KurtH

Thanks Thomas.  I have looked in the stores you mentioned, and have a collection of different beads.   I am sure, however, that there are beads somewhere that have escaped my notice.  It is not just the trucks that are a problem.  I do not have the tools or skills to make ribs that small.   Anyway, I have already done the leather clad truss parrels described in the Marquardt.  As a teenager,I did some Revell plastic kits of ships (Cutty Sark, Thermopylae, Santa Maria).  This is my first wood ship kit build.

Thanks Steve!

Crossing and rigging the topsail yards:

1. Fore topsail yard tye arrangement according to the Marquardt AOS.  Main tye is similar.

2. Main topsail yard tye and halyard arrangement.  The fore topsail yard tye and halyard are similar.   The halyard is rigged according to BJ rigging plan and instructions, which are similar to the Marquardt.

3. Mizzzen topsail yard tye according to the Marquardt.

Here are views of my progress crossing and rigging the yards so far, including topsail yard lifts, which reflect the current rigging on the ship.  I noticed in the photos that this rope is heavier than the rope used in

the other lifts, so I used .018" rope instead of the .012" size specified in the instructions for the topsail yard lifts.

The tangle of lines on the deck are very long tails left in order to later adjust the tension in the running rigging

Onward and upward.  I have rigged the t'gallant yard footropes, and will proceed with the trusses, tyes, halyards, and lifts shortly.  I am still trying to decide whether to rig the braces before or after finalizing the backstays.

I am not sure to what extent the backstays will obstruct the installation of the rope coils.  Keith Julier in his book "Period Ship, a Kit Builder's Maual"  suggests leaving the backstays until last.  Ideas, anyone?

Working on the topsail yard trusses.  The instructions have an illustration of how to do the parrels, which is standard for most of the builds I have seen.  However, when I saw a photo of the parrels on the actual ship, I realized how much smaller they are in comparison with what is shown in the drawing:

I immediately saw that the tools and skills that I have are in no way equal to the task of making these parrels in scale  Looking in the Marquardt AOS, I saw an alternative called the Leather Truss Parrel:

  I got the suggestion to use plumbing tape to use to simulate the leather jacket from another member of MSW.  Who that was was lost along with my build log when I accidentally deleted it.  My thanks to whoever it was.  It worked well.  This is my first attempt, so hopefully I'll get better at it in the future.

Thanks so much Bill!  I greatly appreciate your kind words!

Kurt H.

Thank you so much Steve!  I so appreciate it!

Work is proceeding on crossing the topsail yards.

Heads Up - The spacing of the stirrups on the starboard and port halves of the fore topsail yard in the plans do not match, and the starboard half of the yard is 1/8" longer than the port half.

Back at it again after time away to do video.   All three course yards crossed and slings, jeers, trusses, and lifts rigged.  The standing lifts option for the cro'jack yard shown in the Marquardt AOS is employed here.

View from aft.

A closeup of the cro'jack yard which is rigged a bit differently than the fore and main yards.  Standing lifts used and no jeers called for in the instructions.  Flemish horses also omitted as in the AOS and 

photos of the ship. 

As before the loose lines in the back are cast off backstays.  I am debating whether to rig the braces before or after I finalize the backstays.  Perhaps I should even wait until I have added the rope coils to the belaying pin racks(?)  At any rate, the next step will be crossing and rigging the topsail yards.

One way of insuring that stirrups are all the right length.  There is foamcore under the plan sheet.

The stirrups face fore and aft.  I use a small spot of glue applied to the front of the yard to secure the stirrup, then take the yard off the plan sheet and wrap the line around it holding the loop in the correct athwart ships orientation while I glue the line to the yard.  It seems to work well.

Lifts rigged.  This completes the rigging of the fore yard except for the braces which will be added later.  Loose ropes in the background are cast off backstays.

Now to tackle the main yard.  This should go a bit faster now that I have some idea of what to do, and what not to do.  My plan is to do all the course yards, then the topsail yards, etc.

Sling, lower jeer blocks, and standing end of the jeers installed on the yard.

A view of the fore yard in place with sling installed and jeers rove.  Before I reeve the lifts, I will replace one of the blocks so that they both hang down the same.

My first attempt at rigging a truss.  The tackles are at the mast cap instead of on deck because there was not enough room between the topsail sheet bitt knees to accommodate them.  I ended up painting myself into a corner and having to improvise as best I could.

