Dr PR

Several years ago there was an excellent and extensive discussion - expressing many opinions - about the "proper" color of the dead eyes and lanyards used to set the shrouds. The suggestion was made that someone create a separate topic for this information, but as far as I can tell that didn't happen. I have been researching this topic recently and decided a separate topic was needed to make it easier to find. CAUTION: This is a very debatable topic. In other words, different people have different opinions, and some are very forceful in defending their opinions! The best discussion I have found was in EdT's Young America thread. I edited out some non-relevant discussion, but I tried to include everyone's opinions: It all started with Dowmer, October 9 2018 (post 3133 in this thread): For the deadeye lanyard rigging you have in the channels, is that rigging supposed to be tarred as well like the shrouds? I thought I read that somewhere, that working ships tarred them. That would make the lanyards dark brown or black instead of light natural. Of course this could be a preference too I suppose. I see a lot of ship models like this. EdT, 9 October 2018: Dowmer, I personally do not believe that lanyards were tarred because this would make them very hard to adjust to tension the shrouds and backstays. I rather suspect that they were greased, which would also give them a dark color. I intended mine to be a darker walnut and I may treat them further, but I have been reserving black for tarred lines. Bob Cleek, 9 October 2018: As for the color of deadeye lanyards, it is indeed black, or dark brown, tending to black as additional pine tar is added as a matter of routine maintenance. All deadeye lanyards and other similar lashings were of tarred hemp (and still are, if you can find it!) There is rarely, if ever, any need to "adjust the tension" of standing rigging in ships such as this one and deadeye lanyards rarely, if ever, are "adjusted." The lanyards should be pre-stretched when new and, thus, should not stretch appreciably in use. Even if they did stretch when new, they'd only need to be taken up once and the problem would be solved for all time. The sort of rigging we are talking about here was designed to "give" so that the strain on the spars and hull would be minimized. (We're not talking about a "high strung" modern jib-headed Marconi racing rig here.) In fact, the friction generated by the lanyards against the deadeye holes makes them quite difficult to set up, let alone "adjust." The deadeye holes are greased before the tarred hemp lanyard is tightened, but even so, the tightening requires that a purchase clapped onto the shroud be taken to the end of the lanyard in order to get sufficient tension on it. (I've actually had to attach a second purchase on the length of lanyard running from deadeye hole to hole in order to "sweat" the lanyard through all five of the running eyes so that each segment was uniformly tight.) The deadeyes do spread the line stresses in much the same manner as a block purchase, but the lanyards do not run freely as they do in a sheaved block... not by a long shot! When a whole gang of deadeyes and lanyards are made up and fastened with the sheer pole and lashings, all tarred and, modernly, often painted, they are essentially a permanent thing not meant to be untied to be adjusted regularly. rwiederrich, 10 October 2018: Renowned Marine expert Hervey Garrett Smith in his Book, *The Arts of the Sailor...Knotting, Splicing and Ropework*. Mimics your sentiment concerning shroud lanyards. wefalck,10 October 2018: The story about taking the slack out of shrouds probably comes from the pre-wire rope days, when ships on long equatorial passages stayed for weeks on the same tack. This may have stretched the windward shrouds and slack had to be taken out of the leeward ones because, if a sudden change of tack for whatever reason would be needed, the mast would come over like a whip, risking to snap it. With wire rope this is not an issue. sailor1234567890, 10 October 2018: Any mate worth his salt wouldn't bother adjusting the lanyards anyway, that would put the deadeyes out of line. Yes, he can fine tune the rig that way but normally, if any slack developed, the lashing holding the shroud to the upper deadeye was re-made so the deadeyes were always at the same level. It would of course require setting up the lanyards again but the point was to have the deadeyes all level so fine tuning using the lanyards wasn't really done. As Mr. Cleek said above, they were normally not very slack. It was a periodic maintenance thing to adjust them, not a piece of running rigging that was adjusted with any frequency. stm, 11 October 2018 One general thought about rigging that came to mind when reading the previous is how the extreme weather conditions played a roll in maintaining the rigging during extended voyages. Ropes must have been exposed to extreme changes in temperatures, winds, rain, and sea spray that must have played havoc with the lines. Have not read to much about this unless it was as a result of a severe storm. Possibly our sailing forefathers had it under control through experience on how to meet this challenge without having to much of an impact on a ships progress. Rigging suffered as much as the hull and fixtures of any Sea going, deep water carrier. Hemp rope became stronger and less flexible with introduction to salt water. This is why it is reasonable to assume the lanyards, once set, were weather proofed(By tarring). Once the hemp line absorbed moisture...it was nearly impossible to adjust it through the wooden holes of the Deadeyes. Lanyards are part of the standing rigging...rigging that generally is not intended to be regularly adjusted...hence the term *standing* or fixed. In later models cable and turnbuckles replaced hemp...holding fast the masts in their stepped attitude....resistant of any bi-lateral movement. Stays are used in similar fasion...to prevent for and aft movement. Like a bunch of guy wires holding erect the towering masts. rwiederrich, 11 October 2018: If one is diligent and observant, early photographic and even paintings will give evidence of blackened lanyards...which are and have always been part of the *Standing* rigging...and that rigging was always preserved with leather and a varying viscus concoction, known as tar...not like the black sticky, gooey stuff we heat up and put on roofs/roads....but a material more like thick oil. EdT, 11 October 2018: Color of lanyards is a subject that I hesitate to engage in because it is one of those hot buttons that invite many strongly held opinions. I would suggest that someone – not me – create a topic on this subject. I will gladly participate there with my admittedly limited knowledge. I will, however, at the risk of inviting more comments on this build log, contribute here what I believe are some facts: 1. Deadeyes and lanyards were used not only on shrouds but also on backstays. 2. On a 3-4 month voyage around Cape Horn, upper masts would be struck down, probably more than once, requiring re-rigging of their stays and shrouds at sea. 3. Climate variations between say a New York summer at the start of a voyage, equatorial conditions a month later, and semi-arctic conditions at the Cape a month after that, followed by a repeat of those variations up the Pacific, as well as the case described by wefalck, would certainly alter the tension in the standing rigging essential to the support of masts. 4. All hemp strands were tarred as part of the rope-making process – hence the straw-color (see Luce, Seamanship 1868). No doubt the effects of sun, salt and weather would lighten this over time. 5. The treatment applied to standing rigging discussed in earlier posts, according to primary documentation widely used at the time (again Luce, 1868), can only be described as thick, black, tarry paint. – black due to the carbon black content, thick due to the addition of letharge (lead oxide), tarry due to the pine tar. 6. The relatively complex lanyard/deadeye apparatus is obviously designed to add mechanical advantage (6 to 1) to force applied to the lanyard. It was clearly intended for applying tension as the following well known diagram shows. 7. Methods and practices have evolved over time. Even early 20th century practices were different than those of the 1860's - and wire was different from hemp. So, if I accept the above as facts, I ask the following questions: 1. Why install a large number of contraptions like deadeye/lanyards if they would rarely if ever be used? Why not just seize shrouds/backstays to chains after initial tightening? 2. If these were needed to re-tension or re-rig backstays or even shrouds, why would one clog up this friction-prone device with a thick, tarry paint? 3. If greasing rigging with galley slush or other lubricant was common at the time, why would this not be used on deadeye lanyards, at least when needed? 4. What does all this mean to the color of model lanyards? I am sure others will approach this issue differently, but this has been my rationale and my reasons for dark, but not black, lanyards. wefalck, 11 October 2018: Just a couple of additions to Ed's well-reasoned response: - here and on other fora there has been a repeated discussion of what actually 'tar' is. To summarise: in the pre-industrial ages this was a destillation product from resinous tree-bark, namely that of pine-trees; the Eastern Baltic area was a major source, due to the prevalence of such trees there and considerable amounts where shipped through Stockholm, hence the stuff became know as Stockholm Tar; this tar varies in colour, but is essentially dark brown. The two main byproducts from coal destillation to obtain town-gas were coke and various tars; these are chemically different from the wood-tar and essentially black or very dark brown in colour; their smell is also different; due to the large quantities of town-gas produced from the 1840s on, also large quantities of tar became available and began to replace Stockholm Tar, being a lot cheaper. Both products have different properties and, hence, different applications. Stockholm Tar stays sticky, unless whethered at sea, while some of the coal-tar solidify and become quite dry, one volatiles have gassed off. - hemp is a natural fibre and changes its property with humidity content mainly, even if the strands of the rope had been tarred originally; so adjusting the rigging is mostly likely a need over a period of months or years; covering the lanyards in thick Stockholm Tar would make this more difficult, covering in thick coal-tar almost impossible. - the sailing