First Card Model, HMS Bellona by Shipyard

[Bob Hunt]

Group,

Here are the first set of photos of my card stock model of HMS Bellona. The model is in 1/8" scale and is about 18" long.

The bulkheads, keel and strengthening cross pieces were all printed on light weight paper in the kit. I glued these pieces to mat board which is 1mm thick. Mat board is the stuff they use in framing pictures, and I bought it at AC Moore, a craft store chain.

I've included a photo of the glue I used. It's a kind of rubber cement. You apply it to both surfaces, let it dry, then press the two parts together. It bonds really well.

The hull is actually in two parts. The photos show construction of the first half which is pretty straight forward. You glue the parts drawings to the mat board, cut them out with a #11 Xacto and then put them together sliding the bulkheads into the slots on the keel. The strengthening cross pieces get slid into their appropriate slots after all of the bulkheads are installed.

Nothing was glued until it was assembled. I used a craft white glue called Tacky Glue. It dries white unlike Weldbond which dries clear. I used a toothpick to apply glue to the outside of all of the joints, not inside the joints.

After the forward section was built and glued, the aft section was built by first attaching the bulkheads to the aft section of keel. The two halves get joined when you add the cross strengthening pieces making the hull fairly rigid. Then all of those parts were glued together.

I'm not starting to add the first layer of hull skin between the bulkheads. In this kit, these are printed on heavier card stock that has a bit of gloss to it. They cover the lower half of the hull. Much larger pieces cover the upper half with gunports. My next update will cover the upper portion of the hull and the gunports.

I doubt that I'll use the kit cannons which are paper and have to be rolled in a cone shape. That's just too time consuming and too much work for my taste so I'll probably purchase some cast metal cannons instead. The lower decks use a false type cannon where the carriages are not fully detailed and have no wheels.

Hope you enjoy this build, it's a real challenge and I'm learning stuff daily.

Take care,

Bob

[doctormax]

A great start bob,

[Michael Mash]

Hello Bob,
The old sailing vessels always have that great artistic shape to the hull. Congratulations on the start of your first card ship. She looks great.
Mike

[birder]

Formers look good Bob! I think using the cast cannon is fine to give more of a "wood kit look" I really like the cnc milled wood blocks, I love them, but also like the process of making a few....of course it will be a spell until you need them..

[Wyvern]

Great start!

Wyvern

[Bob Hunt]

I've really been putting in the hours and have run into several problems with parts being misnumbered. I'm apply the second layer of skin on the lower hull but it looks like I'm going to have to do a lot of sanding to get a smooth hull.

I plan to put real copper plates on the bottom. I've done this many times on wooden models, and although it does take a lot of time, the look is very nice and realistic. But you've got to have a smooth hull to start with.

I plan to use the vinyl wood looking strips as Doris uses to simulate the planking and give it a nice wood look.

I'll post photos sometime in the near future when I make some progress worth showing. Right now it looks rather rough looking but then so do my wooden models in the beginning.

Take care,

Bob

[Bob Hunt]

Well, sadly my Bellona is in the trash can. I did so many things wrong on this model I can't even begin to describe them all. Not a good start in card modeling. Guess I need to regroup and try again. Card modeling is much harder than I thought!

Take care,

Bob Hunt

[Pat_craft]

Don't be discouraged we all have models in the trash can, or models which would be in the trash can...

[deckape]

Bob
dont get to discouraged over it Everyone here on this wonderfull forum has a model or two dent to Davey Jones locker. Lord knows I had a few. This is how we learn from our mistakes , most kit are made in Poland or even Germany, a lot of their parts are numbered incorectly, Like My Flymodel line every Fly kit I built thats on this forum I ran into fit problems and misnumbered parts, Once you get the idea and becomeing more familur with assembly the battle is won. Paper in gemeral in,t forgiveing as that of plastic and wood with these two materials you can always make and replace the part fill prime and paint. with paper some parts you cant. this is when he printer comes into action if you have a cd of the model you can always print as many you can without fuss.. So dont get discouraged and give up, Start again I bet even money this time it wont go in the trash can.Start with a kit that is more simple to build unti you get the feel of paper modeling. most everyone here use to be a plastic and wood modler as you know the price and the economy has driven us modelers away from this and resulted to paper. Try again Bob. you will make it.

[lancer525]

Bob, you've made a great start and the best thing about paper models is that if you bollix something up, or there's an issue in the kit, all you have to do is print off another page, and voila! Fresh parts. Can't do that with many other media.

My first models were a huge challenge to me, even though they were fairly simple compared to the Bellona you chose to start with. Someday soon, you'll look back and think "gosh, why did I think this was so hard?" and smile.

Keep cutting and plugging away. Don't get discouraged, and don't give up. I promise you (and I'm sure everyone else would agree) that you'll soon get to a point where you won't even think about it, and they'll all start going together so smoothly that you'll begin building up a huge stack of "To Do" kits...