HMS Ajax 38 gun frigate. Euromodel [COMPLETED BUILD]

Good catch Ken! Knowing your quality builds, it looks better now than Euromodel had originally envisaged it.
 
Great job Ken! She’s looking awesome! Good painting on the metal pieces as well. You should try some dry brushing for highlights if you want to give it a little extra touch. ;)
 
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dockattner said:
A very nice recovery Ken. As a master of the 'redo' I have found that most everything can be fixed if I am willing to put in the time and work.
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Hi Paul, Yes how right you are, nothing is lost except perhaps your temper, I’m well practiced in the art of recovery. Here’s an example of one of my many recoveries.

I was building the Royal William, probably one of the most difficult kit builds on the market and the most difficult part of the build was the stern galleries. I’d been building this section for quite some time, for weeks I’d been filing out the solid cast windows so that I could glaze them. I had just completed the whole stern including the painting, I was ecstatic with the result.

I was using cyno to just put the finishing touches to it. I was holding it standing on its bow with the stern towards me when the top came off the tub of cyno! The whole contents poured over half the castings and a large area of the planking, the heat generated melted parts of the window castings, the fumes were overpowering and I had to drop the model and run from the room. The result of this I found when I returned would have made an angel weep; I’m no angel so I reacted differently to my wife’s displeasure. Many of the window frames were ruined, all the glazing had turned opaque, much of the painting was ruined but worst of all the cyno had soaked into a large part of the stern planking. This was going to be a varnished hull, as you will know glue soaked wood wont take varnish it just goes a blotchy white so would need replacing, so major repairs were necessary. The pictures show just before the accident, the damage then after the repair.

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Hello All. Just a short progress report, but first thanks again for you kind comments, Heinrich, Jimsky, Dean and the two Pauls, as well as the likes that I've been given. Dean, yes a good idea, I think that I'll first try a wash and see how that comes out as I don't want a frigate to look too bling.
The pictures show my finished stern, the painted wale and the prep for the channels.

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Hi, I need some opinions. I’ve just done the channels, what’s best to do next. The choice seems to be between the gun deck canons, the port lids or the dead eye strops. I’m thinking that the easiest is the strops but then they may foul the port lids when I do them, the canons may be more difficult if the lids are mounted first?
 
Ken, the dry brushing is not for bling, but for depth. If you paint the gold ornamentation a single gold color, you are depending solely on light to give depth to the pieces. I usually start with a darker bronze color, then dry brush a brighter gold on the higher surfaces giving the pieces more depth. They actually look more rustic or aged that way, verses one color which makes them look too new or pristine. That’s why I like to dry brush gold pieces. ;)
 
Dean62 said:
Ken, the dry brushing is not for bling, but for depth. If you paint the gold ornamentation a single gold color, you are depending solely on light to give depth to the pieces. I usually start with a darker bronze color, then dry brush a brighter gold on the higher surfaces giving the pieces more depth. They actually look more rustic or aged that way, verses one color which makes them look too new or pristine. That’s why I like to dry brush gold pieces. ;)
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Hi Dean, Yes I agree, but giving the gold a sepia wash, which is specifically made to run into the recesses it has the same effect but rather than brightening the raised part it slightly darkens the recesses. It’s use quite a bit on plastic models for emphasising door, window edges and shading etc. I had the sepia wash but I didn’t have a lighter gold so just went with what I had.
 
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Ken said:
Hi Dean, Yes I agree, but giving the gold a sepia wash, which is specifically made to run into the recesses it has the same effect but rather than brightening the raised part it slightly darkens the recesses. It’s use quite a bit on plastic models for emphasising door, window edges and shading etc. I had the sepia wash but I didn’t have a lighter gold so just went with what I had.
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Yes I use washes and dry brushing. But sometimes I just use up to three shades to get the same effect. Start with a dark base color and then dry brush medium color, then dry brush highlights last with brightest color. Either way it brings out the detail in the pieces. ;)
Also if you don’t have a lighter color, you make one by adding a little bit of white to the color you have and use that for highlights.
In addition, you can add water to thin out water based paints to use for washes. Experiment with the ratio, say 4 parts water to one part paint, etc., until you get the right flow.
 
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Hello, A very short update. I've finished the channels and painted the strakes. The pictures show the hull, masked ready, then painted and then complete. I'm now working on the gun port lids, I don't have to fit them now but at least they'll be ready.