properties of ship depend on many factors, including the trim, the draught, and the rake of the masts; it is known that masters optimised the rigging for given conditions in order to improve the sailing performance; so lanyards stuck in the dead-eyes would not help. - we should not be mislead by the appearance of static museum ships; there compromises have to made for the lack of the continuous and intensive maintenance a working vessel would see; so on such ships you are likely to see a lot of paint and tar slapped onto parts that are prone to deterioration. - also on modern ships rigged with steel wire supporting steel masts you are likely to see many more parts being virtually immobilised with thick coats of paint or tar, because there is no need for adjustment. druxey, 11 October 2018: This is an interesting side discussion. Some years ago I had a protracted discussion with a knowledgeable person over shroud laniards. I had built a model that he otherwise found impeccable, but he took me to task over my light colored shroud laniards. I countered that these were running lines, hence not 'standing' color. He insisted that the laniards were dark. I have since been converted to brown line for these lines! rwiederrich, 11 October 2018 It is unarguable that lanyards are for tightening the shrouds/back stays. Their appropriate tension is the goal to maintain erect, stable masts....and to counter the actions brought upon these members. One can say they are part of an immovable (set) system....others say they are available for adjustment due to warpage and or stretchage. I believe both notions are true. I also believe they had to be preserved in some fasion....to what extent can only been known by time travelers. Personally...I choose dark/black lanyards....for my esthetic eye as well as what I derive from thousands of images and paintings of the subject. Best part of all is that it is a subjective topic as is most of the finer details of these magnificent vessels. I stand behind Ed's conclusion for Ed and it works out wonderfully in the end. Dowmer, 11 October 2018: Oh my goodness Ed, look what I started 😁 I must admit, its facinating stuff and the input from everyone is excellent at the risk of straying from Ed's masterful build. By the way, for what its worth...less than .02 pence if that...........I'd go for the dark brown color for all the reasons stated, but I think Ed was edging that direction anyway. EdT, 11 October 2018: Did you start this, Dowmer? Oh, my. I'm glad to see we are on the same page with dark brown, Druxey - maybe or maybe not exactly the same shade, but......not black. rwiederrich, 11 October 2018 That's what makes it all so magical. One persons brown is another persons black. So who is more accurate....I wonder? Bob Cleek, 11 October 2018: Rope shrouds would stretch to some extent when new, but this was no surprise to them. As you may know, they used "shroud-laid" cordage for standing rigging before metal cable came into use. (And metal cable stretches, too.) Shroud-laid cordage is laid up with four strands around a heart, or central, strand. Shroud-laid rope doesn't have the tensile strength of three-strand hawser-laid cordage, but it is designed to be much less liable to stretch, hence its use as standing rigging. When a gang of rigging was made up, the shroud-laid cordage was often wet down and "pre-stretched" beforehand. By the time shroud-laid rope is properly wormed, parceled, and tightly served, and all of that impregnated with white lead paste and pine tar, it's a heck of a lot closer to an iron bar than a rubber band! I can't imagine a "sudden change of tack" causing a mast to "come over like a whip" in a vessel of the size of Great Republic. Coming about in any square-rigger, and especially a larger one, is a slow, gradual, and rather complex evolution. There's nothing "sudden" about it. Their masts don't "whip." Lee shrouds and stays will always be slack when the vessel is under sail. That is meant to be. Taking up the slack in lee shrouds while under sail results in seriously over-tensioned shrouds when those lee shrouds become windward shrouds on the opposite tack. A lower mast section might survive such abuse, but such tightening of a smaller upper mast section could even snap it on the opposite tack. I've never heard of a sailing ship heaving to in mid-ocean to take up slack in its standing rigging. The purpose of the standing rigging isn't simply to "keep the masts from falling down." It's more important function is to distribute the energy loads evenly throughout the vessel's structure. Every part of a vessel moves to a certain extent, and particularly wooden vessels. They are engineered to move so as to minimize shock-loading. Shroud tension is widely misunderstood modernly. We see many modern Marconi (jib-headed) rigged sailboats exhibiting structural damage from shrouds and stays being cranked down with turnbuckles until they sing like violin strings. The mechanics are the same as those of a bow and arrow. Tight shrouds push the heel of the mast downwards like the pointed end of an arrow while pulling up on the chainplates and we frequently see cracked frames and opened garboard seams in wooden boats and even catastrophic chainplate failures and hull fractures in fiberglass boats as a consequence. Shrouds and stays really only need to be tight enough to not be slack when the vessel is at rest. When it is under sail, the windward shrouds and stays tighten up and lee shrouds go slack. Their masts may bend a bit to leeward on each tack until the windward shrouds take up, but that is as it's intended to be. The "long equatorial passages" by square-rigged sailing ships were almost exclusively made in the Trade Winds because that put the wind at their sterns. The sailing was all reaching and they would do as much as possible to avoid windward work which was certainly not a square-rigger's best point of sail. Reaching put most of the stress on the backstays which in many instances designed as running rigging, particularly those run to the lighter masts aloft. That arrangement accommodated stretch to the extent necessary. Reaching doesn't put a lot of stress on the shrouds, relatively speaking. Bob Cleek, 11 October 2018: Hereafter, in the interests of saving bandwidth, I'll put EdT's comments in bold italics and intersperse my comments in the regular font. (I changed to just italics - Dr Pr) Color of lanyards is a subject that I hesitate to engage in because it is one of those hot buttons that invite many strongly held opinions. I would suggest that someone – not me – create a topic on this subject. I will gladly participate there with my admittedly limited knowledge. I will, however, at the risk of inviting more comments on this build log, contribute here what I believe are some facts: The color of deadeye lanyards shouldn't be a hot button topic at all. It's really just a matter of historical fact. Some of the modern confusion probably results from 1) a lack of experience and 2) the fact that the color changes over time in use. Also, in small craft, where deadeyes were employed, they may have been designed to be frequently reeved and unreeved, such as the case with a ship's longboats. In that case, line that was not as heavily tarred would have been used. Tarred hemp (not to be confused with "manila" or sisal cordage) is naturally light brown, the darkness of the brown being dependent upon how heavily it is tarred. The more tar, which would be thicker and darker, is applied, and that tar picks up dirt, they quickly darken, eventually to black, or darn close to it, the dirt and tar builds up. The yarns are soaked in thinned tar when the rope is made and that doesn't impart a lot of color, but when tar, and then, often, black paint are applied, the lanyard becomes black. As mentioned in another post in this thread, the tar we are talking about is pine tar or "Stockholm tar," not roofing tar. Additionally, tarred line attracts dirt like a magnet, or so it seems. Much of its darkening is attributable to dirt. The tar will wear, or perhaps more accurately, break down from UV exposure and must be reapplied regularly. However "tan" a tarred lanyard might be, it will be very dark brown, if not black, in a very short while in use. 1. Deadeyes and lanyards were used not only on shrouds but also on backstays. Yes, that is true in some cases. In others, the backstays were rigged to be tightened with tackles and called "running backstays." These were generally lighter than the "standing backstays" which weren't designed to be tightened, or cast off on the leeward side. 2. On a 3-4 month voyage around Cape Horn, upper masts would be struck down, probably more than once, requiring re-rigging of their stays and shrouds at sea. Yes, something of a routine task. Their rigging was designed to accomplish this as easily as possible. A good crew could accomplish it easily. A crack naval crew could accomplish it with amazing speed and efficiency, or so it is written. Their deadeyes and lanyards were lighter than the lower deadeyes and lanyards and easier to handle. They needed only to be set up tightly enough not to hang slack when no load was applied to them. 3. Climate variations between say a New York summer at the start of a voyage, equatorial conditions a month later, and semi-arctic conditions at the Cape a month after that, followed by a repeat of those variations up the Pacific, as well as the case described by wefalck, would certainly alter the tension in the standing rigging essential to the support of masts. The variable factor is not so much temperature, which did have some affect the consistency of the tar to some extent, but rather moisture. This is why standing rigging was wormed, slurried in white lead paste, parceled in tarred canvas, and tightly served with tarred serving line, tarred again, and regularly slurried after being set up using what amounted to black paint in order to keep it dry under all weather conditions. This minimized changes in the properties of the cordage and prevented decay (rot) of the material in the elements. 4. All hemp strands were tarred as part of the rope-making process – hence the straw-color (see Luce, Seamanship 1868). No doubt the effects of sun, salt and weather would lighten this over time. That's true. New cordage is "straw color," because the strands are soaked in thinned or "diluted" tar, which soaks into the strands easily. That "tar" would be the consistency of water. Un-thinned pine tar is the consistency of motor oil, or even a bit thicker. Weathering does "bleach" tarred line, but it actually tends to turn it grey more than anything else, which is as much dirt as anything. To counteract weathering, tar would be reapplied to lanyards as part of routine maintenance (and often painted black as well.) That and the collection of dirt stuck to the tarred surface, turned them progressively darker and ultimately black or very near so. There is a difference between applying thinned tar to the strands when making up rope and "tarring" lanyards with thicker tar or "slurrying" them with paint to protect them from the elements. 