JerseyCity Frankie

Hi Ian. Stunsails (spelled Studdingsails) are supplementary sails that can be set on either side of the square sails. The booms you mention could be slid outboard through iron rings attached to the yards well past the ends of the yardams. On these extensions smaller square sails could then be spread, giving the effect of more canvas on each yard.  Here is an excellent recently posted photo of them in use on the the Europa which makes their disposition plain. Studdingsails were only set in light airs with the wind abaft the beam.
Most of the time the booms were not in use and they were positioned inboard, which is how they are usually depicted on models. The canvas on them was "flown" up to them from the deck, not furled on them at all when not in use. The sails could be set as needed and not necessarily all at the same time nor even symmetrically- you could set the portside ones but not the starboard ones, or even set the ones to port on some yards and ones to starboard on others. All depending on the wind. 

Hi Ian. Stunsails (spelled Studdingsails) are supplementary sails that can be set on either side of the square sails. The booms you mention could be slid outboard through iron rings attached to the yards well past the ends of the yardams. On these extensions smaller square sails could then be spread, giving the effect of more canvas on each yard.  Here is an excellent recently posted photo of them in use on the the Europa which makes their disposition plain. Studdingsails were only set in light airs with the wind abaft the beam.
Most of the time the booms were not in use and they were positioned inboard, which is how they are usually depicted on models. The canvas on them was "flown" up to them from the deck, not furled on them at all when not in use. The sails could be set as needed and not necessarily all at the same time nor even symmetrically- you could set the portside ones but not the starboard ones, or even set the ones to port on some yards and ones to starboard on others. All depending on the wind. 

They are regarded as difficult creatures. Studdingsail booms are almost thought of as disposable since they often break, as I have heard crew from Pride of Baltimore II report. They can only exist in light wind conditions and if the wind picks up they must be got in quickly. "Modern" square rigged ships seldom carried them, for instance none of the big steel hulled German barques had them.

Below the thunders of the upper deep;
Far far beneath in the abysmal sea,
His ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep
The Kraken sleepeth: faintest sunlights flee
About his shadowy sides; above him swell
Huge sponges of millennial growth and height;
And far away into the sickly light,
From many a wondrous grot and secret cell
Unnumber'd and enormous polypi
Winnow with giant arms the slumbering green.
There hath he lain for ages, and will lie
Battening upon huge seaworms in his sleep,
Until the latter fire shall heat the deep;
Then once by man and angels to be seen,
In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die.

Experimenting with starch left me disappointed. I used the powdered form of laundry starch in hot water and I dipped the sailcloth into it then draped the sailcloth over holes cut in cardboard. The holes in the cardboard were cut to the size and shape of the outside of the sails. I allowed the sails to air dry overnight. They DID take on the form of the billowing sails and they WERE quite stiff. But something about the starch also made the fabric pucker in a pattern across the entire sail. The result reminded me very much of those old vacu-form topographic maps of mountainous terrain you used to see.
I have had success with a commercial product called "Stiffen Stuff" and another similar product called "Stiffen Quick" which are pump spray craft products you mist onto fabric which has the result of preserving the fabric in the shape it was in when the product was applied. It stiffens the fabric nicely without causing the sort of puckering distortions I found the starch caused.

Another step is to remove a little bit of the “water” your ship (or in this case your creature) will displace so that the hull can be bedded in the sea firmly. I make a paper template of the hull or creatures waterline and put it in the bottle over the spot the assemblage is going to sit on and using an improvised tool I scrape out the outline of the ship or creature. I remove the template then excavate some of the clay out. How much clay to remove and how deep you go will be determined by your models draft. This is a slow messy uscientific process. The best tool I found for this bottle for this job was not my fancy articulated arm, it was a bit of stout copper wire wrapped around the end of a dowel. To get the angle I needed on the tool within the bottle, I was able to bend the wire against the inside back of the bottle into positions it could not have held while being inserted through the neck of the bottle. Little tiny bights of clay are removed one greasy little chunk at a time. Finally at the end of the days work I put in a piece of the Kraken to see what it would look like in there. I think I am finally ready to start actually putting things into the bottle.

I'm reading Moby-Dick again and today I saw this, another of Melville's many digressions from the narrative. Chapter 60 starts off with a description of the whale line used in the boats, its the line attached to the harpoon. Since he mentions tar and the coloration I thought it would be nice to post it here:
CHAPTER 60. The Line.
With reference to the whaling scene shortly to be described, as well as for the better understanding of all similar scenes elsewhere presented, I have here to speak of the magical, sometimes horrible whale-line.
The line originally used in the fishery was of the best hemp, slightly vapoured with tar, not impregnated with it, as in the case of ordinary ropes; for while tar, as ordinarily used, makes the hemp more pliable to the rope-maker, and also renders the rope itself more convenient to the sailor for common ship use; yet, not only would the ordinary quantity too much stiffen the whale-line for the close coiling to which it must be subjected; but as most seamen are beginning to learn, tar in general by no means adds to the rope's durability or strength, however much it may give it compactness and gloss.
Of late years the Manilla rope has in the American fishery almost entirely superseded hemp as a material for whale-lines; for, though not so durable as hemp, it is stronger, and far more soft and elastic; and I will add (since there is an aesthetics in all things), is much more handsome and becoming to the boat, than hemp. Hemp is a dusky, dark fellow, a sort of Indian; but Manilla is as a golden-haired Circassian to behold."....
 
