So this isn’t exactly a ship, but hey. I’m building a rowboat from styrene. As you can see, I’m having more than a little trouble with the overlap and compound curves toward the front. I’ve never tried this before, so I figured maybe you boat people could tell me how to do this the right way. Oh, and I didn’t scribe any woodgrain in either… Maybe on the other side.
Any help would be appreciated. Thanks, Kevin
Hi Kevin, Its the weekend so you might have to wait for more guys to answer your question. I’ve built quite a few ships in my years of building. Some were the wooden kits from overseas as you can see by my avatar. I’m no expert by any means but I’ll be glad to give you my [2cnts] worth. First of all you should build it on a flat surface upside down. Your planks should be started one on each side so the boat will not tend to warp or twist. As you add planks, taper the ends at the bow so that they butt up against the keel smoothly and evenly and still keep adding them one to each side. The last 2 that you add will be the ones that butt against the keel and you can trim them to the size and shape you need.
The one you have in your hand looks pretty good but will need lots of putty and lots of sanding. The whole idea is to trial fit each plank as many times as necessary to get a good fit that will not need much sanding or filling and will keep the finished project straight and true.
Hope this helps you. If I can be of any more help, please feel free to PM me and I’ll see what I can do for you. Good luck with your project.
Jim [cptn]
Thanks for the advice, got some real nice builds there. I had started with the top plank on each side to hold the shape but doing them all evenly makes more sense. On the next side I’ll try trimming them to fit exactly rather than letting them overlap. I may just have to build another one to practice after I finish this one, it’s quite fun!
The same problem occurs with wood planked boats. The strips are extruded, milled, or cut to standard sizes. The boat hull is made of compound curves, and requires planks that are slightly curved for the run of the plank. A 10" wide board may yield a 7" slightly curved plank to fit the hull. I recently built the Legend Model Boats kit of the 1963 Lyman 25’ soft top sleeper - the planks were laser cut, most with a slight “S” shape in them. A piece of 1/8" x 3" balsa would provide 2 curved planks about 3/4" wide.
Try lapstrake boat structure. A very large [insert appropriate idiomatic colloquialism]!
bevel the sides of each peice so that the joints between each piece is flush not v-groove.
What you need to do is called spiling. It means measuring the shape of a curved plank, and transferring that shape to a piece of wood or plastic. You need to start with a wider strip than the width of the plank, or cut the plank from a sheet of styrene rather than a plank. Find a book on building plank-on-frame and plank-on-bulkhead models. The procedure is too involved to include in a forum message. Or, try searching for “hull planking” and planked ship models in a good search engine.
Thanks for the advice, guys. I’ll have to head on over to Google and do some research. Seems like this could be an interesting and educational project.
With regards to the wood grain; there shouldn’t be much in that scale, but I’ve seen some great grain done in plastic for things like wood fences or structures using cheap brass cleaning brushes:
The geometry issues have been answered.
A tip to make applying the strips easier to the curve is to attach them to a wood or such shaped the same as the hull and heat in boiling water for a few seconds so the styrene strips hold the shape of the hull.
Once cooled the strips will retain the shape. Use a large pot and avoid the edges.