5. The treatment applied to standing rigging discussed in earlier posts, according to primary documentation widely used at the time (again Luce, 1868), can only be described as thick, black, tarry paint. – black due to the carbon black content, thick due to the addition of letharge (lead oxide), tarry due to the pine tar. Yes, but the "tarry" or "slurry," used on standing rigging is something different from the pine tar used to condition "tarred" cordage. It is indeed "black paint," although I don't believe they added any driers to it, so it remained somewhat flexible and didn't chip and flake much. As with all oil-based paint of the time, its primary ingredient was pine tar, thinned "to taste" with turpentine, litharge, which is another name for lead oxide, red or white, but usually white, which was the primary solid in all paints of the time (later replaced with zinc oxide or "whiting" which was simply talcum or chalk powder,) and "lamp black," (carbon) for color. This paint was cheap and effective. It was applied to the standing rigging to protect it from the elements. (It was also used on ironwork to inhibit rusting. Most all of the iron fittings would have been wrought iron and so already rather resistant to rusting compared to modern steel.) 6. The relatively complex lanyard/deadeye apparatus is obviously designed to add mechanical advantage (6 to 1) to force applied to the lanyard. It was clearly intended for applying tension as the following well known diagram shows. Yes and no. Lanyards are not "running rigging" per se and while there is a "mechanical advantage" present in the physics of it, it certainly wasn't to provide ease in setting them up! (They look like a block and tackle, but they don't work that way when setting them up because the friction quickly overcomes any mechanical advantage that theoretically existed.) The real purpose of deadeyes is to make it possible to attach a shroud or stay to a fixed point when it couldn't be tied in a knot. There really isn't any other way to set up a thick and somewhat rigid length of standing rigging, except to turn it round the deadeye and secure it with lashings, applying the tension "a bit at a time," distributed through the several turns of the lanyard. The evolution of this piece of rigging is interesting. Originally, a simple lashing served the purpose, but that arrangement created friction which made it more difficult to tighten and chaffed the line as the shrouds alternately went slack or tightened up depending upon whether they were on the windward or leeward side. A "bigger hole" was tried, with large bullseyes, and later with heart-shaped bullseyes with three indentations in the bottom inside of the hole, and, ultimately, the deadeye, which was originally heart- or lozenge-shaped to accommodate more flexible standing rigging, ultimately evolved into the round deadeye which more easily accommodated the thicker and stiffer wormed, parceled, and served shroud-laid standing rigging. The deadeyes and lanyard are essentially an tensionable coupling mechanism that permits the attachment of the standing rigging. 7. Methods and practices have evolved over time. Even early 20th century practices were different than those of the 1860's - and wire was different from hemp. Of course, but as long as deadeyes were used, they were "mature technology" that wasn't improved upon until the advent of wire cable and turnbuckles. Deadeyes always had tarred hemp lanyards, at least until the advent of synthetic line, which those who used it on yachts often painted black to retain the traditional appearance. Curiously enough, in recent years far stronger synthetic line with negligble stretch has become available and is replacing metal cable standing rigging and turnbuckles, as well as other heavier fittings (e.g. metal sail luff piston hanks) on state-of-the-art racing sailboats. (Dyeema is one well-known brand.) This new line is used with modern "deadeyes" and bullseyes because it is much lighter than the older metal rigging and so increases performance. So, if I accept the above as facts, I ask the following questions: 1. Why install a large number of contraptions like deadeye/lanyards if they would rarely if ever be used? Why not just seize shrouds/backstays to chains after initial tightening? As mentioned above, the primary purpose of the deadeyes and lanyards was to provide a way to connect thick and stiff shrouds and stays which could not be tied in a knot to a fixed point while maintaining the tensile strength of the shroud or stay. Three turns of thin line equals one thick one. Secondarily, the arrangement was easily set up and, if necessary, adjusted, and had a certain shock-absorbing ability in distributing the load. 2. If these were needed to re-tension or re-rig backstays or even shrouds, why would one clog up this friction-prone device with a thick, tarry paint? The tar and/or paint served the purpose of protecting the exposed lanyards from the elements. If re-rigging or re-tensioning were necessary, the cheap tarred hemp lanyards are simply cut away and the deadeye holes cleaned out and greased and new greased tarred hemp lanyards are rove through the deadeyes anew. 3. If greasing rigging with galley slush or other lubricant was common at the time, why would this not be used on deadeye lanyards, at least when needed? The lanyards and deadeye holes are indeed greased, traditionally with tallow, the all-purpose marine lubricant of the time. (And still damn good today, if you can find it. This is not "galley slush," but a refined animal fat lubricant.) It does not, however, have the weathering abilities of pine tar and remains greasy until it weathers away in the elements. It makes things slippery, but it doesn't last as long as tar or paint and protect things from weathering. Pine tar forms a flexible coating, somewhat akin to varnish. Adding solids (white lead, or chalk) to create a paint keeps the tar where you put it, rather than having it get sticky and thin in hot weather. Dripping tar turned the decks of sailing ships black in short order and, of course, was tracked all over everything and everyone. Naval vessels which, in most navies of the time were kept "Bristol fashion," "holy stoned" their decks regularly. This was essentially sanding the deck back to bare wood with abrasive stone blocks to clean the tar off of them. Painting the standing rigging instead of just adding more raw tar lessened the need to "stone" the decks. 4. What does all this mean to the color of model lanyards? Well, considering the "scale viewing distance" of a model, and the assumed desire to depict the model as realistically as possible, it means black lanyards. If one were to be building a masted longboat with deadeyes and lanyards which were rove and un-rove each use, it means light brown lanyards, if one is so inclined. "Straw-colorerd" would be too light unless one wanted to show a pristine brand new longboat. Moreover, as a matter of opinion and not historical fact, the contrast of light colored lanyards on a larger vessel have the effect of drawing the viewer's eye to them in a way that distracts from the overall impression of the model. Consider what a real full sized version of the model would look like if you looked at it at full-scale distance and saw "straw colored" lanyards. I am sure others will approach this issue differently, but this has been my rationale and my reasons for dark, but not black, lanyards. Of course they will and if they enjoy doing so, that's what it's all about, isn't it? So long as everybody's having a good time. However, if one wants to run with the big dogs, they'd better be black. Rob, I believe Hervey Garret Smith's comments on deadeyes apply to 20th century yachts, and his description of tar is different than the tar coating described in Luce for application to the "standing" parts of standing rigging. What he describes as a "thin liquid pine oil" would not be black. Oh, absolutely Hervey Garret Smith was writing for a yachting audience, but he was speaking from his own working experience with deep-water square sail. That said, there were, and still are, some rather large traditional yachts rigged with deadeyes and lanyards and a deadeye and lanyard is a dead eye and lanyard. There's no difference between a yacht and a sailing ship in the way they work or are set up and maintained.. As I explained above, Luce's "slurry" paint is a different coating than pure pine tar. Pine tar thinned with turpentine to a "thin liquid" would not be black, but leave a lanyard made of yarn soaked in "thin liquid pine tar" out in the elements, coat it regularly with thick pine tar "out of the can" the consistency of motor oil and let it get good and dirty, and then "slurry" it with black paint, and those lanyards will be black in no time. It's sort of like if one were building a diorama of an old fashioned gas station on a model train layout: What color is the motor oil that has leaked on the ground? It was "straw colored" when it came out of the can, but it's black when it drips out of the engine. EdT, 12 October 2018: Well, my instincts about raising this opinion-charged topic appear to have been correct, so if there is still energy to debate this, please someone start a new topic. I suggest we move on. **** Dr Pr 23 November 2021 (this thread): I have been wondering about dark vs light lanyards for shrouds, stays and other standing rigging in schooners (my current build). Photos of modern schooners show about equal numbers of ships with light and dark shroud lanyards. These are working ships, and not museum ships or models, so there is no single "correct" way. My personal opinion is that the lanyards were lightly tarred and light colored when the shrouds were initially set up. They were greased (with tallow originally), as were the dead eye holes, to facilitate pulling the line through and tightening it, as shown in the drawing above. Then regular maintenance would require occasional coats of tar and/or the slurry described above, and as this built up the lines would darken. Oxidation of the oils and dirt accumulation would darken it more and bleaching by sunlight would add some gray.

