lmagna

Some really honest quality wording from you my friend,    I will add to it by saying  - this is The most warm and friendly forum of any I  know of  or use,  all the members either established artisians of the wood or plastic, or new comers to our world, are all first class individuals who make our little world what it is here.
 
OC.

Hi Denis,
would these figures in scale 1:87 (HO gauge) perhaps meet with what you are looking for.....
https://www.ebay.de/itm/Preiser-139-Figuren-Set-Passanten-um-1900-unbespielt-OVP-1-87-H0/263525822019?hash=item3d5b5cee43:g:EkcAAOSwr21amCMx
 
https://www.ebay.de/itm/Familie-um-1900-Preiser-HO-Figuren-1-87-12132-E/392008717629?epid=1104825627&hash=item5b458a553d:g:AOYAAOSwOyJau6AO
 
https://www.ebay.de/itm/Preiser-12138-HO-Reisende-Passanten-um-1900-6-Figuren/302656750528?epid=1211049894&hash=item4677bf83c0:g:k28AAOSw5VtaFr-f
 
Nils

Hi Denis
I bet this is one build log that won't fall behind or end up in the unfinished kits! This could be the fastest build log in history! Keep it up I'm expecting great things from you!
 
Lou

That's what I thought... though it could be beef (from hamburger, etc.).  Now I know.   As far as cleanup.... there various solvents including dish soap.  I note that lard can be bought at the local grocers.   I'll try the cutting oil first.
I'll let you know here as I want to test a couple of lubes and see what works and what doesn't work.

I'm here too, Lou.  I'll even bring popcorn for those contemplative moments.  

Glad to see you both. Looks like I will need to find better lighting now as well! 
 
Feel free to jump in with suggestions. If you were able to wade through all of the above stuff you will know that this is a VERY subjective build and as such is wide open to interpretation! Right now I am a few days ahead of what I am writing and for the most part it is pretty much in the alteration phase and I feel pretty comfortable with what I am doing. Like I said before I am pretty sure I have voided the kit warranty but I am feeling OK with the new look. I should be able to have a few pictures starting tomorrow. Hopefully they will be OK as that is completely new to me. Maybe They will all turn out fuzzy and I fool everyone that it is the camera not the builder! (That could be good to hide the quality of work as well)
 
Oh by the way, don't forget your hard hats. I can be a little dangerous when I get around tools!
 
Lou
 
By the way Chuck, as you have the plans for the replica Providence you can compare them with this build. I have the book also but my plans are book size and I didn't want to spend the money to blow them up as that is not really the ship I am building. 
 
Me again

The model
 
With all the previous information and more in mind I settled on one set of plans that most represented my conclusions but even they didn’t match them all. I also was divided in that I could either alter the plans to suit my image or find a model hull that would provide the same base. I settled on the later method as #1 I already had the kit and #2 it would also provide most or all the required wood and fittings that would be needed in the build anyway. I went through my stash of kits and narrowed it down to two almost perfect matches, The Corel HM sloop Resolution and the Artesania Latina Colonial schooner Independence 1776. Both were of the right draft and beam with slightly longer decks than I needed, especially on the Resolution. To use that model I would have to make a new profile piece at 94% of the original and shorten the transom counter. On the Independence I would need to lower the fore castle to the level of the main deck, lower the main deck to a more proper depth of hold that would also make the bulwarks higher in relation to the deck, and then raise the quarter deck to match the poop deck. In addition to all this I would also have to alter the bow to a slightly more pointed plan shape and add a little more rake to the bow/cutwater area especially from the waterline down. This kit would also need to have almost an inch of the stern counter removed. The rigging of course would also need to be altered from a schooner to a sloop. At first glance it would seem that the Resolution would be the easier conversion, but I cannot help but feel that the Independence after alteration comes closer to the right shape and size. After this initial alteration there will be a number of other items that need to be dealt with, almost all of them somewhat minor in detail but important none the less.
 
(Next The build)

Hi Piet

You just made my day. I was beginning to think that I was the only person who could see this post.
I didn't think of using the term " Concept build" in my build title, maybe I should have.
 
You are more than welcome to pull up whatever you like, after all it is a pretty empty room, I hope that I can find something better than a stump though! Stumps are no way to treat a guest unless you are sitting in the woods next to a campfire. Hopefully I can keep it interesting, (Or possibly that should be MAKE it interesting) so that I can partly pay you back for all you have provided me with in following your Java build.
 
Lou

The Continental Sloop Providence 1775: Concept
 
Well I suppose I have procrastinated long enough and it is time for me to actually start doing some building.
 
