The scrollwork that came with the kit was laser cut and although I guess it looked ok, I decided to carve my own.
First, I needed to make some patterns from the large plans. 
I did this by scanning the section of the plans I needed and scanning it using our HP Photosmart C4280 printer (I would typically link to HP from here, but they don’t make it any more. It’s only about a year old!)
After scanning the portion of the plans that you see to the right, I took the TIFF file into Photoshop and got rid of the bits I didn’t need.
I also cleaned up all of the marks on the plan (and dirt and bugs (my workshop is in the former tack room of the barn – we’ll probably cover that later :wink:))
The finished pattern looked like this. I then made a sheet of 10 and printed them off.
Next I chose some Swiss Pear that I have been using for the bright work on the ship to make the scroll work from. I get my wood from The Lumberyard and I can’t say enough good things about Dave and EV. They really know their wood… I chose the pear, not for its color (it will be painted white) but because I think it holds an edge better than the boxwood I am using for the other parts.
After planing the pear wood down to about .030” thick, I had a good billet to work with. .030” is perhaps a tad on the thick side (about 2.4 scale inches) but I couldn’t really go any thinner because I was concerned that the piece would be too fragile to carve.
I glued the patterns onto the billets using my normal method of diluted carpenters glue and found another reason that I wouldn’t have been able to go any thinner:
Warping!!!
I don’t use a lot of water when I dilute the glue – just enough to make it easy to smooth the wrinkles out, so I don’t think it was user error. I think the wood was too thin to hold it’ shape.
But most problems like this can be solved with some wax paper, boards and strong clamps. It came out square. Let’s hope it holds or I may have to steam it flat again.
Stay tuned for more….
Take care – happy modeling.
Model Ship Building - USS Constitution 