Planking the Hull (1st Layer) - Part 3

With the first 2 bands in place, it's time to change things and do the last 2 bands from the bottom (keel) up.

The first plank on each side will be the garboard plank.  I couldn't really find a good definition of what this is, other than the 1st plank laid next to the keel of a ship.  Checking around a few of the modeling sites, I found a bit more info - it's thicker then the other planks and is an odd shape (well, they gave a bit more info, but I couldn't really see what the actual purpose of it was so I would know if I was doing it correctly).  They also gave very detailed steps about how to figure out the shape, but it was just too much to figure out...

After a couple of hours I found something called The Matthew Project (not the drug and alcohol support one) that explained it so that it finally made sense... the garboard plank should naturally lay flat along the keel.  This means shaping the edge against the keel so that it will lay naturally (i.e., not forced into position), and leaving the unshaped edge facing away from the keel (i.e., for the next plank to lay flush against it).  There were pictures which made it much clearer.

The detailed steps I mentioned earlier now sort of made sense, but instead of trying to follow them I just went with the "trial and error" method, carefully sanding each strip (1 for each side of the ship) until they laid naturally against the keel.

Using some CA glue, I carefully attached them to the hull, twisting the stretch along the stern section so it lay flat against the keel.  I know it is not perfect, but it looks good!

 

After letting that dry overnight (more because it was late when I did it...), I began on the bottom band of the hull, the one next to the garboard plank.  Like the previous band I did, I think the planks at the bow are supposed to be spiled, but I settled for simply having them end the way I did instead; when I do the last band, I will spile those ones.  Also, it was hard to twist the stern ends of the planks so they lay flat against the keel - with some sanding they should be okay, tho.

 

 

 

 

 

With 6 of the 7 planks done in the bottom band on both sides, I decided to wait and include that last plank in the last band; it is going to include a "stealer" plank (so it actually works out to 8 bands at the end, rather than 7), so I figured it would be best to wait until I was ready to do the planks immediately above it.  A stealer plank is basically an extra plank used to fill wide gaps, such as are found at the stern; the Mayflower needs 2 of these types of planks, as per the instructions (i.e., so these 2 gaps are not because I did the planking wrong...).  One of the planks is notched out to accept the end of the other plank (in this case, both will be half their width when they join up), then they both taper out to their full width at the stern.

One of the stealers will be at the top of the bottom band, and the other will be in the last strip I do, so the top of the last band.  Previously I would have just filled these gaps with scraps of appropriately shaped strips, but this time I'm going to do it the "correct" way.

After cutting and shaping most of the remaining planks (i.e., all but the last full one), and while they were soaking in water so I could spile them, I used a flat file to widen the 4 gun ports on the port side.

 

 

The first stealer worked out alright, although I should have pushed the notched out sections together a bit more while the glue was drying; I'll have to make sure I do better on the next one.

With almost all the rest of the planks in place on the port side, I see I've got 2 slight problems... about mid-ship, the gap is slightly wider than 1 full plank (maybe 1.5 mms?), and at the stern it is wider than 2 full planks (1 of the previous strips isn't quite sitting flat against the keel, so it didn't quite cover enough of the hull at the stern).  I should be able to address these issues with just a bit of extra work...

 

I've completed the starboard side to the same point as the port side (including widening the 4 gun ports on that side), and have similar - but different - problems as I do on the port side.  Nothing horribly wrong, especially since it is only the 1st layer of planking...

 

I could fix them all by just filling the gaps with thin strips of wood, tapered to points, but I want to at least maintain something I read about never taper a plank to less than half it's width (as much as possible, that is... if you look closely at previous pictures, you'll see I didn't quite succeed with some of the bow planks in the bottom band...).

I managed to finish the first layer of planking on the hull, and it took less than a week (being on vacation didn't hurt, as I was able to focus on getting it done).  I'm surprised it went so fast, and actually turned out okay - not great, but it looks significantly better than any of my previous ships at the same stage.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I also went back over it and filled in some of the more noticeable gaps with wood filler; once that has had a chance to dry I'll start on trimming the edges of the planks that went past the stern and then begin sanding the hull smooth.  There probably won't be much to add to this blog while that's going on, so I'll just throw some pictures at the bottom of this one as I go and then start a new one as I move on to the next stage, which will be doing work on some of the decks (e.g., adding hatches, laying the decking and the first bit of staining).

 

 

 

 

 

Sanding in process (first run through with the Dremel, then, once all of the really rough edges were smoothed down, used progressively higher grits of sandpaper to get the final finish):

 

 

 

A slight bulge in the hull: 

My attempt to fix it (I sanded it a bit to much - the plank was almost paper thin when I was done, so I had to build it up again using a small sliver of wood and some sawdust mixed with white wood glue - once it dries I'll re-sand it and go with however it turns out...)