I have not built a ship model in over twenty years and all of the models I have built before, not counting a lifetime of plastic ships dating from childhood, were  RC ships and were pretty much made form plans I found in magazines and using materials scrounged from almost everywhere. One ship was made from fold out plans much like the centerfold in Playboy and the wood started out life as a dog house and was filled in with Styrofoam packing blocks sanded to shape, smoothed out with Spackle and covered with fiberglass. More doghouse for the decks, and old realtor signs for the superstructure And to properly finish it off I found that a section of house drainpipe was perfect for the funnel! Most of my ships were done that way as I didn’t know better, (No internet for me back then) and it was not until I decided to build the USS Oahu that I actually obtained a real set of plans from the Smithsonian. Even then I pretty much used the bread and butter method for building the hull. Just flat boards from the hardware store with all the parts that didn’t look like a China River Gunboat cut away. My building style was a true case of ignorance is bliss in its purest form.
 
Fast forward to the present day. I started looking into period ships as a possibility to re-enter the hobby after my retirement as the body, even after a few surgeries in the last few years is not as comfortable in dragging 36 to 45” or more ships that weigh 35 or more pounds to the pond or lake getting them in and out of the car, lake, and house. They would still be fun to run but all the other stuff, not so much.
 
After locating this forum I was, and kind of still am, a little intimidated by the museum quality of so many of the models presented, and by the precise research that is put into getting them right. I know I can build, but can I build right and when using these methods achieve a presentable model? To compound the issue I feel a little like Harry Potter when he was in Ollivanders getting his first wand and being told that “it’s really the wand that chooses the wizard, of course.” In my case it is the ship that chose me rather than the other way around. I had been looking at scratch and kits for some time and even though there were several that interested me in both categories none of them reached out to me and said “That is THE one.” That is until Old Salt and Chuck Seiler both posted builds for the Continental Sloop Providence. I picked up the book that contained the plans used by Chuck and when I was done reading it I knew that I had been picked.
 
After some more research I became aware that the plans used by John and Chuck were of the replica sloop by John F. Millar and that in her construction a number of things had been changed from the original research to accommodate present day Coast Guard regulations, (Or to avoid them) and in some cases to meet the whims of the people building her. My desire was to build a model that was not constrained by these limitations and fit a little more closely my mental image of what the ship should look like.
(More to follow)

Not all that empty.  Iwill be taking a gander from time to time through the porthole.
 

Me too. 

Research
 
Now reality set in. In order to at least try and do justice to my concept of the Providence I had to try and uncover whatever information was used by Miller and others in determining the size and looks of the original Providence.
 
It became pretty clear early on that I was neither knowledgeable enough, nor in a position to do what could be major research throughout the colonial states to try to retrieve existing scraps of data or new original material. This made me start looking at research that had already been done, most of it about ninety years ago! After talking to Mr. John Millar I received very little that related to his sources, but quite a bit regarding the compromises on the replica Providence. I was finally able to determine that possibly the only research done on the Providence was done by Charles G. Davis back in the mid to late 20s! This brought up other names like Alfred F. Brownell, George C. Wales, and Hewitt R. Jackson. Also it appears that at least one period painting and possibly a few drawings of Providence and what are considered similar ships have also been used. The painting was done in England by Francis Holman in 1777 even though it is certain that he never actually saw the Providence first hand and was working from descriptions at best. At any rate it became apparent that what I think were plans created by Davis, Brownell, and Wales became the basis for virtually all the current models in collections all over the eastern states. This research was not only considered accurate enough at the time, but a number of years later was at least partly used by Jackson in his research for the replica Lady Washington and later for the sloop Union. He also used research produced by Chapelle and Chapman but his hull lines and many details of his plans clearly show a very strong reliance on Davis’s work. So that brings us around again to Millar who also told me he was the guiding influence behind the replica Lady Washington. I made an attempt at the Mystic Seaport museum, the curators of Davis’s papers, to obtain information on his Providence research if they exist, as well as a copy of his paper on Hudson Bay sloops, but unfortunately the request didn’t even elicit a reply and as I am not in a position to go there in person had to be regarded as a dead end.
 
A number of ships also came to light at this time, all supported by one degree of documentation or another, either in written or pictorial form and could be considered contemporaries or descendants of the Providence. The already mentioned Lady Washington and Union, and the Experiment by name. Jackson states that the Experiment was the basis for Davis’s research and that he produced plans based on that. Again another somewhat closed loop. All of these ships appear to have Hudson River sloop ancestry so I decided to follow the herd so to speak rather than try to reinvent the wheel.
At this time almost all I have to go on are some general dimensions, a few pictures of the better models of what is considered to be the Providence, and a couple of contemporary partial descriptions. It appears that everything present today outside of the contemporary information is based on Davis’s work, and therefore very similar.
 
