Don't think of it as fear and instead as critical thinking. You are absolutely taking the correct variables into consideration. However, I can offer some help based on my experience. Others may chime in with their ideas/approaches and that would be awesome as well. As with any approach, it is up to you, your skills, your tools, and your preferences. Either way, if experimenting with someones advice, including mine, do so on a piece of scrap wood.

That said, I have found that on most pieces the char was very surface level. This will depend on the quality of the wood and you will sometimes come across a pieces that has some deeper charing. However, be it luck or consistent quality, all pieces I received weren't too bad - hat tip to the manufacture/designer!

This is where some good ol' past experience with model tall ships comes into play. With the ribs you actually have a bit of wiggle room in regards to the outer and inner sides of the ribs. The areas where the ribs rest into the keel are a different story...don't remove the char at all in these areas, otherwise you will end up with a loose fit. Some modelers suggest removing all char to improve glueing, but in my experience, a good wood glue works just fine and there are often times when I leave the char intentionally to create a nice visual between the two joined pieces. For all my ribs I only removed the char on the outside and inside edges and left the char in all places where two pieces joined.

For the foremost and aft-most ribs removing the char won't be much, if any of an issue at all since they get beveled quite a bit. This will be more evident once you put the template against these ribs.

For the rest of the ribs that are mid-ship, I used a 240 grit drum on my Dremmel, set it to the slowest speed, and worked away bit by bit. The same can be accomplished by hand, and some may prefer a wood block, but due to the complex curves I found slow and steady with the Dremmel worked best for me. However, I have become quite adept with rotary tools over the past couple years and suggest you practice this on scrap pieces before you even contemplate taking the tool to an actual rib. But, set on a slow speed and with a very fine grit, the removal of wood is slow enough that you should be fine.

Once I had all the char removed where I wanted it removed I followed up with some 320 grit and finished things off by hand. Love the feel and smell of wood when sanding by hand. Love moving my fingers over the grain as it tightens up. Sanding is therapy!

Overall, I removed all char without messing up the size of the ribs. I actually laid a couple test strakes along the outer side of the hull and it laid very nicely against all the ribs - another hat tip to the manufacturer/designer.

Hope this helped and of course, follow up with any other questions you may have.

Finally figured out how to add a profile pic and a signature line to my profile. By the time I am done with this log I may have a new career in the tech sector

Whew! 30 minutes here and there throughout the day and finally got the stain nearly done. Still need to go in and touch up in a few areas and figure I will bring some of those up now.

If you are going to stain or apply any type of finish to your model you need to be very clean with your glue. Scratch that...you need to be exceptionally clean with your glue. I have gotten better with this over time and am fairly happy with my results on the HMS Bounty. I have attached an image where I have highlighted areas that the stain did not take properly due to my poor glue management techniques. Thankfully, there weren't many and that is simply because I was very diligent in cleaning excess glue as soon as possible whenever I applied glue. I have found the key for me is to let the glue set just enough to keep the piece in place and the go back with a blade and clean off the excess. Will then go in with one of those Q-Tip type glue thingies, wet it a bit, and wipe the area to ensure I removed all the excess glue. On this model I was straight up religious about this as I wanted it to look as clean as possible when I stained it.

That said, I still missed a spot here and there. In the image below I circled these in magenta. The areas circled in green are actually places where I need to go in and touch up since I missed that spot with the stain.

Wow!! That really does look fantastic.
Well done.
Chris

That is looking very nice. Very tidy work. it is going to look amazing when you’ve done.

Mark

I’m loving this tenderfoot, it’s looking fantastic. I think it’s a real credit to you, how you have overcome problems and sailed on. What a difference the stain makes, I should think there are a lot more members looking in on this build and thinking about having a go, me included.

Happy to share what I do in these instances. I'll try to break things down in detail to help as many as possible.

