steam trains up close and even ride them. Great fun!

The fun continues

Did a quick clean up of the gun ports as I can't complete them until the bulwarks are bonded in place. The same will be true for the smaller oar openings. Also roughed the chaser ports and made the basic shape for the inner bulwark piece(not shown here). The good news is that the oar ports were simpler to file square then I thought they were going to be. not 100% satisfied with the location of the chaser ports but I made several templates before committing. The plans for the Cruiser class seemed different then the Irene as far as the gun ports. I know Irene has a decorative transom but in the plans the ports looked closer to center. oh well....moving forward. : )













It's good to be sanding the hull...makes me feel like I'm making progress. ha ha

Tim

Excellent! It is starting to look great.

Thanks Paratrooper

Finished rough-filing all the oar ports. Happy with the results and looking forward to continuing on the exterior hull detailing.







more soon
tim