Very nice build! I have been deliberating the black vs natural color for the shroud lanyards. After reading through every book I have, modern and contemporary, I have found no statements about how these lanyards, and the lanyards on stays and other lines that occasionally need adjusting, are prepared. However, a couple of books say the lanyards were well greased before threading through the deadeyes, and they needed to be flexible in order to take a tight strain on the shrouds. This seems to argue against heavily tarred lines that are not especially flexible. Photos of modern schooners seem to show that untarred or natural hemp lanyards are more common.

Since this is a discussion of white balance, I thought I would post some examples. I recently bought a cheap LED ring light. It does produce "white" light, plus all sorts of silly color effects for kids taking selfies. I just wanted to see how it would do. The camera (Nikon D5200) has several white balance settings for incandescent, fluorescent, direct sunlight, flash, cloudy, shade, auto and preset manual. I turned the ring light on and positioned a white card in front of it. I selected the Preset Manual option and set the white balance. The lens was a Nikon AF-S VR Micro-Nikkor 105mm f/2.8G IF-ED macro lens (unfortunately it isn't a "Turbo" lens). It is an excellent macro lens! Actually, maybe a bit too good. Every time I look at model photos made with it I see a lot of imperfections in my work! The photo on the left was shot with the "AUTO" white balance setting. The camera had to guess the colors and there were no white objects in the photo. The colors are awful! The shot on the right was with the preset white balance, and these colors are very close to the light brown bulwark interiors, black cap rail and wood tones of the deck - about what I see (with both eyes open) in diffused sunlight. Here are two more photos shot the same way. The AUTO white balance setting seems to have excess magenta, possibly because the cheap LED light really doesn't produce a true white light. Again, the shot on the right with the Preset white balance adjusted to the LED light produces pretty accurate colors. I did no editing on all but the last photo except cropping to the same view area. The one above right is a photo stacked image of six shots to get a good depth of field. But I did nothing to change the colors from what the camera captured. I hope this shows that you should use a custom white balance for any "non-standard" light source (and cheap LEDs are not a "standard") if you want to get good color rendition.

