DSiemens

As tight of a fit as the wheel was this is just that much more. She'll look great either way though I think. The only other option is removable shrouds but that is a problem all on it's own. Probably best to keep on your current coarse of action. Running out of space in the bottle neck reminds me of a line from How to Train your Dragon paraphrased its, "We're SiB builders it's an occupational hazard." Some times it doesn't matter how much you measure something just sticks out to far.

I thought I remembered the name and now that I see the Santa Maria I think I remember seeing this on MSW 1.0. Absolutely incredible work and a great read. It sounds like you've done your research. I wish I could have read this while building my Santa Maria.

Thanks Augie I will look into that.

John I actually run into that a lot as well. When fitting ships for bottles I really have to pay attention size. It's hard because most bottles are long and narrow and ships are at least as tall or taller then they are long. Especially the square rigged ships. I have to find shorter bottles or add more things into the bottle like scenes or more ships. A good general rule is as mentioned ships are as long as they are tall.

Well I'm off to the rigging yard. I guess in this case the rigging box. I put on the last platform. No cross trees this time. She's just to small. Maybe on my next model. I started on the topgallant shrouds. I'll see if I can't trim the edges of the rat lines a little more. I'm thinking some small nail clippers might do it.

I've been doing some research and interviewing some older ship in bottle builders and thought I'd open this discussion up on this forum. I'm gathering information on how some of the first ships in bottle were built in hopes of using the same materials tools and techniques and documenting the experience through a build log and my blog. It seems to me a lot of this information is fading in time or at the very least hard to find. I'd like to contribute another source to make it that much easier to find and keep it alive. Here's what I have so far. Wood used was mainly pine. While not used for actual ships it had a lot of other purposes and was widely available. Hulls were often thinner then what would be scale. Segmented hulls were not often if ever done in older ship in bottles. I have heard of old ships in bottles being made from bone as well. Masts and yards were made from either splintered wood or match sticks. Both would have likely been sanded down with dry sharkskin. Glue was made from different fish parts boiled down. There's youtube videos on this I'd have to dig around for them again though. Thin thread may have been hard to find but wax from candles could have been used to strengthen pieces enough to use. Don Hubbard had a thought that Baleen from whales could have been used for thread but there's no way to know for sure. Sails were not common among old ship in bottles because they were harder to do. Usually the ship was just shown with the bare yards. When it was done they used paper or some times wood shavings. Sea is tricky and I think it depends on the time period. Michael Bardet suggested that seas were made of wood in old ship in bottles. I've seen some of the old ships he restores, some as old as 1895, and have seen how that was done. His work is incredible I highly suggest seeing it. http://michel.bardet.pagesperso-orange.fr/indexa.htm Other methods for sea was some kind of putty with pigment in it. Don Hubbard theorizes that green copper oxide could have been used as well. As far as bottles I found an interesting idea from an article by Louis Norton. He says that most alcohol would have been transported in wood barrels on sailing ships so the bottles used were more likely medicine or spice bottles. I wouldn't doubt that a sailor would keep a clear liquor bottle he picked up in port though. Most of the old bottles I've seen have mostly been wine bottles. I've looked around a little bit in regards to tools. Sailors definitely had knives and this would have been a primary tool. Other things I found were surgical scissors and Sail Awls. Tweezers or forceps could have been carved out of wood. I'm not sure yet on drills. Don Hubbard uses a technique where you sand down a needle and use it as a drill. This may have been the tool used. Shark skin for sand paper. From what I can tell sailors were quiet resourceful. Just about anything and everything could have been used. I'm sure there's ideas I haven't thought of or possibly books I don't know about. If you have any ideas please post them.

I guess they didn't call them tall ships for nothing. Great work as always.

I really need to look into cross trees. At small scale I've always been able to get away with not having them. Including them thought would make the ship that much better. My plan was to glue the topgallant mast shrouds directly to the platforms. This is not to far off the plans I have. Theoretically I think the platform sits just above if not on the crosstrees. I just got a book on rigging I'll see if it has something more on them.

Thanks Augie. I wasn't sure I would do the bowsprit this was but it didn't seem right with out it. I really thought hard on this because of how much force the bowsprit may take going in the bottle and holding up the masts. I got it on and it seemed pretty firm so here's hopping. Dan that is very helpful. At this scale I may just add some color print it real small and glue it on the back. I did the same on my Mercury.

