Mark P

Hi Kurt; Thank you for the reply. I will keep them all together. All the best, Mark

Hi Everyone; I want to start my build log soon, it will be of HMS Tremendous, a 1:48 scale model of a 74 gun ship launched in 1784. I intend to display her in a case with her ship's boats placed around her on the base, but near the glass so that they can be seen. I shall build the boats at intervals during the build. I would like to check how to post them, though. I assume I should start a separate build log for each boat, and not place them all under the same log as the main ship herself. Can someone please confirm that this is how I should do this, just to be sure. All the best, Mark P

Hi Mike; All the illustrations I have seen have just showed a pin like a steel rivet. When dropped in from above, the dome-shaped head stopped it falling through the hole. Happy Christmas to All!! Mark P

Hi Mike; You're quite right there. Trouble is, that doesn't work on the top deck, because there's no upper cill. All the best, Mark

Hi Mike; In the Royal Navy, carronades (at least those mounted inboard, not the very early ones) when not in use were swung parallel to the bulwarks, with their pivot pin placed differently, and lashed (or pinned?) in position. There is a good contemporary illustration of this parallel position on page 132 of Brian Lavery's 'Arming and Fitting.' With the long guns I am not sure what was done, but it would seem that they would need to be run out until the front of the carriage was tight to the bulwarks, and then lashed to the timberheads. This both freed up the maximum amount of deck, and left no slack in the ropes for them to heave around in a seaway. There would be no reason to change this when docked, so I say 'run 'em out!' Happy modelling! Mark P

Hi Hooite; In the Royal Navy, initially decks of warships were planked with oak all over. However, as the 17th century progressed, the supply of timber from English forests became severely reduced, at the same time that supplies from America became cut off due to loss of the colonies. This meant that shipyards were forced to start buying timber from Northern Europe, which was shipped from the Baltic. This was known as 'Crown Plank', or 'East Country Plank' and was pine, or deal. In the later part of the 17th century, this was used for most of the decks, only the outer 3 or 4 planks, and the first ones at the bow and stern being made of oak. How this was applied to Granado I am not sure. I believe that there is an AOS volume dealing with her, and more information might be found here if there is. Happy modelling! Mark P

Hi Jason; The gripe and the cutwater were leaded. The principal reason was to protect against chafing from the anchor cable as the ship swung in tides or currents. The paragraph below is from a contract for building the Bellerophon, signed in January 1785. She was launched the following year. However, the contract is a standard printed form, and was used for other vessels around the same time, and also in hand-written versions, where the wording is very similar. This is under the heading 'GRIPE' on the contract. 'To lead the Gripe with thick Lead of 12lb to the Foot Square, to lap each side 6" and buried in a rabbit, fastened with proper Nails, their Heads dipt in Lead, and to run up from 8' abaft the Ends of the Keel, so high as the lower Cheek, the ends to be let into the Wood and well fastened, to have Horshoes to the Gripe properly fastened.' I am not sure how this practice continued after coppering became standard, but as that was in the early 1780s, it must have been usual at the time of this contract, so maybe it was still done under the copper, or maybe its continued mention was just another example of bureaucratic inertia. All the best, Mark P

Hi Gary; You may well already be aware of this, but certainly in the Royal Navy gunports were a set size for a particular poundage of gun. Contracts also stipulated the height of the gunport cill above the deck, and the number and size of eye bolts and ring bolts to be used on each deck. All the best, Mark Po

Another pennyworth: I have deck plans from the NMM of HMS Tremendous, a 74 launched in 1784. There are notes and sketches on all deck layouts, drawn by the original builder, including many of the plank seams and butts. Although unfortunately these do not show the details of any nibbing or hooking at the bow, they show quite clearly that on all decks the planking runs in tapering curves towards the bow and stern. And whilst the bow planking clearly runs into a margin plank or waterway, at the stern the number of strakes remains constant, and they all diminish. At both bow and stern the outermost planks have much more curvature than those nearest the centre. All the best, Mark P

Gentlemen; Druxey's comments on the first rate model may well be correct. The ceilings of a couple of the stern galleries have been given a very amateurish and garish paint-over which is not in keeping with the standards of the rest of the model; so someone may well have tried to 'improve' it at some point in the time since it was first built. As both nibbing and hooking seem to have been used on contemporary models, I would agree with Chuck, it is a matter of choice, although the hooking seems to display a higher degree of craftsmanship. All the best, Mark

Gentlemen; regarding the dating of the model of the first rate from George I's reign, discussed above by Alex and Druxey, this is held by the Science Museum Archive, and is listed as mid 18th century (although George I died in 1727) The gun-deck of this model is normally invisible, only seen when the model is taken apart, and its planking treatment is totally different to all the other decks. All upper deck planking is cut from wide sheets, scribed to represent individual planks. This was a common technique in the Georgian period. I thought the shift of the planking on the gun-deck was incorrect as regards the shift of butts, however, the rest of the model seems to display all the signs of age, with shrinking and cracking of planking. I believe it to be a contemporary model to the period it represents, and as to why the butts shift wrongly, I can give no reason. All the best, Mark