I have never used RAW. I know it is supposed to be great, and apparently the original photoelement RGB values are always underlying the edited images so we can step back through editing stages to rework the picture - like "undoing" edits in Photoshop. But I do not use RAW. I take hundreds of 24 megapixel shots every time I go out. Many are the same picture with different focus points and fstop/depths of field. The camera has a 32 gigabyte high speed (30 MBytes/sec.) flash card, and I carry an extra one in my camera bag (64 Gbytes total). I have a separate 3 terabyte drive in my computer just for the JPEGs and Photoshop files, and a 14 terabyte external drive to hold everything and make backups. 1. A typical 6000x4000 pixel RAW image is about 27 Mbytes and the lowest compression 6000x4000 JPEGS are about 9 Mbytes. RAW files are about 3x the JPEG file size. The 32 Gbyte memory card will hold about 1200 RAW images, 3600 JPEGS, or a little less that 900 RAW+JPEG shots. I can easily shoot more than that in a day, and on long trips I fill both cards with JPEGs plus storing more photos on my laptop. With my "shoot from the hip" method only about 1 in 10 shots is a keeper. However, only the really blurred shots are deleted. Even though most don't end up edited, they are still a record of what I see on my photo shoots, and the sequence and locations in which the photos were made. So just editing 1 in 10 helps reduce the needed storage space on my computer. But the edited JPEG Photoshop PSD files are anywhere from 30-100 Mbytes each! So figure 350 shots per week at 8 Mbytes each, plus 35 good ones at 65 Mbytes each plus a 1 Mbyte JPEG thumbnail = 5110 Mbytes. Add another 350 RAW images at 27 Mbytes each (9540 Mbytes) and I will need 14.6 Gigabytes of storage per week, or about 760 Gigabytes per year. Without the RAW images that is just 260 Gigabytes per year. And even after I have gone back to thin out the unnecessary pictures I am still pushing 3 Terrabytes to store the photos plus equal size backup drives. With the RAW images added that would be over 7 Terrabytes internal and more than 7 Terrabytes external storage. Shooting with RAW images will more than double the memory requirements on my computer. 2. I found that shooting the RAW/JPEG combination cannot be sustained very long at high speed continuous shooting. When I started shooting RAW I lost a lot of action shots because only 3-5 1/3000 second frames could be written to memory before things slowed down. With just JPEG I can shoot for many seconds before things bog down, and rarely do birds/animals/grandkids hang around for longer sequences. 3. I NEVER change the original photo, so I can always go back to the start and re-edit it. Edited photos are saved under a different name. The original files are saved on multiple external drives and DVDs. Really important files are saved in JPEG and/or PNG, PSD and TIFF formats. 4. I have been taking pictures for over 60 years, and I get acceptable photos without using RAW. For me it would add additional unnecessary steps to achieve my goals. 5. Not all photoediting and photo display programs will open RAW files. Everything works with JPEGs. So I don't use RAW.

I agree with everyone's comments. And we are mainly talking about photographing ship models. I do a lot of outdoor photography while hiking - no army of helpers with reflectors and diffusers, and very little time to set up photos. I have to accept the lighting conditions at the time and make the best of it. This brings up two comments. 1. Photoshop's "Shadows and Highlights" can do amazing things. I accidentally rotated the knob on my camera from M (manual) to A (aperture priority) and the aperture (f/16) was too small for the lighting in shadows (1/200 second exposure). It was set for taking photos in much brighter light. I took what I thought would be good photos, and they were actually very dark (left, unedited). But "Shadows and Highlights" pulled a usable picture out of the murk (right). This is Tolmeia menziesii, piggy-back plant or youth-on-age. It is interesting because it has flowers and reproduces sexually to make seeds. But it also grows tiny new plants from the lower leaves, and these asexual clones drop off and take root. What I find amazing is the diaphragm was closed down to f/16 and the background is still nicely blurred! That was sheer luck! Steve will appreciate this. I discovered "Shadows and Highlights" years ago while looking at photos I took of some friends' wedding outdoors in bright sunlight. The bride was an absolutely gorgeous redhead, and wore a scarlet dress. The groom wore a white shirt with narrow stripes. The bright reflected sunlight from her dress was red. She had her back to the sun, so her face and front were dark. His shirt was totally washed out and her red dress reflected off it making it pink. The background was in shade and almost black. It was a horrible picture! But using many of the tools in Photoshop I managed to tone down his washed out shirt so you can see the stripes and killing the red reflections, while lightening the shadows on her, and pulling out some detail in the green foliage background. It came out a good photo. 2. Most people apparently do not realize that "bright sunlight" is accompanied by ambient blue skylight. The sky is a huge blue omnidirectional light, and it influences the colors in photos. I have known this since I was a kid when I was trying to paint sailboats. The canvas didn't look right until I realized that the shaded side wasn't gray but was actually sky blue. So if you want you photos to look like outdoor shots you need blue light in the shadows. On the other hand, that blue light can really mess up the colors in outdoor shots. And bright sunlight is just too bright to get subtle details in things like egrets or flowers unless you want unnaturally dark backgrounds. Here is an example: This is Douglas' catchfly Silene douglasii. I have dozens of photos, all taken outdoors, but in almost all cases the subtle details at the center of the flower are too dark and the petals too bright. Even Photoshop can't produce a really good photo. The parts of the white petals in shadow are sky blue, and that is wrong. And the washed out brightness of the petals eliminates the distinction between the petals and the auricles (the finger-like things projecting from the base of the petals). But this photo was taken on a cloudy bright day - all diffuse light from the white clouds. No blue shadows. The low contrast allowed me to capture all of the morphological details of the flower, and that is what I was trying to accomplish. It was ideal lighting! So the moral of this story is that there is no one "perfect" lighting setup. And you should consider yourself very lucky if you can actually control the light to your satisfaction!

Wefalck, I had trouble seeing the "5" in the blue circle at bottom center on my laptop. But on my primary monitor, which is used by some pro photographers, the "5" stands out clearly - with both eyes. Steve, I agree with you that lighting is very important, and in most cases I like diffused light that does not produce harsh shadows. But you can have too much light! If part of your subject is white and part is dark, like sails and hulls, you will have difficulty getting a good exposure for the entire thing. This is especially true for wildflower photography which I do a lot of. Sunny days with clear skies have part of the subject illuminated with harsh white light that washes out any subtle details, and shadows are illuminated by that big blue light called the sky. Colors come out strange. Cloudy bright days illuminate everything with a soft white light, allowing details to come out in the brightest parts without harsh shadows. Often when inside I will shine a light on the white ceiling to reflect back to the ship model. I place the camera on a tripod and use very small apertures (f/22-f/40) to get good depth of field. Then I may have to use a 30 second exposure to take the picture.

I realize his is tangent to the subject of the thread, bit I seem to have aroused interest in some readers about color vision. I have read that a substantial part of the male population has this difference of color vision in the eyes. But I have met very few who have even heard of it, and only one other fellow who has noticed it. I started out in art in Grade School, and had nine years of training outside the school system. For me the color differences were very apparent when trying to decide which paints to use, and being able to view an object with warm and cool colors was very helpful. And I want to emphasize that I have passed all tests for color blindness, and I can see the full spectrum (at least as well as anyone can) with both eyes. There are just slight differences in hues. It is called color vision deficiency. 8% of white males have it, but only 1.4% of African American males and 0.5% of females have it. https://www.aoa.org/healthy-eyes/eye-and-vision-conditions/color-vision-deficiency?sso=y Look at the circular "pseudoisochromatic plates" at the top of the page (attached below). Do you see numbers in each of them? Some have two differently colored numbers. Of course, as mentioned earlier in this thread, whether or not you can see all the numbers may depend upon whether your can see all colors or if your display can reproduce them all! I have four displays on my computers and a cell phone. The laptop display is pretty poor - I can barely make out the number in the blue background circle at bottom center with either eye or both. The cell phone is a bit better (Samsung OLED). The best monitor, that I use for photo editing, gives me good contrast for all the numbers. The other displays are in between, but a cheap one that I have thought had relatively poor colors is still better than the laptop. I also printed the image and my Brother color LED printer produced intermediate results between the laptop and my best display.

