Hubac's Historian

Let us go back in detail to this back part of the funds.
On this view you can see:
The "Manual" which served the helmsman to orient the rudder according to the orders. This device of use in the XVIIth century will be replaced by the double wheel better known. This vertical lever was articulated in a nut and moving it from right and left pushing it made the helm of the rudder visible.

A double partition supposed to insulate this rear compartment or "Sainte-Barbe" includes supports where were hung the powder gargoyes. A table and benches for cannoniers and one also sees the traps giving access to the powder tanks.
 
A section of this section provides a better understanding of these developments.
It is a piece of the plans of the Ambitious of Monsieur Jean Boudriot. This ship built at the same time as the SR and like him in Brest undoubtedly had the same facilities

The curbing of the hull or lively work is a long and meticulous exercise. The slats are calculated in width and length to respect certain principles:
None of the curbs should end in whistle or tip.
No joints on chords should be on the same chord with less than three gaps.
The edges are skewed on edge to stick well to the bottom .... but you know that of course.
Operation of more than one month. The same will apply to the felling of dead works

et's go to the first bridge or first battery.
The main structure is finished with: leases, beams, reinforcement curves, bolsters, hatches stacked masts ...
In this detail, we can distinguish the leases and barracks, the corbes, the portico extensions, the ceiling of the wall, the sills of the next bridge and their seals, the bolsters which keep the gaps between the leases and the notches on the leases To accommodate future curling coamings.
Then the small capstan with single bell and the large capstan with double bell.
Then at the prow is the Gatte, a compartment in the form of a bin pushed back in lead sheets to receive the waters resulting from the retraction of the anchor cables. Scuppers on both sides allow the flow to the sea.
In the foreground the vertical bolster of the bowsprit mast
The curbing of the first bridge is short. The coamings are in pear tree as well as the central part, the rest of the bridge in sycamore (French maple). Aesthetic reason, but also because during the scratching of the oak bridges with sea water the salt in the long time bleached the wood. Operation called "Briquettage" because one scratched with bricks of terracotta.
In the foreground one sees the sheep park followed by the large hatch.
The curbing of the bridge is completed on the starboard side, the port side is left open to see the structural work.
The equipment is in place and we make a first presentation of the guns of 36.

Welcome Cedric!  I am sure that you will find that the knowledge and eagerness to share, here at MSW, goes quite beyond expectations.  In the short time that I have been a member, here, I have learned so much from so many.  It never ceases to amaze me the particular talents of others.

Cher Michel,
 
C'est magnifique! Thank you for sharing your work with us. Your workmanship is superb.  If you continue and rig the model, it will be even more impressive.

You are right, the Beautiful is a beautiful little frigate as well as Fame.

Let's make a small break by the sculpture of the elements of the prow
The jottereaux are in place on the spur and the frieze is carved.
Then a few steps of the sculpture of the marine horse, it was my first sculpture and I have to make touching soon.
The frieze, which is very fragile, required three weeks of work

The following coltis border was quite complex to make.

The doors are functional and the brass sheaves at the top of the pediment are also functional

Thank you and later.

Let's continue the construction detail
On this view we distinguish:
The bread oven
The main mast
The passages of the bilge pumps and a pump
The puit aux boulets and its entrance by a sliding trapdoor
The great sep of halyard
 
On the second picture the three pairs of ebony loudspeakers are positioned before gluing
Next picture the pecks are glued in place. The rounded parts at the bow are cut in the ebony mass because this wood breaks with the cambering.

Thank you Mark and good Sunday
You know, doing the rigging with the cargoed sails for part will be a very long adventure. I think it will take me at least two years if I believe my friends of the Forum of Gérard Delacroix. Besides I have big fingers at times not very skilled.
When to do another boat, why not but then which one?

Are the translations good? I try to express myself in simple words.

I will continue my story if it interests you and your friends.
Have a good day
cordially
Michel

I continue my description:
The cannons:
15 guns of 36 on each edge in first battery
15 guns of 18 on each edge of second battery
15 guns of 12 on each edge of third battery
5 guns of 8 on each edge of the aft deck
3 guns of 8 on the castle of before
2 guns of 4 on the poop on each edge
A total of 110 canons all in Bronze.
I remind you that the portholes of retreat and hunting ports were not armed as well as the first port of the first battery.

