NMBROOK

Today's project (and last nights) was the shrouds.  Lots of serving of rope, but I think I'm good on thread for a while.

 
The dead-eye/shroud jigs I made worked fantastically, and allowed me to make much better looking rigging than I would have thought at this point, being only my 2nd build.  I also used zip-seizings on top of the dead-eyes to allow the proper rigging of the shrouds crossing over on top of the dead-eyes.  Really like the way they turned out.

 
Current status, shrouds completed, but attached to the jigs.  I am trying to decide the easiest way to seize the shroud cleats - I am leaning towards removing the jig, and seizing them by sticking the shrouds in a third hand to the side of the ship, one at a time, rather than trying to work on the inside of the shrouds on the ship.
 

 
About a year ago, when I first started building the Carmen and found MSW, I spent a lot of time going through build logs, and like any new thing, I think people tend to see a specific 'thing' that make them go "Wow, that is amazing, I could never do that".  On this site, for this hobby, there is a lot of that 'wow' factor in many of the logs here, but one of the main ones that stuck out to me (for whatever strange reason) was the mast-heads on some of the ships, where so many ropes come together and chaos should reign, but instead, there is an orderly and neat stack of ropes showing a definite purpose and design.
 
Today I had a real 'wow' moment in my ship modeling.

 
I have no idea why that seems so amazing to me, but it really does, and even now I'm having a difficult time believing that yes, it really was me that did this thing (although there is more to go there of course).  There have been plenty of things on this ship that were more difficult than this, and took far more effort to be happy with, but for strange reasons in my head, this is probably one of the coolest moments for me so far in the hobby.  It's a good day.

I have actually started on the rigging, finally!  Not just messing around with serving and making a test shroud, but actually rigging!   Started by attaching some blocks to the bow that will hook to the bowsprit when it's installed.  I'm putting that off as long as possible, it's so long, and thin at the end that I'm afraid of breaking it while turning the model around to work on it.     Unfortunately, there is very little I can do on the bowsprit itself before it's installed to the ship, so I moved to the main mast, which while it will be sticking up, it won't be sticking way outside of the hull to the front, so I think it's a lot safer to have in place for a long time, and it's also much thicker and tougher than the bowsprit.   First thing was to figure out a way to make the shrouds all line up properly at the bottom where they will tie into the dead-eyes that were mounted in the channels earlier.  I ended up using a thin piece of wood, and drilling holes into it to hold the upper dead-eyes with soft copper wire, so that I will be able to attach the shrouds to them while they are held in position.  I made a line to align them vertically, and then held the shroud lines down in the position that they would run in order to orient them to be in a straight line when the shrouds and lanyards are all rigged.  You can see the pencil lines I made by holding the shrouds in front as shown here.  

 
Then, started on actual rigging stuff.  I made the backstay pendant.  This goes around the top of the main mast before anything else, and has blocks at the ends which will attach to tackle on the rails near the ships wheel on either side.
 

 
Next I made the first piece of rigging that will actually make the mast un-removable from here on out.  It's officially part of the ship now.      
This is the Spreader Yard Horse.  I have no idea why it's called a horse, but it is.  I'm learning lots of new things about sailing ships by doing this.  This thing actually acts as a secondary mast, and the lower yard (the spreader yard) attaches to this, not the mast.  The reason is that the yard needs to be able to be lowered to the deck, and it if was attached directly to the mast, the parrel (the thing that holds it to the mast, err.. to the horse) would run into the main sail hoops that are around the main mast.  I had to re-read the bit about this thing several times, and look at the rigging plans a bunch, before I finally understood what it did and why.  In any case, it's the 2nd item that has to go around the top of the main mast, so it was installed next.  Here it is in all it's glory, it's the rope running along the front of the mast.
 

 
Top:

 
The top mast will go into the spot in front of this, so it won't be able to slip off of the braces it's sitting on (the raised curved pieces on either side).   Bottom from front and side:     It's attached to the deck with little tiny dead-eyes, just like the shrouds will be attached to the channels later (next actually).   And that's an update of probably 8 or so hours of ship-building.  Strangely, when I'm focused on working on it, I don't really realize how much time is passing at all.  I guess that means I enjoy this stuff!   ps - For those who are curious about why I explain a lot of stuff, I write this for a non-ship building audience of general modelers as well, and I'm too lazy to re-write everything when I post it here.  If I did it the other way around, and posted here, I'd have to re-write it for the other group, or they wouldn't understand half of it.  I figure you guys can look past the over-explanation of what things are, and there might also be new people reading who actually appreciate it!

