Hi
I would not use basswood if you are going to stain or have it be natural wood finish. It's a softer wood and has poor grain which doesn't look great when stained. The grain is very open and coarse. It is typically used for structural work on models, and covered over with a thin veneer of quality hardwood. It bends well after soaking in water, but the coarse grain will splinter if you bend it too far. However, if you are painting the wood, it will work just fine. The open grain may give the finish a rough look, however, so sealing and sanding should be done before painting if you want it smooth. It doesn't want to get super smooth with sanding alone, and retains a slightly rough, hairy surface. It is very cheap to buy. Popsicle sticks are made from basswood, so you know what that's like. Experiment with finishing before you commit to using basswood as your finish layer wood. If you want an inexpensive wood that's easily available in the U.S.A. for deck planking, try maple, and for the hull, cherry or walnut. I'm not sure what woods are easy to get in Australia or New Zealand. I always wanted to visit those countries!
I went for Birch, mainly because it was the quickest available ply I could source. (I hate being held up waiting for deliveries).
This is for compartment walls in the hold and is barely visible on the finished model
About 18 months ago learned from an ice cream guru that popsicle sticks are made from birchwood and willowood the majority of the time but basswood and aspen are used on occasion. I am part way along a project (currently on hold) for a client that wanted the entire model of the Atocha 1620 made from popsicle sticks from his ice cream bar, Doozee. The color of the sticks varies a lot, and not nearly as nice to work with as box, castello, apple or pear. But, it is much better than the open grained sapelli (so called walnut) junk seen so often. The length of the sticks also makes things a bit difficult at times, but not too bad depending on the scale of the model. A pic from part way through the build is below. Some rework needs to be done, but nothing major. The entire build is somewhat speculative as there is virtually no contemporary information as found in later years, so a lot of fun making best guesses and using drawings by Fouret et al. The sticks have the ice cream store name on one side so I flipped over most of them, so the name is not shown on every plank. Per his request I did not flip all of them as he wanted some of them shown as you can see in the photo.
Very cool Allan, very impressive. So, how many popsicles have you devoured to get to this point
. Cheers Grant
) I hope he gave you new sticks and not ones from a collection bin outside his establishment! I built this plank on bulkhead and used birch veneer plywood for the bulkheads. While there are no contemporary drawings in existence, I spoke with the folks at the Mel Fisher Museum in Key West and was told the drawing I had found below was a reasonable conjecture. I took the first drawing below as my base then made the second drawing below for the bulkheads. It was not an overly long or difficult part of the project.
Allan, I don’t wish to be rude, but this thread is for my Anatomy of Nelsons HMS Victory
You are absolutely correct. I did get into the wood discussion and ignored the base topic and got carried away. Please know that you and the team have my very sincere apology.
Thank you for your understanding Allan
. Looking forward to seeing your progress.
OUCHY!Yeah, fitting those gun port linings is difficult for me as the action of pushing them in position causes me some pain in the hands. Due to 50 odd years of manual work as an electrician I have worn away all the cartilage in my lower thumb joints at the base of the trapezium bone, so I can only manage a few at a time before having to rest my hands
But I’ll get there
