Scratchbuilding a B&O RR stick lighter: Pt. II 7.
8.
7. This overhead view shows the “chopped” corners on the deckhouse. Also, note that the deckhouse is not centered on the barge. 8. The deck planking has been completed, and the ends are ready to be trimmed flush with the bow and stern. Great care must be taken when installing the planks to ensure
these fillers between the two bulk- heads, one flat at the bottom and the other just below the level of the tops of the bulkheads. They should be on the centerline of the barge. Also glue the two end bulkheads in place; hold them in place with blue tape until they dry. Now take a sharp ¹₄″ drill bit and carefully drill a hole vertically through the two pieces of plywood flush up against the front of bulkhead No. 7. Go slow to get a nice clean hole. This will give you a good strong assembly into which you can later glue the mast. Drop the deckhouse into its recess and cut some pieces of scrap to glue be- tween the stringers wherever the front and rear walls are more than about an ¹₈″ from the nearest bulkhead. Shape the top to match the camber of the deck, smear a little glue on the ends, and hold the pieces in place snug against the walls of the deckhouse. Do not, however, glue the deckhouse in place yet. You just need to glue these scraps into place. They support the ends of the deck planking where it butts against the deckhouse walls. Before starting the planking, sand all joints flush on the outside of the hull so the planking will lie flat. Also stain the outer face only of the end bulkheads; use the same stain you used for the stripwood. The first thing I did was glue a piece of stained scribed (¹₈″ scribing is fine) basswood sheet to the sloped portion of each end. The scribing runs horizontal- ly. The edges were then sanded flush with the vertical face of the ends, the hull sides, and the bottom. Next, glue on the side sheathing us- ing individual planks. (Be sure that you purchase enough material of the
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that you keep them parallel with the sides of the barge. You may wind up with a narrow plank when you finish, but you do not want to wind up with a tapered one! You can see here how the “egg crate” will support the deckhouse. The deck will look even better when it is weathered a bit more with powdered chalks.
correct size for all of the planking at the same time and from the same source to lessen the chance of winding up with a few planks in the middle of the sides or deck that vary slightly from the others because they came from a different production run. As good as the manufacturers are with quality control, in such small sizes and with a natural material it’s almost im- possible not to have slight differences from one run to another of the same size. A difference so slight as to be un- detectable with a fingertip will be visi- ble from six feet away when the light rakes across the deck at a low angle.) As the sheer line is not extreme, I didn’t have any problem bending the planks “sideways” to match the curve of the deck. The uppermost piece was glued on first, flush along top edge of the port and starboard stringers.
I
used dress pins to hold it in place until the glue dried. You can also use small spring clamps if you have enough of them.
After the first piece has dried thor-
oughly, you can add the rest. Push them up tight against the lower edge of this first plank before pinning each of them in place to dry. Smear a thin lay- er of glue on the back of each plank and try not to let any squeeze out onto the face of the hull. Work your way down the side of the hull until you reach the bottom. I used ¹₈″ wide stripwood and there was just enough space left to glue the last plank in place. The last one will extend past the bottom of the side, more at the center than at the ends be- cause of the sheer. When this planking is all dry, carefully trim the bottom edge where it extends past the bottom of the barge.
Now it is time to work on the deck.
Take the pre-stained stripwood you are going to be using for the deck planking and dump it in a heap on the work- bench. Cut a strip a bit longer than the length of the barge and glue it in one piece along the edge of the deck flush with the outside of the side planking. Before the glue sets up, check that it is straight and even along the edge of the barge, then let it dry. As a rough guide, when I started the
deck planking I decided to make the longest plank no longer than needed to span the next four bulkheads. Pick a number from one to four and count that number of “bays” from one end. Pull a piece of decking from the pile and cut a piece long enough to reach from the end to the center of the select- ed bulkhead. Cut it to that length, us- ing a NWSL Chopper if you have one, to get a nice square end. Starting at the left end, glue this piece down and pin in place. Throw the rest of the first strip to one side, starting a “second go- round” pile. Pull a new strip out of the original pile and lay it end to end with the piece you just glued down. Butt it tight and mark at the center of the fourth bulkhead to the right. (I happen to be right handed and work left to right). Repeat this until you reach the other end of the barge, always using a different strip for each successive piece of decking to insure that you get a ran- dom pattern to the plank colors. As you do succeeding rows of planking,
vary the length of the first piece, then continue that row by counting four to the far end. You do not want any of the joints in adjacent rows of planking to fall on the top of the same bulkhead. After you have worked your way through the origi-
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