Cooking Ribs

Time to bend and install the ribs (called frames in real ships).  These are 3/32" square cherry stock.  To bend them, I immersed them in boiling water for 5 minutes.  They can be handled with your bare hands almost immediately after pulling them out of the water.  One end of the rib is put in the socket on the keel, then slowly, slowly bent along the mold, then clipped down.  It took me about three minutes to slowly bend each frame.

And here's the frames (ribs), all bent and clipped into place to dry overnight:

And here are the starboard frames, dried and formed.  Note how the curve becomes more pronounced amidships.  This is the first time I've ever boiled and bent cherry wood -- and it worked great.  Only three frames broke, and it was because I was bending them too fast.

Building the Mold

The Bounty's Launch is a plank on frame model, which means it is built very much like a real ship.  The keel is laid down, then the frames (ribs) are installed, the planked, then the interior is built up.  The difference with this model is that the process takes place upside-down, on a mold.  This wooden mold ensures that the ribs are the correct curvature, and that everything is spaced just right.

The HMAV Bounty's Launch

Welcome to my blog, where I post step-by-step pictures and comments as I construct wooden model ships.

My first blog project will be the H.M.A.V. Bounty's Launch, made famous by the 1787 mutiny on the Bounty.  The launch was the Bounty's service boat.  The mutineers, led by Fletcher Christian, forced Capt. William Bligh and 18 other loyal crew into the launch and cast them adrift in the middle of the Pacific Ocean with hardly any provisions.  Capt. Bligh navigated the launch almost 4,000 miles over 47 days to the closest friendly port -- Timor.  It remains one of the most amazing feats of survival and navigation skill in history. 

First, a disclaimer:  I call the HMS Bounty the HMAV Bounty because I'm a Big Geek. The designation "H.M.S.", standing for "His Majesty's Ship", was never used for the Bounty (it didn't come into formal use until the 1790s).  It was most frequently referred to as His Majesty's Armed Vessel the Bounty, so I refer to is as HMAV Bounty.   But there's no reason it wouldn't have been called HMS if the mutiny had happened 10 years later.  So there.

My kit was purchased from ModelExpo.  It was manufactured by Model Shipways.  The scale is 1:16, or 3/4 inch = 1 foot.  Here are the model's specifications:

Actual Launch                        Model
Length:  23 feet                      17.25 inches
Beam:  6 ' 9 "                          5.378 inches
Depth: 2 ' 9 "                           2.063 inches
Height w/ masts: 19 '              14.378 inches