The next one should be better.  Practice makes perfect.

This is a really beautiful model!  Congratulations!

I am back in the saddle.  Here is my idea of how to hold a yard while working on it using Quad Hands and a couple of clamps:

And here is my first attempt at foot ropes using .008" Syren rope:

I did the starboard side first.  I got better at making those tiny loops as I did the port side as you can see.  I have the jeer blocks stropped, and the sling assembly ready to install.  I still have to make up the blocks for lifts, and braces, and reeve the jeer fall.  I will post the result.

I found the size of the jeer falls.  It is 4.5" in circumference.  At scale, that would be .015" in diameter.  I will use Syren's .018".

Thanks for the info!  I did consider .005", but chickened out and am proceeding with .008".  I have done the footrope on the starboard half of the fore course yard, and am pleased with how it came out.  I will post a photo when I have the truss, jeers, lifts, and sling in place. Speaking of which, the instructions give the size rope for the jeer pendants, but not the running component of the jeers.  Do you know what that would be?  I am guessing .025(?).  I have to stop now, as I am preparing for a video job.  Constitution will be in "ordinary"  for a few weeks.

Thanks!  Dividing that by 96, I get .0078, so .008 size rope should be right.  That's what I thought, but it is nice to be sure.  Very nice job on the Alfred.  It looks as challenging as the Connie.

Can anyone out there tell me what diameter rope was typically used for footropes?  My instructions do not have it.  None of my books on ship model building have it.  I cannot find it by Googling.  I imagine it would be the same regardless of the size of the ship.  Thanks!

Another milestone reached.  All standing rigging lines are in place.  Backstays can still be cast off if they obstruct installation of running rigging.

Yaay!

Thanks so much Mort for your advice and encouragement!

Thanks so much Bill for the info.  I will check out that site.

All main mast rigging in place.  T'gallant and royal shrouds and stays are glued in place with a spot of CA, but can be unglued with debonder (acetone?) if need be. Tails left long for now.  Fake eye splices and trimming to be done when I can be reasonably sure that no additional adjustments are necessary.  Hard to know when that will be when I have no prior experience in this sort of thing.  I am thinking that the tyes may affect the backstays, and the braces may affect the fore and aft stays.  Lifts, jeers, and trusses would probably make no difference (?).  Gluing in the fore and main fife rails permanently will make access to the top mast stays and the t'gallant preventer stay eye splices at the deck impossible, so I will need to be sure these stays are stable before beginning the running rigging.

There. That's better.  All foremast rigging in place.  Tails are still left long and backstay seizings left undone to allow for future adjustments in the tensioning.

Now that all the upper stays are in place, the final appearance of the bowsprit rigging can be seen.  It more resembles the present configuration than it does the more complex rig shown in the  BJ plans.

Out of curiosity, I have looked at other builds using ready made sheathing plates and have found, in all fairness to BJ, that all the ones I have seen so far have nail heads that are out of scale.  Of these, the Revell plastic model comes the closest to having the right size nail heads, but even they stick out more than these nails do:

Incidentally, it seems to me that those of us who, like me, are distressed to see irregularities in their work when photographed super close up, can take some comfort in this photo.

Thank you so much Allan.  I really appreciate your kind words.  Thanks for the photo.  I will add it to my collection of ship photos. You are quite right about the nail detail.  It is also true that the thickness of the BJ plates is well out of scale.  I am thinking that if I do coppering on my next project, copper tape might be the way to go, now that I have seen the way it really is:

At the time I did the coppering, I didn't know nuttin' about it.  I am not even sure how I could go about making detail that small at 1/96.  As you say, better to not have it than make a mess out of it.  Thanks for the confirmation about the overlapping.  I have seen sources and builds in which it is done the opposite way.

Photo of the upper rigging of the foremast in progress to show that I have not abandoned the build.  A photo of a more finalized version

 will follow.  Tails to be left long until the very last stages of the rigging process.  LInes that remained taut for months are now slack and have to be re-tensioned.  Fortunately, I did not seize these, and debonder will allow me to loosen and redo the hitches.

Yes. I laid the gun stripe planks first so I could sand them thinner without disturbing the planks which are above and below it.  I get all my planking stock from BJ.