This will be my first boat build at this scale, so who knows how it will turn out.

I got a set of Vic Smeed's plans from Sarik Hobbies along with their wood packs for the model - I thought having some laser cut parts might be helpful.

I grew up in Alness, so if the build goes well I'll probably paint it as 2757 which was based at 1100 MCU Alness/Invergordon in the late 1950's to early 1960's.

The keel came laser cut with the Sarik Hobbies wood pack, along with some 1/8" square strips and 1/8" ply planks to be glued on either side.

Looking at the plan and laser cut bulkheads, the 1/8" planks should have been 1/4", so I've added a couple more 1/8" ply planks to the rear of the keel to make it the right size.

I got some V slot aluminium extrusion from Amazon to use as a jig for building the hull on. I've no idea how well this will work, but time will tell...

Even though the bulkheads came laser cut in the wood pack, I wasn't too sure about the positioning of the front No1 bulkhead, so started with No2 & 3 instead.

It took a while to work out how to use some v slot aluminium to make a framework that would keep the bulkheads vertical and perpendicular to the keel, but I think I found something that works.

Added bulkheads 1, 4 & 5 today.
I cutout the centres of 4 and 5 before attaching them to the keel using a circular saw blade on the flexible attachment to my mini table saw - not a bad result for my first time using it.

I didn't do this one yesterday because it isn't perpendicular to the waterline (and therefore the other bulkheads) and also didn't fit without some modification.
A few more Amazon purchases to get moveable extrusion joints and much fiddling later and it is in place.

In addition to getting the fixing angle right, it took longer because despite both the bulkhead and keel being laser cut items from the Sarik short kit they don't fit together.

The bulkhead comes with a 1/8" keel slot, but the keel is 3/8" wide at that point, despite being 1/4" narrower than the keel design on the plan.
It looks like the central 1/8" keel section is the only one that should be full length, to give a 1/8" tab for the bulkhead, but all 3 laser cut keel parts are identical in the kit.

I guess if I'd noticed before laminating the keel sections I could have done something about it. I didn't though, so had to widen the keel slot in the bulkhead instead.

I also found that the deck height was too low when dry fitting, which prompted much height, level and angle measuring.

Oddly, the bulkhead is exactly the same size as the one in the plan and the angle I had was also pretty much spot on - it just sat noticeably low on the keel compared to the deck level of the other bulkheads, which isn't the way it looks on the plan.

I eventually decided to add 1/8" shim to the slot in the bulkhead to raise it up to approximately the same height as the other bulkheads. The slots for the chine also line up reasonably well visually with the shim in place, so hopefully it was the right thing to do.

A relatively easy job today.

I added the 1/8" carlings that join all the bulkheads together at deck level and the engine room sides that are located immediately inboard of the carlings between bulkheads 4 & 5.

The chines are made from 3 laminated 1/4"x1/8" strips on each side.
I added one layer at a time over three days, using lots of 1" bulldog clips to clamp everything down.

The strips between bulkheads 1 & 2 are bent inwards and upwards. This was my first go at plank bending and I improvised a tool out of some pulley wheels mounted to some V slot aluminium to try and get something consistent.

Bending the height of the strips distorted them slightly, but I don't think that will matter in the end since they will have to be carved down to the bulkheads later anyway.

The keel from the Sarik semi kit stops at the level of the chines near the bow so some work is required to build it up to full height. The plan is a bit hazy on exactly what the full height is (which may be why Sarik stopped short). I've tried to make it level with the inwales at bulkhead No1.

I also decided to make a former for the curve of the inwales between the bow and bulkhead No1 to increase the chances of getting something symmetrical.

For both of these tasks I scanned parts of the plan and imported them into Adobe Illustrator to get something that could be scaled and printed accurately.
Once printed I stuck the shapes onto some 1/8" ply, cut them out and then glued them in place.

The inwales are made from 3 1/8"x1/4" strips laminated together.
Unlike the chines they run the full length of the boat.

The bow sections involve much more curvature than the chines did, so I soaked each strip in boiling water before bending - this seemed to work, as none of them broke.

The bow former allowed each strip to be clamped to what I hope will be a symmetrical curve.

The next stage will be to trim the chines and inwales back to the bulkhead shapes.

This weekend I planed and sanded the chine and inwale laminations down to the shapes of the bulkheads ready for the hull skin to be added.

Since the bulkheads in the semi kit have the more accurate curved shapes from the plan I'm going to try planking rather than shape ply sheet to composite curves.
To make that a little easier I added more formers at the bow ahead of bulkhead 1 at the level of the chine line.

My current plan is to add the hull skin over the former before adding the solid bow block from the plan. Hopefully that will mean I'll know the exact shape required for the block.