I got Chuck's Serv-o-matic a while back, and last night I began the assembly.  Lots of sanding of laser char.  The parts fit pretty much perfectly, just lots of sanding!
 

 
Also finished the stand, got it stained and a coat of poly on it.  For some reason the lighting in this shot makes the horizontal pieces almost glow gold.  Doesn't look like that to the eye.  Odd.

 
Tonight I put Chuck's machine to work, and served the first set of shrouds.  There isn't any real tension on it in these pictures, just a couple binder clamps to keep them sort of in the right position (not clamped to anything, just laying on the table top).

 
And a shot of the forward shroud where it transitions to non-served.  The aft shroud of this pair (the rear-most shroud) is fully served all the way down.

Thanks everyone for the feedback.  I'm actually sort of leaning towards option 1, so as to keep the hull as visible as possible, but what I may do is build all three supports for one side and just not glue them in place so I can compare them visually and make up my mind.  It probably takes close to an hour to get one fit right, but that's really nothing in the greater scheme of how much time I've got invested in this little boat!
 
Back to the swivel guns, after making the yokes, it was time to solder on the handles.

 
Next I soldered the base rods onto the yokes.  This was a pretty good imitation of the keystone cops, as I kept getting the handles too hot and making them fall off, followed by doing the same to the yoke rods when re-attaching the handles.  In the future I'm going to invest in some different silver solders that melt at different temps.  You do the first joint with high-temp, next one with medium, and the last (if you need three) with low temp solder.  They also make some heat-sink compounds that you can place between joints to help keep the one cool.

 
After filing/cleanup, stuck them on the ship for the pictures.

 
These will be blackened, and a knob added to the handle end.  Obviously they are just dropped into their mounting tubes at this point and are not secured, or that would be pretty interesting!
Going to try JAX chemicals Pewter Black (and brass cleaner) since it should also blacken the solder, whereas the Birchwood Casey Brass Black leaves the solder a gorgeous silver.  Thanks to Frank for letting me try his chemicals!
 

Since the last opinion poll went so well, time for another one!
 
I'm now working on the base, inspired by Mobsie (sp?) and another more recent build whose name is completely escaping me at the moment (sorry man).
 
I'm wondering how many hull supports I should add.
 
Option 1, just the center one.

Option 2, add two more at the positions marked.

Option 3, all locations.
 

 
Thoughts?

For Frank.  Jig stuff!
 
So when it came to making the yokes for the swivel guns, one of the biggest challenges to my thinking, would be how to drill the holes through the soft brass evenly so that the trunions would be level, and consistent.  Secondary issue, making the 'U' shape consistently the same size.
 
After messing with a few different techniques I decided that really the only satisfactory solution was some sort of a jig, so I started playing with wood to make something, and what I eventually landed on was this solution which used some of the left over bits from the boxwood I used for the masting.  I used the boxwood instead of scrap basswood because of it's hardness.
 
Step 1 (no photo, just a terrible paint drawing) was to mark the depth and width of the "U" shaped hole that I wanted as the outside edge of the jig former on the end of a piece of boxwood.  I then found a cutting bit for the mill that was the right width, and placed the wood flat on the mill floor in the vise, and simply ran the mill into the wood creating a 'slot' on one edge of the wood, with a natural "U" shape due to the round nature of the cutting bit.  
 
Here is a paint drawing illustrating what I mean, as seen looking down on the cut.

 
I then took a smaller piece of boxwood (again, scrap that was cut off after shaping the masts) and milled the end to a rectangular shape that would barely fit inside of the above slot, filing it so that it was the exact same thickness, and then sanding enough to allow for the brass strap to fit along both sides at the same time.  I then used a file and filed the inside of the "U" shape into this piece.
 
Finally, I glued another piece of boxwood on top of the slot I'd cut into the first piece.  Bam, jig!

