Started Friday on my SODAK class BB, the USS ALABAMA. Working on a wood hull design for IRCWCC. I hope to have her on the water at the Oakboro battle in Oct. I have just over 17 days left to build her..... After two days work, here is what I done. First thing of course was getting on the computer and sorting out my ribs, keels, and stringer locations. This all determines where my water channel goes before I even cut a single piece... Then off to the shop where I glue the paper to the wood for cutting... All the frames ready to go.... yes I could have saved wood by cutting out the inside of the ribs then glueing them.... I am just hard headed and like to cut the outsides, then go back and mark my cuts for the insides after I decide where my cross frames ect are going.. Time to cut.... I so luv this DeWalt! All the ribs cut and ready to mark and cut the insides.... Now for subdeck. I will be using 1/4" ply for the this. I didn't have a long enough piece so I had to dovetail in another piece to get my length... I place the pieces together where they will be, then mark where my deck rim is.... then on one piece I mark my dovetail to the size I want..... Here you can see the markings... Then I cut the 1st part out... Then I trace the inside of the dovetail onto the other piece.... being careful to line up the marks. Then I cut the second piece... you can also see where I cut out the middle just a little. I like to do this so I can be sure my dovetails are fitting tight.. Here you see the nice tight fitting dovetail..... Then I mark the center line and ends of my hull on the wood. Then I mark my rib locations on the center line... Since the lines on the drawings are centered, I mark the 1/4" needed for the ribs by marking 1/8" on each side of my mark then use a square to draw the lines... Comes out looking nice... you can now see where things start to go... I then place my ribs onto the wood and line up the center line.... then mark my outside edges.... I do this for all ribs... of course keeping these dominoes from falling for a pic takes some time after a few beers... The I mark my subdeck with a flexible scribe, or just use the plans if they are close. I do this because most plans are not symmetrical and I want to get things lined up better.... Then I cut the edges. This is also a good time to mark your barbets, cross mebers, battery locations ect... fit out most things and plan for them now, not later..... Then I cut my inside out. I am using 3/4" wide subdeck here because later I will use magnets for the decks. After notching the ribs and the subdeck, I kerf the underside of the subdeck where the deck turns upwards for the atlantic bow.... this removes the stress from the wood.... I can go back later after the decks are glued and fill in the kerfs with bondo... A few dress rehearsal shots.... I always fit and refit the pieces.... and I always see something I need to alter or add. The nuts are going to get cut off... lovely detail later, but will hinder my stern guns.... You can see where the water channel will go. After I glass the bottom on the outside, I will remove the cross pieces in the channel.... She even has the nice armor belt impressions on the sides...
Made some more progress today. I did manage to get sidetracked for a few hours.... I am planning on buying a Micro Lathe and Mill next month and was watching videos about the tools... got lost in the awe.... Anyway... Got all the sanding done on the stringers and flaring the ribs... I so hate that part of any build... no tools can do the job other than a sanding block.... ugh! I started to fill in the ribs with the balsa, and because I need a few more pounds of ballast, I decided to add the weight in the framework. I am using #8 lead buckshot. I will mix the shot with resin, pour where needed and tada, instant perma ballast.... Here is how I determine how much room I need in my ribs to be filled with lead/resin... I use clear film to keep the shot from going everywhere... I place the balsa close to what I think I need in space, and fill in the open area with lead till I have used up all the weight I need. Here you see 5 sections at about 2 inches wide, filled with lead, this weights about 2.5 pounds.... just a little too much when I double it for the other side... So I took the width down to 1.5 inches, and hit my target weight of 4 pounds of lead being added. Later I will show you how I make small discs that have a 1/4" hole in them to be used as ballast on the ends... You can see here where the lead is going to be... awe... had to add the pic of my mini table saw.... next to my scroll saw, this the best tool investment I have made to date... Has worked flawlessly over the past 15 years... has paid for itself many times over... Here is all that shot from one side..... LOL good lord dont let that bag break... that dam shot goes everywhere!!!!!!!!!!! and I mean EVERYWHERE... and of course magnets are useless in cleaning it up, and the wife will beat you to near death if she catches you using the vacuum cleaner to get at it.... I know that someplace in Statesboro there are a couple of cleaning ladies at a hotel who are very upset at us..... I dumped a full pound of it on the floor.... was stepping on that shit the entire weekend! Well, got almost half done and getting tired.... I am retired, so I need my rest... LOL More to follow..... 16 days left on the build....... can he do it?!
Always love watching your builds. No laser cutters or 3d printers. Just good old fashioned woodworking well planned and well executed.
Your build threads have a very interesting habit of the pictures petering out around this point in the build I've noticed.
More coming, just in a rush to get the boat finished for Oct Battle.. Once I get close to finishing, I forget to post end pics...
Just for Nick..... Balsa going into the bottom... You can see the water channel area real well now. Then the worst part of the build.... sanding... Once sanded, I place a 1/32" thick plywood on the bottom to cover the channel area. Once the ply is good, I then add the ballast shot. I use saran wrap to keep the pellets in place till I know what I need, then dump it into a cup to add resin, then pour back in without the wrap... Gluing the cap rail in pace. I use wrap here as well to keep the deck from being glued... the screws you see are how I hold the deck in place while the cap rail is positioned and glued. You can also see where I scribed the lines for the wood planking. I use a small steel scribe for this.... the planks are larger than scale to show them off some... about 1/8" wide. I missed shots of a few steps as I am working late on the boat... So far completed is the hull, deck, barbetts, stuffing tubes, prop shafts, rudder shafts, servo mounts, motor mounts, air system for trips, trips with new elbows and installed... some other things I can remember right off hand... You can see here how I adjust my guns... The rudder servo mount and air system for trips... Motors mount with screws... The props are in close...
Looking good, I like seeing all the ways you come up with to make mounts for components. Squeaky wheel and all that.
I borrowed the idea for the guns from Charley at BC, then modified it a little. The motor mounts I think I got from Trey.
More done this morning... took advantage of wife being at work and did my glass work inside.... for some reason she dislikes the smell of resin in the house! I first drilled in some recesses to fit my magnets... and then glued them in with a little goop. top and bottom view These hold very well..... the hull is already at 7.5 pounds... Somebody wanted better shots of the adjustable gun mounts... Here is a bottom view of the block where I adjust the gun striking height and a cross brace or two to keep things solid. I used bar stock aluminum and drilled/taped everything... The top view, this bracket allows the previous adjustment to raise or lower the guns.. By raising the mag ends... I lower the strike and of course to raise strike point I just lower the mags.. The same set up also is combined with my deck latches to hold the deck in place.. Here you see the rear "clip" And here is the back clip. The deck goes on mags first with the wood block setting forward.... Then I place the rear clip under the deck and slide it to the rear, thus locking the deck in place. When the center lid is on, the rear will not come off... Here you can see both end clips... My shaft tubes being preped for glass... I draw a line on my cloth so it helps me keep the cloth lined up when glassing and the glass...
Very Nice, I can smell the wood from here. Be careful on the magnets, I had a number pull free between battles. The way I solved it was to glue a "cover" of fiberglass over it (in this case a thin piece of wood with 1/4 around it). This way the magnet is never stressed, no reason to pop out (and if it did, it would stay in the "pocket"
Great Idea... its too late for the forward section, but I can still get this into the middle section.
If you can, use a thin piece of fiberglass cloth and resin it in. You can also remove just a little wood around the magnet in the sub-deck and fill that with resin and cloth, that will work "well-enough".
