USS Chickasaw Part 9: Stern-O-Plasty
I’d planned on the joining of the upper and lower hulls on Chickasaw to be an ordeal, but it wasn’t as bad in some respects as I’d expected, but was worse in other respects. While Chickasaw doesn’t have the full “raft over a lower hull” arrangement of the original Monitor or her follow-on Passaic class ironclads, it does exist. While building the lower hull, I exerted too much moisture and force in getting the sheeting applied, and completely removed the curve from the lower hull. I wasn’t prepared to clamp the two hulls together in an effort to straighten the problem out, as that would have just caused more. My resolution in the photos below…
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- The problem: upper and lower hulls don’t meet at the stern.
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- I scribed a line at where the break/gap started.
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- Initially the plan was to cut through half-way and bend it down, then fill the offending gap.
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- The thickness of the material in the after portion still wouldn’t allow a good fit, though, so…
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- Stern-ectomy of the lower hull. The rest of the lower hull as been aligned and glued into place with 30 minute epoxy.
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- I needed three frames/ribs to rough-out the missing stern section. Here are three pieces of styrene, held together with white glue and a paper clamp.
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- After sanding to shape, and running under warm water to release the glue, here they are.
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- New ribs/frames attached.
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- Filled with Elmers Wood Putty. I had thought of filling this with Apoxy Sculpt and sanding to shape, but that seemed as if it’d be too much work, and then thin styrene would sand much faster than the Sculpt. It’d have been much more difficult to blend everything together.
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- Sheeted with a slab of styrene.
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- Trimmed to size, then lots of sanding, filling, shaping.
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- Duplicolor High Build Primer. I’d never use this on a kit with any form of detail, as it’s a true automotive filler primer and would hide or soften all fine detail, but it was perfect for this. I believe this is eight coats of primer and sanding later. Ready for the prop and rudder fillets.
I’ve always been interested in the early iron ships, and in junior high built my own Monitor, and Merrimac in shop out of sheet metal. I like your Chickasaw, and wanted to know where you got the plans to build it, and if it is something I can get to build myself.
Thanks, a fan,
Kirk
Kirk,
Thanks! The model is actually from a 3D computer model that was exported, laser cut into plywood, and then the frame and some sheeting was all assembled. I’m not sure what plans the initial designer used, but there was some extrapolation in the process. I’ve never been able to find any detailed drawings of Chickasaw. There are basic overall line drawings of the concept and the initial builder loft plans in Canney’s “The Old Steam Navy: Part II”, and there’s a guy on eBay that sells as DavesDryDock that will sometimes have larger sheets of those same rudimentary drawings.
The guy who did the 3D model that this is based off of is working on upscaling her and after that he may offer the thing as a “kit” that you can buy directly from the laser cutter: you’d get sheets of laser cut wood shipped to you. I’ll definitely mention here when that’s ready to go.
Take care,
-Devin