Landlubber Mike

Hi John, hope you and your family are having a great 2014. Really nice work on your Morgan - it's coming along great. I remember getting to this point on my Badger and getting excited that the build was finally looking like a ship I don't mean to hijack your build log, but can I ask you a question? I am going to start the Morgan after my Badger is completed, and I'm considering avoiding the use of paint as much as possible. So, I've been thinking about what type of wood to use for various parts of the ship. In looking at your pictures of the real Morgan and other pictures, it looks like the deck, bulwarks and deck furniture and other items seem to all be the same color. Was that your recollection? If so, I was thinking that maybe using boxwood for those areas would work. Thanks very much!

Absolutely beautiful model of a beautiful ship. Thanks so much for sharing.

Daniel thanks for that great explanation. Makes a lot of sense, thank you!

Thanks, I'll have to try that out.

Oh, he made it collapsible? I was worried that his model was damaged, whew! Did you manage to get Google translator to work? Or do you speak Italian? I would love to find a translated version for reference on my next build - which, at the rate that I proceed at, will likely be in 5-10 years

This is a good point Eamonn - I've been thinking about your comment most of the day today which made me go back to some of the resources I consulted when trying to figure out how to approach the furled sails. The diagrams in Harland show very tightly furled sails, relatively close to the scale of mine. Zu Mondfeld also cautions that the furled sails should be neither too thick nor too thin - he includes a picture on page 331 of an 1867 French corvette whose furled sails he praises. It's a bit hard to tell from the black and white photo, but it looks like the ends of the square sails are at the same scale as mine if not smaller, but the bulk in the middle is significantly larger. Maybe this is a factor of the sails being furled on top of the yard, rather than down and in front? The general bulk of the driver/spanker seems to be a little larger than mine as well. So, definitely a point of consideration. Now I'm hoping that mine aren't too thin

Wow, I just came across this webpage where the builder's sails are absolutely amazing and put mine to shame. The website is in italian, and I can't seem to get Google translate to work on it, but the pictures tell the story. For the squeamish, don't scroll down on page 2 http://www.deagostinipassion.com/forum/posts/list/50/23263.page

I added buntlines to the topsails and the fore course. Rather than knotting the end of the line and running it through the buntline blocks at the top of the mast like you would do per the kit instructions, I glued a portion of the line onto the sail and ran it through the buntline blocks before furling the sails. Unfortunately the example I showed in the beginning of the thread was for the topgallant sails, which didn't have buntlines. I skipped the bowlines and reef tackles. You're a brave man if you are going to add them I will likely add a combination of furled, partially furled and full sails to my next build, so I'll be following your techniques closely.

Looking really great Augie. Wales and the treenails came out very nice indeed

Hi again Jay, sorry I missed this response earlier. What confused me earlier was the configuration in the kit plans for how the clew lines and sheets and their related blocks were run - essentially, the clue line is fixed to the spar towards the end, travels downward to the clew block (from which the sheet is run), then back upward to the clue block on the spar near the middle of the spar, forming a triangle. The triangle is fictitious really, and is there only because the kit's plans show a typical model without sails. Actual sails had the clew block attached to the cringle of the clew of the sail, and the sheet or tack (depending on the sail) was run through the cringle. The diagrams from pages 82-82 of the Lennarth Petersson book are very helpful, but unfortunately I can't find the online version to post pictures. So, what I ended up doing with my sails is that I added the cringles to the clews of the sails, attached a clew block at the sail clew (and for the fore course a sheet block as well), then ran the sheets through the cringles, knotting them at one end so that they stayed locked at the cringle (for the fore course, I ran the tack). It took me a long while to wrap my head around all this, but I think this is how it all works. You're right that it does make for a busy section at the furled sail clew. I've seen a few models with furled sails where the sail clew was omitted, perhaps because of the "busy-ness" at that point, or perhaps because it makes things a bit more complicated.

Thanks very much Eamonn, really appreciate the kind words. Give them a try!

Jay, the location of the furled sail as to the spar (below and in front vs. on top) depends on the period. I think when jackstays were introduced (I think that's they were called, but I could very well be wrong), the furled sails sat on top of the spar. The Badger dated from about 1778, which preceded the jackstay (or whatever it was called), so I put my furled sails below and in front. Mike

Very cool, thanks very much for sharing your technique! Looks fantastic, particularly against the red painted areas.

Looks great Jay! How did you do the seams? They look very good. The crew were very brave indeed to stand on the yard horses and furl the sails. Here is one picture that I found online of some folks doing that - not my cup of tea, and I don't think that I'd be all smiles like these gentlemen!

