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Ian_Grant

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  1. Ian_Grant
    Hey Paul, thanks for your experience! Actually, living in Ottawa, we are only about an hour drive from Ogdensburg NY. Many people around here have US stuff shipped to the Ogdensburg UPS store which runs a parcel pickup for Canadians. You then drive down, tell US customs what you're up to and hand them (used to be) $10, pick it up for a (used to be ) $5 fee, then drive back across the border and pay the applicable duty. I've done this myself in the past for some special bird surgery stuff my wife ordered for her vet clinic, before COVID. I'm not sure what happens now vis-a-vis coming back into Canada, no rapid test, or what the latest requirements are. If I could have done this for this order I would have saved about CDN$100 even after paying for the gas there and back. So there's some hope yet.
  2. Ian_Grant
    The lifts are best understood using Plan 9 too. See where the bottom of the topmast cap is shown right at the top of the diagram? A line there is labelled "Standing part of Lift". That's attached to the span going round the cap that Longridge mentions. Now look down at the top of the shrouds, just below the end of the forward cross tree. A twin "sister block" is seized between the 1st and 2nd shrouds. I made this by gluing two blocks together with an additional scrap of wood at each end, then using three seizings to attach to the shrouds. This sister block is labelled "Upper sheave > Reef Tackle ; Lower Sheave > Topsail Yard Lift". So there you have it: the lifts start at the topmast cap, run through the lift blocks at the ends of the topsail yard, run through the lower sheaves of the sister blocks, and down to deck. You can see them on Plan 7 if you know where to look; don't get confused with the topsail sheet and clew lines, and the reef tackle line, all also shown in the vicinity. By the by, answering your earlier query about the lower yard I forgot to mention the yardarm tackles. You could omit them if you wish but many modellers like to rig them as they are of interest in their utility.
  3. Ian_Grant
    Bill, the topsail yards have two halliards to take the strain and equalize the lateral pressure on the topmast. As always Longridge describes it accurately, but it is difficult to parse the facts. Let's look at pictures. Plan 9 depicts the fore cross trees and the topsail yard. The first bit you have highlighted in orange describes the large 20 double tye block at the yard's centre, with the two buntline blocks attached to its strop, projecting like bunny ears. It also describes the two single blocks suspended close up beneath the crosstrees (difficult to see in plan 9, but labelled "20" single tye block each side". You can see the long strop of the starboard block passing up the mast just behind the middle crosstree, with its eye captured by several turns of a lashing around the mast, just above the last backstay ("above the rigging" as Longridge puts it). See the plan 9 note "Standing part of each tye is clinched around the mast here", just above the aforementioned lashing? Those are the start of the two tyes. The starboard tye goes through one sheave of the double block on the yard from stbd to port, then up through the port single block. Correspondingly, the port tye goes through the other sheave of the double block from port to stb, then up through the starboard single block. We now have two tye ropes emerging from the two single blocks, one on each side. They pass partway down the mast and each ends with a 26" double block. Now let's look at plan 7. At the after end of the main channel you see a block a few feet above the bulwarks with its long strop connected to an eye on the channel. That's the 26" single block Longridge says is attached by a 3-1/2" halliard to the double 26" block on the tye. He mentions a becket on the upper end of this single block; that's to attach the end of this halliard which then goes double block - single block - double block - kevel on deck. (At this scale I just trap the halliard under the strop when stropping the block, then tie a knot in the halliard to secure it). Two more things of note: the length of the tye is such that if the topsail yard is lowered, the 26" double blocks should be about at the level of the EDIT: CORRECTION topmast lower mast cap (Longridge says this but you didn't highlight it). If you are rigging the yard raised with a sail on it then adjust the block position down accordingly. Secondly, the 26" double blocks are attached to the after topmast backstay with thimbles ensuring that it slides up and down without twisting. Longridge describes this at very end of pg 246, and 247. Referring again to plan 7, Longridge has indicated this by sketching a short length of the backstay to the left of the 26" double block with two little lines indicating the attachment. Hope this helps. Here is how Petersen illustrates it, as a backup aid. He doesn't show the double blocks sliding on the backstay, on this frigate. Nor are the buntline blocks shown.