It appears that the general consensus is that the Providence was built in the time period between 1768 and 1774 with most sources using the earlier date. Her statistics were about 75-90 tons with the higher number being preferred as it was common in colonial America to lie about the tonnage of a vessel in order to avoid taxes based on that tonnage. Her length was somewhere in the 60-65’ range on deck and virtually all accounts list 20’ as her beam, and her “depth of hold” about 7’6”- 8’. I personally think the 8’ mark was probably more of a draft measurement as it seems more in line with other known draft measurements for these vessel types and would have made her more able to navigate the waters of the eastern seaboard where she was designed and built. Virtually all accounts state that she was fast, and I take that to mean that she was fast even for vessels of her kind, otherwise why mention it at all. One writer even states that she was copper bottomed, but I do not hold the same opinion. The same holds for an off sided statement by Millar that she could of also had a slightly raised fore castle. He did not expound on his statement and I have also not done much with it at this point other than consider it only slightly possible. More on this later. It is clear that she was built as a trader or merchant ship not as a warship but one has to remember that she was also built by a man who had been involved in the privateers of the French and Indian Wars, was almost surly a smuggler when he felt he could get away with it, and lastly a known slaver. All of these things were better served by fast ships so I personally think her speed was more design than just copper plating.
 
So with that as my guidelines I approached construction methods.
 
(More to follow)
 
Lou

The Continental Sloop Providence 1775: Concept
 
Well I suppose I have procrastinated long enough and it is time for me to actually start doing some building.
 
I have not built a ship model in over twenty years and all of the models I have built before, not counting a lifetime of plastic ships dating from childhood, were  RC ships and were pretty much made form plans I found in magazines and using materials scrounged from almost everywhere. One ship was made from fold out plans much like the centerfold in Playboy and the wood started out life as a dog house and was filled in with Styrofoam packing blocks sanded to shape, smoothed out with Spackle and covered with fiberglass. More doghouse for the decks, and old realtor signs for the superstructure And to properly finish it off I found that a section of house drainpipe was perfect for the funnel! Most of my ships were done that way as I didn’t know better, (No internet for me back then) and it was not until I decided to build the USS Oahu that I actually obtained a real set of plans from the Smithsonian. Even then I pretty much used the bread and butter method for building the hull. Just flat boards from the hardware store with all the parts that didn’t look like a China River Gunboat cut away. My building style was a true case of ignorance is bliss in its purest form.
 
Fast forward to the present day. I started looking into period ships as a possibility to re-enter the hobby after my retirement as the body, even after a few surgeries in the last few years is not as comfortable in dragging 36 to 45” or more ships that weigh 35 or more pounds to the pond or lake getting them in and out of the car, lake, and house. They would still be fun to run but all the other stuff, not so much.
 
After locating this forum I was, and kind of still am, a little intimidated by the museum quality of so many of the models presented, and by the precise research that is put into getting them right. I know I can build, but can I build right and when using these methods achieve a presentable model? To compound the issue I feel a little like Harry Potter when he was in Ollivanders getting his first wand and being told that “it’s really the wand that chooses the wizard, of course.” In my case it is the ship that chose me rather than the other way around. I had been looking at scratch and kits for some time and even though there were several that interested me in both categories none of them reached out to me and said “That is THE one.” That is until Old Salt and Chuck Seiler both posted builds for the Continental Sloop Providence. I picked up the book that contained the plans used by Chuck and when I was done reading it I knew that I had been picked.
 
After some more research I became aware that the plans used by John and Chuck were of the replica sloop by John F. Millar and that in her construction a number of things had been changed from the original research to accommodate present day Coast Guard regulations, (Or to avoid them) and in some cases to meet the whims of the people building her. My desire was to build a model that was not constrained by these limitations and fit a little more closely my mental image of what the ship should look like.
(More to follow)

There is, somewhere here on MSW, some pretty good discussion on the evolution and history of pigments.  As i recall, which is in itself of dubious value, red was not a very common pigment until the 18th century, and even then, when looking at carpenter's stores, not abundant as compared to other pigments. 
 
Ochre is the colloquial term used by archaeologists to describe an earth or rock containing red or yellow oxides, most commonly hydroxides of iron. Red ochres typically consist of iron oxides (Fe2O3) derived from hematites (from the Greek word for “blood-like”) and other iron-rich rocks. Red ochres are relatively common in natural geological and soil formations, with archeological evidence of use since more than 30,000 years ago. 
 
Use as a pigment for ships is less tangible, surprisingly, than other uses.  It would require fairly regular updating as the pigments and binders of the period were rather impermanent.  It wasn’t until the late 18th century that the French developed a method for artificially producing a similar red pigment.
 
