My first paying job was in 1976, working in the yard building the Pride of Baltimore. I reported aboard as crew in 1981, on my 21st birthday. I acquired a copy of her plans from Thomas Gilmer in 1982 and started a model in 1:32 scale. Before it was finished it was destroyed during one of my many moves. Now that I'm a bit more settled down, here's a second attempt to model the old Pride. This model will represent the first Pride of Baltimore as she appeared in the fall of 1981, when I was aboard her. She will be built "plank-on-bulkhead," glassed outside, the bulkheads removed, and the inside coated with resin. She will be built from Thomas Gilmer's plans, my photos from my time aboard, and other images I can find of the boat from that time. Pride of Baltimore in 1986 The model will be 1/20th the size of the original; Gilmer's plan redrawn and scaled to 1:20 Hull length: 54" (137.4cm) Length on deck: 48" (121.9cm) Length on waterline w/o rudder: 46.75" (118.1cm) Beam: 13.625" (34.6cm) Draft without ballast keel: 5.875" (14.9cm) Total height (top of jack-yard to bottom of keel): 61.6" (156.5cm) The plans and patterns were printed on an HP inkjet plotter. The patterns for the forms were glued to 5/16" CDX plywood and cut out. They were stood up on the building board in September of 2010. 10 months later the keel was cut and fitted - also of 5/16" CDX. Over the Columbus Day weekend, planking was cut from white pine using a table saw jig. and planking the hull began I'm not too concerned with spieling the planks as she'll be glassed and painted. Narrower planks will cover down to the waterline, with the wider planks taking over from there. The bottom will be glassed up to the bottom of the wale. She'll be polyurethaned and painted up from there.
I kept thinking about that "glassing to the wale" idea and decided it would cause more problems than it would save. In fact, I couldn't think of it saving anything at all, so - once planked and faired, the hull will be glassed up to the sheer rail (the cap rail on top of the waterways. I'll add that wale to the hull over the glass. Now, reading Claudio's thread on his 1:28 Enterprise, I'm really tempted to take a shot at making a glass hull off this one using that brown tape idea. I printed the patterns for a 1:35 scale British frigate that will get started as soon as Pride's off the workbench. HMS Macedonian Mac's bulkhead patterns coming off the plotter So, planking continues... as of 10/16
Hehe, sorry Claudio - I fixed it. So, more planking and the transom is framed and planked. I was hoping to finish the planking this weekend, but just couldn't get that far. Besides more planking, the sheer strake was added... Pride had a "square tuck stern" whick basically means the planking stopped at the last station on the stern post and a counter took over from there...
Brought Pride into the house to snap a picture of it with the Constellation. ( Pride is 1:20 scale, Constellation is 1:36) Fully rigged, both models will span about 8 feet from tip of boom to tip of jib-boom. The transom and counter sides had been trimmed back to the planking on the 23rd. I scribed and roughly trimmed the top of the transom. I hope to have all the planking done and be started on filling and sanding this weekend. Hopefully I'll have a nice smooth hull ready to cover in cheap brown plastic tape by Sunday. To facilitate taking off a glass hull, there's hull details I'll be leaving off; the wale, as mentioned, moldings, gunports, transom details, etc. All that will applied to the glass hull. That also allows for a glass hull to be finished differently; different transom, gunport layout, even a different scale to a point.
Pulled almost all the nails out of the planking and took the block plane to some ridges and bumps, followed by a little sanding. I hope to have all the planking done this weekend and be ready to glass. View attachment 9308 A sketch of the intended sailplan.
By the 30th the bottom was closed up... and the hull was completely planked on Halloween night. I had a monster pose with it in honor of the occasion: Home sick today with a sore throat, I pulled out form #10, the aft most one, which includes the transom forms. A couple of taps with a screwdriver handle was all it took to loosen it, and a little wiggling to break free the glue stuck to the blue tape. That form was the most complex and I expected it to be the most difficult to remove. The trick is, as this is going to be a form for a glass hull, the rest of them don't need to be removed.
Nice work indeed Jerry, now I suppose you are going to spread some resin inside before starting external sanding ! Cheers ClaudioD
Though I sanded and planed a bit as I set each plank, there was still some unevenness, low spots, ridges, etc. I used water putty to fair the surface. Applying it the Thursday evening and smoothing it with a damp sponge and wet hands. Friday I sanded it and applied another coat where it was needed. More sanding, some touch up spots, more sanding, etc etc and then I trimmed the transom top to where the actual boat had her's - a point where plan and real boat differed. Puttied. Sanded. Puttied some more. Sanded some more. Transom trimmed; just a little off the top. Forms #0 and #10 removed. Originally this was going to be the models hull, and after glassing the outside, the form were to be pulled out and the inside coated in resin - BUT, Claudio, you planted the idea of using this as a form to take off a glass hull, and I am so easily distracted. I'm going to give the brown plastic tape idea a shot (I'm a sucker for brown packing tape-see Constellation model). I'll cover the form with tape, lay up both halves using the keel as a flange. The two halves will be joined to a new wooden keel to make another hull, which I'll mat inside with a trunk for a removable bulbed fin keel, etc. Provided that works I'll finish the form as a static model. A fellow that sailed on Pride when I did is the director of Historic Ships in Baltimore. I may give it to them as thanks for letting me poke around Constellation when I want too, and ride her home from dry dock. A friend's pushing me to make a mold, but I don't see much demand for 4 foot bare Baltimore Clipper hulls - and I'm not trying to get into the model hull business.