  4. Ian_Grant
    Actually they don't all attach to the yard (example the nave line, sheets and tacks) but you pretty much have to rig most of them. Many have to do with supporting the yard and are pretty essential. You could omit the nave line, it's pretty much invisible anyway. If you are omitting sails you could leave off the buntlines and slab lines. The clew lines are normally attached to the sheets (and tacks, for lower sails) in this case (which is what Longridge drew in plan 7). Or you could omit the sheet and clew lines; which would look pretty bare! In my case, without sails, I left off the slab lines but I did rig the bunt lines, just hitched to the yards, because I thought all the blocks under the fore top would look odd if left empty and anyway I had all the buntline blocks on the yards. I also rigged all the bowlines on the ship, again just hitched to the yard in positions sort of near where they would be if a sail was furled on the yard.
  5. Ian_Grant
    Damn! Another error in my build!
  6. Ian_Grant
    Bill, mine took the reverse - 5 trucks and 4 ribs. It's better to have trucks at the ends rather than ribs. 😃
  7. Ian_Grant
    "Had I known the cabinet was for YOU, I would have chopped it into pieces with an AXE!!!" Actually I'm now not sure it was Seinfeld, wasn't thinking of that soup-nazi episode; but somewhere a character gets a tattoo of Chinese characters thinking they have deep meaning then discovers that it just reads "soup". Wasn't that Seinfeld??😵
  8. Ian_Grant
    Glen, are you sure the Chinese characters don't translate to "soup"? 😆 (.....calling all "Seinfeld" fans........)
  9. Ian_Grant
    Thanks Glen! I need to think out of the box, the way you do........😀
  10. Ian_Grant
    Yes it could reasonably be used in parts of a planetary explorer ship 😄
  11. Ian_Grant
    So I assembled a bunch of parts into the required length of mechanism. The beam is a bit of a kludge of disparate parts, and the baseplate is longer than necessary because the shorter length was out of stock. Shown are the 2-1/2" linear bearings which do slide nicely on the SS shafts. You can see how lo-o-o-ng the beam is compared to the length of the bearing surfaces at the ends. In point of fact, it cannot reliably be operated by a single servo in the middle (or in this case my finger); one can see sometimes different vertical shifts at the two ends. So the scheme with two beams on only 1-1/4" bearings is out. Probably just as well. There will be a lift servo at each end of each beam, with the servo pair on a given beam y-harnessed to the Arduino output. The U-channel for mounting oars has to be in three pieces as shown because this channel only comes in limited lengths. I also find that the hinges are stiff, too stiff in my opinion. Oil seems to make no difference. Can I find some piano hinges with metric hole spacing I wonder? Still wondering how much of this stuff to use, and how much to make from Baltic Birch plywood.
  12. Ian_Grant
    TinkerCAD is handy, and not so complicated to figure out as a lot of 3d software. Keep up the good work! Ian
  13. Ian_Grant
    Hi Bruce - when ship plans and drawings list a size for rope or wire, the custom is to give the circumference not the diameter. A 3-1/2" DIA steel wire would be like an iron tree! Does Campbell actually say "diameter"? I'm guessing not. If so, your "3-1/2" guys are about 1.114"DIA or about 1/4mm at 1/96. The 5" main stay works out to about 1.6"DIA which would be about 1/2mm at 1/96. These large stays are doubled for added strength. These threads seem small if you're accustomed to building earlier wood ships with hemp ropes.......steel wire delivers so much more tensile strength in a given diameter. Keep up the great work! Do you have Underhill's clipper rigging book? By the way, I agree with Rob about using the Revell kit blocks. They look fine when rigged and no stropping required! A little paint is even better.
