Good evening (China time) everyone. If am this quiet, you must know that I am busy on the scheepshelling.
Next up was the installation of the vals wand, the construction of the geschutpoorten and their corect placement on the vals wand. This was a task I was not looking forward to as it would see me try my hand at my first “plank-bending” exercise. And to add even more adrenalin was the fact that the “plank-bending” was not only the normal bending that you would use when planking a hull, but also “vertical” bending. And potverdorie; the Batavia gave me my first challenge ... but more about that a bit later.
For the vertical bending part, I used the method as described by Ships of Scale forum member, Glen Barlow, which, I must say, worked great!.
In a nutshell, I first immersed the planks in hot water for about a minute and thereafter laid it on its designated place on the full-scale plan. With the help of clamps the wet plank is then shaped into its exact shape and curvature. After about 10 minutes, I “ironed” the planks with a steam iron. The steam worked well as it ensures that there is no burning of the planks. While doing this, the planks visibly change colour as they become drier. Once done, leave the planks for another 10 minutes or so clamped and remove. Voila! You have a perfectly bent plank which can be glued immediately.
While I was ironing wood, the Admiral added in a few pieces of her clothing as well to be ironed. It is dangerous for a man to be caught seen with an iron in the hand!
The instructions provided me with a bit of a headscratch to figure out what exactly is meant by “verspringen” of the planks in the vals wand. Luckily the full scale drawings provided a good clue of what was meant, but even then, I still found it necessary to run my interpretation by some fellow forum members first. @ Leensen: Thank you very much for clarifying this perfectly for me.
With the idea of "verspringen" understood, I could carry on!
I inserted the short plank between spanten #14 & #13 and proceeded by gluing the first full-length vals wand plank into position.
The first full-length vals wand in the clamps.
Verspringen completed and first full-length plank glued. Viewed from port side, all was good!
Second, full-length vals wand plank in position (starboard side). All was good and I was very happy that there were no gaps between the two planks!
Third gunwale plank: CHALLENGE!!!
No matter how many times, I measured, the available space for the third plank was NOT 6mm - it was less - in some cases, only 4mm. Sure I could plane the plank to 4mm, but I possess neither such machine nor hand-planer and with 90% of all shops in China still closed because of the Coronavirus, I couldn't buy one. Trying to file or cut open the slots would, in my opinion, result in too weak a joint between the bulkheads and deck beams. So I did the only thing I could think of. I glued a full-sized plank behind the first two gunwale planks to the maximum height it would go and made it run all the way from bulkhead #14 to #3 for maximum strength.
Obviously this means that some of the geschutpoorten boxes will not sit flush all the way against the vals wand - there will be a 1.5mm gap (the thickness of the planks) between the back of the boxes and the third plank. To eliminate this gap I simply inserted custom-cut pieces of planking as required. What I do have are two gunwale sides that are very strong and solid being effectively double-planked.
I contacted Hans about the issue and the Admiraal came back to me immediately. Obviously the thickness of the planks vary from supplier to supplier and are sometimes wider than the 6mm they are supposed to. Hans already has some very good ideas about future modifications to the Batavia kit that will solve the problem of variances in plank width, permanently. Once again, the customer service that I received from Hans, was Prima!
All three vals wand planks in position. I was very happy with the line that the two vals wanden followed, because they were absolutely identical.
Next up was the making of the geschutpoorten boxes - a fiddly and fidgety job, but one that gave me a slight break after all the headscratching with the vals wanden. So far 13 have been completed - still 9 to go.
The boxes next to a one Yuan coin!
Hopefully, I will be back soon with an update. Thank you all for your interest and for following!
Vriendelijk groete - Heinrich