Golden haired Cirassian indeed. You can read the whole chapter (or the whole novel) here: http://www.gutenberg.org/files/2701/2701-h/2701-h.htm#link2HCH0060

Continuing:
 

Raising the Topsail yards.
 
A word about yards.
 

Working out the details.
 

Parrals at 1:150 scale are pretty small.
 

Topsail yard in place,
 

A member of the Royal Corps of Marine Infantry gives scale to the top.
The sails were attached, dampened and pulled into position using the Buntlines, Leechlines, and clues.
 

Rigging the anchors.
 
 
 

I think you will find a reasonable set of sail plans in Alan McGowan's 'HMS Victory: her construction, career and restoration'
I'm not at home to check for sure but if memory serves they are pretty thorough.
 
Nick

I have a history of doing maintenance work on historic sailing ships and I have painted on a fair amount of pine tar in my day. Landlubbers often think the tar we talk about when we talk about Tar is asphalt tar, a not too good smelling petroleum industry byproduct used in road maintenance on land. Easy to mistake it with Pine Tar if you don’t use your nose since the two products are shiny black and gloopy. But those of us who use Pine Tar on ships all agree it’s the most lovely smelling substance, perhaps in all the world. Some even say its an aphrodisiac.
But I digress.
Traditional pine tar is made by heating the roots of pine trees in the absence of oxygen, which produces charcoal and pine tar. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_tar  and this nice essay on tar is worth a look too: http://www.maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.htm
 
Nobody on modern tall ships paints tar on their ratlines, but neither do modern sailing vessels use natural fiber line as ratline stuff. Unlike natural fiber line, modern Dacron line is impervious to rot and requires no coatings. But natural fiber line can last longer in a marine environment if its painted or impregnated with tar.
Tar can and often should be cut with turpentine or linseed oil or both, this allows it to flow better and penetrate the fibers of a rope. Full strength unadulterated tar has the consistency of molasses and appears black and is very gloppy. Its not really pigmented and if painted onto a white nonporous surface it will appear to be a streaky dark brown film, it will not behave like black paint which has pigment particles suspended in it and will thus “cover” the same white surface the tar would only smear.
Also the paint will dry in a day while the tar remains very sticky for quite a long while, it remains sticky for weeks. Repeated applications of tar will eventually produce a thick black opaque coating and this is why shrouds and standing rigging is black, they have many coats of tar applied to them eventually leading to a hard shell of tar which keeps the water out and the Ultraviolet Radiation can’t penetrate. Despite modern man-made-fiber lines imperviousness to rot, it still can be harmed by U.V. radiation and this is why it is sometimes tarred but I have read that black paint is often used on modern ships in place of tar since it performs the same U.V. blocking function, LOOKS like tar and is also universally available while Pine Tar can be hard to come by in our modern age. But back in the old days Pine Tar was ubiquitous. Today small quantities are available at tack shops for the horse riding trade.
If you paint Pine Tar on canvas (which I tried once) it turns the fabric an olive drab color and makes it heavy and waterproof and this is where we get Tarpaulin. Paint it on manila line and it darkens it slightly but not so much that you would tell the difference right away between a painted and unpainted piece of line. Put four coats on manila and you will certainly see the color shift to a darker hue but nowhere near black, the line now fairly waterproof and very sticky.
Getting finally to the point, the long way, I am sure pine tar was painted on ratlines. Also I am sure pine tar was already in the rope when it arrived at the ship, having been applied at the ropewalk in a thinned solution or rubbed on with a rag to produce a coating that would penetrate the fibers and add to the lines longevity. But I don’t think it would have been applied in thick enough or repeated coatings sufficient to make the ratlines black. I imagine the bo’sun would have thin tar applied to the ratlines whenever they started to appear dry or took on a chalky chaffed appearance but I do not know that for a fact, I just surmise it from my own experience.

Some picture I found years ago on the net, if I remeber well from the "original" rig of the Batavia replica. Unfortunately no idea who to give the credits for ...
 
From a stay

 
Tarred twine

 
XXXDAn

Well,just about finished,except for fixing the rudder and a bit of touching and tidying up. Yes,I know I could have done better,and put more on it,but I'm pretty pleased with it as it is. On to the Cutty Sark!!!

