Wooden treenails.
Quite often models are treenailed with oversized and dark treenails. Deck treenails were typically less than one inch in diameter and then capped so they are just visible even at full size. The inclusion of treenails is a nice touch for most of us but too often the decks and hulls look like they have a case of measles or chicken pox due to the contrast in color and huge size. My own thought is that treenailing with wood is limited to about 1:48 scale or larger. 1:64 is a stretch for the hull and nigh impossible for the decks without it looking unrealistic.
With a few thousand needed for the decks and upwards of 10,000 on the hull, the cost can still be held to a couple dollars/Euros.
Bamboo skewers are strong, cheap, and easy to work.
I slit these into smaller pieces with a scalpel. They vary a bit in size, but can be slit again and again as needed to get to a workable size.
The next step is the run the slit strips through the largest hole in a draw plate then work down to the next smaller hole and so on until the desired diameter is reached. I have been using a Byrnes plate for about 20 years but there are other brands. A good quality plate is preferred as cheap versions are not always accurate in the progression of the hole diameters.
The plate I use goes down to 0.016" diameter. The example I show is 0.0175, about right for deck treenails at 1:48 scale.
Once the strip is to the size needed I cut them into pieces about 1/4" long so I can handle them with tweezers or small pliers to insert them into the holes.
Finished deck nails about 0.016 inch diameter (0.75" at full scale)
Finished hull treenails which are about o.o3" diameter (1.5" at 1:48)
Quite often models are treenailed with oversized and dark treenails. Deck treenails were typically less than one inch in diameter and then capped so they are just visible even at full size. The inclusion of treenails is a nice touch for most of us but too often the decks and hulls look like they have a case of measles or chicken pox due to the contrast in color and huge size. My own thought is that treenailing with wood is limited to about 1:48 scale or larger. 1:64 is a stretch for the hull and nigh impossible for the decks without it looking unrealistic.
With a few thousand needed for the decks and upwards of 10,000 on the hull, the cost can still be held to a couple dollars/Euros.
Bamboo skewers are strong, cheap, and easy to work.
I slit these into smaller pieces with a scalpel. They vary a bit in size, but can be slit again and again as needed to get to a workable size.
The next step is the run the slit strips through the largest hole in a draw plate then work down to the next smaller hole and so on until the desired diameter is reached. I have been using a Byrnes plate for about 20 years but there are other brands. A good quality plate is preferred as cheap versions are not always accurate in the progression of the hole diameters.
The plate I use goes down to 0.016" diameter. The example I show is 0.0175, about right for deck treenails at 1:48 scale.
Once the strip is to the size needed I cut them into pieces about 1/4" long so I can handle them with tweezers or small pliers to insert them into the holes.
Finished deck nails about 0.016 inch diameter (0.75" at full scale)
Finished hull treenails which are about o.o3" diameter (1.5" at 1:48)
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