These cannons were decorated with the arms of the Count de Vermandois, the baton of King Louis XIV. They also featured a wildlife head with a breech button.

Not finding in France a competent workshop and a reasonable price to melt them, I turned to Alexey Baranov, an engineer from Ukraine who accepted the challenge.
Only Tribord will be armed, Port being not decorated to let the work of framing.

These guns were modeled on a 3D milling machine and then cast by the process of lost wax. Then trimmed and polished. I applied a treatment later to give them the appearance of verdigris.
All are mounted on their hooks and rigged with maneuvers hoists and fixed against their respective ports.
This picture shows one of these 24 guns that equip the Royal Sun No. 2 of 1693, sunk at the Battle of the Cardinals

good morning Marc
I took more than four years to complete all the internal structures and the first bridges. As will be seen in other photographs, the bridges with notched dovetail leases against the walls are as numerous as the pairs and each one carries numerous assembly notches.
This framework, for the time, was very astute and admirable resistance. Everything was nailed, pegged, no glue or screws or bolts.
What is also remarkable is that the construction of the ship required only a little less than two years.
5000 workers of all the trades animated this site.
More than 3000 very large oaks were necessary without counting the woods needed for the mature.
Yes, I think to do all the rigging if by then the great author of the cosmos gives me time. That is to say a little more than 4 years to see 5.
Good day Marc

Some details on this structure of the framework.
Each chord or "couple" has 7 pieces: a veranda on the keel, two knees, two first elongates, two second elongates. These pieces are assembled in staggered form and are of decreasing thickness to lighten as much as possible the tops of the vessel ..Sa nearly 700 pieces to carve in the respect of the dimensions of the time and the 1 / 48th.
Preparations are done on the table with templates from the plan.
It is therefore a very very long and somewhat tedious work, but necessary. Some "fillings" are necessary between the meshes at the places where it will be necessary to pierce the ports of the three main batteries.
All the "bottoms" of the aisseau are equipped with false bridges, floors, partitions of the various equipments as in the real ship.

Thank you for your nice comments.
I introduce myself: I am an engineer of Arts and Crafts and I have always done a little modeling during my life parallel to my job. I am married, I have three children and six grandchildren. I'm 76 years old.
In retirement since 1998 I accidentally fell on the drawing of the stern of the Royal Sun, drawing by Jean Berain.
Immediately I was seduced and I decided to build this ship in Arsenal.
I started my research in 2008 by browsing the historical backgrounds in search of exact documents on the Royal Sun. My object was to compile all these documents in order to have enough to draw up the plans of this ship as well as possible.
This was done in 2009. It was a first approach that was to guide the construction while allowing the retouching as and when.
The axial framework with more than 90 frames and the stern and stern frame will be presented at an exhibition in January 2010.
Photos of this period:

I present here the latest photos of my Royal Sun. It is not finished and if it interests you I would put you following as work progresses.
Excuse me but not speaking English I use the Google translator

Doris, it seems like such a shame to hide all your work under a roof. May I suggest that rather than make a roof, you make a clear plastic covering instead? You can buy a sheet of polycarbonate, heat it up in an oven, then bend it over a mould.

Hey Dan,
 
Sometimes I take for granted that I can just see the Michelangelo at our meetings, but I've really enjoyed reading through this log, so far.  There have been a number of ingenious solutions to vexing problems.  I'll be following along.  She's really shaping up beautifully, Dan!

You seem to work at a steady pace with tremendous progress in a short timeframe.  How long did it take you to research and develop plans for Katherine?

On the subject of girdling, I remember reading some time ago that there were problems with the Katherine after her launch, in terms of her handling characteristics.  The inclusion of this detail, is a very nice touch, and a subject that one rarely ever considers when thinking about ship models.

Doris,
I really am so floored by what you do.  As is the case with your other models that I have seen, the Royal Katherine is so cleanly worked and her lines are so fair - if I didn't know it was a model, I would swear it were the real thing springing up before our eyes.  You have such a strong sense for how the architecture of these floating batteries should look.  And your resourcefullness, in finding such creative ways to simulate realistic details, makes you a ship-modeling genius in my eyes.
 