I have a history of doing maintenance work on historic sailing ships and I have painted on a fair amount of pine tar in my day. Landlubbers often think the tar we talk about when we talk about Tar is asphalt tar, a not too good smelling petroleum industry byproduct used in road maintenance on land. Easy to mistake it with Pine Tar if you don’t use your nose since the two products are shiny black and gloopy. But those of us who use Pine Tar on ships all agree it’s the most lovely smelling substance, perhaps in all the world. Some even say its an aphrodisiac.
But I digress.
Traditional pine tar is made by heating the roots of pine trees in the absence of oxygen, which produces charcoal and pine tar. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_tar  and this nice essay on tar is worth a look too: http://www.maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.htm
 
Nobody on modern tall ships paints tar on their ratlines, but neither do modern sailing vessels use natural fiber line as ratline stuff. Unlike natural fiber line, modern Dacron line is impervious to rot and requires no coatings. But natural fiber line can last longer in a marine environment if its painted or impregnated with tar.
Tar can and often should be cut with turpentine or linseed oil or both, this allows it to flow better and penetrate the fibers of a rope. Full strength unadulterated tar has the consistency of molasses and appears black and is very gloppy. Its not really pigmented and if painted onto a white nonporous surface it will appear to be a streaky dark brown film, it will not behave like black paint which has pigment particles suspended in it and will thus “cover” the same white surface the tar would only smear.
Also the paint will dry in a day while the tar remains very sticky for quite a long while, it remains sticky for weeks. Repeated applications of tar will eventually produce a thick black opaque coating and this is why shrouds and standing rigging is black, they have many coats of tar applied to them eventually leading to a hard shell of tar which keeps the water out and the Ultraviolet Radiation can’t penetrate. Despite modern man-made-fiber lines imperviousness to rot, it still can be harmed by U.V. radiation and this is why it is sometimes tarred but I have read that black paint is often used on modern ships in place of tar since it performs the same U.V. blocking function, LOOKS like tar and is also universally available while Pine Tar can be hard to come by in our modern age. But back in the old days Pine Tar was ubiquitous. Today small quantities are available at tack shops for the horse riding trade.
If you paint Pine Tar on canvas (which I tried once) it turns the fabric an olive drab color and makes it heavy and waterproof and this is where we get Tarpaulin. Paint it on manila line and it darkens it slightly but not so much that you would tell the difference right away between a painted and unpainted piece of line. Put four coats on manila and you will certainly see the color shift to a darker hue but nowhere near black, the line now fairly waterproof and very sticky.
Getting finally to the point, the long way, I am sure pine tar was painted on ratlines. Also I am sure pine tar was already in the rope when it arrived at the ship, having been applied at the ropewalk in a thinned solution or rubbed on with a rag to produce a coating that would penetrate the fibers and add to the lines longevity. But I don’t think it would have been applied in thick enough or repeated coatings sufficient to make the ratlines black. I imagine the bo’sun would have thin tar applied to the ratlines whenever they started to appear dry or took on a chalky chaffed appearance but I do not know that for a fact, I just surmise it from my own experience.

Small update before closing the stern. I made beams and added the map on the table. The next phase of work is laying the proper plating.
 

 

   

Furnishing Admiral’s cabin has been completed. I performed a table leg using the jig (as usually I do). The jig was cut out of pressboard (thickness 0,8 mm). Between movable (this on the right side) and fixed element of the jig (this on the left side) I’d put wet strip of alder veneer (pear veneer was too hard), and then the movable element of the jig I squeezed with clip. Veneer remained in the jig until dry, about an hour.
 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 
To be continued...

Just a short observation regarding black dying of textile fibres – this was a tricky business before the nineteenth century (and it’s the same with ink on paper). Many a contemporary rigging would no longer be here today if dyed black with ink, which was a very common method for making black threads.
In the state archive where I work we keep many charters from the last ten centuries where we see black (ink dyed) threads that hold the wax seals disappear because of their chemical properties (every inkmaker used his own recipe), while other colours (based on minerals) keep well. The acid in the ink “eats” threads (and paper), but, depending on luck and the various recipes, not every black thread is afflicted by this problem.
This might be one reason there are not so many models with contemporary black rigging lines today.
Cheers,
Gregor
(Well, the oldest charters don’t have treads on the wax seals yet, and it’s ink on parchment, so they're keeping quite well).

