Building Midwest Products' Chesapeake Bay Flattie Model Ship Kit

Midwest Products' Chesapeake Bay Flattie

Plank-on-Bulkhead Model Ship Kit

Promises Ease of Construction

Midwest Products Chesapeake Bay Flattie kit.

While solid-hull ship models are generally considered the easiest to construct, Midwest Products has created a "Success Series" of ship model kits that offer plank-on-bulkhead models that promise to make model shipbuilding easy for the complete novice.

We decided to test this theory by making Midwest's Chesapeake Bay Flattie ship model kit our first on-line kit build. The simple lines of these boats that made them ideal for locals to build from locally-available lumber should also make this an ideal ship model kit or a person with no prior wood ship model building experience.

The biggest challenge of plank-on-bulkhead ship models is planking the hull, and because of the simple shape of these boats, this task is accomplished in this kit with a single plank on each of the sides, and two planks on the bottom.

The kit comes with well-executed die-cut and pre-cut parts, as well as fittings, rigging line, sail material, and a well-done set of instructions and building plans.

Click on the links below to visit each stage of construction:
Chesapeake Bay Flattie Kit: Introduction
Chesapeake Bay Flattie Kit: Chapter 1, Keel and Bulkhead assembly
Chesapeake Bay Flattie Kit: Chapter 2, Deck Assembly
Chesapeake Bay Flattie Kit: Chapter 3, Mast Steps and Bow Stiffeners

We have a lot more steps ahead of us, so keep checking back for updates!

Photo Gallery of Historic Lumber Schooner Wawona

Once Lumber Schooners Plied the Pacific in the Scores

After Breakup of Wawona Just One Historic Lumber Schooner Exists

Documentary Photos of Schooner Wawona

Lumber Schooner Wawona

From the scores of wooden three-masted schooners built in the 19th and early 20th centuries for service in the West Coast lumber trade, the schooner Wawona was one of only two known to be preserved when she was surveyed in 1986. She was dismantled in 2009. She and the one surviving lumber schooner, C.A. Thayer (National Maritime Museum, San Francisco), were built by Hans D. Bendixsen, who was well known in his time for the superior construction of his vessels.

Wawona was designed for the Dolbeer & Carson Lumber Company of Eureka, California to transport more than 500,000 board feet of lumber per voyage from from the Pacific Northwest to ports further south on the coast. Like most ships in her day, Wawona’s hull was lofted from a carved wooden half model rather than a detailed set of engineering drawings.

Her official dimensions at launch were:
Length: 156.0 feet
Beam: 36.0 feet
Depth: 12.3 feet
Gross Tonnage: 468.42
Net Tonnage: 413.94
Wawona was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 1970.

Our photo gallery offers documentary photos of Wawona taken during a survey for the Historic American Engineering Record.

Photo Gallery of Fishing Schooner Lettie G. Howard

Photos of Lettie G. Howard

Offer Insight to Model Ship Builders

Details abound in documentary photography of historic fishing schooner

Starboard bow view, Lettie G. Howard

Readers of our site have asked for photos in addition to the Lettie G. Howard Plans we used to illustrate our page The Hull: Heart of a Ship, so, we are now offering them in high resolution.
Our Lettie G. Howard Photo Gallery of the last existing clipper-bowed inshore Fredonia model fishing schooner come from the 1989 Historic American Engineering Record survey, which was completed when she was de-masted and undergoing restoration, but still offer the ship model builder tremendous detail. HAER documents historically significant engineering, industrial, and maritime works in the U.S. The project is administered by the National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior. The drawings and photos from those survey are maintained by the Library of Congress.