Wefalck, You are correct about the brain "fixing" the color differences between the two eyes. I actually see three colors - left eye only (cool or bluish shades), right eye only (warm or reddish shades), and the color blend my brain creates when both eyes are open. The differences are very subtle and I don't normally notice unless I deliberately try. Like looking at outdoor clear sky shaded scenes with my right eye to see what a skylight filter would do on my film cameras. **** I do understand the need for precision or accuracy in some situations. I have done a lot of work with spectroscopy, and there we try to determine the exact wavelengths of absorption or emission spectra. This is critical in chemistry, physics and astronomy, just to name a few fields. And if you want to get into it really deep, just look at color printing or paint mixing! The goal in digital photography would be to relate a given wavelength of light (color) to a specific digital value. Colors are implemented in RGB (red green blue) on displays or CMY (cyan magenta yellow) for printing. The idea is to represent each shade or hue as a different numerical value. In most digital images there are 255 intensities of red, green and blue, each ranging from 0 to 255, expressed as RRR,GGG,BBB. 255x255x255 = 14,630,625 different colors. But this could be any number, such as 1024x1024x1024=1,073,741,824 possible colors. Few, if any, cameras, displays, printers or scanners can come close to actually reproducing this many colors. In the real world there are an infinite number of possible wavelengths, So it is not possible to represent them all with binary numbers (unless you have an infinitely large memory). Therefore absolute color precision is not possible with digital imaging. The next problem is assigning digital values to wavelengths. Exactly what wavelength does 255,0,0 represent? This is arbitrary, as are most things in the real world. But we can define a value, just as we can define the wavelength of the color we perceive as "red." For archival photography the goal is to capture an image that can be related to some standard color scheme, so sometime in the future people can reproduce the colors as accurately as possible. But for most photography none of this matters. We just want pictures that are pleasing or satisfy our needs. But I do agree that if you are not planning to post process the images you should correct for white balance.

CAUTION: I am about to "step on some folks toes" with the following comments. I have been photographing things for more than a half century. Early on I worried a lot about getting the "correct" colors. But eventually I realized that there are no correct colors. Allow me to explain. When I was about 5 years old I discovered that my two eyes do not see the same colors. The right eye sees things a bit redder than the left eye. This was very useful in film days, because I had a built in "skylight filter" (old time film photographers will know what that means). By the time I was 8 years old I understood the basics of optics - our eyes see light reflected from distant objects - and realized that the light reaching both eyes must be composed of the same wavelengths. So one eye had to be "wrong." I soon realized that maybe both eyes were "wrong." I have no way to know if what I see is the same as what anyone else sees! But we all agree to the names we give to colors, whatever we see. By the time I entered middle school I was very skeptical of what everyone else seemed to believe was reality. This skepticism has served me well as a scientist, photographer and artist. I understood that the colors of objects were dependent upon the color of the lighting. So there is no "correct" color for anything. It is totally subjective. When I entered U.S. Naval Officer's Candidate School I was given extensive eye exams, and I am not color blind. I can see all colors with both eyes, but I see two different versions of each. And I had extraordinary eyesight, better that 20:15, so they wanted me to be a pilot. As a scientist I used many types of chromatography and spectral analysis, and I studied the chemistry of color - why and how different chemical bonds absorb and reflect different wavelengths. Absorption and emission is a property of the the excitation states of electrons in atoms and the nature of chemical bonds, but even there the wavelengths are dependent upon environmental conditions. There are no absolute colors! Color is purely a fiction of our minds. When I took up wildflower photography as a hobby at first I worried a lot about getting the "right" color. But I soon realized that there is no right color. Flowers of the same species have a variety of colors depending upon the plant's physiology, soil mineral composition, rainfall, plant age, lighting conditions and who knows what else. So I no longer try to get "perfect" colors. I just try to get pleasing images, and detailed images to illustrate the morphology of plants or the details of my models. Yes, it is possible to try to establish the "right" lighting colors and intensity ("right" being whatever you define it to be), and to try to get reproducible reproduction of the color spectrum in each and every case. If you want to go on "chasing your tails" and seeking perfection, go ahead. But you will never succeed. Whatever type of display you use to display images, or process to create prints, no two will be the exact same, and even the same devices will produce different colors depending upon temperature, humidity, lighting and who knows what other variables. And they will all likely change with time. But in the end the colors that viewers see will be entirely dependent upon their genomes and the viewing conditions.

Leo, Thanks for posting the link. Another useful illustrated book I came across years ago is "The Lore of Ships" by AB Nordbok, Crescent Books, 1975. It is a hodgepodge of information about ships with about 1500 illustrations. Occasionally I find something useful for a project in it.

Be VERY careful selecting papers/decals to print in a laser printer! These machines fuse the pigments to the paper by melting the pigment at high temperature. A lot of inkjet materials will not survive a laser printer's fuser. I speak from experience! I shopped around for a glossy paper designed for a laser printer. Someone at a print shop recommended a particular paper that "they used all the time." One pass through my laser printer sent the $800 machine to the dump (Samsung printer that did not have a replaceable fuser). Lesson learned the hard way! 1. As far as I can tell there is no way to print a glossy image with a laser printer. 2. Never buy a laser printer that does not have a replaceable fuser! I currently have a Brother LED printer that has a replaceable fuser. It runs so hot it melts the glue on envelopes, sealing them shut. I can still split them open, but I haven't found any envelopes that do not have this problem. I have printed decals with earlier printers, but I am worried that the Brother printer will melt them and cause a several hundred dollar repair. I think you can be certain that if you run a painted/stained paper through a laser printer it will damage the fuser and possibly the paper feed mechanism. The bright side is that you will get to buy a newer and better printer.

Petersson's book is pretty good. However, he tries to show every possibility for topsail schooner rigging. In actuality smaller schooners had an abbreviated set of rigging. For example, bowlines and reef tackles seem to have been "optional" on smaller vessels. The anchor information came mostly from Darcy Lever's "Young Sea Officer's Sheet Anchor" (1808) and George Biddlecombe's "The Art of Rigging" (1925) which repeats much of Steele's "The Elements and Practice of Rigging and Seamanship" (1794). Steele is available on line. Because these were written in the late 1700s and early 1800s, and were "how to" guides for rigging sailing ships, the information comes straight from the horse's mouth. Unfortunately, these books talk about large square rigged ships only, and there is little if anything about schooners. Karl Heinz Marquardt's "The Global Schooner" is possibly the best book about schooners, but he uses a number of undefined terms and it sometimes is hard to figure out what he is talking about. He was German, but lived in Australia, so much of the terminology is for north European (Baltic) vessels, translated into Australian "English." Lees "Masting and Rigging of English Ships of War" is useful for determining dimensions of rigging, but again it is exclusively for large square riggers, and Lees also uses some undefined terms that make some of what he says pretty ambiguous. His information is misleading unless you know that schooner masts were lighter and only about 3/4 the diameter of a full square rigged mast - and every rigging dimension is based upon the diameter of the mast at the partners (deck). Of course he doesn't tell you that important bit of information! Harold Underhill's "Masting and Rigging the Clipper Ship and Ocean Carrier" is by far the best reference for sailing ship rigging I have found, and he leaves nothing to the imagination. Every term is defined and listed in the 11 page index (about 1350 entries)! He has a chapter on schooners and other small craft, and relates their rigging to the larger ships. However, he is talking mostly about late 1800s and early 1900s vessels. But he does give formulas for calculating schooner mast dimensions and noted that the masts were only about 3/4 the diameter of a full square rigged mast. The book is VERY well written!