I have a history of doing maintenance work on historic sailing ships and I have painted on a fair amount of pine tar in my day. Landlubbers often think the tar we talk about when we talk about Tar is asphalt tar, a not too good smelling petroleum industry byproduct used in road maintenance on land. Easy to mistake it with Pine Tar if you don’t use your nose since the two products are shiny black and gloopy. But those of us who use Pine Tar on ships all agree it’s the most lovely smelling substance, perhaps in all the world. Some even say its an aphrodisiac.
But I digress.
Traditional pine tar is made by heating the roots of pine trees in the absence of oxygen, which produces charcoal and pine tar. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_tar  and this nice essay on tar is worth a look too: http://www.maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.htm
 
Nobody on modern tall ships paints tar on their ratlines, but neither do modern sailing vessels use natural fiber line as ratline stuff. Unlike natural fiber line, modern Dacron line is impervious to rot and requires no coatings. But natural fiber line can last longer in a marine environment if its painted or impregnated with tar.
Tar can and often should be cut with turpentine or linseed oil or both, this allows it to flow better and penetrate the fibers of a rope. Full strength unadulterated tar has the consistency of molasses and appears black and is very gloppy. Its not really pigmented and if painted onto a white nonporous surface it will appear to be a streaky dark brown film, it will not behave like black paint which has pigment particles suspended in it and will thus “cover” the same white surface the tar would only smear.
Also the paint will dry in a day while the tar remains very sticky for quite a long while, it remains sticky for weeks. Repeated applications of tar will eventually produce a thick black opaque coating and this is why shrouds and standing rigging is black, they have many coats of tar applied to them eventually leading to a hard shell of tar which keeps the water out and the Ultraviolet Radiation can’t penetrate. Despite modern man-made-fiber lines imperviousness to rot, it still can be harmed by U.V. radiation and this is why it is sometimes tarred but I have read that black paint is often used on modern ships in place of tar since it performs the same U.V. blocking function, LOOKS like tar and is also universally available while Pine Tar can be hard to come by in our modern age. But back in the old days Pine Tar was ubiquitous. Today small quantities are available at tack shops for the horse riding trade.
If you paint Pine Tar on canvas (which I tried once) it turns the fabric an olive drab color and makes it heavy and waterproof and this is where we get Tarpaulin. Paint it on manila line and it darkens it slightly but not so much that you would tell the difference right away between a painted and unpainted piece of line. Put four coats on manila and you will certainly see the color shift to a darker hue but nowhere near black, the line now fairly waterproof and very sticky.
Getting finally to the point, the long way, I am sure pine tar was painted on ratlines. Also I am sure pine tar was already in the rope when it arrived at the ship, having been applied at the ropewalk in a thinned solution or rubbed on with a rag to produce a coating that would penetrate the fibers and add to the lines longevity. But I don’t think it would have been applied in thick enough or repeated coatings sufficient to make the ratlines black. I imagine the bo’sun would have thin tar applied to the ratlines whenever they started to appear dry or took on a chalky chaffed appearance but I do not know that for a fact, I just surmise it from my own experience.

I have a history of doing maintenance work on historic sailing ships and I have painted on a fair amount of pine tar in my day. Landlubbers often think the tar we talk about when we talk about Tar is asphalt tar, a not too good smelling petroleum industry byproduct used in road maintenance on land. Easy to mistake it with Pine Tar if you don’t use your nose since the two products are shiny black and gloopy. But those of us who use Pine Tar on ships all agree it’s the most lovely smelling substance, perhaps in all the world. Some even say its an aphrodisiac.
But I digress.
Traditional pine tar is made by heating the roots of pine trees in the absence of oxygen, which produces charcoal and pine tar. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_tar  and this nice essay on tar is worth a look too: http://www.maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.htm
 
Nobody on modern tall ships paints tar on their ratlines, but neither do modern sailing vessels use natural fiber line as ratline stuff. Unlike natural fiber line, modern Dacron line is impervious to rot and requires no coatings. But natural fiber line can last longer in a marine environment if its painted or impregnated with tar.
Tar can and often should be cut with turpentine or linseed oil or both, this allows it to flow better and penetrate the fibers of a rope. Full strength unadulterated tar has the consistency of molasses and appears black and is very gloppy. Its not really pigmented and if painted onto a white nonporous surface it will appear to be a streaky dark brown film, it will not behave like black paint which has pigment particles suspended in it and will thus “cover” the same white surface the tar would only smear.
Also the paint will dry in a day while the tar remains very sticky for quite a long while, it remains sticky for weeks. Repeated applications of tar will eventually produce a thick black opaque coating and this is why shrouds and standing rigging is black, they have many coats of tar applied to them eventually leading to a hard shell of tar which keeps the water out and the Ultraviolet Radiation can’t penetrate. Despite modern man-made-fiber lines imperviousness to rot, it still can be harmed by U.V. radiation and this is why it is sometimes tarred but I have read that black paint is often used on modern ships in place of tar since it performs the same U.V. blocking function, LOOKS like tar and is also universally available while Pine Tar can be hard to come by in our modern age. But back in the old days Pine Tar was ubiquitous. Today small quantities are available at tack shops for the horse riding trade.
If you paint Pine Tar on canvas (which I tried once) it turns the fabric an olive drab color and makes it heavy and waterproof and this is where we get Tarpaulin. Paint it on manila line and it darkens it slightly but not so much that you would tell the difference right away between a painted and unpainted piece of line. Put four coats on manila and you will certainly see the color shift to a darker hue but nowhere near black, the line now fairly waterproof and very sticky.
Getting finally to the point, the long way, I am sure pine tar was painted on ratlines. Also I am sure pine tar was already in the rope when it arrived at the ship, having been applied at the ropewalk in a thinned solution or rubbed on with a rag to produce a coating that would penetrate the fibers and add to the lines longevity. But I don’t think it would have been applied in thick enough or repeated coatings sufficient to make the ratlines black. I imagine the bo’sun would have thin tar applied to the ratlines whenever they started to appear dry or took on a chalky chaffed appearance but I do not know that for a fact, I just surmise it from my own experience.

