Bill Morrison

Yes, the smallest ships that could be considered as ships-of-the-line were Fourth Rates. They had between 60-68 guns.  Next up included Third Rates, ships of 70 to 84 guns. Second Rates were up to 98 guns, while First Rates were any ship above 100.  Please note that these ratings were very dependent on periodicity.  For example, the ratings were vastly different during the first Anglo-Dutch War and the Third Anglo-Dutch War, even though the wars began in the 1650s-1670s. They continued upwards until the mid-1760s.  However. please note that these ratings differed for the Dutch, whose ship sizes were regulated by the shallow waters in their harbors and the North Sea.
 
The Greyhound was never considered to be a ship-of-the-line. As a Sixth Rate, she was considered a small Frigate.
 
Bill

You are very close to nailing it!
 
Bill

I appreciate your comments!  Thank you! You explained yourself clearly and cheerfully.
 
Bill

I appreciate your comments!  Thank you! You explained yourself clearly and cheerfully.
 
Bill

I appreciate your comments!  Thank you! You explained yourself clearly and cheerfully.
 
Bill

You are doing great work so far.  however. there are several small that I need to make.  The first concerns the width of the white band; it is simply too tall for the Constitution (not Connie). That said, the gunport lids are also too tall.  I would begin by repainting the band. the gunports should be okay.  The ship itself has never been nicknamed "Connie".  Also, the Spar Deck carronades (short range but firing a heavy ball) are not cannonades, which are a light weight but long barreled cannon.  Anyway, I'm not nit-picking, just trying to be helpful.  Again, you're doing a great job!
 
Bill
 

I appreciate your comments!  Thank you! You explained yourself clearly and cheerfully.
 
Bill

I appreciate your comments!  Thank you! You explained yourself clearly and cheerfully.
 
Bill

I appreciate your comments!  Thank you! You explained yourself clearly and cheerfully.
 
Bill

@Bill Morrison   Thank you for the comments, Bill.  If you read my first post on this build log, you will understand that this is not my ship.  I am merely completing the model for a family that recently lost their father who was the original builder.  Since the family would like the model as a tribute to their father, I do not want to change any of his original work if I don’t have to.  I want there to be as much of him in the completed ship as possible.  Are there some things I might have done differently were it my ship?  Sure.  As an example, I would have painted the masts solid white instead of having black bands.  But my assumption is that the original builder had a reason for the black bands.  Maybe it was his signature style or maybe he just liked the way it looked.  Not sure, but I don’t want to change something like that because if I did, in my mind I would be making it my ship instead of his.  The same goes for the height of the white band.  
 
Regarding the gunport lids, I measured the upper and lower pieces and they actually fit the opening perfectly.  So it may just be some bad photography on my part that makes them look too tall.  
 
As for the spar deck cannonades not being cannonades, you got me on that one!  I had to read the armament part of the kit instructions 3 times to realize it was saying “carronade” instead of “cannonade”!  My mind kept seeing cannonade.  So thank you for the correction on that terminology.
 
Thanks again for the comments, Bill.  I appreciate you looking in.
 

And she sure looks quite good. This is a very nice build! Thank you for sharing it.

Well more second planking, back from holiday so slow progress.

Started second planking layer with African Walnut, didn’t realise it wasn’t actually proper black walnut but more akin to a mahogany. Anyway, it has quite fine grain and well,  I think that’s what Costeo must have used in his build.
 
Better Pictures added now. The camera can be unforgiving
 
 

Finished the first planking layer today, not too much filler needed. Looking at Costeo’s build I think it must be walnut for the second layer so probably what I’ll go with. Turned out to be quite straightforward.

You're doing very well, mate. And speed is not an issue in this hobby. Particularly not at the expense of care and precision, which is much more important, and is what you are achieving. Beautiful work.
 
Steven

Nearly finished first planking layer typically manage 2- 3 a planks day, slow, but waiting for glue to set slows down the process, not much sanding of bulkheads needed on this build

I find all OcCre’s plans and descriptions very similar and building the hull follows the same steps and I ignore them as I’ve build enough models now. When I built the San Martin I found instructions to be very deficient for the rigging and I expect this one will be the same. That where this site comes into its own. 
 
But rigging is a long time ahead and I am not called Slowhand for nothing!
 

Can't wait to see this one being built. I'm glad the initial setup was fairly painless. I built Occre's Revenge. The setup was not so painless. : )
 
I'm interested in knowing what you think of Occre's directions/plans. For the Revenge, they were pretty good overall. In truth, I like Mamoli's plans. Artesania Latina's leave quite a bit to be desired. 
 
This ship is on my possible to-do-in-the-future list, so I'll be watching along with the others.