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Dean62 said:
Yes I use washes and dry brushing. But sometimes I just use up to three shades to get the same effect. Start with a dark base color and then dry brush medium color, then dry brush highlights last with brightest color. Either way it brings out the detail in the pieces. ;)
Also if you don’t have a lighter color, you make one by adding a little bit of white to the color you have and use that for highlights.
In addition, you can add water to thin out water based paints to use for washes. Experiment with the ratio, say 4 parts water to one part paint, etc., until you get the right flow.
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Hi Dean, Thanks very much for your input on this. You put forward a good argument for highlighting so I’ll give it a go next time I get my paints out. If I don’t prefer it, as It it’s only such a light coat I can easily paint over it, so no harm in trying.
 
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Bryian said:
Gosh, thats very quick construction, and it looks a beauty. :)
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Hi Bryian, Thanks for your comments they’re appreciated. You know Euromodel kits fairly well, they do come out quite nice, but are rather, shall we say interesting to build! I’m finding them a bit addictive, though I don’t understand why and I may even try another of theirs if I survive this one with some sanity left.
 
Hi. Again thanks to all those that gave me likes. I'm still moving forward at a great pace and have now finished making the port lids. Nothing difficult, it was just like a production line, I think that the pictures speak for themselves. The hinges came with tabs on for mounting but I cut these off and used pins into the lids themselves, I think this is a much more secure way than relying on glued on hinges which break away when knocked. So next will be mounting them, again I'm not expecting it to be difficult.

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Ken said:
Hello again. Thanks for those likes and comments. I find that it's fairly difficult starting a log and get it going in a direction that you you would like and your comments help quite a bit.

Here we go again in an effort to catch up to where I'm at with the build. Having made up the supports for the decks and masts I decided to add them after I'd fitted the bulkheads to the keel, that way I could check first that they were in the correct position when I placed the deck on. I fitted the kitchen deck and stained it, it wasn’t worth planking as it is so low down it would never be seen. I attached blocks at the bow and stern, material was supplied for this, boxwood I think, and carved them to shape as shown on the plan. I sanded and faired the bulkheads to get a good flow of planks. Having checked the bulkheads with the plans initially I found that there was almost no correction needed, they were all pretty good.

I fixed the gun deck into place using glue and nails, this now left me prepared for the first planking. The planks were a white wood, nice quality 5mm x 1.5, my fears over them being old proved unfounded as they were nice and bendy and didn’t tend to split as old wood does. I started at the level of the gun deck and went downwards. I terminated them at the rearmost bulkhead as I would normally expect but after fixing three planks I realized that I was going to run into serious problems later when I needed to make up the stern galleries, an issue that caused me to re think my build plan, more of that next time.

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Only one comment Ken. As far I remember, you mentioned here, that you never use bow and Sternfellers. where I recommended this to a builder., but at least on this Ajax I see both types
 
Ken said:
Hello Everyone. Progress continues apace. Today’s post is to tell you about my second planking. I don't intend to do what many do and shape each plank to a set pattern, carefully measured into sections, adding scarfs and stealers so that each plank ends up the same. I tried that once and found that I couldn’t master it and the end result looked poor, a bit of a mess with not perfectly fitting edges. I much prefer the planks to end up smooth, flat and tightly fitted to its adjacent plank with not the slightest gap, they may not be correct to the purists but to my eye it looks better. I know I will end up with the dreaded tapered to a point planks but I will arrange these so that the wale covers the pointy bits and all should look well, to my satisfaction anyway.

The planks are 5mm x 1mm and are nicely machined. Because of the age of the kit I found that although they were still nice and springy the wood was very dry and prone to having small splinters coming away, so I had to be careful with them. I don’t use a holding cradle or hull clamp when planking, I find that these prevent you from getting at the hull from all angles and hampers you. I just put a pillow on my knee and rest the hull on that, you can move it around easily to come at it from any angle just like wresting with a small dog.


I started my planks by running the first just above the gun ports, the width of the recess and the second just below the ports then I planked in between them cutting and sanding them to the exact size so that it leaves the correct gap for the port recess, it may feel like it takes longer but there will be no cutting out for the recess which can often lead to a slightly imperfect edge. With that section done I continued down tapering each plank slightly and fixing until I thought the pointy planks would then run to under the wale then started from the keel upwards. I use cyno on all my second planking only doing small lengths at a time, pressing down into place then when set moving along to another small section. I leave the planks standing upright in a thermos flask of hot water for at least ten minutes before I use them. I only needed to use my nippers for the bow curves but for the stern as the curve was pretty severe I needed to use a soldering iron. A good thing about cyno is it activates with moisture so still works well with damp planks. So far, so good

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gun port and the upper plqanking1Th Class. Well Done Mate
 
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