 
I laid the jig on it's side and clamped it into the mill vise.  The "T" on the insert piece is so that I would have the same side 'up' on every use for consistency.

 
Using a small pair of the pliers with the round ends for making rings, I formed a small "U" in the brass strap, made sure it was as perfectly even as possible, and then stuck the "U" into the jig.

 
The insert piece is then pushed firmly into the jig inside of the brass "U" to force it to shape.

 
The mill head was positioned to drill into the center of the brass strip, and while holding the insert firmly, run through the jig and the brass.  This was the touchy part, as if I moved the insert I could have easily snapped the drill, and I only have one bit this size.  Need to get some more, I use this size a lot (#74).

 
Remove the insert, which usually pulls the brass strip out with it.  When it doesn't, just pull it out with the long end.

 
All that's left is to trim the ends with a Xuron precision end cutter, and solder it to the base rod.
 
And that's my super-amazing scrap-wood "U" jig.  

The people have spoken!
 

 
I have to remake one of them because somehow the hole on one side is way off.  It must have slipped in the jig, no idea how, but I'll just call it practice, and the jig is still clamped in the mill, so not a huge deal.
 
 

Masting is done!  Well, I still need to attach one side of the parrels to the gaff and boom, but I'll just call that part of rigging.  
 
The main boom with sheave.

 
The topsail yard and spreader yard.  I did have a do-over on the topsail yard when I cut too deeply into it after I was all but finished.  Oops.  Oh well, only 1 do-over for all the masting (not counting the multiple bowsprits I made prior to switching to boxwood), I'll call that a win!
 

 
And everything all lined up together ready to start getting rigging.

In non-picture news, I got some actual ship progress done today.
 
I have completed the main-mast.
 

 
And the Gaff.
 

 
I've got the Main boom shaped, with a working sheave installed instead of the 'hole' the instructions say to use, the jaws mounted and strapped.  Tomorrow I'll get the chocks and cleats installed and hopefully get both the yards made and fitted out, and then I'll be ready to start rigging!

Finally at a point where I am getting to 'visually' see how big this little (not so little) boat is going to be when it's completed.
 
First I finished up the bowsprit by affixing a bunch of little cleats and sanding them to shape, and affixing the rings that support the jib boom.
 
Bowsprit & Jib Boom:

 
Next I mounted the cheeks and cross-trees on the main-mast, then put two of the chocks in, and made the third chock. After playing with the fitment of the third chock, and looking at the plans, I realized that the base of the topmast wouldn't fit through the round fitting at the top of the main-mast, so I removed the third chock and will place it after the topmast is placed permanently later on. I then made the topmast and cut the little hole in the base where a piece of wood called a 'fid' goes through it to rest on the cross-trees. I drilled a sheave slot in the top-mast, but haven't drilled the hole and placed the sheave yet.
 
Here is how the main-mast and top-mast will fit together.  Really happy with how this came out.

 
And finally, dry fitting the complete bowsprit and mast assemblies to see the overall size (minus the main boom which will extend behind the ship by several inches too).

 
It got big all of a sudden!

Good to see you around Alistair, and yea, I've stuck the bowsprit assembly and main mast on already, it's pretty awesome the size jump.
 
I continue to put off doing the chain plates on the port side, and have done some experimentation (failed) and various small bits.
 
First, I decided to continue on my route of replacing most of the cast pieces in the kit by making my own mast hoops out of wood.  Unfortunately, this didn't work out so good, as the wooden hoops are just too fragile, and I can't get them cut off without breaking them.  This is partially because of their small size, and partially (or maybe mostly) because I was using a dowel as my wood, and the grain is just too big for this sort of thing.  I have an idea on how I could make it work using multiple pieces of boxwood laminated together with the grain all going the proper direction, but in the end I decided that the effort just wasn't worth it for these pieces, and the kit hoops have been primed (and now painted as well, but no photo of that).

 
The next cast piece to get trash-binned was the strap that holds the foot of the bowsprit.  This piece doesn't fit the bowsprit properly as I completed it, and it's kind of ugly anyway, so I made a new piece out of brass.  This is 5 pieces soldered together, which was quite a trial, as the pieces are so small I couldn't heat one joint without breaking another one.  In the end I got it done, it's not perfect, but it will do.  I drilled holes for brass pins that I will make to pin the strap to the deck, and to the bowsprit.  I then blackened it with Birchwood Casey Brass Black, as I can no longer get Blacken-It at the local shop.

