Will make Barham eventually, but wanted to document the process of adding casements. This is maybe the 5th hull I'll be adding casements to. This time I decided to print the negatives for the hull instead of cutting out of wood. Generally pleased with how the molds turn out. A couple of them warped a bit from acetone. At this stage I cut out the hull for where the casements would go, and then attached the negatives with silicone. Negatives had two layers of PVA film which worked out Fiberglass prep Getting the angles is tough - a lot of filler, then cloth to hold the filler in place Stern portion Two of the molds came off easy, the bow one was tougher Cut the excess off. Good thickness. A couple of bubbles to fill but overall a success Cut the other side, hopefully get the negatives attached tomorrow evening
That looks fantastic. so I have to ask, why didn't the hull have casemates in the first place? Is that a hull of one of the more modernized QEs that deleted the casemates, and you're just reverse-engineering them into the hull?
Yes the hull is for the final refit version for some of the ships, Barham did not get that refit so I’m adding the casements for more impenetrable area
Malaya also did not get all the casemates plated over Warspite got some plated over. Valiant and QE had them all plated over. So there's lots of choices of casemate fun!
Valiant and QE had the hulls modified so there was no sign of the former embrasures and casemates. That's the QE Class hull Ralph Coles makes. He used to make a less accurate hull with modified bulge shape for ease of sheeting - it was the 1930s version with all of the casemates represented.
Dude, I dug my workshop's wood stove out of a garbage dump. you have active timber sales in your vicinity! The dump doesn't charge Value-added taxes!
Second side came out pretty good. The tape separated while laying it up. Tape was used to hold the filler in place, so some of it oozed out- easy to backfill later. Cutting through the excess was a struggle. I always like to see a hull with casements, way more menacing than a billboard. this was the largest casualty from tape separating I’ll probably do the float test so I can pull the rest of the tape off-previous owner drilled holes for ribs but they were both deeper than I prefer and probably not the same locations. Plan to keep bottom of windows above the lowest bulge for ram protection, need to verify I can get the boat that deep.
I'm really impressed. those forward casemates look like they would be a beast to get right and ya pulled it off.
It’s not his first time doing it either the Rivadavia that I bought from Kevin he did the same thing with it. He is a very skilled builder
Thanks guys. I've been successful with the large overhangs by building up a ramp from the side of the ship to the overhang with filler and then 'capturing' it with a layer of cloth that holds the filler in place. In this case I used some fiber strands that my dad had, but on the Courbet's I just used milled fibers. Most of it get cut out, but really doesn't take too much material. Trying to get cloth or mat alone to make corners like that is not a plan for success Keys to success that I've found are not trying to get the cloth or mat to make a bend that it can't make. To do that, cut up small pieces based on the size of the 'flat' areas, use filler in any areas where the bend is too extreme, use cloth for the more complex bends then reinforce with mat, tear the mat to get an edge that bends easily. Also remember that everything can be fixed and sometimes requires a few batches. The printed molds worked great, much more exact than the wooden ones I've made.
Sidenote: Going back to your first pictures in this thread looking at the hull, I'm 98% sure this was a QE hull I sold back around 2016 base don the tape used to mark ribs
I swear, would not be surprised to see Craig at nats 2021 wearing a trench coat, pulling guys into the alleys, dealing boats