Hi wq; It may be a bit too late to add my thoughts, but here goes: the braces approach the stay from different sides, with an angle between them. The sheaves in a double block are parallel, so the ropes need to approach with no angle between them. Blocks on a span can swing to match whatever angle the brace approaches at. All the best, Mark P

Thanks Pompey; Even if I don't build a copy of your trolley, there are still some well thought through ideas involved in it. I like the dowel stops and the sliding book board. Thanks for sharing these. All the best, Mark P

Hi Alan; The Sergison and Rogers collection are the same thing. It belonged to Charles Sergison's descendants before Colonel Rogers bought it, from under the nose of R C Anderson, who was really miffed that he had not been informed of the sale before it was completed. The Pepys collection is a manuscript collection in Magdalen College, Cambridge, and contains no models. Charles Sergison was Clerk of the Accounts at the Admiralty in the late 17th century, and laid the basis for the collection before he died in 1719. It remained in his family at Cuckfield Park, until Rogers bought it. Sergison inherited Pepys's models when the latter died. all the best, Mark P

Congratulations Alexandru on a great model, and all the clear photos. It is all very inspirational. I wanted to add to the debate about the height of the beakhead deck which I have just been reading. Maybe what I am going to say has already been said further on in this log, but I am reading through it slowly and have not seen all of the posts yet. Anyway, I have studied many draughts of 2 decked warships from the second half of the 18th century, and in every one it is quite clear that the upper deck is lower than the beakhead deck. There is a little ladder, of 2 or 3 steps, stepping up to the higher deck. This often is shown on the inboard profile. However, on several designers' draughts of 3-deckers, visible online from the NMM collections, for example the 'Duke' of 1777, and the 'Royal George' of 1756 and of 1788, the beakhead deck is a continuation of the upper deck, and is at the same level, with no steps. It would seem, therefore, that maybe Fortres is correct, and this is something that would bear further investigation; that the beakhead deck on 3-deckers was different to that on 2-deckers. Slade's design draught of the 'Victory' from 1765 is in the NMM collection, but it is very badly damaged and difficult to make out the details in the online image. However, there is an image of it in a recent book on Nelson's Victory by Brian Lavery which I have, and here it can be made out that this deck at the same level as the upper deck. This does show her as built, of course, and by the time of Trafalgar this may have changed, as she had been much re-built. In all the three-deckers mentioned above, the top of the main rail's central section is at the same level as the upper deck. As this part of the main rail formed the sides of the grating deck, the grating deck cannot have been any higher than the upper deck. All the best, Mark P

Hi Ian; If you do source boxwood from any other countries, one thing to bear in mind is that it should come from as cold a place as possible. As far North or South as it can be, or as high up. This is because the colder the climate, the slower the tree grows, and the tighter together the rings. It is the closeness of the rings that dictates the fineness of the grain. All the best, Mark P

Lovely work Alan; Hope that I will still have the determination to admit mistakes when I make them, and scrap the piece concerned. Well done to you! Rather sad though to hear about the poor devils locked up in such circumstances. It seems that although the official age of criminal responsibility was 10, if it could be proved that the child knew what he/she was doing was wrong, the age was lowered to 7. Hard times. Mark P

Thanks Mark; I have looked at your build log, and it makes clear a sensible way to have partners that not only lock into place, but are also removable. Thanks for the link. Your work on your model is beautiful! I hope to start my own build log soon. All the best, Mark P

Thanks again, JB, for taking the trouble to look this up. I have a copy of 'Vade Mecum' downloaded from the Bodleian Library in Oxford, which is a very good copy, clear and with good margins (unlike the Google copy, which trims some words off the edges) I have checked this out, and it describes the set up in quite a lot of detail for each deck. I might have a slightly different edition, because in mine it is on page 208-209. So the conclusion has to be that even at the end of the 18th century, longboats were still occasionally, or perhaps more often, still stowed on the upper deck, rather than on the boat beams in the waist. This would explain how it was possible to fit a ship's boat complement onto the booms, if the longboat was first stowed under them, then they were replaced, and the remaining boats stowed on top. This was perhaps undertaken when sailing on long voyages away from land, in order to keep the centre of gravity lower. Again, many thanks for all your help. Hi Gary; Thank you for your earlier suggestion, I have checked through your build log again (such amazingly beautiful work, sir!) and had a good look at your capstans. This is all a great help to understanding how such things were done. Again, many thanks for all your help also. All the best, Mark P