 
I got the mast wedge filed to fit the mast, and rounded the outside edge.  Haven't decided yet on any detailing for this piece.

 
And finally, tossing the cast swivel guns into the bin, I started work on the replacements.  First I soldered the trunions in place, and began to form a 'yoke' to support the gun.

 
I then soldered the yoke to a rod, drilled holes for the trunion, and stuck a gun on to see how it will look.

 
Pretty happy with how these look.  Worth the effort and expense.  Opinion time - should the yoke drop right down against my existing post mounts I've made, or should the rod stand them up slightly from the mount base?

 
I will also be adding a handle to the gun.  I sort of completely forgot to do that.  Doh!
 
Another question.  The yoke is so small, that I don't think I'll be able to solder the trunions to the yoke without breaking the existing solder joint of the yoke to the rod.  Thoughts on 'fixing' the gun in place?  Super glue should work I suppose, but I'm not sure how easy that will be to make invisible, and would need to be done after blackening.  I'll play with some ideas, but more than open for suggestions on this!

Thanks for the continued likes and comments everyone.  Feel free to jump in with suggestions for improvement or telling me I'm making errors at any time.  This is only my 2nd ship, so I've got plenty to learn still.
 
Instead of finishing the chain plates and dead-eyes on the other side of the boat, I decided to play with power tools. The plans show a sheave in both the bowsprit, and the jib-boom, but the kit doesn't provide it, and both the plans and instructions say to just drill a hole for the line to run through. Well, the heck with that, I'm an idiot and decided to risk wrecking my bowsprit by building in the sheave!  I am pretty happy with how the one for the bowsprit came out, I used a small piece of dowel with a hole drilled through it and sanded down to size for the pulley.   Not super happy with how the one in the jib-boom came out, it's just so small that I had a hard time getting a clean slot cut. I didn't even try to insert a pulley. I'm hoping that with rope run through this it won't look bad.   And here is a shot of the bowsprit and jib-boom together. They aren't actually glued together, I have a bunch of work left to do adding little cleats and stuff to them. Notice the length of this assembly is slightly longer than the length of the hull of the ship it will be attached to!     Then I made the main mast. This is the longest piece of wood on the ship, and was somewhat challenging to shape because it was so long. Pictured here next to the remainder of the 1/2" square boxwood that it was carved from. The other pictures are close ups of the top and foot of the mast. Pretty happy that I pretty much nailed the shapes and size on my first go at it. I do have 1 spare piece of boxwood if I had totally messed it up, but glad I shouldn't need to use it.

When I added the swivel gun pedestals, I completely forgot to drill the hole for the eventual mounting of the guns, so I needed to do the drilling while already mounted on the ship. I realized that this would be a smart thing to do now, before getting all the rigging in the way, so I had to decide how I was going to mount the guns when the time comes. As I've tossed the cast swivels in the proverbial trash can (I still have them, but am not going to use them), I will need to fabricate new mounts. I played around a bit and figured out what size of brass rod I am going to use, so from there it was a matter of how would I insert them into the pedestals. I chose to try something different, which may allow me to leave the swivels able to actually swivel. I cut off some very short pieces of micro-tube, which the brass rod would barely fit into, and blackened them. I then drilled holes into the top of the pedestals in 3 steps, using small drills, ending with a 1.60 mm bit to allow the blackened tubes to fit.    Pretty happy with how they came out, and if I manage to make the mounts for the swivels actually decent (yay I get to practice soldering), I may leave them 'loose' so they can turn. I can always glue them in if I choose also.   Here is a pedestal with the tube mounted.   And here is a shot with the brass rod inserted to show how it will fit.   The yoke for the swivel mount will be attached to the brass rod which will drop into the tube.   After that little side project, I went back and began remaking the chain plates. This time I chose to put the 'joint' at the bottom where it can be somewhat covered, or at least disguised a bit, by the nails I was going to use to pin the plates to the hull. They came out reasonably well, although by no means perfect.   After initial placement, prior to painting. Way shiny (also this is massively over-exposed to show the plates against the black wale).   Massively over-exposed shot after putting the cap on the channel and first paint.    And a only slightly over-exposed shot showing more what the eyeball sees.   If I was doing this over again, I'd ignore the plan locations and put the holes for the base of the chain plates slightly further up, so that the bottoms of the chain plates wouldn't hang below the wale and make it harder to disguise my bad joint.   In any case. The starboard side is done!    

