capnharv2

I hadn't thought of that .

Filling up the gaps on the Gallion
 
Things went less easy then I expected. But other Diana builders may perhaps take some benefit out of this. As the pics show : on both sides an eyebolt that receives standing rigging coming from the bowsprit obstructed somehow the operation so I could not reach into the corners. So one may want to fore these holes ( for the eyebolts ) just one or a few mm higher, building instructions were not that clear to me. Nonetheless I'm quite satisfied : this awkward void is filled up and the lads may feel a bit more comfortable...
First pic show the necessary tools and a try out made out of card
 
Now back to the yards !

Yes, I know what you mean, Greg.  My initial reaction to the seemingly small sizes of iron straps etc. was similar - and I'm kind of a nut on strength issues.  Some research and some arithmetic helped.  Based on some numbers in S.B. Luce, Seamanship, 1868, an 11" hemp rope of the time had a breaking strain of 64,000 lbs.  On rope of this size on the model I am using 24 gauge copper wire for straps and bolts.  At .020" diameter this converts to  just less than 1 1/2" at 1:72.  If my math is right (always questionable) iron rod of this diameter would have a tensile strength of about 90,000 lbs  (55 KPSI), about 1.5 times the strength of the rope itself.  So, not to worry.  I would assume the rope around the deadeye/bullseye would beak first.
 
I took the bolts through the knightheads (assume nuts), rather than into the tops as is shown on some drawings, because I thought bolting into the end grain would subject the knightheads to splitting.  I wasn't too crazy about main stay eyebolts in foremast bitts, but this was common.
 
Wait till we get to wire rigging sizes.
 
Ed

Young America - extreme clipper 1853
Part 209 Forestay
 
The forestay was a fairly simple job to install, but before getting into it, I should say a few words about my sequence.  I am sure there are many approaches to this, but my general plan is to work fore to aft, bottom up, so I will do the standing rigging on the lower masts, working aft, then either go on to the lower yards or topmasts – not decided yet.  Details on the lower shrouds like fairleads, staves and ratlines will be added later when convenient.
 
The first picture shows the installed forestay.
 

 
It is 10½" rope (like the lower shrouds), doubled around the masthead with a seized collar, secured with four seizings on each leg to bullseyes with iron straps shackled to eyebolts in the knightheads.  These were installed earlier.  The lower legs are seized together above the lower seizings.  The rope is served around the collar and at the lower ends and the upper part around the masthead is leathered.
 
The next picture shows the leathered collar bedded on the shrouds.
 

 
The next picture shows the extent of the upper serving and leathering and the upper seizing.
 

 
In the next picture the lower ends of the stay have been hauled up and clipped so the seizings can be put on.
 
 
 
The starboard seizing has been started in the picture.  The next picture shows the lower legs completed and the lower seizing installed to pull them together.
 

 
Finally, the completed stay from above.
 

 
There is quite a bit of work to do on the bowsprit, but because the forestay is secured at the knightheads, I can defer this until the fore topmast is being fitted.
 
Next, the main and mizzen lower mast rigging, but first I want to replace all those topmast backstay chains and channel deadeyes discussed in an earlier post.
 
Ed

Well I finished up the ratlines and futtocks for all the masts. Also had to take a break and do some fence repair and garden works with the admiral since she wanted to paint the fence. Since she wanted to paint it; who am I to get in her way so the repair work came first. 
 
I started with the main mast stay lines by first making the mice to fit the served lines. I have serving lines down pat with my Sherline lathe and served six inch lengths and 2 inch lengths on the shroud lines. After forming the loops and locating the mice I added the bull-eyes to the bow and added the cross brace to keep them aligned.
 
Once the lines were in place I tried tying the snake lines using different weights of threads and the knots at the shrouds just did not look right. So I fell back on my airplane building and took a length of Syren's .008" black line and soaked the line hanging with a weight to stretch and keep straight with a mixture of white glue and water. I soaked the line twice and allowed to dry overnight which resulted in a nice stiff line to work with. The sequence of pictures will explain better than words. Also having tied over 2,000 clove hitches was great preparation for tying the snake line in place. This does require knowing how to tie a clove hitch upside down and backwards given some of the locations around the foremast. With black thread, black snake line on black shrouds will also test one's depth perception.
 