I have a history of doing maintenance work on historic sailing ships and I have painted on a fair amount of pine tar in my day. Landlubbers often think the tar we talk about when we talk about Tar is asphalt tar, a not too good smelling petroleum industry byproduct used in road maintenance on land. Easy to mistake it with Pine Tar if you don’t use your nose since the two products are shiny black and gloopy. But those of us who use Pine Tar on ships all agree it’s the most lovely smelling substance, perhaps in all the world. Some even say its an aphrodisiac.
But I digress.
Traditional pine tar is made by heating the roots of pine trees in the absence of oxygen, which produces charcoal and pine tar. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_tar  and this nice essay on tar is worth a look too: http://www.maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.htm
 
Nobody on modern tall ships paints tar on their ratlines, but neither do modern sailing vessels use natural fiber line as ratline stuff. Unlike natural fiber line, modern Dacron line is impervious to rot and requires no coatings. But natural fiber line can last longer in a marine environment if its painted or impregnated with tar.
Tar can and often should be cut with turpentine or linseed oil or both, this allows it to flow better and penetrate the fibers of a rope. Full strength unadulterated tar has the consistency of molasses and appears black and is very gloppy. Its not really pigmented and if painted onto a white nonporous surface it will appear to be a streaky dark brown film, it will not behave like black paint which has pigment particles suspended in it and will thus “cover” the same white surface the tar would only smear.
Also the paint will dry in a day while the tar remains very sticky for quite a long while, it remains sticky for weeks. Repeated applications of tar will eventually produce a thick black opaque coating and this is why shrouds and standing rigging is black, they have many coats of tar applied to them eventually leading to a hard shell of tar which keeps the water out and the Ultraviolet Radiation can’t penetrate. Despite modern man-made-fiber lines imperviousness to rot, it still can be harmed by U.V. radiation and this is why it is sometimes tarred but I have read that black paint is often used on modern ships in place of tar since it performs the same U.V. blocking function, LOOKS like tar and is also universally available while Pine Tar can be hard to come by in our modern age. But back in the old days Pine Tar was ubiquitous. Today small quantities are available at tack shops for the horse riding trade.
If you paint Pine Tar on canvas (which I tried once) it turns the fabric an olive drab color and makes it heavy and waterproof and this is where we get Tarpaulin. Paint it on manila line and it darkens it slightly but not so much that you would tell the difference right away between a painted and unpainted piece of line. Put four coats on manila and you will certainly see the color shift to a darker hue but nowhere near black, the line now fairly waterproof and very sticky.
Getting finally to the point, the long way, I am sure pine tar was painted on ratlines. Also I am sure pine tar was already in the rope when it arrived at the ship, having been applied at the ropewalk in a thinned solution or rubbed on with a rag to produce a coating that would penetrate the fibers and add to the lines longevity. But I don’t think it would have been applied in thick enough or repeated coatings sufficient to make the ratlines black. I imagine the bo’sun would have thin tar applied to the ratlines whenever they started to appear dry or took on a chalky chaffed appearance but I do not know that for a fact, I just surmise it from my own experience.

I have a history of doing maintenance work on historic sailing ships and I have painted on a fair amount of pine tar in my day. Landlubbers often think the tar we talk about when we talk about Tar is asphalt tar, a not too good smelling petroleum industry byproduct used in road maintenance on land. Easy to mistake it with Pine Tar if you don’t use your nose since the two products are shiny black and gloopy. But those of us who use Pine Tar on ships all agree it’s the most lovely smelling substance, perhaps in all the world. Some even say its an aphrodisiac.
But I digress.
Traditional pine tar is made by heating the roots of pine trees in the absence of oxygen, which produces charcoal and pine tar. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_tar  and this nice essay on tar is worth a look too: http://www.maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.htm
 
