This is a Plank Bender. It has a sharp edge for “breaking” the fiber of the Plank to be able to bend it around the Hull without any pressure.
What you do is to squeeze down on the Plank just enough to break the fiber and to give it a little twist to the way you want yo bend the Plank.
I swear, these little MicroMark Mini-Clamps work perfectly on these Garboard Planks!
I was having a heck of a time trying to find a way to squeeze them together because they’re at an angle, and I didn’t want to end up having them bowed in from applying pressure on the wrong place.
Well, these little Clamps have these little triangles in them that are ideal for catching the edges.
This book wasn’t too bad. It had some good information.
There are a lot of different methods to Planking and this guy used the Proportional Dividers Method.
What he has you doing is to use some Masking tape to get the outline of the Bulkhead, then to use Proportional Dividers to find the thickness of the Plank at different points along the Hull.
Quite frankly, I found this system to be a bit awkward. Mainly because the Proportional Dividers that I bought didn’t really go small enough for it to work.
I had to resort to using the Calculations Method… Which worked a lot better for me.
A good thing to purchase would be a nice set of Digital Calipers is what I would recommend. I use the heck out of mine!!!
I decided to make my own Plank bending Jig.
I bought a piece of PVC Tube that is 3″ in Diameter.
I secured it to a board using some screws.
I’m experimenting with adding Ammonia to the Water that I use for bending. I’m giving it about an hour’s worth of soaking to see how it turns out.
I used about 120 ml / approx 1/2 Cup of Ammonia, for this Tube that I use for Soaking.
I boil the water in the Kettle and mix it all together. There is a Screw on the top.
The problem I’m having is that the wood is splintering as I bend it. So hopefully this takes care of the problem… Hmmm 🤔🙄😲
I’m going to go ahead and use it… For all things considered with this Model, the 2nd Later is going to be some pretty thick Walnut Planks so I’m not too worried about how the 1st layer looks.
All I’m really concerned about is to do it in a classical fashion. It’s an exercise really.
I bought this Plank Bending Jig from MicroMark. I had forgotten all about it to be honest! Anyway, I’m using it now and so far it looks like it’s working pretty good. I suppose you can just make your own but I bought it to fill out my orders to over $75 bucks for the Free shipping.
One thing that I found annoying though. MicroMark gave you just enough of these little Washers to fit the Spacers. Well… I promptly lost one of the Washers and without it, it won’t tighten hard enough. So now I have to hassle around with buying some more!
In my efforts to learn about planking, I ended up learning about three or four methods and here’s what I found out.
I think that’s the worst thing that you could do is to go by planking your boat haphazardly. You really need to make a plan and think about what you’re doing before you begin the project.
The first method that I learned was from the book Ship Modeling Simplified.
To be honest, I really wasn’t a big fan of this method because what they require you to do was to bend your plank around the Hull and at the point where the plank above it was your point x and for you to taper the playing from that point on to the Bow at the point where that plank met it.
The next method is the one that I’m using now. This method requires you to use a batten that divides the Hull of the ship into two bands. The upper band and a lower band.
Then what you have to do is to calculate out how much taper you’re going to need by mathematically finding out how small the Plank needs to be in order for it to squeeze into a certain space.
First you have to find out how many planks are going to be all the biggest part of the bulkhead, then you determine how you’re going to be able to squeeze that many planks into a limited space like the first bulkhead.
Another method is by using proportional dividers. I kind of have a hard time with this one because the proportional divider didn’t go small enough for the scale the ship that I was using but I’ll save that for later scale model which is bigger.
Like I said, there are as many methods as there are Model Makers. But this is my method. I’m not into it for speed production. Slow and Steady…
“Steady as she goes…” 🤣ðŸ¤ðŸ˜²
This is absolutely necessary for measuring the curvature of the Bulkheads.
I must say that I’m really loving this Superglue with Gel Control for doing the small precise work…
Also, I noticed that it has a bit of a floaty quality to it with the part so it allows you time to adjust it as you apply the part.
Here I’m demonstrating how to make these Clamps. I actually got the idea off of some guy on YouTube. They work really good for the initial Planking… Of course, you have to find out another way to hold the Planks down when you run out of bare Bulkhead to plank on to.
I made a little YouTube video on how to make them –