So I'm learning that I really dislike working with the metal bits.  I'm not really equipped yet to do soldering on very fine parts yet (need one of those pinnable soldering mats of some kind), so I went with black coated copper wire to make the chain plates.
 
I made a simple jig after getting the length figured out on a very rough not-pretty hand made piece.

 
I test fit the first one and it was fairly decent, so I made all 4 for one side.

 
Then I bent them to fit the ship and.. I managed to flip the dead-eye in the jig on all but the first one, making them too long.  I'll remake all 4 after adjusting the jig slightly and adding side pieces so that it's not possible to flip the dead-eye the wrong way.

 
My system for these is quite simple, I'm making the joint where the cap of the channel will cover it, so the fact that it's not perfectly mated and soldered doesn't matter, and just joining the thing together with CA glue.  This seems like it is going to work just fine, but I'll end up having to re-glue them all to keep them aligned after bending them to fit, as the brittle glue joint between the two sides tends to fail when I'm bending them into the channels.  
 
They'll also be painted matte black so they aren't shiny.  If it doesn't work out, then I'll revert to doing something in brass, but I'm hoping this will work, as they seem to look just fine and once they are fixed in place with the nail/glue at the bottom and the channel cap at the top, they shouldn't be moving enough to be a problem.

In order to get the angle for the chain-plates right, I cut a piece of basswood to the proper length for the main mast, then cut the bottom to fit at the correct angle, and built a step into the top at the height of the cross-trees.  Using this false-mast, I could run rope around the mast to get the angle correct (hopefully!).

 
Yesterday, I spent a large chunk of the day doing touch-up painting, getting an extra coat of paint on all the new stuff I've added, so that I can put some poly on it after it's all dried.  I then made bowsprit mark II.
 
For the re-made bowsprit, I started with 3/8" square boxwood from Crown Timberyard, and first shaped it to a slightly oversized octagon using a lovely little jig that Frank loaned me on Saturday.  Once I had that done, I shaped the base of the bowsprit, cheating heavily by using the mill, and then using the lathe, turned the round portion down to size at half-inch intervals, and then used 220 grit sandpaper, still in the lathe, to finish it to a smooth taper.  I then used the cut-off tool to cut off the tip, which I then sanded to shape by hand.  Finally, I cut off the larger square piece where it was chucked into the lathe, and completed shaping the base to the correct angle to sit on the fore-deck.
 
Much happier with the improved mark II version.  It's sort of hard to see in the photo's, but the edges of the octagon are much sharper, it's much more uniform, and the square foot is much sharper and better shaped in general.  It's a very tight fit through the bow.  In the photo's the original bowsprit I made from the kit basswood is the lighter one on top.

 
Edit: Fixed dimension of the wood stock.

Ship update!
 
After redoing the workshop, I got back to the final deck details prior to starting to work my way forward and upward!
 
I completed the timberheads, swivel gun support posts, and the channels in preparation to begin the chain-plate fabrication next.
 

 
I think I'll make a dummy mast so that I can attach rope to get the angle on the chain-plates correct, and then make some sort of a jig (I've got some ideas from other build logs here) for positioning the upper dead-eyes later.  I've decided to replace the kit dead-eyes with Syren ones, and I've got them assembled but not sanded yet.  Also, after messing around again with the kit brittania cast swivel guns, decided to throw them out, and ordered brass swivel guns which I'll need to fabricate a yoke and handles for.

After the catheads, I decided to make a timberhead, which came out pretty decent for my first try.  Only made the one for now, need to make 5 more.  I made this using a barret file for shaping.

 
Next up was the stairs.  I made an angle in my little planking jig to make the ends parallel based on the bottom angle on the ladders, and then used the mill to cut groves for the treads.  I'm not very happy with how they came out, but they do look much better just staring at the boat than they look in the pictures.  I'll ponder whether to make some new ones to replace these.

