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popeye2sea

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Posts posted by popeye2sea

  1. I know it is common for the main and fore knights and even other knights located about the deck.  For those it is absolutely necessary to have the line pass through a sheave at the bottom.  You would have massive problems if you tried to belay directly to the head of the knight.  But I have not seen it before at the beakhead bulkhead.  The line there can be redirected using the rail itself.

     

    Regards,

  2. As far as I can tell during this period the tacks and sheets did not come inboard through sheaved holes.  Sometimes they used decorated holes (lion heads and such) and other times they used chesstrees as fairleads.

     

    I am not sure what would be proper about belaying pins.  My reading is that they were not much used in this period, however I have been leaning towards using the pin locations on the side bulwarks but replacing the plastic ones with brass. I know that they would have been wood but I like the contrast with the royal blue bulwarks. The lines to the beakhead bulkhead will remain tied off to the rail stanchions.

     

    Speaking of the beakhead bulkhead, I have seen a model of the SR (I believe it is M. Saunier's) with sheaves let into the base of the rail stanchions to redirect the lines up to the stanchion head.  Do you know if this was actually done?  I am thinking of adding them into mine.

     

    The list of upgrades keeps getting longer :default_wallbash:

     

     

    I wish I had more time to get back into the model.  It is sitting here by my desk calling to me.  I am getting some outstanding projects finished that should free up a bit of time. 

     

    Regards,

  3. It's really very simple.  Everything in the rigging needs to get to or be fixed in to position in three dimensions: up/down, right/left, and forward/back.  Now put a rope on everything such that it pulls in those directions (down is mostly taken care of by gravity).  If the object is heavy add a way to multiply the force (block and tackle).  Try not to foul or tangle the lines.

     

    There, I just described 99% of the rigging for all ships!

     

    Sounds silly but it's true.:)

     

    Regards,

     

  4. I suspect that the sail would be set outside the stays and not between them.  It also looks like the sail is too big.  I doubt it would extend beyond the main mast.  The lee sheet would be slack over the stays.  That is how the sail gets to the other side on the opposite tack.  The sail would be brailed up and the clew hauled over the stay using the sheet.

     

    Regards,

  5. 22 hours ago, shipmodel said:

    Hi Tom - 

     

    One small point - the name of those extended sails is 'studding sail', not 'stunning sail'.  The confusion is easy, since the sailors' contraction was spoken and written as "stun'sl".  I don't know how the word slid down the alphabet, but it may have had something to do with all those English dialects and accents mixing in the early Royal Navy.

     

    Dan

    The word is actually a multiple contraction similar to Fo'c'sle for forecastle.  It's really spelled stu'n's'l.

     

    Regards,

  6. Here are my thoughts on this subject, and I may be wrong, but I think a little common sense may apply.

    The reason to have the knight on a lower deck was to have it on the same level as the capstan.

    The hole for the halliard should be just large enough or slightly larger than will fit the six parts of the tackle fall plus the top rope so that they run fair to the rams head block on the tye.

    The hole should be above the knight otherwise you will have much abrasion and loss of purchase due to friction.

    The halliard would be free of any service to allow it to pass readily through the sheeves on the knight and rams head blocks.

     

    Regards,

  7. The one with the screw elevation is a true carronade. It is also mounted differently to it's slide with a pin that runs underneath the barrel.  The other type of cannon is called a gunnade and is more like a cross between a carronade and a traditional cannon in that it has trunnions and a quoin but is mounted on a slide.

     

    Also the carronade carriage is fixed in place via a pintle inside the gun port.

     

    The gunnades were made for the ship in error during her 1920's refit.  Currently the ship has only two carronades.

     

    Oops, didn't read on in the posts.  Already explained!!

     

    Regards,

  8. Here is a two part answer. 

    The lead of the spritsail sheet varied by country and by date.  Some, at the middle of the century had very short or no pendants.  The standing part of the sheet is made fast somewhere near the fore shrouds and the hauling part goes inboard abaft the fore rigging.  Towards the end of the century the English, the Danish, and the Dutch took to using very long pendants that came well aft, sometimes abaft the fore channel. The pendant passed trough a bullseye or thimble either affixed to the fore channel or hanging from the fore most shroud.  This would answer your last point as to how to keep the sheet from dragging in the water.

     

    As you can see in your diagram the spritsail sheet block is unusual.  It has a rim or collar around the top and the strop is fitted in a particular way.  The ends of the strop are put through holes in the rim so that the block lies in the bight and the two ends go to the clew of the sail forming the pendant.  The two legs of the strop were twisted together into a sort of cable laid arrangement and the ends were formed into a spritsail sheet knot which goes through the clew of the sail.  The spritsail sheet knot is a special form of wall and crown knot made from all six strands of the two legs of the strop instead of the usual three strand wall and crown.

     

    Probably more info than you needed, but interesting anyway.

     

    Regards,

  9. I concur with Dave and Frank.  I do notice that all of the lines in that plan are depicted as permanently fixed to the rails.  In fact the hauling ends would not be seized to the rails but belayed at some point, either to belaying pins or some other fixture.  That may be what generated your confusion as to them being fixed and immovable.

     

    Regards,

     

  10. I believe the Royal Caroline has a lateen mizzen. So the the cross jack yard is only used to spread the bottom of the mizzen topsail and there would not be a sail set from this yard. It does not need to move much.  A lateen mizzen is not meant to swing widely like a gaff rigged fore and aft sail.  It is only meant to increase or decrease the turning effort of the aft rigging; helping to keep the ship on or off the wind.

     

    It would help to know what you mean by "bracers" also.

     

    Regards,

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