Steven,
 
It certainly will be, not sure what wood to use yet.
 
steve

The plywood hull sides went on very nicely then started first layer of planking 2x 5mm of lime, following instructions from OcCre, not quite realistic but give a nice shape. 

The fit with the false keel, bulkheads and decks was so snug, I didn’t need to build a slipway, just glued 4 blocks of wood on a plywood base to hold build upright. As for my San Martin of a few years ago added blocks between bulkheads to fit false cannons to poke through gun ports.
 
LED lights added to stern areas to twinkle and shine in gloomy interior.
 
OcCre always suggest planking decks before fitting. I decided not to as wanted a deck Color sympathetic to the hull so will plank hull and see how it looks. Definitely not using veneer sapelli planking for the hull.

A typical OcCre kit,  with nice materials, sharp cuts and the sails especially, much better since my last build. The false keel,bulk-heads and deck all fitted together nicely, tight on a dry build but with a bit of easing made a nice frame. 
 
Lots of metal fittings  I hope to replace, as many as possible but we’ll see.

I love a Spanish Galleon and have been intending to build this kit for a while. I saw a build log by Costeo a while ago and it inspired me to build the ship. I don’t intend to modify it as much as he did. Two photos from his build below and a link to his build log too. Such a shame it was never completed.


 

I spent the weekend doing yard work.  But I wasn't pushing the lawn mower in our 100 degree heat like I should have been.  Instead, I was hunched over the drill lathe making all the yards and yardarms for Connie.  That consists of 15 yards, 16 yard arms, a gaff and a spanker boom.  
 
Here's everything laid out on the mast/yard plan after the tapering process which was followed by adding the center battens, the parrel cleats, and the yardarm cleats.

 
 
Next, I carved out the jaws for the spanker boom and gaff.

 
 
Here's the completed spanker boom and gaff.

 
 
 
Here's a closeup of the main yard.

 
 
 
And here's the whole 9 yards (haha 🙄). 
  
 
 
 
I think that's a fair amount of progress for a little over a week, so I'm going to give Connie a short rest and head back over to the Flying Dutchman/Black Pearl SIB.

Did you say 8 seconds or 8 months, Ken?  I think this will be the longest bull ride in history!
 
And just when I thought I was getting the bull under control, he turned and started raging in a new direction!  I was looking at the ship sitting on my table and something didn't look quite right.  I dismissed the idea at first thinking it was because, like @Bryan Woods said earlier, I'm not used to seeing a boat that large on my work table.  Then it hit me like the business end of that bull's horn.  The masts were on backwards.  Going back to the first pic I took when I started, you can see that top masts and topgallant masts are attached to the rear instead of forward and the the fences on the mast tops are in front instead of in the back.

  
 
The good news was that, as I mentioned earlier, the glue bond on the main and fore mast was broken, so they were easy to remove from the hull.  The bad news was the the mizzen mast was still firmly in place.  The worse news was that more close-quarters cutting would be required to get the mizzen mast flipped.  
 
So I put a circular saw blade on my Dremel and oh-so-carefully made a cut through the bottom of the mast, trying not slip and shred the ship's wheel which sits 1/4" from the front of the mast.  Why didn't I just make a cut higher up on the mast?  I wanted to cut as close to the deck as possible to fix another minor issue.  The mizzen mast tilted to the starboard side, so I thought this was a good opportunity to straighten it up.  I figured a slight angle in the mast near the deck would not be near as noticeable as one higher up on the mast.  
 
The cut was successful, dowel was installed, mast was flipped, and glued in place.  Whew!  Still riding that bull!

 
 
 
Next, I decided to re-repair the sky sail pole which required another (much easier) cut and dowel job.  Then it was a matter of color matching the shade of brown used on the mast.  Before and after pics below.
 
 

 
 
 
With all mast repairs completed, time to re-step the masts into the deck.  The bull decided to take a nap during this part and things went pretty smoothly.  The first pic shows decent alignment of the bowsprit and masts from bow to stern.  The second shows ok vertical alignment as well.  The plans show virtually no rake, so I made them as perpendicular as possible.
   

 
 
 
Next, I revisited the bowsprit where I had to make that cut inside the bow head.  I had an ugly gash from a slip of the reamer plus an unsightly junction showing between the original bowsprit and the new one.  So after getting everything epoxied in place, I hid the ugliness with a gammoning rope.  The plans called for 9 turns of the rope which was just enough to hide my mess.  With the bow head grating already in place, there was no way to actually wrap the gammoning rope around the bowsprit, so the ends are just tucked down the small gap on each side.  That will be our little secret, ok?
 
Before and after pics: