bruce d

Welcome, Brownbread. Judging from the pic of your armour, you know how to build models so we look forward to seeing more of your longboat. Regards, Bruce

After a cup of tea and a browse I should qualify the statement I made earlier: At least some revenue craft were painted black during the first half of the 18th century so my comment about the later stripes' could confuse matters. There is another thing, not conclusive, but worthy of comment. As I recall, there was a protocol for the flying of jacks and pennants by revenue craft. A revenue craft was originally obliged to fly a long pennant for identification and some took to flying the jack as well. This caused friction as they were not part of the English navy. The compromise was that the revenue vessels would display their pennant and were allowed (not required) the jack but must haul it down if in the presence of a vessel 'properly' entitled to fly the jack: in other words, pennant only if in sight of any of His Majesty's ships. That fits the picture, whether by coincidence or design. Make what you will of it.

Giampiero, very impressive. When you started you said it was an 'impossibly small' scale: well, you have solved that problem! Lovely work. Bruce

Hmmmmm…. I do not want to tell you what you already know, but I don’t know what you know, so here goes: The nearest boat is flying the red ensign. This was used by commercial shipping under the English flag from about 1707 so she is not smuggling, she is legitimate. Also, her colours are consistent with early-mid 18th century practice. The further, smaller boat could be an early revenue cutter. She could also be a privateer. The pairing of these two (if the second is in fact a revenue cutter) would make sense as a comforting bit of graphics to illustrate the ability of commerce to function safely under the protection of revenue patrols. However, I will look at some notes on revenue service craft later and comment. My strong impression is that the map is about something happening (or proposed) on land. Do you have any reason to believe that the map is ‘official’ in any way?

Hello Stephen and welcome to MSW. If you are satisfied that the map predates 1750 I may be able to stir things up a bit. Both vessels would be typical of the daily traffic in the Channel at that time and the fact that Number 1 is armed should not lead you to conclude that she was a fighting vessel. Most commercial craft were armed because of the constant threat of being taken. The second looks more interesting to me. It looks like a typical sloop of the mid 18th century but the most telling feature is the decoration: the stripe created by those painted wales is more typical of the age of Nelson and later. Can you tell us a little more about the map? Does it focus on a particular aspect of the coast such as shipyards or ports? Does it omit anything obvious? Either can give a good indication of the intended purpose, hence the likely user, and may give a good handle on the date. Also, perspective matters. One of the duties of prospective officers in the navy was to draw the coastline of any area where they were visiting/stationed. These sketches (never named officially but generally referred to as ‘illustrative views’) were graded by their captain or superior lieutenants and the best were sent to the hydrography department to have their features incorporated in maps. This was done in home waters for practice and in foreign waters for effect. The distinguishing feature of these illustrative views was that they were records of what was seen at eye level from the deck of a ship, not projected views as would appear on a finished map. I mention this because the would-be-officers were encouraged to sketch a wide range of craft incorporating details of rigging and deck layout. The drawing materials of the day were charcoal and/or watercolour and the sketches you have posted are consistent with those I have seen. So, perhaps if there is more you can share about the map we may be able to get to specifics. Hope this helps, Bruce

Good photos, and I especially liked the entire collecton. I used to work about two minutes walk from one of the London East End photos and recognised it immediately. Back to the subject: here are some figurehead images collected over time from The National Archives UK. They are drawings in a file of assorted subjects and do not have additional descriptions beyond what is on each page. In context, it is possible these were proposals submitted to Their Lordships for figureheads and may or may not reflect what was actually chosen. Pretty, ain't they? Maybe there are some more out there? Bruce

Jim, I don't know how but your build log slipped past me. Brilliant work, I am watching from now on.

Alan, good luck on Friday, looking forward to seeing all those frames and blocks in a few weeks. And helm ports.

Hello Eugenio and a warm welcome to MSW

Careful with that watercolour: the NMM links it to 'Waterloo' which would make it the 1824 Bellerophon.

Pumps?

Hello Mitsuaki, I have not seen your log before, it is very impressive. I like the jigs, I will watch if you don't mind? Regards, Bruce

That is dedication. Well done.

Hello silverman834, I like what you have done with this obscure subject. I assume you have seen the two papers in this link: Regards, Bruce

From experience: under no circumstances breathe in the smoke or fumes. The smoke is HOT and I needed medical help after a similar accident occurred on the workbench right under my nose, burning my sinuses. Good warning, might save someone some pain.

Welcome to MSW, Daniel. There is a current build log for Polaris which you may have already seen, it could be useful. Bruce

Welcome to MSW, Patrick. Bohuslan looks like a good project, look forward to seeing your build log. Regards, Bruce

Hello Clark, before buying from CAF I contacted Tom via messages on this forum and he is extremely helpful. Even though I only ordered some of his smaller kits( like the longboat) he offered to help in any way once I start. I believe the website is 'work in progress' and he concentrates on kits. Looking forward to all these CAF builds! Bruce

Gerco, welcome to MSW

Thanks for the kind words. I try not to think of how immaculate your cutter looked at this stage compared to my build. I started with a plan and the issues I have had so far all stem from my choices of materials. I will tread carefully from now on. There is still a quarterdeck and cabin roof to do for Mediator and I have been playing around with some materials, dummy-ing up the parts in card to see if I can predict any issues with different thicknesses of materials. Heaven forbid I actually have to buy something.

Mediator is fighting me. I am winning, but it is important that I do not underestimate the ability of Mediator to lay an ambush. The new sub-deck pieces (see last post) have to bend in two planes to sit properly. They were made of an inferior plywood that appeared easily bent. A test run revealed splits in the surface and de-lamination after being bent and left overnight, so it was the end of the line for these bits. Fortunately I still had the original sub-deck pieces made of superior plywood. To get them to bend over the bulkheads (which was the reason I had rejected them) I cut a series of grooves in the underside to allow the stiff ply to bend. For some reason I imagined that the grooves were not needed right up to the edge where the two halves would meet. Stay tuned… To hold the two halves in their new shape while the Titebond worked required clamping. Due to the compound curves I needed to improvise something that would hold the centre edges straight, pull the width onto the curve of the deck across the tops of the bulkheads and keep whole kaboodle true to the sheer. These are the clamps I made from the type of small screw-in eyes used in picture hanging and 2.5mm eyelets: Pilot holes were pre-drilled in the deck pieces but not into the bulkheads in order to get the most out of the gripping power of the self-tapping threads. They were screwed in with fingertips. Started in the centre on the hull centre line and worked towards each end. Once that was done I improvised a hold-down clamp like this … … on the centre line until the whole line was tightened down. Then, a bit of force to pull the outer edge down. Lots of glue, worked quickly … … and let it sit for a day before unscrewing. The whole thing worked and was as solid as I could have hoped for, but the centre join line was proud where the ply had resisted bending. This was due to my bright idea of not cutting the grooves near that join. To be safe drove a few pins in before about half an hour with 80 grit sandpaper wrapped around a sanding sponge to fair the join. That's all for now.

Large clinker built cargo vessels from the late medieval period in Northern and Western Europe - The Mönchgut 92 wreck in context Master thesis Klara Fiedler Maritime Archaeology Programme University of Southern Denmark Large_clinker_built_cargo_vessels_from_t.pdf

Welcome to MSW Greg,

Hello Bob. I have had a ground steel 200mm engineers square that was out by a whole degree: it happens. Fortunately, that amount of 'slop' doesn't happen very often but it is wise to check carefully especially if buying budget tools.

Wonderful work, Doris.