Hi Peter, thanks very much for looking in. The zu Mondfeld approach seems like great advice - I'm working fore to aft, but I think working aft to fore would have been a better approach. I'll probably try that next time. No offense taken at all on my furled sails - I appreciate all thoughts, comments and advice, as I'm always looking to improve things. One thing I would note is that the amount of sail to be reduced is very dependent on the thickness of the material that you are working with. Even though the material I am using is the thinnest weight cotton that I could find at a fabric store, it is still a bit too thick for my liking. I originally was going to go with zu Mondfeld's suggestion of reducing by 30%, but the sails would have come out too bulky. If I had used something else like silkspan or the like, then I probably could have gotten away with keeping more material. For future builds, I'll probably see if I can source thinner material, like high quality linen handkerchief type of material or maybe very fine cotton material used for bedding, or tissue-like material like silkspan. In any event, that is why I had to get a little creative with the pattern of the sails. I'll mention one other thing about the thickness of the material I was using. It might have been easier to create folds and creases using thinner material. Maybe that's less important at the scale I'm working with now (1:64), but I would have liked to have been able to get more folds and creases in the sails. Even reducing the sail by as much as I did, the furled bulk is still very tightly furled with little extra space within the bulk to help create the folds and creases. It's also amazing at how tightly sails could be furled to the yards. I've read that the furled bulk should be about the size of the yard, which is not all that big - in fact, this led me to believe that perhaps my topgallant and maybe even topsails were a tad too big. Here are some pictures I found of the Niagara and another ship. Amazing that even the driver could be furled so tightly!

Looking forward to following your build!

PiratePete, Are you the author of the build manuals on Euromodel's website? If so, a big thank you! I downloaded them yesterday, and was very impressed. Vince, Congratulations! If the Royal William is anything like the Friedrich Wilhelm, I'm sure you were very impressed with the materials and the plans of the kit. I have a few kits now, and almost wish that I had stuck with Euromodel kits. I'm excited to follow your build, if you decide to post a build log. Nigel, Congratulations on the Mordaunt! That looks like another fantastic kit. Hope you post a build log

Really great work Jason. I'm a bit further along in rigging my Badger, but I think I would have had an easier time going with your approach of adding the mast sections and accompanying rigging in sections, rather than building the entire mast, stepping it, and trying to run the rigging. Things get a bit complicated with the lines doing it the latter way. The only good reason to do it the latter way in my opinion is that it is probably easier to ensure that the mast sections are all lined up correctly. I'll be interested to follow your steps and see how you liked your approach.

Ulises, your work is absolutely outstanding. I love the improved rigging line and blocks. That extra bit of enhanced detail really sets a model apart from a "by the kit" model. I'll have to look into improving those components for my next builds. I really like your furled sails. Just out of curiosity, did you add clews to the sails? A number of modelers don't add them, but a few I've seen do. I ended up adding clews to my Badger sails (in large part because I was wondering how you would otherwise run the clew lines), but I was sorta guessing on how to do it.

Looking great George. What a beautiful ship!

Thanks very much Anthony, I appreciate the kind words One thing I forgot to mention - in reality, when sails were furled they weren't rolled up as you would do with a rug. Instead, they were gathered up. They look like they were rolled up because as they are gathered, a "skin" is formed by a fold of the sail which serves to cover and protect the entire bulk. I tried this on the square sails, and had a tough time doing it. So instead I just rolled them as well as the driver sail up. Just remember to compensate for the fact that the bulk of the sail will end up along the furled side, so you need to preposition the sail a bit towards the opposite side from where you are rolling so that the bulk ends up in the right spot. I did manage to use the gathering/skin method on the jib sail, which was a little easier since it wasn't fully furled. A possible improvement to the sails would be to add seams to them. I've heard of various techniques to indicate the seams, such as by using pencil or pen to trace the lines, actually sewing in a seam or pulling a a thread line out of the cloth. My personal view is that at this scale (1:64), the pencil/pen and sewing methods are slightly overscale and add a bit much to the look of the furled sails. The pulling of the thread technique sounds very interesting, though I wonder how easy it is to do. I should also say that if anyone has any questions or suggestions on improvements, I would love to hear them.

Thanks very much Steve, but after looking at your Victory and Apostol Felipe, I think it is you that need to put together a tutorial, and me to do the reading - very nice work! I'm glad to hear that you're planning to put sails on your Constitution - that's one ship that will look fantastic with sails. Nice job by the way on the small boats on your Constitution. I'm going to start the Charles Morgan as my next build (alongside the Corel Unicorn), and the small boats are constructed in a very similar way. The Badger (and most other kits) use cast resin bodies for the small ships, which can be nice, but I like the idea of wood hulls.

Thanks very much guys. I probably would have finished my Badger four months ago had I not gone the furled sail route, but I think it's been well worth it. Jay, the boom is coming. I'm planning on adding an ensign to the end of the gaff, which will be raised by a halliard which is belayed to cleats along the bulwarks near the captain's cabin of the ship. I figure that it will be easier to belay the lines if the boom is not in the way. As for the other model you saw with no boom but a flag staff, some mizzen/gaff sails do not have a boom, but are set flying (I think these are technically called spankers). Maybe that was what the model had? As you say, if there is a flag staff, then a boom would tend to get in the way. By the way, I love your tutorials, both on here, and on youtube. You definitely set the standard for passing along great information to the rest of us.