I wondered about the absence of a capstan or windlass on some of the models I have seen, especially of schooners and other small vessels. I have done some research on anchor handling on small ships: https://modelshipworld.com/topic/27410-small-ship-anchor-handling/?do=findComment&comment=787942

I should also note that I have not used some common belaying methods in this plan, and possibly I should. For example, on some ships lines were belayed to the knight heads, the fife rail posts, timberheads, cavils and cleats on the bulwarks, cleats pinrails and and spiderbands on the masts and bowsprit, and to cleats lashed to the shrouds. There were many different ways to belay lines! I will be using the timberheads at the bow for the anchor rigging.

Bill, I have been puzzling over topsail schooner rigging for my revenue cutter model. I have posted a thread describing the basic sails and rigging here: https://modelshipworld.com/topic/25679-topsail-schooner-sail-plans-and-rigging/?do=findComment&comment=750865 Here is a link to my rigging and belaying plan for a similarly rigged ship as the 31 ton vessel: https://modelshipworld.com/topic/19611-albatros-by-dr-pr-mantua-scale-148-revenue-cutter-kitbash-about-1815/?do=findComment&comment=863237 The 31 ton vessel has a simpler rig (not as many shrouds) than the theoretical 100 ton vessel I am modeling. However, the rigging principals were the same on all two masted fore topsail schooners, so you should get some ideas from these links.

Mark, You guessed right! I ended up on the ipsfocus themes page link - the one above the "Themes V" link. I switched to the "ips unedited theme" and that solved the problem. This makes the Model Ship World web site much more user friendly - at least for me. Thanks!

I'm sorry if I ruffled a few feathers by suggesting any features that makes a program useless is asinine - but that is my opinion, and it comes from decades of programming experience. I have seen some really bonehead mistakes and poorly designed user interfaces! Now, back to the problem. I opened MSW on Chrome, Opera and Edge, and the scroll bars are light gray background with a dark gray slider. I see Microsoft has purged Internet Explorer from my system in one of the updates, so I can't test it, and Safari never worked correctly on this machine. Edit: Aha! I got Internet Explorer working again, and it has scroll bars with a light background and a dark slider. So the problem is associated with Firefox - my normal browser. I am not surprised. I have created four web sites, and there have always been incompatibilities between browser implementations of HTML and XHTML. Usually it is Microsoft that has the strange implementation! Because I am aware of this I have always tested my code on all the available browsers, and modified it so it works the same on all of them. Apparently the ipsfocus programmers don't have much experience with these problems. I'll fiddle with Firefox settings to see if I can fix the problem. To be continued ...

Mark, Thanks! I looked at the different "themes" and the "Illuminate 4.6" does not have this problem. It has a white background with a gray scroll bar. However, I do not see how to change this theme for my account. It looks like ipsfocus wants me to pay $30.00 for the theme (for use in new web pages)! But I have created several web pages and the user cannot change the themes (it is part of the HTML/XHTML/CSS code). **** I am running Windows 10 Home (latest update 9 November 2021) on a Toshiba laptop. I am running the laptop screen at high brightness and high contrast, although I have to say the display is distinctly inferior to the screens on my work station. The Intel HD Display is set for moderate brightness, contrast and gamma that gives me the best resolution with Google Maps. I have Windows configured for pretty much the default options, with a custom background photo. The photo is the remarkable Hubble Deep Field - about 1500 galaxies in a black sky. However, it doesn't cause black backgrounds in the default Windows scroll bars. The windows "Color" setting is "light" and that produces a default white background for open windows. The Color accent is automatic (whatever that means). The current "Theme" is "Custom" because I have selected a custom photo. Theme "color" is automatic. Other programs like Microsoft Office (Word, Excel, PowerPoint, Paint), my CAD programs, Firefox, Chrome, Opera, Safari, Thunderbird, Internet Explorer/Edge, Teams, Zoom, GoTo, photo viewers, eDrawings, and printer/scanner utilities work with no problems with the scroll bars. I have always been suspicious of "themes" created by web page designers who often have no clue what their pretty color schemes will do. Often they seem to be young twits who have spent their entire lives pecking at cell phones and have no understanding of how people use computers! Anything but the operating system default color scheme is just asking for trouble. It reminds me of the program MathCAD. They wanted a distinctive appearance, as if it would somehow improve the performance of the program (and that is all that matters). So they decided to scramble the normal Windows color scheme. But if a user changed the background color in windows it changed the colors in MathCAD in unpredictable ways. Some combinations made menus disappear into the background, others caused the text to disappear from the working window, etc. It made the program useless for anything but the Windows color settings that were on the programmers' computers while they were writing the program, and they weren't using the Windows defaults! Duh!

George, In the past I have always assembled the masts before stepping them. This allows me to add all the details, such as mast bands, blocks, etc., while the masts are on the work bench. I will add all the rigging to the spars before attaching them to the masts. I will add the shrouds and standing rigging first. This is essential for getting the masts straight and at the proper angles. I may rig these to the masts on the work bench and then attach them to belaying points afterward. However, some of the backstays were "portable" with tackle and hooks that allowed them to be tightened or moved depending upon the tack and positions of the fore and main gaff sails. These can be rigged to the masts on the bench and attached to the belaying points later, after other running rigging is put in place. I will probably follow the general practice of working from bow to stern, starting with the bowsprit. But right now I can't say what sequence I will use. It depends upon what things look like as the build progresses.

On my laptop the scroll bars at the right side of the screen are black and the slider and up/down buttons are dark gray - almost always nearly invisible against the black background. Aside from being an asinine choice and extremely user hostile, this choice of colors makes it much more difficult to control the movement of screen content up and down. I have tried to eliminate this problem with the windows setup option - and other web pages don't have this problem, so I am guessing it was a deliberate choice of the person who designed the web pages. Is there some way that we can defeat this extremely irritating color scheme and just get the web page to use the Windows default color scheme for the scroll bar?

For the last several months I have been planning and working on small details on deck furniture, and puzzling over how the rigging was belayed on deck. Very few books go into detail about schooner rigging, and those that do give good details how the rigging is arranged aloft and then say the lines "go to the deck." That isn't a lot of help!! The Mantua plans show only the standing rigging and say nothing of the running rigging. There are not nearly enough belaying points (pin rails, ring bolts, cleats, etc.) to handle the running rigging. I have finally come up with a rigging plan and belaying plan that I intend to use on the model. First the full rigging illustration: This is a bit different from my earlier plan. Instead of a spar gaff topsail on the fore mast I am using a main top staysail. And I am still considering adding a traveller to the jib boom for the flying jib rigging. Here is the belaying plan: This plan was made a bit more complicated by the pivot gun that fires above the bulwarks. Several lines might optimally be located along the bulwark between the middle and aft cannons, but these would be blown away by the pivot gun. Several belaying point shuffles were necessary to get everything tied down without fouling the lines. Of course this is preliminary. When I start rigging the model I may have to rearrange some of the lines to avoid tangling and chafing the lines. I have also attached a PDF file listing all the lines (standing and running), their termination points and lengths (dimensions are in inches). Part of this exercise was to calculate the lengths of the lines so I know what to order. There are a little over 200 lines totaling about 182 feet (55.47 meters), and that doesn't count coils of rope at the belaying points, or the cannon rigging. Revenue Cutter Rigging Terminations.pdf

I'll be watching this build. I am working on a topsail schooner revenue cutter myself.