A few updates. I have the platforms on. Upon further looks at the plans I should include a platform on the mizzen mast as well. I also moved the main mast aft. It didn't look right being so close to the forward mast so I repositioned it. I then put a hatch cover over the hole for the original mast. Except for the stern I'm ready for yard arms. I still need to figure out what windows or designs to put on the back (transom?). I think that's the right word.

Priceless. Congrats on a job well done!

Now that is a tight fit. This is turning out to be a very impressive project.

Wow! Very impressive work. I don't think I've seen any one take the time to sew in that type of detail.

You know your making progress when the masts are coming up and a boat too. How many does she carry? Great work as always John.

That's really neat that your giving away most of these. I find building a ship for some one else adds an element of fun. Still hard to give them up though.

Yay the dimes are out. Time for some cool small stuff. I'm enjoying your log John keep it up. Merry Christmas to you and the admiral.

Dan- Thank you for that article. It has a lot of great information. It'll take me some time to read all the way through it but from the dozen or so pages I did read I'm very impressed. I find it interesting that the circumstances of the time created a perfect storm for the golden age of piracy. Wars were coming to an end and sailors that had always known a life of sea warfare didn't have much else to fall back on. So why not go into the pivateering or piracy. Meanwhile less war meant more trade and the shipping industry was booming with lots of ships to steal from or commandeer. I found it interesting as well how bold pirates became. They would use there names openly and talk directly to their victims. As the article explains they had no fear of the judiciary. It seems it all caught up to them eventually but with the way these men presented themselves and the rumors that flew because of word of mouth communication it's no wonder piracy is romanticized as it is now. I think your right though that I am on the right track with the french frigate plans. Mark Wilde-Ramsing has obviously done extensive research into the QAR. I trust his opinion. As well as yours. Thanks for the help.

Thank you all for your comments. Dan - that is a very good point and one I haven't thought of. It raises some questions actually. First I wonder if I have the right ship design at all. I based the build on plans from late 1600's to early 1700 french frigates. There is a big difference between a slave ship and a frigate. From just a small amount of research it seems slave ships had much broader bows and lower poop decks if they had poop decks at all. They didn't have nearly so many gun ports but obviously Black Beards crew would have cut these out after her capture. I did find accounts differ as to the Queen Anne's revenge. The http://www.qaronline.org/History/TheShipsJourney.aspx website begins with the ship as being a slave ship. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_Anne's_Revenge suggests that the QAR was built as an English frigate captured by the French and converted into a slave ship. If that's the case I still may be off since the plans I used are French and not English. Wikipedia doesn't seem to have source for this info though. I did find multiple sources stating La Concorde was originally a French capture though and refitted as a slave ship. It's impossible to say what the extent of the refit was though so it's any ones guess as to how she really looked. I guess a French frigate is as close as anything. Also if she was a navy frigate to begin with she may have had paint of some sort. It may have been removed during the refit though. Who knows. All said I'll stick with the plans I've selected. I will go with the assumption that Black Beard would have painted the Queen Anne's Revenge after a few of his early successes. Jesse - I'm a little biased but I say go for it. Small scale is a lot of fun.

Your painting and lines are fantastic. She's coming out to be a really beautiful ship. Great work.

Thank you all for your comments. I did some research on the paint and with some help from a couple guru's on this forum and in the club I found my answer to the color scheme. I also think it fits the Queen Anne's Revenge rather well. She took a much darker turn. Ships in this day in age generally came in three colors. Ocher, red and black. Usually a mixture of the three. The colors came from different things mixed in the paint. Black was created from ash. Red from oxidization or essentially rust. I'm not sure about ocher I'd have to ask again. A very common theme for the day was a black ship with an ocher stripe a long the gun ports and red on the inside of the bulwarks. This seemed to fit so I went with it. The masts are in place but I plan on cutting them down and stepping them. Still more to do.

One last update. At the request of the pirate I made this for, I wrote up a build log for his website. He gave me a link to share. It will be officially posted on the 15th or 16th so this is just a sneak preview. http://piratesurgeon.com/pages/other_pages/mercury_bottle1.html It tells the full story and has a few things I don't think I included in this build log. Also if your interested in the golden age of piracy his site has a lot of information.

I love the hinge. Great work!

Looks great Augie! Once again your making quick work.

Very nice. I can't wait to see more.

Looking great!