jbshan

Welcome to the world of Philadelphia.  There are several folks with logs here.  If you saved or can get the issues of Ships in Scale that contain the build by Kurt van Dam that is another resource.

Your fingers are 55 times too big to do the thing the way they did on the original.  You got to be creative.

Just a little side note.
This ship is noted as being the first with four funnels.  She indeed held the Blue Ribbon for a while.  It seems the folks wanting to emigrate would so much rather sail on a ship with four funnels as being a 'better ship' that some ships were built with a false fourth funnel to attract ticket sales.  As an example, the fourth funnel on Titanic was used to exhaust gases from the galleys.  An additional function on Titanic was to improve her righting arm by virtue of the weight of the funnel tube high up on the structure.

Perhaps better to put a dehumidifier in the room with your models, if you're lucky enough to be able to have them all in one place.  If you're in a constant rainy region, however, that might not be helpful.

Your fingers are 55 times too big to do the thing the way they did on the original.  You got to be creative.

Your fingers are 55 times too big to do the thing the way they did on the original.  You got to be creative.

Just a little side note.
This ship is noted as being the first with four funnels.  She indeed held the Blue Ribbon for a while.  It seems the folks wanting to emigrate would so much rather sail on a ship with four funnels as being a 'better ship' that some ships were built with a false fourth funnel to attract ticket sales.  As an example, the fourth funnel on Titanic was used to exhaust gases from the galleys.  An additional function on Titanic was to improve her righting arm by virtue of the weight of the funnel tube high up on the structure.

Just a little side note.
This ship is noted as being the first with four funnels.  She indeed held the Blue Ribbon for a while.  It seems the folks wanting to emigrate would so much rather sail on a ship with four funnels as being a 'better ship' that some ships were built with a false fourth funnel to attract ticket sales.  As an example, the fourth funnel on Titanic was used to exhaust gases from the galleys.  An additional function on Titanic was to improve her righting arm by virtue of the weight of the funnel tube high up on the structure.

Your fingers are 55 times too big to do the thing the way they did on the original.  You got to be creative.

Your fingers are 55 times too big to do the thing the way they did on the original.  You got to be creative.

Your fingers are 55 times too big to do the thing the way they did on the original.  You got to be creative.

As Joel would put it - the Lauck Street DVDs have led me to an epiphany. Working the seizings has become childsplay.  It's not the whipping part - nothing revolutionary there. I just didn't realize that after you are done with the whipping, you can slide it around on the rope or pull the rope thru it.  Maybe everyone knew that but me
 
At any rate, I am progressing with the rigging of the spars. Remembering this is a lateen rig, a yard will be bound to each mast. First a gammoning on the yard. One end of this is supposed to be the haliard and run up thru the mast top. The instructions were terrible on how to do this, so I used a suggestion from this post.
 
Over the gammoning a parrel is made to hold the yard to the mast. This showed me the value of sliding the seizing around. According to the instructions you seize a loop on the yard, run the other end around the mast and seize another loop on the yard. You end up with something like this.
 

 

 
Well for me, trying to seize that in place would have been a bear. The rope around the mast has to be tight (no room for fingers) and all sorts of other ropes in the way.  Instead I seized a loop in a third hand, then slid the loop over one end of the yard and down to the gammoning. Then slid the seizing down to tighten. Easy enough but how do you seize a loop to the yard on the other side of the mast?
 
Rather than doing all this with a cut piece of rope I used the whole spool. Seized the first loop at the end of that. Then I seized another loop about 10" down the rope from the first one, again with the third hand. This loop is run around the mast and slid over the other end of the yard and down to the gammoning. At this point both loops are in place on the yard but there is a lot of excess rope between them. Given that the rope can still be pulled thru the seizings that's exactly what I did - pulled all the excess thru the seizing.
 

 
Worked like a charm!  And since the rope is still on the spool I don't have to cut and throw away the excess rope. Like I said, a new world has opened. Now tell me I'm not the only one that didn't know about this.
 
 

Sorry if this is not helpful, but I've always preferred 'splice the main brace.'

I've been watching for a while, Nils.  Wooden sail is more my area than steel and steam, but maybe I can make a comment from time to time that is helpful.
Magnificent work, a Grand Old Dame, even if she does have a man's name.

Yes, the grating allows the water to drain out (onto the deck aft?) while keeping the landing of the ladderway dry.  You sometimes see gratings around the helm of a ship, laid onto a solid deck, purely for traction.  Also, wood is slightly less slippery than steel, at least in a time when you didn't have miracle paint finishes like today.

Sorry if this is not helpful, but I've always preferred 'splice the main brace.'

I've been watching for a while, Nils.  Wooden sail is more my area than steel and steam, but maybe I can make a comment from time to time that is helpful.
Magnificent work, a Grand Old Dame, even if she does have a man's name.

Yes, the grating allows the water to drain out (onto the deck aft?) while keeping the landing of the ladderway dry.  You sometimes see gratings around the helm of a ship, laid onto a solid deck, purely for traction.  Also, wood is slightly less slippery than steel, at least in a time when you didn't have miracle paint finishes like today.

Measure the masts, the beam, all that sort of thing.  Maybe the ships are right but the box art and marketing are wrong.

You going to paint the interior of the funnel stacks soot black?  Just curious, not critical.  Beautiful work.

Welcome to the world of Philadelphia.  There are several folks with logs here.  If you saved or can get the issues of Ships in Scale that contain the build by Kurt van Dam that is another resource.

No, Mike.  Ideally they each had two hammocks so one could be washed and the other used.  British practice of course, and I have doubts everybody slung a hammock every night purely from lack of room below decks.  Many 'standard and customary' practices I doubt were used on these vessels.

Don, there were something like 130 on board, on the day.
20 guns, 5 per gun gets you to 100 really quickly.

They look pretty good, Mike.  You can tie a couple of ropes across the ends to close up the troughs, and don't forget if needed you can do them at an angle for clearance.

Measure the masts, the beam, all that sort of thing.  Maybe the ships are right but the box art and marketing are wrong.