Allan, I think you are correct that rigging connections to ring bolts were always attachments for standing parts of tackle. All but one of the ring bolt connections I have shown are for tackle connections. However, I hastily placed the fore sail brail on a ring bolt - it should go to a belaying pin or cleat, and I will change this. Whether or not a running rigging line (or some standing rigging lines for that matter) needs a tackle is a matter of conjecture. You really need to know how the line is used when the ship is underway. This was brought home to me in Harold Underhill's "Masting and Rigging the Clipper Ship and Ocean carrier." On page 139 he comments that lower bunt lines on some ships may have whips (single block) for extra purchase (mechanical advantage) while on other ships the line may run straight to a pin. "It is a matter of the work to be done." A straight run requires only a place (pin) to belay the end of the line. But a whip, gun tackle or luff tackle requires a firm attachment for the standing end (a ring bolt on deck, for example) and a pin for the running fall. In another place Underhill notes that clew lines and bunt lines are under no strain when the sail is set, and are left slack so as not to foul or chafe against the sail. Because they are normally slack they lead down straight to the belaying point. Both may be tied off on the same pin since they are both used at the same time while reefing the sail. But the sheet is always under strain when the sail is set, and it may be necessary to attach the running end to a tackle, such as a gun tackle (two single blocks) in order to get enough mechanical advantage to control the sail. Whether or not to use a tackle on a running rigging line depends upon the size of the sail (the work to be done) and the size of the crew. On merchant ships with small crews tackles were more common on running rigging, and in the later years when crews were smaller still other methods such as winches were used. So to really get it right I need to know how to sail the real ship! Lever's "Young Sea Officer's Sheet Anchor" is helpful, but it only talks about full rigged square sail ships and says nothing about schooners. My current model rigging plan uses luff tackles (single and double block) for the heaviest items like the fore course yard lifts and truss, topsail yard halliard, fore sail tack, fore and main tackles (burtons), throat halliards and peak halliards, running back stays, main outhaul and such. Gun tackles (two single blocks) are used for lighter loads like the foresail sheets, topsail yard lift, topsail sheet, staysail halliards and sheets. Whips are used for even lighter loads like vangs, main boom topping lift, topsail sheet, and topsail yard lift. These ideas came from a combination of Lees, Underhill, Petersson and Marquardt, based upon what seems to me to be the extent of the loads. However, this is still preliminary. The schooner I am modelling is not a large vessel, just 70 feet between the perps, 74 feet on deck, and probably about 100 tons. It has only one topsail and no topgallant or royal. No square sails on the main mast. I suppose some of the luff tackles could be gun tackles, some gun tackles could be whips, and some lines with whips might be run straight to the belaying points. Any suggestions?

I am building the Mantua Albatros Art 771 kit from the 1980s. I am trying to create a belaying plan for the ship. The main mast is simple, but the fore mast is quite complex. The Mantua plans show only the basic standing rigging, and show none of the running rigging. I have eleven books that discuss sailing ship rigging, including the standards Steel, Lees, Biddlecombe, Lever, etc., but these describe full square-rigged ships and are mostly useless for deriving a schooner rigging and belaying plan. After detailed discussions of how to rig the lines on the masts, spars and sails they all finish by saying the line "runs to the deck." I do have several books that talk specifically about schooner rigging (Petersson, Underhill, Leather, Hahn, Marquardt). Most of these also say to run the line "to the deck" or "to the rail." Again, no help. Petersson's "Rigging Period Fore-and-Aft Craft" shows the belaying plan for a topsail schooner, and is the best reference I have found, but it doesn't describe the variations found on different ships. Underhill's "Masting and Rigging the Clipper Ship and Ocean Carrier" has far and away the best an most detailed discussion of ship rigging I have found, but it is mostly for full-rigged ships, with only a brief discussion of schooners. Marquardt's "Global Schooner" has good detail about rigging but it also says the lines run "to the deck." Leather's "The Gaff Rig Handbook" is nearly useless, having no useful index and focusing mainly upon 20th century racing yachts. So I have been left to my own devices to figure out how to belay the fore mast rigging. I am using two assumptions. First, lines coming down from purchases close to or on the mast lead down to ring bolts or fife rails at the base of the mast (or pins, cleats or spider bands on the mast), and lines running from the yard arms run down to the pin rails or cleats on the bulwarks or to ring bolts in the waterways near the bulwarks. Second, lines from lower purchases lead forward, and lines from higher positions lead aft. The idea is to avoid crossing lines. Here is my working plan: As you can see, there are 35 running rigging lines coming down from the foremast (not counting studding sails!). The base of the mast seems a bit crowded with 21 standing and running lines attached to ring bolts in the deck and pins in the fife rail. To achieve this I had to run the fore course bunt lines and clew lines outboard to the pin rails even though they lead from the lower top and the quarters of the fore course yard. I would appreciate comments and corrections from those who understand belaying better than I do. NOTE: I expect that as I start rigging the mast I will to have to reorder some of these positions to eliminate fouled lines.

Allen, This isn't the only confusing terminology I have seen referring to historic ships. Mondfeld (page 163) calls your "kevel" a "staghorn" and his "kevel block" is similar to your "cavel block." However, on page 246 he has a drawing of ropes fastened to one of his staghorns, labeled "Belaying to a kevel!" George Biddlecombe's "The Art of Rigging" (page 18) says a kevel is two crooked pieces of timber with the lower ends together and the heads branching out like horns, agreeing with Lees "cavel." Webster's "Third New International Dictionary" 1966, the font of all knowledge about ships, says a "kevel" or "cavel" is "a strong timber, bollard or cleat ... or a timber bolted across two stanchions." This latter definition is closer to Lees "cavel cleat" on page 170. A kevel is also a staff or hammer. Nordbock's "The Lore of Ships" (page 32) shows a "kevel" similar to Lees "cavel" and Mondfeldths "staghorn." On page 33 he shoes a "kevel head" as a timber mounted to the bulwark next to a cathead, with a top protruding above the cap rail and turned like a timberhead. Charles Davis' "Ship Models How to Build Them" describes a "cavil" as a "stout cleat of wood bolted fore and aft on the inside of the bulwark stanchions" used to secure heavy ropes. Bjorn Landstrom's "Sailing Ships" refers to "large V-shaped cavils" for securing sheets. Campbel's "Neophyte Ship Modeler's Jackstay" (page 28-29) shows nine different "cavels" or"kevels." He says the earliest of the 17th and 18th century were shaped like two horns (Mondfeldt's "staghorns") and shows a Dutch type (A) and an English type (B). The third is the type on the Victory of1765 (C). Another (D) is horizontal with or without a sheave, on the fo'c'sle bulwark to take the end of the catfall tackle (something like Nortbock's "kevel head"). Type E is a "verticle kevel with sheave" from before 1800 (a "kevel block"). The heavier type F was used after 1800. The type G is a lighter type used on schooners, type H was used on English luggers, and last, but not least, is type I, a heavy cavel with a hole that aligned with a mooring port in the bulwark. So it looks like just about anything you can tie a line to is a kevel! Or cavel. Or cavil. I may be belaboring this a bit, but it is just this sort of name differences between authors that has caused me much confusion (and still does) as I try to learn more about sailing ships. Even worse is when authors use various terms without bothering to define them, just assuming that everyone else in the universe can read their minds!