drobinson02199

Thanks, Zappto

Thanks, Bob

Thanks, Ross.

Regards,

David

Something of a milestone here.  I haven't finished the project yet, but I have finished all of the work on the ship itself (except for adjusting the davits).  What remains is building the four small boats.  I started this ship in June, 2021 -- so at 2 years one month (and not yet quite finished) this is my longest build.

Pictures below show the stern and main mast lanterns.

I also got the ship off of the temporary cradle and onto brass mounting columns.  But it's a really HEAVY ship, and had too much lateral sway, so I added two small wood columns under the hull and now it's solid as a rock.  A couple of pictures below showing that.

Regards,

David

Anchors Aweigh!  

Regards,

David

No, I looked all over.  And even weirder now that I see your totally logical two sheets of four.

Regards,

David

Something odd in my kit.  When I went to get the anchor stocks -- 8 needed -- there were only 7 in the wood sheet.  There isn't an eighth anywhere.

The parts book says 8.  But curiously, there is no drawing of that wood sheet in the book.  If you look below, you will see a finished sheet with even sides and only 7 stock halves.  Really, really odd.

So I had to make one, which I did out of a scrap piece of the 5mm walnut sheet, sanded down to 4mm thick and then shaped.  I have since sanded the mounted stocks you see below, and now have painted them black (no picture here of that), and you can't tell which one has the handmade stock.  So all's well that ends well -- but really odd with that finished sheet and missing one stock.

Regards,

David

Finished rigging the bowsprit guy lines.  The red arrow shows them running up in parallel from the beakhead to the spritsail yard, and then diverging to different points on the sprit.

The manual wants you to use a single thread for both sides of the black line, which requires you to seize a block into the attached line near the beakhead, and which would make precise alignment difficult (or impossible for me).  So I started at the beakhead end with one line per side, got the blocks lined up (with a slight slant to the stern to match the direction of the guys), and then attached them to the appropriate points on the sprit.  Not sure why the manual doesn't do it that way.

OK, getting close now.  What's left for the main ship is the anchors and the lanterns.  Then I will build the small boats.

Regards,

David

Quarter davits done.  A few comments on these:

• I have not yet fixed the running end of the lifts, and that's because I won't know how far out I want them to swing until I build the boats and decide which ones I want to hang on the davits.  The plastic clip you see provides some mild tension on the lift for now.

• I left them natural walnut (vs. painting black) to provide some interest and make them more visible.  They have not been varnished yet, because when I do that I will probably cause the hinges to seize, so again I need to wait until I have the angle set and the boats hung.  So they look a little rough right now.

There will be block & tackle for the boats -- I'll add that when I hang them.

Regards,

David

Fore and main cluelines, tacks and sheets done.

Some of these go through holes in the hull and are anchored below the skids.  It's super difficult to do that last, when you are trying to tension the lines.  So I started there, got them anchored, and then rigged back to the eyebolts on the exterior of the hull -- and it's easy to tension there.  Three points of tension have to be balanced at the same time.

Regards,

David

Driver boom built, mounted and rigged.  Also the jackstaff for the ensign.

Regarding the ensign:  there are no flags supplied with this model, and I thought a small ensign would be a nice addition.  So I researched British ensigns of that period, and found a good picture that I could download.  I then used Photoshop to resize it, and also to do a "flip horizontal" on the image so that the backside would come out properly.

Looks nice on the model.

You may notice that the lanterns aren't on.  I held off on that to avoid pranging them, but now that the boom sort of "protects" that area, I can add them at any time.

Regards,

David

Finished building, mounting and rigging the Driver Gaff.  One of these pics shows the gaff better, and the other one shows the rigging bettter.

One comment:  the instructions say to rig both the mizzen top yard and the mizzen topgallant yard braces before rigging the vang.  I did the top yard brace because the angles put some downward pull on the gaff, but the topgallant brace would pull up.  So after the top yard brace I rigged the vang, which puts nice downward pull on the gaff and also helps to align it side to side.  Then the topgallant brace and I could put some tension on it because the vang anchored the gaff down.  Just a small note for those who might be building a step or two behind me.

Regards,

David

Braces now done.  Next step is the boom and gaff, which look semi-complex to build and to rig.

Regards,

David

A note on the rather odd backgrounds you may notice in my more recent pictures.  When I started building the yards, I needed to clear my workbench, so I moved the ship on top of some large boxes that contain case lots of household supplies -- something we started doing during Covid and have kept up.  

What I found was that I could get to both sides of the ship easily without having to rotate it all the time.  The hull is just below chest level, so the masts and yards are at a perfect height when I'm standing up.  So I bought a headlamp (mentioned earlier) to provide a good worklight in that area, and that's where I've been mounting yards and doing rigging.  Works pretty well -- but it's why you see those odd "basement" backgrounds.

Regards,

David

The lifts, sheets, buntlines and cluelines are now done on all 3 masts and the bowsprit.  Pictures attached.

Next step is braces.  It moves along more quickly once you get to the "real" rigging stage.

Regards,

David

Main mast yard lifts, sheets, buntlines and clewlines done.

Regards,

David

Finished the foremast yard lifts and sheets (plus "bunt" and "clew" lines, whatever those are).

I used flash in the dark with no white background so the rigging would show up.

Regards,

David

Bowsprit yards done and mounted.  Pictures show bow-on view with some arrows added so the yards are more identifiable, and a top-down view.

Now the real rigging can start!

Regards,

David

Mizzen yards done and mounted.  Now just the bowsprit yards left.

Regards,

David

Fore topgallant yard up.  So now on to the mizzen yards, which are simpler to build than the fore and main yards.

Regards,

David

Built and installed the fore topmast.  Knocking them off, one by one.

Regards,

David

Allan:

You asked why many of my blocks are rigged upside down.  Actually, I think it's all of them.

I'm sure you are right, and that I'm doing it upside down.  When I started building ships, it seemed to me that rigging the sheaves (the holes) at the loop end vs the tie end would lead to more aligned rigging and less fouling.  So I've always done it that way.

Regards,

David

The fore yard is built and rigged onto the ship.

Going on a trip for a couple of weeks so won't be posting again until latter part of June.

Regards,

David

Main topgallant yard built and mounted.  I included a pic of the rigging.  Again, as with the topyard, I have rigged a strop to hold the yard down, and I'll cut that if something comes along later that does that.

Regards,

David

Finished the main topsail yard and mounted it.  Some things to comment on with accompanying pictures:

• The parrel beads and ribs look nice.  I've typically had trouble mounting yards with parrel beads -- holding everything in place (even with the ends knotted to make a tight assembly.  This time I dry-mounted the yard with painters tape, which made it relatively easy to rig the beads.  Didn't have to resort to my default on earlier boats of gluing them to the mast and then rigging them.

• Other pics show the "tye" rigging including long block and tackle at the end.   In order to get the tyes tensioned correctly, I needed to tie the yard down, and there is a thin loop (red arrow) doing that.  If something comes up in the later rigging that holds the yard down, I'll snip that loop.

• There is something called a "truck" that lashes the rigging to one of the backstays.  It's supposed to be a cast item, but looked high and low and nada in the parts box.  So I improvised with some scrap walnut dowel as shown in the picture.  In general, I've been pretty disappointed in the cast items in this kit -- particularly the yard rings, which I've ditched for my own using wire.

It took me about 5 days to build and mount this second yard, so allowing for an upcoming vacation it may be sometime in August before I have them all done -- maybe later.  I'll keep posting as I go.

Regards,

David