 
I then made and placed the boom crutches, which can be seen in the above photo, and then assembled the binnacle.  Fairly happy with how it came out, but I mis-placed it just slightly, but since it's pinned, I think it will stay here!
 
Shots of the overall ship as it sits now, and close-ups of the binnacle.

 
Still to go - 5 more timberheads, the pedestals for the swivel guns, and the channels and chain-plates.  After that we start looking at masts and rigging!

The catheads turned into an unexpected issue.  The angle built into the laser cut parts appeared to be completely wrong.  When the 'flat' on the bottom of the cathead was placed on the cap rail per the plans and instructions, the base was standing proud of the inside of the bulwarks near the deck by about 1/4".   Not sure if they are cut wrong, or if I somehow managed to get the angle on my bulwarks that far off of what they should be.
 
The solutions that I could think of were:
1) Cut an angle into the cap rail making the catheads stick up at an angle more severe than that shown in the plans.  Issue being that I was not sure the cap rail had enough thickness to actually support that angle, and the base of the catheads on the bulwarks would be lowered, possibly enough to interfere with the waterway.
2) File the bottom of the cathead  to make it fit, again causing a fairly steep angle, and presenting issues with how to shape the bottom edge of the cathead once that much of and angle was built into the 'flat'.
3) Modify the catheads by separating them into two pieces right at the corner, and changing the angle.  Issue - getting them aligned properly upon re-assembly, and making the join neat enough to not be visible on completion.
 
I eliminated #1 almost immediately, as if it didn't work right, I would have the problem of wrecked cap rails which would be a huge task to replace.
 
#2 seemed to be a problem with the shaping and the angle both.
 
So I went with #3.  Using the UMM micro-saw, I carefully sliced the cathead into two pieces, right at, and parallel to the 'flat' where the cathead would sit on the cap rail.  I then filed the piece that would go on the bulkhead, a little bit at a time, test fitting until I hit the right angle, and to keep the mating surface reasonable close through the entire process.  I then drilled a small hole into the bulkhead piece, and inserted a small brass nail cut to leave just the pointy tip exposed.  I then pressed the two pieces together carefully aligning them.  The tip of the nail gave me a point to drill the hole into the top piece, and I then replaced the pointy brass nail with a slightly longer one cut to be a pin to help secure the two parts together.
 
I took a picture after the first one was complete, overlaid on the one that was still unmodified to show how much angle I changed.

 
Seemed to work ok, so I cut the other one and followed the same procedure, and then mounted them both on the rail.  Right after that I realized I forgot to drill the other hole in the cathead for the rope.  Doh!  So I carefully drilled out the other hole while supporting the cathead with a finger.

 
Issue defeated.  I'll decide after I finish all the knightsheads and swivel gun supports whether these will be painted per the instructions or left natural, as I'll need to do a fair amount of touch-up painting where I removed the paint to get a good joint between the bulwarks / cap rail and the catheads.

Thank you all for the likes and comments.  Now that the pumps are done, I finally installed the companionway in it's permanent home.

 
And then I buckled down and did it.  All the guns are rigged.  Woo!

Went back into the workshop and made the pumps.  The kit used to include walnut dowel for the pump bodies, but at some point they changed it and only give beech dowels, so they required staining.  I used card-stock for the bands instead of brass, because it's so easy to work with and it is painted black anyway.  I used the hard brass nails from my Carmen kit for the rods and handle pivots instead of the softer brass rod from the kit.  It's slightly smaller diameter, but not enough to really change the visual look at all.
 

So instead of finishing the guns on the other side of my ship like I should have today, I totally went off on a tangent, for no real reason other than the idea popped into my head and I felt like it.  I apparently have modeling ADD.
 