You answer one question for me and I have ten new ones.  Rather than ask those questions now, though, I will do as you suggested and read through your Royal Caroline build log.
 
The basic question your models provoke is this:  with results so clean and fair, using such simple materials and tools - why build a ship-model any other way?
 
Well, I will be watching with great fascination from here on out!
 
 

Hi Doris,
 
What sort of card stock do you use?  Is it specialty cardboard that you might buy at an artist's supply?  I was thinking I might adapt some of your technique to my model of Soleil Royal.  I'll need to create new interior structural support and cambered deck beams because I am scratch-building all new decks in this, otherwise, plastic kit.  My thought was that card would be easier to layout, cut and shape than styrene sheet, as an underlayment for what will ultimately be wooden strip planking.  Or, would it not be advisable to glue wood strip to cardboard false decks, because of humidity fluctuations between different materials?  Is that why you use plastic foils to simulate decking?

Hi Doris,
 
I've wanted to witness your process for some time!  I am so excited to see you build the Katherine, and I will definitely be following along.  Your work is really exceptional!
 
Regards,
 
Marc

You continue to surprise and amaze us! Not only do the details look terrific, but the the overall effect has visual unity; a very tricky balance to achieve. 

Welcome Cedric!  I am sure that you will find that the knowledge and eagerness to share, here at MSW, goes quite beyond expectations.  In the short time that I have been a member, here, I have learned so much from so many.  It never ceases to amaze me the particular talents of others.

Good evening everyone,
 
A few weeks after my inscription on ModelShipWorld, the time has come to present myself.
My name is Cédric Liégeois and I’m a belgian modeler, 48 years old, working in civilian engineering area and, when I’m not busy with building sites, principally connected to the XVII century ships of the line and even earlier, I spend a lot of time building battleships ; in fact I still have a number of 1/350 kits just waiting to be built.
After a long break (children and so on) I came back to the hobby a few years ago after spending a holiday near Rochefort, France, where the replica ship l’Hermione was under construction. That gave me the impulse to come back to a long - forgotten project concerning le Soleil Royal of Heller.
This project, owing to certain specific developments, has now evolved in a somewhat different direction. I have decided to attempt a conversion of the Heller kit into La Reine of 1668. This ship, altough dimensionally somewhat smaller than Le Soleil Royal in lenght and breadth, was constructed in the same shipyard (Brest) by the same master carpenter (Laurent Hubac).
Currently, my progress on this model can be viewed on the French modeling forum La Royale Modelisme.net
That’s how I met Hubac’s Historian, who’s current WIP on Le Soleil Royal lead us to exchange informations and our correspondence gave me the courage to translate my work in English. Marc is helping me with translation, I’m really not fluent and the imperial system of measures that most of you are using is quite a nightmare for me.
 
As soon as possible, I will start my own building log on MSW, I’m looking forward to you comments and help.
 
Have a nice day.
 
 
Cédric

Hey Dan,
 
Sometimes I take for granted that I can just see the Michelangelo at our meetings, but I've really enjoyed reading through this log, so far.  There have been a number of ingenious solutions to vexing problems.  I'll be following along.  She's really shaping up beautifully, Dan!

Hi all –
 
Thanks again for the compliments and likes.  I have to say that the questions and discussions always stimulate my mental juices.  Keep them coming, and please don’t worry about pointing out things that can be improved.  It is always better to hear about them during the building process when they can be corrected.
 
The last segment ended with the hull smoothed and primed.  Next came the process of detailing it.  In the two photos below you can see that the surface was very smooth.  Construction was done with welded plates, edge joined rather than having strakes of overlapping in-and-out plates as earlier ocean liners had.  This meant that the hull would be simpler, but what was done would have to be more precise.  This was especially true for the two lines of portholes.  Which are the most obvious features other than the ship name and the green detail stripe. 
 

