Jumping back and forth over the deck of my RC O now started with the hatches and gratings.
First the gratings and these are build from lasered strips of pear. Which are fixed to each other at a 90 deg. angle like in every kit. I made a template for this to create a exact 90 deg grating by glueing some scrap strips on a piece of paper in which the gratings are fully enclosed.
After dry fitting a full grating I put these in the template and cover these with multiple layers of shellac to glue everything together.
After drying of the gratings I drilled 0.6 mm holes in the joints and glued a brass pin in it to strengthen the construction.
On the reverse side of the grating I removed the small pieces of wood between the strip running in the lenght of the hull, this as in the original construction the gratings are made from small beam along the width with planks in the lenght of the hull on top.
Now it is time for sanding. On my belt sander I sand it down to nearly half the thickness.
As the grating is bigger the I also cut it to the correct dimension. You can now nicely see the subtile effect of the brass pins.
Next step is the hatch coaming, made from lasered strips of walnut. As the hatches a slightly bollow I shaped these again on my belt sander.
The grating I shaped accordingly by bending it after steaming.
Normally the hatch coaming is fixed to the deck with the grating loosely fitted in it providing acces to the deck below. As my battery case is below it I fixed the grating into the coaming and the coaming fits snug into the deck providing acces to my battery case.
When fitted this is not visible.
And the result after oiling it crrating a nice contrast between the walnut, pear and brass.