It's my first nautical build so what might appear to be lightning fast construction is really just a lot of catching up on already completed steps. My photos of the early stages of the build are hit and miss and the quality leaves a lot to be desired. It's casual documentation at best. Fortunately, lots of good logs for this boat are already available on this forum so all the nitty-gritty of actual construction techniques have been covered quite thoroughly by far more accomplished builders than I.
For me, these items alone are worth the cost of the kit. I was a little surprised that Model Shipways used such a crudely built version of the boat on the box cover. It doesn't come close to accurately representing the quality of the kit and really would have made me think twice about my purchase if I had seen it in person.
Your results will most definitely be far better than what you see on the box! My kit had quite a few small and not-so-small discrepancies between the plans and the laser cut parts so be sure to compare the two and proceed accordingly. Trust the plans rather than the die-cuts. I know better now. I added small blocks to strengthen and align the joints overall and I think it was worth the minimal effort invested. I may have just gotten a little unlucky with my particular kit but I suspect this is a common issue.
Dead flat and staying that way is a must if you want the bow and stern horses to sit properly and receive the frames without modifications. The frame after it had been removed from the horses. Note the use of small blocks to square up and stabilize things. The planking process puts a lot of stress on this thing so sturdy is good. If your jig matches the plans, your planking should go on without a hitch. The biggest area of concern for me was getting the planks to transition properly into stem and stern posts.
The planks appear to rest on top of the stem and stern posts creating a ledge rather than merging into them. I needed to thin the planks quite a bit to get a somewhat smooth transition. Live, learn, move forward. Starting the planking process with a little help from my friends at the Albany Distilling Company. So my completed hull came off the planking jig as advertised with surprisingly little glue seepage inside. Joy to the world! On to the frames. These are made by laminating 2 thin strips together and conforming the lamination to the insides of the hull at regular intervals.
