Zvezda Medieval (?) Lifeboat

[Aginvicta]

I have followed several builds of different Zvezda model ships and I have got myself the Borodino and Varyag kits with photoetch and wooden decks. Before I attempt one of the them I decided to try a smaller boat first, the Medieval lifeboat.

The two sprues have plenty of detail and no flash. The hull sides were a good fit and needed no filler, and once dry I fitted the lower planks.

The seats (thwarts) were next to be glued in place and then the tiller. A small belaying point was glued to the mast and the ring that holds the jibboom fitted to the bow. The mast and jibboom were then glued in place as well as the barrel that goes into the stern.

Andy

[Gremlin56]

That is an amazingly nice build. :thumbsup2:

[louiex2]

Nice start- looks like a good kit to get your feet wet

[beefy66]

This looks like an interesting little build project

Beefy

[Aginvicta]

Thanks for the comments guys.

I painted the mast, jibboom, hull and seats using Plastikote nut brown enamel. I decided to leave the lower part of the inside unpainted, it's a lighter brown and I think it highlights the lower planks. I used white matt emulsion paint that I have left over from decorating the front room, to paint the furled up sail, it gives a washed out look that sails seem to have. Instead of painting the yard arm that the sail is tied to and the ties, I borrowed a brown felt tip pen from my daughter's school bag that she had left lying about, teach her not to put things away. It went on easily and a coat of varnish has sealed it nicely. There is no rigging thread included so I found some thread from a wooden ship model I built a few years ago. The rigging is straight forward, the knots are sealed with varnish. The instructions suggest that you glue the two backstays to the hull sides, I found a couple of photoetched eyepins and after drilling two holes in the side of the seats, fitted the eyepins with CA gel. The backstays were then tied to these pins, it looks a lot better. The ten oars were painted and then 2 sets of 5 were tied together, these will be glued along the seats later. I have varnished the rigging to smooth down all the fibres of the thread but it has made the rigging look a little bit slack, I'm not sure how to cure this, although if you look at full size tall ships their rigging is completely taut. All I have to do now is make up some coils of thread to go on the ends of the rigging and then it's finished.

Andy

[Aginvicta]

To make up 4 coils of thread to go on the ends of the rigging I first pushed 8 pins into some plywood, two per coil, at what I thought was about the right gap for each coil. A piece of thread was then wrapped round each set of pins about 5 times and then sealed with clear varnish. The photo is a bit blurred but I couldn't zoom in any more.

The next day I cut the loose ends off and there you have it, 4 rope coils. These were glued in place and then the boat hook and two sets of oars were fitted. I just need to varnish the whole boat with matt varnish, it's a bit too gloss looking at the moment, and that's it finished.

Andy