Nobody on modern tall ships paints tar on their ratlines, but neither do modern sailing vessels use natural fiber line as ratline stuff. Unlike natural fiber line, modern Dacron line is impervious to rot and requires no coatings. But natural fiber line can last longer in a marine environment if its painted or impregnated with tar.
Tar can and often should be cut with turpentine or linseed oil or both, this allows it to flow better and penetrate the fibers of a rope. Full strength unadulterated tar has the consistency of molasses and appears black and is very gloppy. Its not really pigmented and if painted onto a white nonporous surface it will appear to be a streaky dark brown film, it will not behave like black paint which has pigment particles suspended in it and will thus “cover” the same white surface the tar would only smear.
Also the paint will dry in a day while the tar remains very sticky for quite a long while, it remains sticky for weeks. Repeated applications of tar will eventually produce a thick black opaque coating and this is why shrouds and standing rigging is black, they have many coats of tar applied to them eventually leading to a hard shell of tar which keeps the water out and the Ultraviolet Radiation can’t penetrate. Despite modern man-made-fiber lines imperviousness to rot, it still can be harmed by U.V. radiation and this is why it is sometimes tarred but I have read that black paint is often used on modern ships in place of tar since it performs the same U.V. blocking function, LOOKS like tar and is also universally available while Pine Tar can be hard to come by in our modern age. But back in the old days Pine Tar was ubiquitous. Today small quantities are available at tack shops for the horse riding trade.
If you paint Pine Tar on canvas (which I tried once) it turns the fabric an olive drab color and makes it heavy and waterproof and this is where we get Tarpaulin. Paint it on manila line and it darkens it slightly but not so much that you would tell the difference right away between a painted and unpainted piece of line. Put four coats on manila and you will certainly see the color shift to a darker hue but nowhere near black, the line now fairly waterproof and very sticky.
Getting finally to the point, the long way, I am sure pine tar was painted on ratlines. Also I am sure pine tar was already in the rope when it arrived at the ship, having been applied at the ropewalk in a thinned solution or rubbed on with a rag to produce a coating that would penetrate the fibers and add to the lines longevity. But I don’t think it would have been applied in thick enough or repeated coatings sufficient to make the ratlines black. I imagine the bo’sun would have thin tar applied to the ratlines whenever they started to appear dry or took on a chalky chaffed appearance but I do not know that for a fact, I just surmise it from my own experience.

I have a history of doing maintenance work on historic sailing ships and I have painted on a fair amount of pine tar in my day. Landlubbers often think the tar we talk about when we talk about Tar is asphalt tar, a not too good smelling petroleum industry byproduct used in road maintenance on land. Easy to mistake it with Pine Tar if you don’t use your nose since the two products are shiny black and gloopy. But those of us who use Pine Tar on ships all agree it’s the most lovely smelling substance, perhaps in all the world. Some even say its an aphrodisiac.
But I digress.
Traditional pine tar is made by heating the roots of pine trees in the absence of oxygen, which produces charcoal and pine tar. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_tar  and this nice essay on tar is worth a look too: http://www.maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.htm
 
Nobody on modern tall ships paints tar on their ratlines, but neither do modern sailing vessels use natural fiber line as ratline stuff. Unlike natural fiber line, modern Dacron line is impervious to rot and requires no coatings. But natural fiber line can last longer in a marine environment if its painted or impregnated with tar.
Tar can and often should be cut with turpentine or linseed oil or both, this allows it to flow better and penetrate the fibers of a rope. Full strength unadulterated tar has the consistency of molasses and appears black and is very gloppy. Its not really pigmented and if painted onto a white nonporous surface it will appear to be a streaky dark brown film, it will not behave like black paint which has pigment particles suspended in it and will thus “cover” the same white surface the tar would only smear.
Also the paint will dry in a day while the tar remains very sticky for quite a long while, it remains sticky for weeks. Repeated applications of tar will eventually produce a thick black opaque coating and this is why shrouds and standing rigging is black, they have many coats of tar applied to them eventually leading to a hard shell of tar which keeps the water out and the Ultraviolet Radiation can’t penetrate. Despite modern man-made-fiber lines imperviousness to rot, it still can be harmed by U.V. radiation and this is why it is sometimes tarred but I have read that black paint is often used on modern ships in place of tar since it performs the same U.V. blocking function, LOOKS like tar and is also universally available while Pine Tar can be hard to come by in our modern age. But back in the old days Pine Tar was ubiquitous. Today small quantities are available at tack shops for the horse riding trade.
If you paint Pine Tar on canvas (which I tried once) it turns the fabric an olive drab color and makes it heavy and waterproof and this is where we get Tarpaulin. Paint it on manila line and it darkens it slightly but not so much that you would tell the difference right away between a painted and unpainted piece of line. Put four coats on manila and you will certainly see the color shift to a darker hue but nowhere near black, the line now fairly waterproof and very sticky.
Getting finally to the point, the long way, I am sure pine tar was painted on ratlines. Also I am sure pine tar was already in the rope when it arrived at the ship, having been applied at the ropewalk in a thinned solution or rubbed on with a rag to produce a coating that would penetrate the fibers and add to the lines longevity. But I don’t think it would have been applied in thick enough or repeated coatings sufficient to make the ratlines black. I imagine the bo’sun would have thin tar applied to the ratlines whenever they started to appear dry or took on a chalky chaffed appearance but I do not know that for a fact, I just surmise it from my own experience.