  14. Ian_Grant
    Actually the knowledge is not completely lost. For example, in 1989 the Jamestown Colony laid down the keel for a replica of "Susan Constant" from 1607 with Brian Lavery as their consultant on wood shipbuilding of the day. An experienced crew of shipwrights took more than a year to do the job. I have a book "Wooden Ship: The Art History and Revival of Wooden Shipbuilding" by Spectre and Larkin which has many photographs of this authentic build in progress. I also recall visiting "Victory" in about 1988 (?) when yet another refit was in progress, and watching some workers bending the largest teak? plank I had ever seen around the bows on the port side. In the rain. 😬 Keep up the good work!
  15. Ian_Grant
    Bill, in those days the sails were lashed to the yards by robands with the result that the heads of the sails were underneath the yard. It's only in the more modern ships that the yards were equipped with jackstay bars running along their tops, to which the sails were attached; in this case yes the sail smothers the front of the yard. In fact, in windjammers a second bar was run along just behind the jackstay, called the safety stay. It provided a handhold in an emergency. Additionally, small rope loops were attached to it through which crew could thrust a forearm to secure them when using both hands. Here's a picture of how it was in the old days..........
  16. Ian_Grant
    Bill you've made incredible progress in a single year, as I've said before. Regarding your blocks, the smaller blocks look better for the bunt and leech lines. But the smaller version of the topsail sheet block (upper yard in the photo) is too small. The bigger version on the lower yard is more to scale; ideally it should be 1/4" same as the quarter blocks below the jeer blocks. Conversely, the 12" lift blocks, attached to the sheet blocks, should be about half the size of the sheet blocks, and are actually only slightly larger than the buntline blocks.. I think the smaller lift block, shown on the upper yard, is better. Finally, a reminder that the buntline blocks don't dangle above or below the yard, but rather lie along its front face. See the famous Plan 8.
  17. Ian_Grant
    How about a couple of hull shots, for those of us on the edge of our seats? 😄
  18. Ian_Grant
    Good recovery, Bill. 👍
  19. Ian_Grant
    Bill, just to clarify, the topgallant yards would not have had booms or boom irons like the lower yards. The topgallant stuns'l's foot would be set on the topsail yard boom, and its head on a small spar dangling from a block on the topgallant yard. You can make this out on the Geoff Hunt print.
  20. Ian_Grant
    Looking great! I happened to catch your talk of thin line - I'm searching for something to use for ratlines at 1:150 scale, something fine and non-fuzzy. Would this cotton line meet the need; if so what is it please? Thanks, Ian
  21. Ian_Grant
    No I just ignored them as this light equipment would be stored until needed. I did however make fore and main royal yards for her, which I stowed lashed to the inside of the topmast shrouds, one to port and one to starboard.
  22. Ian_Grant
    Very nice! I find your topmast cross-trees more convincing than Heller's strange interpretation which has the masts between the 1st and 2nd cross-trees and the 3rd dangling out way in back of the masts.
  23. Ian_Grant
    Bill, according to my print of Geoff Hunt's "England Expects" which depicts Victory plodding into Trafalgar in very light winds, she had stuns'ls on the fore and main topgallant yards too.
  24. Ian_Grant
    Just wondering how accurate that is - I'm not a CS expert - but there would be a lot of force on that railing stanchion from the chain holding the fluke end! Or are those stanchions iron too?
  25. Ian_Grant
    I think the main reason windjammer ratlines didn't need to be as wide is because there were far fewer men trying to get aloft at once; Victory for example would put more men on a topsail yard for reefing her massive sails than Preussen probably had on watch. Earlier in this log there was a brief discussion on ratlines and shrouds. Veszett in post #43 sent pics of a model showing six shrouds on the lower masts with ratlines spanning four, or six for every 5th one; also a photo of Preussen a few posts later that seem to show six. Heller only has five shrouds which I ended up not changing. So I suppose I could do three, or five every 5th one. That would be somewhat fewer knots than I estimated. I don't mind the tedium of tying the knots, I'm just afraid that at 1/10" spacing they'll look more like a solid wall unless I can find some very fine non-fuzzy line. I may cheat and go to 1/8" spacing; just don't tell anyone! 😄

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