Thanks JB; I appreciate your time in replying. I will have a look for the book by Harland; it sounds like one that I should have in my library, although I have never heard of it nor seen it anywhere. I'm sure that there are many more books out there like that, though! I think that this must be the same John Harland who wrote the book 'Seamanship.' Thanks Gary; I am grateful to know about the Steel plate; I thought that I had seen most of his plates, but it seems I have some few still to go! As for looking through your build log, it will be a pleasure to look at such work again. I will be sure to take a look at page 9. Regarding the AOS Bellona, I have had this for many years, since it was published, but I didn't remember anything about a lowering capstan. I checked it out, and you are quite right, there sits the capstan room; although Lavery describes it as used for bosun's stores. Presumably, however, it could accommodate the capstan if it were necessary. Many thanks to both of you, gentlemen, and happy modelling! Mark P

Hi Druxey; Thanks for the information. I have recently joined the NRG, and will be buying the back issues on disk. All the best, Mark P

As I am researching the building of a 74-gun ship, HMS Tremendous launched in 1784, I have read many articles regarding boat stowage in the fighting ships of the Georgian era Royal Navy, and there seems to be a lack of concrete information regarding how it was actually done. One alternative, and well established custom, was to have the longboat stored on deck in the waist, which would seem rather to get in the way of working the guns and access to the hatches etc. The assumption has always been that the advent of the beams across the waist meant that the boats were then stowed here, as would certainly seem logical. The beams started to appear from around the middle of the 18th century, and gradually became permanent features of the waist. How long old habits of stowage lasted would seem to fairly well settled; boats in the latter half of the 18th century were stowed on the beams, thereby replacing the older custom of sometimes using the deck in the waist. However, and very interestingly, the contract for HMS Ganges, dated 1778 (NMM ref. ADT0012) and others of a similar date, describe removable capstans, in order that the longboat can be stowed on deck; and not really removable, but actually lowered down! So old habits died hard, perhaps. It seems that the entire spindle, and both the capstan and trundle-head from each deck was lowered as a unit I will quote the relevant paragraphs from the contract: 'Step for the Jeer Capstand' (on the gun-deck) 'The step for the Jeer Capstand to be prepared to shift for the Capstand being lower'd down to stow on the Orlop out of the way of the Long boat, as the Ships lately fitted in His Majesty's Yards, or as shall be described.' 'Partners for the Capstands' (on the upper-deck) 'The Partners for the Jeer and Main Jeer Capstands to be 7 ins thick and to be fitted as is done in the Kings Yards for Ships of her Class, that the Fore Jeer may be lowered down out of the Way of the Long boat.' The capstan is then described, and sounds perfectly recognisable and normal. No further description is given as to how it may have been lowered down. 'Capstands' 'To make & sett a Jeer Capstand afore, & a Main Jeer Capstand Abaft on the upper Deck of 1ft 11ins dia. in the Partners, each fitted with 12 Ash Bars of 12ft 6ins long, with ribs & Hoops in the Partners, & Hoops sole & Bolts on the Step, Cranks for the Bars, Iron Pins & Chains, & four Iron Pauls on the Deck, & in every aspect to be completed as is done in his Majestys Yards.' I would be very interested to know if anyone has any knowledge of how this lowering may have been achieved, or of any models that show something similar. I have seen references to removable capstans from the 17th century, but I was sure that such had died out by the later 1700s. Obviously not, though! All the best to all those who read this. Mark P

Hi Alan; I too am building a 74-gun ship, HMS Tremendous, launched 1784. I chose her because there is an 'as built' draught available, beautifully drawn, showing the details of the figurehead and stern carvings, as well as much of the inboard works. I am presently working up the drawing using Cad, which takes some time. Anyway, I have not read all your build log yet, as 21 pages is a bit too much unless I have lots of spare time, a very rare event; but I thought that you would like to know that the NMM have some of the original contracts for building of 74s in the 1770s & 80s, and these are available as copies at a very reasonable price. They are A3 sized, run for quite a few pages, and are crammed with detailed descriptions of virtually every timber in the vessel being built, including scantlings, as well as descriptions of many other parts and fittings of the ship, such as capstans, hatches, bitts, bulkheads, headrails, eye-bolts, ring-bolts, bolts and much more. Look on the website under ADT009, and you will find the contract for the actual 'Bellerophon' herself. ADT0011, ADT0012 are for the 'Bombay Castle' & 'Ganges', and ADT0030 is for 'Elephant', all from the similar period. There are more, and they follow a set format in the order that timbers etc are described. Some are hand-written, and some are printed; but they are all fascinating and original documents, well worth the cost of purchasing (£20 each plus postage) Each begins with several pages of overall or general dimensions, and it is these which would have been used by the draughtsman in the mould loft to help set out his full size frames, or by any subsequent draughtsman setting out a draught in the method outlined by Steel in his 'Naval Architecture' wherein he describes the drawing of a draught line by line; this is impossible without access to the measurements given in the contract, or by obtaining them elsewhere, or inventing them. Happy modelling! Mark P

It is most possible that it is a toilet. At this period the roundhouses for petty officers, as later fitted to the beakhead bulkhead, were not yet built; and I have read of similar things being fitted to the sides of ships, accessible from the gun-deck, for the use of the middle ranking members of the crew. Mark P

Companionway it certainly is! Mark P