I had read that the solute the sailors gave was to hold their hand to their forehead with the fingers facing the face, so as not to offend the officers with the black tar on their hands. The sailors are even often referred to as "tars" due to their usual state of being covered in tar.

I have a history of doing maintenance work on historic sailing ships and I have painted on a fair amount of pine tar in my day. Landlubbers often think the tar we talk about when we talk about Tar is asphalt tar, a not too good smelling petroleum industry byproduct used in road maintenance on land. Easy to mistake it with Pine Tar if you don’t use your nose since the two products are shiny black and gloopy. But those of us who use Pine Tar on ships all agree it’s the most lovely smelling substance, perhaps in all the world. Some even say its an aphrodisiac.
But I digress.
Traditional pine tar is made by heating the roots of pine trees in the absence of oxygen, which produces charcoal and pine tar. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_tar  and this nice essay on tar is worth a look too: http://www.maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.htm
 
Nobody on modern tall ships paints tar on their ratlines, but neither do modern sailing vessels use natural fiber line as ratline stuff. Unlike natural fiber line, modern Dacron line is impervious to rot and requires no coatings. But natural fiber line can last longer in a marine environment if its painted or impregnated with tar.
Tar can and often should be cut with turpentine or linseed oil or both, this allows it to flow better and penetrate the fibers of a rope. Full strength unadulterated tar has the consistency of molasses and appears black and is very gloppy. Its not really pigmented and if painted onto a white nonporous surface it will appear to be a streaky dark brown film, it will not behave like black paint which has pigment particles suspended in it and will thus “cover” the same white surface the tar would only smear.
Also the paint will dry in a day while the tar remains very sticky for quite a long while, it remains sticky for weeks. Repeated applications of tar will eventually produce a thick black opaque coating and this is why shrouds and standing rigging is black, they have many coats of tar applied to them eventually leading to a hard shell of tar which keeps the water out and the Ultraviolet Radiation can’t penetrate. Despite modern man-made-fiber lines imperviousness to rot, it still can be harmed by U.V. radiation and this is why it is sometimes tarred but I have read that black paint is often used on modern ships in place of tar since it performs the same U.V. blocking function, LOOKS like tar and is also universally available while Pine Tar can be hard to come by in our modern age. But back in the old days Pine Tar was ubiquitous. Today small quantities are available at tack shops for the horse riding trade.
If you paint Pine Tar on canvas (which I tried once) it turns the fabric an olive drab color and makes it heavy and waterproof and this is where we get Tarpaulin. Paint it on manila line and it darkens it slightly but not so much that you would tell the difference right away between a painted and unpainted piece of line. Put four coats on manila and you will certainly see the color shift to a darker hue but nowhere near black, the line now fairly waterproof and very sticky.
Getting finally to the point, the long way, I am sure pine tar was painted on ratlines. Also I am sure pine tar was already in the rope when it arrived at the ship, having been applied at the ropewalk in a thinned solution or rubbed on with a rag to produce a coating that would penetrate the fibers and add to the lines longevity. But I don’t think it would have been applied in thick enough or repeated coatings sufficient to make the ratlines black. I imagine the bo’sun would have thin tar applied to the ratlines whenever they started to appear dry or took on a chalky chaffed appearance but I do not know that for a fact, I just surmise it from my own experience.

I have a history of doing maintenance work on historic sailing ships and I have painted on a fair amount of pine tar in my day. Landlubbers often think the tar we talk about when we talk about Tar is asphalt tar, a not too good smelling petroleum industry byproduct used in road maintenance on land. Easy to mistake it with Pine Tar if you don’t use your nose since the two products are shiny black and gloopy. But those of us who use Pine Tar on ships all agree it’s the most lovely smelling substance, perhaps in all the world. Some even say its an aphrodisiac.
But I digress.
Traditional pine tar is made by heating the roots of pine trees in the absence of oxygen, which produces charcoal and pine tar. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_tar  and this nice essay on tar is worth a look too: http://www.maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.htm
 