It may be of some interest to take a look at recent research concerning the HMS Victory where they have determined that it was not painted red in the Orlop, but rather the flats of the deck (deck referring to the level of the vessel, and flat the surface trod upon) was most likely unpainted, while the bulwarks (walls) were more likely a lighter shade (quite possibly whitewashed).  See Goodwin, Peter G. 2013. “The Application and Scheme of Paintworks in British Men-of-War in the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries.” The Mariner’s Mirror 99 (3): 287–300. doi:10.1080/00253359.2013.815993 for a very interesting analysis by one of the top living experts on the Victory.

 

Life rings and fire hoses added, plus some ammo boxes etc. I’ve started some weathering, in particular the back deck but I’m going to add some pastels later. 
 
 

one from some time a go. 1997 I think 
Jim 

Lard is what my Mom called bacon fat.

M
Mark, lard is animal fat 
 
Lard oil is the clear, colourless oil pressed from pure lard after it has been crystallized, or grained, at 7° C (45° F). It is used as a lubricant, in cutting oils, and in soap manufacture. ... Lard oil has excellent lubricating qualities, but it tends to become rancid

Davis did some good work as one of the early naval architects turned hobby modeller mentor.  Writing for a much different audience, he frequently provides a snippet of the information - just enough (often) to achieve something, but not enough to go any further.  Nothing mean or lazy, just vastly different times. 
 
If we take a gander at works by Lee (masting and rigging), among others, we can quickly begin to wander the rabbit hole.  In an effort to simplify and condense large tables of numbers for lines, poles, spars, blocks, yada yada, the desired dimension (let's use the length of the mizzen gizzard on a 1730 54 gun ship (a ficticious item as I am to lazy to get my book).  The gizzard, in contemporary literature, is given as a table of length on deck (across the top) and number of guns (down the side).  Now, Lee may have gone through this and found that in 1730, the mizzen gizzard was actually 2.31 times some other item dimension, likewise calculated from some other dimension.  The thing of it is, decimal math wasn't in common use - the division left a remainder in xx/yy.  Thr builder of old would have used something like 2 and 29/94 units.  Modern calculators make those conversions to decimal so easy!

I also have the book and the only thing that makes me wonder is why Davis didn't just state the sizes in relation to the shot size rather than just giving the formula? I'm just being lazy i suppose.
 
You need to consider Wayne's information as well though. Sometimes, like in converting a merchant ship to carry guns the ship would be too small to have the ideal ports for the size of gun or number of guns that were intended. I suppose that could apply to warships as well.
 
Lou

No problem shipman. For the most part my comments are just that, comments. I am neither a scholar nor a naval expert and as such calling any statements by me a contribution is possibly stretching things somewhat.
 
Having said that, what I was saying about Davis offering the formula for use with out just stating the formula results especially on page 229 was just my way of saying I am being lazy. He did give the results on page 230 for later era ships.
 
All formulas like Davis used would have been the standard for designing a ship and one would think they would be considered the ideal resulting hopefully in a balanced ship that was matched to it's armament. I am sure that exceptions were made to compensate for real life considerations, or local beliefs. Shipbuilding was not just a trade but a skill back then, much like model ship building is to us today. and each master builder very probably had his own idea to a certain extent what was right.
 
Lou

Interesting idea.. bacon fat. Maybe I'll have to have bacon tomorrow morning. 
 
I'm not sure what grade this copper is.  I bought it at the local metal yard (1 foot long by 3/8" for $3) which was the smallest diameter they had.

Thanks to all for the likes - I appreciate your interest in this project. As always feel free to jump in with any sort of comments you may have. No egos here, so if you see something you're not crazy about let me know. We can discuss out back     Seriously all your opinions are welcome here.
 
I finished the second set of stealers. As I mentioned I had to use lime wood rather than sapelli. I still haven't found that 7mm stick I was using at first. As the pix will show I need one more stealer to even out the spacing between the top strakes and the bottom. That doesn't sound like a big deal except that there is only room for 4 more strakes total and there is still a lot of frame to cover from the top down. With that in mind I am doing alternate strakes to finish out - one strake for the top band then one strake (plus stealer) for the bottom band. It's going to be very close.
 
I suppose all this is happening due to the elevated deck at the stern. Frames & transom are farther from the keel than other builds I have done? I believe there was only a single stealer per side on my Niagara build, but it has no rear deck. Unfortunately there is no plank plan so I don't know how the "experts" at Constructo would have done it.
 
All in all I think they're coming out OK. Probably even OK if this had been the only planking layer.
 

 

 

Sweet work, Denis.   Looks like the working boats I've seen in the past.

I thought the first ones looked pretty nice but the new ones are a big improvement. Nicely done.