I played with the Catheads.  The base parts are part of the laser cut walnut parts, but the holes for the tackle to go through are not pre-cut of course. The kit instructions are to drill 4 holes, and then using your X-acto blade, cut a shallow slot between the hole pairs in order to make a fake sheave. The slot would be just deep enough for the rope to be flush with the top surface when the rope then runs through the holes.
  I apparently don't put any value on my time at all, so I decided I was going to make working sheaves with actual little tiny brass pulleys in full slots instead of faking it.   First I cut out the slots, and then drilled a hole through the sheave slots for the axle to go. Here you can see the catheads with the other items I used - a brass rod for the axle, and a brass tube to be cut into the pulleys.   Next up was cutting little tiny slices off of the tube to make the pulleys.   Then sticking the little pulleys into the sheaves and fishing the axle through them. I secured the axle to the outside edge by applying super-glue and working the axles a bit to allow capillary action to pull the glue into the catheads.   Complete!   Then I fished a .021" rope through one of them to test it. Works perfectly. Such a huge waste of time for the heck of it on something that nobody will ever see once it's rigged, but hey, I had fun!

I had a request to document my method of stropping the single block to include the tackle rope, so this post is a pictorial step-by-step of how I do that.
 
The materials.  I am using Syren 5/32" Pearwood single blocks, Syren 3mm hooks, some generic tan thread I found that is very thin for seizing, .008" Syren brown rope for the stropping, and .012" Syren tan rope for the tackle line.

 
I cut about 8" of .012" line for the tackle rope, this leaves me with about an inch or so left over after creating the rope coils on deck and an extra inch or so for the block end to make it easier to work with while seizing.
 
I cut 6" or so of thread for the seizing to give me plenty to work with.  If you leave it too short it can be hard to grab while wrapping the seizing, and it's thread, the spool is something silly like 300 yards long, I'll never run out and if I do it's cheap.
 
For the same reason (ease of working) I cut 5" or so of the brown rope, even though less than an inch is actually used in the strop.
 
1) I put the single block into a clamp that I secured in my vise, and then tape down the tackle rope to the clamp across the base of the block.  Before I tape the rope, I apply a very tiny dab of CA glue to the base of the block where the rope will cross it.  I use the tip of a steel X-acto punch tool to apply the glue from a drop on a piece of tape.

 
2) I thread the stropping rope through one of the hooks and tie a single knot in the rope *before I cut the hook free from the sprue*!!  I lost about half the hooks I tried to thread to the floor when I was trying to hold these tiny hooks and thread them when cutting them free first.  Once I have a hook tied to the approximate middle of the brown rope, I soak about 1" or so on either side of the hook in CA glue (from the same drop on the tape I used above).

 
3) I don't really know how to capture a photo 'in progress' of the next step, but I'll try to describe it.  Take the hook on the rope and put it in behind the block, centering the hook on the top of the block.  Pull the rope down both sides of the block, cross them across the bottom of the block where the tackle rope is, and then continue up the other side of the block and then back across the top where the hook is.  This will give you a double rope strop all the way around the block.  Continue back down to the base, and then hold them steady for 30 seconds or so to let the CA take a good set.  If the ropes are not even on the sides of the blocks, it is easy at this point to use the back edge of an X-Acto blade to push them into place.  You can add glue at this point if needed, or in the next step.

 
4) Remove the block from the clamp.  At this point if everything is looking good, you can trim the rope at the top shoulders of the block.  If you need to adjust things, it's pretty easy with either the X-Acto blade or a very small set of pliers or whatever tool works to prod the rope into place.  Add another dab of glue if anything comes loose and squeeze it into position with the pliers.  

 
5) Using small flat blade pliers I then squeeze the tackle rope into shape at the base of the block.  It will be stiff because of the CA.  I also use the pliers to flatten down the ends of the trimmed stropping ropes, adding a tiny dab of CA if needed to get rid of the cut ends.

 
6) Put the stropped block back into the clamp, but this time clamp in the seizing thread with an inch or more going past the block.

 
7) To seize the tackle rope, form a loop with the seizing thread, with the top coming back up to the clamp.  Leave the loop large enough to be able to thread the other end back through it, which is why I cut this thread longish.  Take the top of the thread and while holding everything else in your left hand (or right hand if you are one of 'those' people), and wrap the thread around itself, starting at the block and working away from it.  This part takes practice to make it work, as you really can't watch it, as it's all happening between your holding fingers to keep a tight seizing.  I use only about 5 wraps on these tiny blocks or the seizing looks way too big.  Once you have 5 wraps, take the loose end, and thread it through the loop between your fingers, and pull it firmly until it goes through your fingers so that it's tight.  Bent nose tweezers can be helpful for this.

