Thanks Derek, your comments are much appreciated

I had that exact concern you're mentioning about ending up with planks that are too thin after sanding the hull. And to minimise the risk off going too thin the plan was to make sure, that in those areas where the adjoining planks were not flush and had more of a clinker look, the overhanging plank stuck out no more than 0.5mm.

Well, the plan worked quite well in most areas. At a couple of points the overhang was just shy of 1mm but I'm confident that after sanding no plank is thinner than 1mm.

There is only one spot where I had to glue a scrap piece of plank on top of an existing plank as the overhang was about 1.5mm. This fix is not crazily obvious and will be covered with a wale anyways.

I'm not 100% sure what type of varnish to use when it comes to staining the hull. In order to figure that one out I'm currently making samples to try different combinations.

For the wales i decided to get walnut strip wood as I want to reduce the rest of a potentially varnish bleeding...

I found that the walnut looks a little bit dull, so I applied two coats of walnut and ended up with a nicer contrast between the varnishes

Also, I added some tree nails form bass wire, which I think and hope will give a nice little detail addition to the hull. I pre-drilled the holes with a 0.4mm drill and then filled them with 0.5mm brass wire.

In order to do the whole hull of the Victory, I'll have to pre-drill and fit approx. 4,500 of these nails

Happy days ahead...

Hi Odo,

I’ve just read your last post with interest as I went through the same decision process when I was at this stage.
I think you are making a good choice with the first stain sample. It looks much more ‘Normal’

Keep the posts coming.

Chris

Before making any wood colouring choices, I need to focus on something else. I can't do the staining until the false keel is installed anyway so here we go.

I didn't want to risk for the blade to wander off and cut into the hull whilst cutting along the provisionally fitted keel, so I decided just to make a pencil line along the keel and then use a chisel knife to cut along the line.

It's, again, a slow process but it allowed me to have more control over staying on the cut line.

...and the stern post

Thanks Trev

Thanks Mark!

Sorry to hear that all your hard work got ruined. I'd be devastated if for whatever reason the whole thing would fall apart at this stage...

I found it really tricky to get the cut right for the false keel at the stern, especially when the keel was fitted.

My idea was to leave the width of the cut-out where the planks are twisting and at approx. 5mm. At that point the planks thin out to nothing and become very fragile but also very flexible because of it.

I thought to use that flex so that the planks will press themselves against the keel. Some pieces of the planks chipped of, but sanding made these areas less obvious.

Unfortunately, I didn't not take enough pictures to illustrate my thinking but I hope it makes sense...