18th Century English Longboat by Model Shipways, Part 1

With all the projects I work on, progress in any one of them can be a bit slow. Every now and then I start to get antsy to finish something. This is one of those times, so I decided to finish up my 18th Century English Longboat. I’ve had this small 1:48-scale model (1/4″=1′) project since about January of 2012. Though I’ve primarily worked on scratch projects over the last few years, I decided to pick up the kit as something straight forward to build, something that didn’t require lots of research or decision making – just something to work on when I didn’t feel like working on something else.

Over the course of almost two years I worked on the model here and there and pretty well finished up the hull. After the recent ship model display at the Good Sam Showcase of Miniatures, where the model was displayed “in progress”, I decided the model was close enough to being done that I would go into high gear on it and finish it up. I hope to finish it up in the next week or two and will post more about it as I go.

Good Sam Showcase of Miniatures

While this event has already come and gone, I thought I should make a mention of this annual event that takes place this time every year in San Jose, CA. This is a big showing of vendors, primarily serving the doll house miniatures enthusiasts, of which there are apparently many.

Every year, one of the members of the South Bay Model Shipwrights club is invited to display a couple of his models. This year, there was more room, so the club was asked to participate. Three large and three small models were provided by club members, giving some great public exposure to ship modeling. I participated with two models, my Mary Taylor model and my in-progress 18th Century English Longboat model based on a kit from Model Shipways.

In addition to the models, the club provided a human presence to answer questions about the models and about ship modeling in general. It was a two day event and it was fun to work a shift meeting people who were interested in knowing more about the models.

I worked a few hours one day and discovered that a couple of the vendors were ship modelers. One of them, Steve Goode, has a mail order wood supply business that I’ve used many times in the past. I forgot that he was a friend of ship modeler Lloyd Warner, who also used to sell milled woods for ship modelers and still sells linen rigging line and some of the best rigging blocks available.

I’d never met Steve Goode, so it was nice to finally get a chance to meet him in person. I looked as his sample of wood again and realized that his is about the best modeling wood available. As he put it, he is more concerned with quality rather than price. So, his stuff is a bit pricier, but the quality is top notch. I’ve included his contact info on my Resources page in the menu above.

In any case, I’m looking forward to participating in this event again next year.