Close examination of these and other photos, as well as the plans, indicated that the lines of portholes followed the curve of the sheer.  None of the photographs of the portholes show any detail, no matter how close the photograph was taken or how much I enlarged it.   They simply look like holes in the hull.  I am sure that there were small lips around them, but I never could see any.
 
The first step was to offer up the plans to the hull and to compare the porthole locations on the paper, one by one, to the portholes that I could see in the photos.  It turned out that the plans did not show some 15 portholes on either side of the hull.   They were marked on the plans for future use.
 
Then the plans were cut right through the top line of portholes and taped to the hull.  As you can see, the line on the plans wanders a bit up and down, so the plans could not be used “out of the box.”  Using a compass, the distance from the sheer edge of the hull block to the first line of portholes was set and a light line drawn along the length of the hull.  An awl was used to make starter holes along the pencil line at each porthole location. 
 
At the bow the flare of the hull pulled the plans up, so the portholes would have ended up too high on the hull.  The curves also made it impossible for me to just use the compass to set the line.
 
My solution was to apply 1/16” black striping tapes just below the porthole locations.  I could apply them, eyeball them, and adjust them as needed to get two matching sets of straight lines on both sides of the hull.  The plans were then used to set the horizontal locations for the portholes, and starter holes were made with the awl.

 
I next had to decide how the portholes were going to be modeled.  Since they had no detail, I could have simply made holes in the hull.  I tried it on some scrap, but the edges of the holes often came out ragged.  This was unacceptable.  A sleeve of some sort would solve this.  In prior models I had used small brass grommets, but I could not find any which were small enough.  They had to be around 18” in scale, or about 0.05” on the model, for the interior diameter.  The length was less important, but something around 3/16” would be good for ease of handling. 
 
I could have sourced some brass tubing and cut off individual pieces.  I even have a powered cutoff saw that uses an abrasive disc rather than a saw blade.  But making over 500 of them without burrs or flash which would need additional cleanup was not something I wanted to try.  Instead, I found 1mm x 4mm fluted brass beads on the Fire Mountain Gems website.  This was a perfect size, but when they came in I saw that they were not perfectly round.  The fluting process turned them into rounded pentagons.  The difference was only visible under magnification, so I decided to use them.
 
The outside diameter of the beads was 0.060” at its largest, so an 0.062” drill was used to make all of the holes in the hull.
 
A toothpick was the perfect size to pick up a bead and slide it part way into a drilled hole, leaving them proud of the surface.  The friction fit between the beads and the holes was probably enough to secure them, but the sides were painted with dilute white glue to be sure.
 
Then a small tack hammer was used to set them down flush with the hull.  Before the glue set the line was eyeballed and any beads that were slightly high or low were nudged into proper place.
 
The hull was given another coat of primer to blend in the portholes and fill any small gaps around the beads.   When I was satisfied the upper hull was given a final coat of gloss white.  The paint was left for 24 hours to dry, then the upper hull was masked at the waterline with tape and paper towels.  The lower hull was painted an OSHA red that closely matched my best color photos of the hull.
 
At this point it was only a few days till the Joint Clubs Conference on April 29, so I did a few things a little out of sequence to make a better impression.  Photoetched brass doors from Gold Medal Models and Tom’s Modelworks were painted white and applied to the hull following the locations on the plans and photos.  Self-adhesive green striping tapes were applied to the hull.  The one at the waterline is 1/8” wide, while the upper decorative one is 1/16” wide. 
 
These green stripes are only temporary.  Although they are the right color, they are a bit too thick and the upper one is a bit too wide.  The thinner tapes do not come in the right color, so I may have to take thin white tapes and paint them.  More on this later.  Similarly, the windows here at the stern are paper place-holders until I can make up the custom decals that ultimately will be used.    
 
At the bow I can see that some touch-up work is needed, but nothing that can’t be accomplished with a bit of elbow grease.
 
So here she is at the conference again.  The prominent line of windows of the promenade deck have been printed on pieces of paper to test the fit.  The paper ones will be replaced with laser-cut ones done in either 0.020" styrene or a thin plastic-impregnated circuitboard material.   Unfortunately, she has to be set aside for a bit so I can complete the QAR.  I will pick her up again when I can.
 
Until then, be well.
 
Dan