Next step was to furl the sail as much as possible off the build before attaching the gaff to the main mast: I was able to completely furl the head area along the gaff up to the throat of the gaff. You'll see I used three gasket type lines to hold the furl here, to somewhat represent the brail lines. Not sure if this would be accurate as I think the brail lines actually ran through brail blocks at the gaff, and then were belayed down to the deck. But, this would have been overly complicated at this scale, not to mention that multiple pins and cleats would have to be added. So, I went with these three gasket type lines. Ultimately, I went with two along the gaff, and moved the remaining line to the throat area of the sail (and not at the throat of the gaff itself). I was also able to get the luff edge furled pretty well at this stage as well. My plan of not angling the foot worked out pretty well, as you can see that the bulk is greatly reduced at the tack, with most of the bulk at the throat. In case you're wondering, I'm using napkins under the red clothespins because I've found that the color on these colored clothespins can rub off on the sail cloth From there, it was a matter of installing the gaff and lacing it to the mast. As noted above, the lacing for the mast is a bit different than the lacing to the gaff - I think zu Mondfeld has 10 different approaches in his book. From my research, part of the reason for the different lacing was so that the sail could slide more easily up and down the mast. I used the mast lacing pattern as in this diagram: Next I furled the rest of the sail, and added two more brail lines against the mast. I also added a block and tackle arrangement at the deck as you can see in the third picture below. I'm also planning on adding the outhauler line, which would run from the tack clew, through a sheeve at the end of the boom, and belayed at a deck cleat at the base of the main mast. The kit plans have two pairs of deck cleats to be installed at the base of the main mast, with only one pair used, so all I needed to do was add an extra pair of eyebolts to the deck. They still need some work to try and get in some folds, etc., but overall it came out somewhat ok I think. I'd also note that in addition to real drivers having brail lines and blocks, there are a number of other inhauler/outhauler lines at the peak, as well as lines at the end of the boom. For my build, I thought they would add too much complication given the kit's pin and cleat configuration, and I had already installed them per the kit plans before deciding on the furled sails. So that's how I added a furled driver. There are probably better ways of doing this, but hopefully this helps give people a jump start on how to approach them - I had searched all over the internet for methods on how to install a furled driver, but couldn't find any so hopefully this helps a bit. Thanks for reading!

My approach Like the other sails, I started by drawing a general outline of the driver sail, tracing the plans for the gaff, main mast and boom, and then just drawing a line for the leech end of the sail. The next step was to draw the pattern for the reduced sail. Here, there were three considerations: (1) how to reduce it enough that I could get a tightly furled sail; (2) how to design the pattern so that the furled sail bulk would be thinner at the peak and tack, and thicker in the area in between; and (3) mechanically, how would I proceed with the furl given that the furl takes multiple directions along the brail lines. Here is what I came up with: The total bulk of the sail is reduced to about 40% of the full sail size. The depth along the head and along the luff is about the depth of what I used for the furled fore and main course sails. The shape is a bit odd in that at the head area, the leech end is angled inward, while at the foot, it runs parallel to the boom (on actual mizzen sails, I believe the foot of the sail was curved). This was because of the way I planned to furl the sail. First, I furled the sail up to the gaff, similarly to how I furled the square sails. So, the leech end, like the sides of the square sails, was angled inwards to reduce bulk at the peak. Second, I furled the sail at the throat area and the luff side. The foot is parallel to the boom and not angled as the head was because I realized that as I furled the gaff area, the outer edge of the foot would be pulled upwards, essentially angling the leech end near the foot upwards. So, there was no need to cut the pattern to an angle like I did with the head (otherwise, I would have almost no sail to work with at the tack). Hope that all makes sense. The other thing to note is that I added a mock clew at the edge of the sail. Given the shape of the overall driver sail, I thought the clew on the actual sail would end up midway along the luff, rather than at the throat. I also wanted to add an outhauler line that was attached to the clew. I modeled this off the MS Brig Niagara instructions, where the clew is brailed up the middle of the luff. With the pattern cut, I prepped the sail to attach it to the gaff. I added lacing holes along the head (5mm apart) to run the lacing to the gaff. I also added cringles along luff area (10mm apart) so that I could subsequently attach it to the mast. I also added clew and tack cringles at those areas. From my research, it seemed that these sails were bent to the gaff with simple lacing that ended at the throat of the gaff. I went with 5mm apart for the holes, which was what I used on the square sails. The sails are bent to the mast using a different lacing pattern (shown in the next post) using cringles, which I represented by running a line of thread along the edge using fabric glue, and pulling it up every 10mm to create the cringle. Given that the sail will be furled, these will not be visible later on. They did serve as a good guide for the mast lacing however, which I couldn't accomplish using holes drilled into the sail itself.