 
8) Now remove the assembly from the clamp, but keep holding everything with your left hand.  Using your other hand, grab the end of the thread that was clamped with the block, and start pulling it.  This will pull the loop closed between your fingers.  Feel for the loop to close up against the seizing, and then pull the back of the thread tight again.  Now you can stop holding with your left hand, and see how the seizing looks.  If needed, slide it up closer to the block now, and play with the bottom thread to tighten up the seizing coils.  Then finally, pull the top thread firmly until it completely pulls the loop inside of the seizing.  You should end up with something like this (the practice part is important here, it took me doing a bunch of these before they didn't look a total mess).  Now apply dabs of CA glue to the three points that will be trimmed - both ends of the seizing, and the extra tail on the tackle rope.  Trim them off with nippers or nail clippers or whatever you have that will trim very close.

 
9) Dab a bit of CA on the trimmed ends, and using the flat nose pliers, crimp them to make them blend into the overall seizing.  I use a very fine Xuron needle nose plier for this.  No substitute for good quality tools I've learned. I get more use out of a single $25 plier than a full set of pliers from Lowe's that are cheap.

 
10) It's done!

 
Hope others can find this helpful, it's a system that works well for me, when other systems that I've read and tried just didn't seem to click for me.

Thanks Doc.  I'm not sure what a spreader yard horse is, but I'm sure I'll find out!
 
Picture of the completed (but not glued) riding bitt.  I need to do a bit of final filing as it's not quite sitting flush on the deck yet.

 
And... I'm half way done with the gun rigging!  Well, more than half really since I have the breaching lines done on all of them, but half way done with the out-haul tackle and rope coils.  You can almost see what order I did them when how I got better.  The first two were on the middle gun, where the first coils is sort of ragged, and the other one gets quite a bit better.  Then I moved to the rear gun and I found a system that worked better for me and they went pretty smooth (if a bit fiddly) after that.
 

Time to get back to making progress on the ship.
 
I made 5 more breaching lines, attached them to the cascabel's on the 5 cannons, and then opened up the side gun carriage rings, put the line through them, and re-closed the rings.
 

 
I then attached the breaching lines to the bulwarks, glued them in, and glued the guns down.
 

 
Everything in these pictures is now permanently attached to the ship (except for the sloppy rope coils that are just sitting there). I will attach the companionway later, I need to build and install a couple of elm-tree pumps that go really close to it, so I am waiting on that. I also need to do some touch-up here and there as I managed to ding some things, and knock a cleat loose while putting the cannons on. I really am far too clumsy for this hobby.

Thanks all, both for the comments and the likes.  Please don't hesitate to offer constructive (or even not so constructive) criticism as well.  I had no idea that there was a 'standard' length for breaching lines, even if I didn't go with that length purely for my own visual appeal reasons.
 
Tonight I got back to the cannon.  First I made a shorter breaching line and used much smaller seizing thread.  I think it came out much nicer.  Since I was happy with both the length and the look, I went ahead and fixed the gun into place and secured the breaching line.  I then replaced the block with the broken hook, and rigged the out-hauls on both sides and after very carefully pulling the line tight, used a small brush and painted the lines with 50/50 white glue/water mix to help 'fix' the ropes.   All that's left now is to do the rope coils, but I'm going to wait until all the guns are in place for that, so I can better picture the space available for both location and size of the coils.     As far as the new toy goes, I don't really know enough about it to talk much really.  It's the 17" Sherline, and I got it with a fairly good assortment of accessories, a couple of 'how to' books, and a DVD.     It's very nice, and it's clearly designed for precision work, with a tool holder.  The Proxxon (which I also have and can be seen in some of my photo's) uses a 'rest' rather than a tool holder, and doesn't throttle down to slow speeds, where the Sherline can be run from 0 speed on up.  They are really designed for different uses, with the Proxxon being for wood turning using hand tools, and the Sherline is for using a tool-rest and precision work.   I initially figured when buying the Sherline that I would sell the Proxxon, but after using it, I think they both have a different purpose on the work bench and will probably keep the Proxxon for doing hand-work using the tool-rest.