The form is taped. Here I go making another model involving packing tape - what am I thinking? Anyway. I don't have enough cloth on hand to make a hull, so I went to the local Hobby World to get some and they're gone - the shop was empty with a "Lease this space" sign in the window. Sigh So I ordered some cloth from Duckworks who didn't charge more in shipping than the total of what I was buying. That killed making a hull this weekend - guess I'll shoot for next weekend. Here's the package, ready for shipping
The glass came in today - Veteran's Day - I didn't know UPS delivered today? So, I sprayed the hull with a light coat of adhesive, laid on the cloth and trimmed it, then did the other side. I also cut pieces for the second layer.
Dear reader; If anyone implies, or you infer from me in any way that I know what I'm doing - ignore it - I don't, at least not all the time. The first batch of resin seemed thick, and gave me fits getting it on. I did the stern and the bow and most of one side then mixed another 4oz. This time I put in a splash of acetone and that went much better. I had some left over and poured it into Constellation to fill some crannies along side her stern post and keel. The second batch cured nicely - thank goodness or I'd have a nasty lump of it to pull out of Constellation. The first didn't cure right, at least not everywhere - as if I hadn't mixed it thoroughly. At any rate, I pulled it off and took off the tape. That was an interesting distraction, so now's it's back to plan A. I pulled all the stations out, one-by-one, carefully. I missed about 8 or 9 of those nasty little nails/pins, but each station came out nicely otherwise. I had to cut down the sternpost - which is something I should have done when the keel was just a piece of plywood and not surrounded by planking. Thank goodness for Mr Dremel's machine. The inside of the hull got sanded and scraped a bit, then I painted it with thinned Tightbond III to get all the inside nooks and crannies. Any openings were filled with sawdust from the sander and glued up. I'm going to resin the inside of the hull first. I'll hot glue a couple of forms back in to support the hull as I glass the outside. Then I'll cut down some forms to epoxy back in to support the equipment deck. Constellation's forms were thin luan plywood, and I couldn't use them this way - Pride's I can. There's that monster from Halloween again
Jerry, For someone who claims not to know what they're doing you're making very good progress & of course we've also seen your Constellation build....... Bad luck with the first layer of glass/epoxy - was the ambient temperature a bit low for the first batch? It'll certainly result in a thicker mix. At least you were able to rescue it with reasonable ease. It's always good to see progress being made & it's about time I started throwing some bits of tree & epoxy at my Enterprise build - seem to keep putting things off, although I've started knocking together a temporary hull cradle........ Regards, Row
The temps were in the low 70's f. I think if I had left it alone it would have cured, just slowly. I should have went ahead with the second layer of cloth, but I thought it was doomed and didn't want to waste more. BTW: It was removable because of the brown tape - I was trying to use the hull as a positive mold. I did get resin inside the hull this weekend past - I put a touch of acetone in and it did just fine, sanded it a little last night after getting some planks on the Macedonian. A friend of mine; who built my 16 foot daysailer Lydia back in 1978 and which I still own; has more experience working with glass than I do. He wants to make a 2-part mold from this hull and another 46" schooner hull we're going to start on next week. That implies making more hulls. I don't need a stack of Baltimore Clipper hulls littering the joint - so it's either skip that exercise or sell a few bare hulls on ebay.
Pride's hull got resined inside a while back, but I've been working on getting another hull planked since then. Pride with the 1:24th scale USS St Lawrence at the US Naval Academy Museum, Annapolis, MD, USA. Pride, Macedonian, & Constellation
On Christmas day, it being in the high 50° (f), I glassed the port side of the hull... A couple of days later I glassed the starboard side... Everything was trimmed and sanded a bit... and on the 30th I glassed the counter and transom. That actually got the excess trimmed off, but there's a lot of sanding and wax removal to do before I go any further with the outside of the hull. On the other hand, she can actually get wet now.
On the 16th and 17th of January, the deck clamps were glued in. The inside of the hull was sanded and marks made at the tops of the deck beams. Further marks were made 3/8" below this line and the deck clamp was epoxied to the inside of the hull with the top at this line. The deck clamp is made from the same 3/8" x 1/8" strips used to plank my Macedonian. A second strip was glued inside this to increase the thickness to 1/4". Doing it in two layers made it easier to bend it to the hull's shape. The deck beams were cut from white pine left over from another project that was planed down to 1/2" thickness. The widest beam was given a camber of 1/4" and used as the pattern for the rest of the beams. The beams were placed at the rear and front of the main cabin; behind the main mast; the rear and front of the main hatch; behind the foremast, with one evenly spaced between the main hatch and foremast; and one at the fore bits. None of these are fixed in place as yet as the equipment deck and dagger-board trunk have to be installed first.
Splish splash I was takin a bath... The hull got wet today. It actually will fit in the bathtub, so I dropped it in and threw the 12 pounds of lead I have in baggies in it to see how it did. It was still a few pounds short of reaching the waterline but I'm guessing it'll take around 20 pounds of gear and ballast to put her on her marks.
Resin-ating While putting fiberglass on Macedonian's hull, I sanded and gave Pride a coat of resin, and when that set up - another good sanding.