 

 

 

  

Fixing the bow (I had to add a strip of wood to bring the height up, then some wood filler followed by sanding):

 

 

 

All-in-all, I think the planked hull turned out quite well!  So well that I don't think I am going to do the 2nd layer of planking later on (it is optional from a bit below the gun ports)!  I am even considering just staining the hull instead of painting it white (although there will be lots of opportunities for staining later, including most of the upper part of the ship, so I probably will just go with the white paint)...

 

Next up is creating a number of hatches for the decks, and then adding and staining most of the decking (two of the decks - the small one at the bow right below the 'E' in the above picture, and the 2nd one from the stern - are done later).

 

FYI: Today is the last day of my vacation, so updates from here on out won't be as frequent as they have been this past week... at least until my next vacation in October...

Planking the Hull (1st Layer) - Part 2

With the 1st band of hull planks in place, it's time to start planking the rest of the hull.  In my previous ships (and that initial layer), I always just did this 1 strip at a time, measuring and trimming each plank as I went.  But for the rest of the hull I'm going to follow some of the guidelines on the web (including one by Chuck Passro, the guy who designed this model) about planking a ship.

This is going to be a much more detail-oriented process than I'm used to, so I'll see how it goes with the next band.

To start, I know I will have 3 more bands, so I need to figure out how many planks need to be in each band.  Measuring from the bottom of the 1st band to the bottom of the ship, it is 67mm at the middle bulkhead (it is the same on both sides).  Each strip of wood is 3.2 mm wide (more like 3.3 mm with the gap between them), so to cover the rest of the hull requires 19 planks plus the garboard plank (a wider plank that goes at the very bottom of the ship).  Divided by 3 bands, that is 6 for 2 of the bands and 7 for the one with the garboard plank.

Next, I marked the width of each band on a tick strip (aka a plain piece of paper...) and then transferred those marks to the middle bulkhead of the model.  Using those marks as a starting point, I taped a piece of thread to the middle bulkhead, and then positioned the other ends of the thread at both the bow and the stern of the ship until I was satisfied with the overall curve of the band; I taped both ends.

 

 

 

 

I repeated this step for the other band on one side, then repeated the process for the other side of the ship, making sure the bow and stern end points matched.  Once done, this will enable me to get the width of each band at every bulkhead.

Now that I have the width of each band, I calculated how wide each strip would need to be at each bulkhead in order to maintain the curve.  For example, the planks for the top band (below the one I already did) are mostly the full width of each strip except at the stern they each need to taper to 95% of their width for the last 43 mm and at the bow they need to taper to 80% of their width for the last 77mm, plus they need to be "spiled" (another new technique for me - bending the strips along the edges instead of the width) to get the curve for the bow...

To practice spiling, I used the template which came with the kit and glued it to a scrap piece of wood.  Then I soaked 3 short pieces of wood for about 10 minutes before gently bending them around the template and locking them in place using 2 small pieces of scrap planking as "stops" (the stops and template together are a "jig").  Once they've had a chance to dry, I'll see if the spiling will make a difference.

The empty jig:

 

With the 3 strips inserted:

 

 

After leaving the pieces in the jig overnight, I took them out and they retained their curved shape.  After a quick test fit on the hull, it looks like it will worth, with the planks running smoother together than the earlier ones which were not spiled.  Of course, I probably should have tapered the strips before putting them in the jig, but I should be able to do that with the spiled planks; I'll just need to make sure they still fit neatly together.

The final strips after drying overnight:

While the spiling did seem to work, it is time consuming as the wood needs to remain in the jig long enough to fully dry (e.g., overnight), otherwise they won't retain the correct curve, plus the jig can only do 3 at a time and I'll need probably 30 of them to do both sides of the hull (I won't need to do all of the strips in the bottom band).  If I try to make it hold more by moving the stops, there might not be enough pressure to hold the centre pieces tightly in place.

I could use the 3 pieces I just made and create more jigs, which would allow me to do 12 at a time, but before I do that I am going to try to manually create the required curve with the electric plank bender.  If that works, it would probably be better as I could make them as needed.

Another option is to make the curve by actually cutting the planks to the required shape, but I'd need wider planks to obtain the correct curves, which the kit doesn't have.  I could glue 2 pieces together and get the curve that way, but I'm not sure if the kit includes enough spare wood for that, plus I'm not sure how the wider planks would affect the overall planking.

Okay, so the electric plank bender worked, and of the 12 strips I curved that way, only 2 of them cracked while making the bend (they didn't break so I could still use them).  As you can see, these spiled planks fit together smoother than the first band I did - it's still not perfect, but compared to my previous models it's a significant improvement!  Plus I still need to sand (and use wood filler in some places...) everything smooth before this 1st layer is complete.

 

The 2nd band completed on the starboard side of the ship:

 

 

 

At the bow (looks crappy... I'll need to use some slivers of wood to make the planks line up with the keel):

 

 

I did better on the port side - it'll be easier to cut the ends then to try to extend them:

 

 

 

 

Both bands fully in place:

 

 

The stern (obviously I still need to trim the wood so the ends are flush with the boat's stern):

 

Bottom view showing what is left to plank.  This will be made of 2 more bands, and I will start from the bottom (the band with the garboard plank).