Nobody on modern tall ships paints tar on their ratlines, but neither do modern sailing vessels use natural fiber line as ratline stuff. Unlike natural fiber line, modern Dacron line is impervious to rot and requires no coatings. But natural fiber line can last longer in a marine environment if its painted or impregnated with tar.
Tar can and often should be cut with turpentine or linseed oil or both, this allows it to flow better and penetrate the fibers of a rope. Full strength unadulterated tar has the consistency of molasses and appears black and is very gloppy. Its not really pigmented and if painted onto a white nonporous surface it will appear to be a streaky dark brown film, it will not behave like black paint which has pigment particles suspended in it and will thus “cover” the same white surface the tar would only smear.
Also the paint will dry in a day while the tar remains very sticky for quite a long while, it remains sticky for weeks. Repeated applications of tar will eventually produce a thick black opaque coating and this is why shrouds and standing rigging is black, they have many coats of tar applied to them eventually leading to a hard shell of tar which keeps the water out and the Ultraviolet Radiation can’t penetrate. Despite modern man-made-fiber lines imperviousness to rot, it still can be harmed by U.V. radiation and this is why it is sometimes tarred but I have read that black paint is often used on modern ships in place of tar since it performs the same U.V. blocking function, LOOKS like tar and is also universally available while Pine Tar can be hard to come by in our modern age. But back in the old days Pine Tar was ubiquitous. Today small quantities are available at tack shops for the horse riding trade.
If you paint Pine Tar on canvas (which I tried once) it turns the fabric an olive drab color and makes it heavy and waterproof and this is where we get Tarpaulin. Paint it on manila line and it darkens it slightly but not so much that you would tell the difference right away between a painted and unpainted piece of line. Put four coats on manila and you will certainly see the color shift to a darker hue but nowhere near black, the line now fairly waterproof and very sticky.
Getting finally to the point, the long way, I am sure pine tar was painted on ratlines. Also I am sure pine tar was already in the rope when it arrived at the ship, having been applied at the ropewalk in a thinned solution or rubbed on with a rag to produce a coating that would penetrate the fibers and add to the lines longevity. But I don’t think it would have been applied in thick enough or repeated coatings sufficient to make the ratlines black. I imagine the bo’sun would have thin tar applied to the ratlines whenever they started to appear dry or took on a chalky chaffed appearance but I do not know that for a fact, I just surmise it from my own experience.

I have a history of doing maintenance work on historic sailing ships and I have painted on a fair amount of pine tar in my day. Landlubbers often think the tar we talk about when we talk about Tar is asphalt tar, a not too good smelling petroleum industry byproduct used in road maintenance on land. Easy to mistake it with Pine Tar if you don’t use your nose since the two products are shiny black and gloopy. But those of us who use Pine Tar on ships all agree it’s the most lovely smelling substance, perhaps in all the world. Some even say its an aphrodisiac.
But I digress.
Traditional pine tar is made by heating the roots of pine trees in the absence of oxygen, which produces charcoal and pine tar. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pine_tar  and this nice essay on tar is worth a look too: http://www.maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.htm
 
Nobody on modern tall ships paints tar on their ratlines, but neither do modern sailing vessels use natural fiber line as ratline stuff. Unlike natural fiber line, modern Dacron line is impervious to rot and requires no coatings. But natural fiber line can last longer in a marine environment if its painted or impregnated with tar.
Tar can and often should be cut with turpentine or linseed oil or both, this allows it to flow better and penetrate the fibers of a rope. Full strength unadulterated tar has the consistency of molasses and appears black and is very gloppy. Its not really pigmented and if painted onto a white nonporous surface it will appear to be a streaky dark brown film, it will not behave like black paint which has pigment particles suspended in it and will thus “cover” the same white surface the tar would only smear.
Also the paint will dry in a day while the tar remains very sticky for quite a long while, it remains sticky for weeks. Repeated applications of tar will eventually produce a thick black opaque coating and this is why shrouds and standing rigging is black, they have many coats of tar applied to them eventually leading to a hard shell of tar which keeps the water out and the Ultraviolet Radiation can’t penetrate. Despite modern man-made-fiber lines imperviousness to rot, it still can be harmed by U.V. radiation and this is why it is sometimes tarred but I have read that black paint is often used on modern ships in place of tar since it performs the same U.V. blocking function, LOOKS like tar and is also universally available while Pine Tar can be hard to come by in our modern age. But back in the old days Pine Tar was ubiquitous. Today small quantities are available at tack shops for the horse riding trade.
If you paint Pine Tar on canvas (which I tried once) it turns the fabric an olive drab color and makes it heavy and waterproof and this is where we get Tarpaulin. Paint it on manila line and it darkens it slightly but not so much that you would tell the difference right away between a painted and unpainted piece of line. Put four coats on manila and you will certainly see the color shift to a darker hue but nowhere near black, the line now fairly waterproof and very sticky.
Getting finally to the point, the long way, I am sure pine tar was painted on ratlines. Also I am sure pine tar was already in the rope when it arrived at the ship, having been applied at the ropewalk in a thinned solution or rubbed on with a rag to produce a coating that would penetrate the fibers and add to the lines longevity. But I don’t think it would have been applied in thick enough or repeated coatings sufficient to make the ratlines black. I imagine the bo’sun would have thin tar applied to the ratlines whenever they started to appear dry or took on a chalky chaffed appearance but I do not know that for a fact, I just surmise it from my own experience.