1. Try not to get glue in places that will be visible and/or finished. I know this sounds pretty basic, but it is truly the best thing you can do. Take your time when gluing. Don't apply too much. More isn't better since the excess simply presses out into the visible areas.

2. Wipe excess glue off. Again, pretty basic, and I cannot even begin to describe to you how much time I spend making sure I have wiped up any excess glue after each and every piece I glue. I pay very, very close attention to this as it is the best way to prevent problems later. Now on to my method and this may be a bit more specific to the wood glue you use. I use the red Titebond and have found that where I do get some glue pressing out, if I wait for about a minute and then take a blade to it, it scrapes off nice and clean. It may take a few passes. Be patient and be sure to get all of the excess off, especially in those tight little corners. You will be surprised how much those small little corners show up if there is glue remaining and you apply a stain or finish.

3. Once you have scraped the area clean, go in and sand. Typically, if there was any glue that did work its way into the grain you can see this as it looks like a wet or darker area of wood. Simply sand until you are comfortable that you have worked all the glue out. Having a nice tight grain on the wood (340 grit is what I prefer) helps to prevent the glue from working into the grain too quickly, but it is still not perfect. No matter what, I typically end up having to sand a few areas.

4. No matter how hard I try, there always seems to be a spot or two that I have missed. Never fails. Never, ever fails. And Wow! will those spots leap out the moment you apply a stain. But no worries, the fix isn't as bad as you may think. There are two types of errors you may encounter in this regard. Scenario One, the blob of glue...this is a good amount that is sitting on the surface of the wood. I will typically try to scrape this away as as best I can before moving on to what I do for the second scenario. Scenario Two, there is a hint of glue that worked its way into the grain. This is the more typical scenario for me. A simple way to fix this is to take a piece of sand paper (make sure it is the exact same grit as the one you used prior to staining), dip a corner of it into the stain, and then to wet sand the area where the glue prevented the stain from taking. Not going to sugar coat it, it takes a bit of patience and an eye. You will need to slowly work the area, maybe even re-dip your sand paper in the stain, and slowly blend the area in. Often times you will need to work an area a bit larger than the spot to get this looking nice. But if you do take your time you can get those little trouble spots out.

I've attached a few pics that show a couple spots on the stem. I was actually going to just leave these as they would have been nearly invisible on the finished piece. But figured they would be good for demonstration purposes. You can tell by the pics that these are cases of scenario two where there were small traces of glue that had worked their way into the gain (looks like there was glue on my finger tips when I handled the piece...shame on me). Following the wet sanding method above I was able to completely eliminate them with about 20 minutes of effort...well worth it.

Hi Tenderfoot,
Thank you for sharing a very detailed answer to my question.
I am sure there are many people on here, including myself, who will benefit from your knowledge.
Chris

Once I had the pieces glued up I went ahead and used a knife to cut the for Orlop deck. I first cut the bow end as the instructions indicated. Once I was happy with the result I cut the piece to length, again with a new knife blade.

With the remaining length of planking I then cut the aft Orlop to length. Finally, per the instructions, I marked the center for each mast hole. However, I did not use a drill bit for these since, in my experience, on small pieces like this a large drill bit would simply chew up the wood and leave me with terrible results. Instead, I carefully drew the 10mm circle and began cutting it out with a nice sharp blade. I actually cut the circle a bit inside the lines and then followed up with a rounded needle file to finish it off. Took my time doing this and the end result was satisfying. I like satisfying results.

One thing to note. I didn't like the little nub on the fore deck...that little bit that protruded forward into the stem area. Just looked really weird to me. So, I decided to lop it off and round things just a wee bit. This was simply a personal decision and not related to any issues with the model or instructions.

Finally, I applied a simple wipe-on poly to each deck and let it dry overnight.

Good to see that your next parts have arrived safe and sound.

I`m really enjoying your diary with the addition of the tips included for others to follow.

Keep up the good work.


Regards
delboy271155
(Derek)