 

 



 

 

 

 

 

 

Now to move onto the mizzen stays. My goal is to add as much as I can before adding the bowsprit which is more of a space restriction where I work in turning the model side to side.

Here's some status for the week. I was away last weekend cleaning out the stuff from my father's basement, so all of this work was done after work during the week. He lived in the house over 50 years, so you can imagine what he accumulated. Found some good stuff to save though, and some good memories. My son and nephews chipped in big time to help me out so we filled up a 20 yard dumpster in about 5 hours.
 
I finished up the fore mast shrouds and stays last week, and here is how they came out.


 
This week I was focused on the main shrouds. I have all of the dead eyes seized and the lanyards in place. I will finish them off after the main stays are added, so I can adjust any tension that needs it.
Starboard side:



Port side:
 


I am now noticing that the last dead eye is a little higher than the others, so I need to correct it. I also see from Ed Tochi's log that I should probably have put the shear poles in before tying off the fore shroud lanyards. Good thing they are not glued in place yet, so I can loosen them up to put the poles in without too much trouble.
 
My goal this weekend, after those fixes, is to get the main stays made and installed and maybe finish off the main shrouds. We will see...
 
 

I am not offering the 1765 version of the kit. I don't think I have ever stated I was. The truth is that if that version was offered, no matter how much aesthetically pleasing it would look, it would not sell well enough to justify the extra development costs.
 
Anyway, I have been working on Prince, and while waiting for the new carvings to arrive, I made up the new spiral staircases. The old ones were Amati fittings, and each set was exactly the same. I designed the new sets to reflect the ones on the Science Museum contemporary model, with the correct number of steps and decoration for the side rails (laser cut and PE parts). Everything on the deck is dry-fitted only, and nothing is finished or varnished yet..
 



 

The set-up for "adjusting" lanyards is perfectly capable of overcoming whatever "tar" they might have put on them.  The odds are Stockholm Tar was used, but something was used, no passage making ship is going wandering about with bare lanyards.  Yes, the system shown is from a Navy manual where there's enough crew to send the mast through the bottom of the ship, but the system's the same outside the Navy as well.

My wife had cataract surgery a couple years ago. Her comment after surgery-"Wow, the trees have leaves again!". Recovery is pretty fast too. She had to take antibiotic eye drops for a month or so, and that was pretty much it.
Yes, it can be pricey. But, if you can afford it, the surgery can correct other vision problems at the same time.
 
Good luck Nenad. I hope things work out well for you.
 
Harvey

My wife had cataract surgery a couple years ago. Her comment after surgery-"Wow, the trees have leaves again!". Recovery is pretty fast too. She had to take antibiotic eye drops for a month or so, and that was pretty much it.
Yes, it can be pricey. But, if you can afford it, the surgery can correct other vision problems at the same time.
 
Good luck Nenad. I hope things work out well for you.
 
Harvey

My wife had cataract surgery a couple years ago. Her comment after surgery-"Wow, the trees have leaves again!". Recovery is pretty fast too. She had to take antibiotic eye drops for a month or so, and that was pretty much it.
Yes, it can be pricey. But, if you can afford it, the surgery can correct other vision problems at the same time.
 
Good luck Nenad. I hope things work out well for you.
 
Harvey

My wife had cataract surgery a couple years ago. Her comment after surgery-"Wow, the trees have leaves again!". Recovery is pretty fast too. She had to take antibiotic eye drops for a month or so, and that was pretty much it.
Yes, it can be pricey. But, if you can afford it, the surgery can correct other vision problems at the same time.
 
Good luck Nenad. I hope things work out well for you.
 
Harvey

My wife had cataract surgery a couple years ago. Her comment after surgery-"Wow, the trees have leaves again!". Recovery is pretty fast too. She had to take antibiotic eye drops for a month or so, and that was pretty much it.
Yes, it can be pricey. But, if you can afford it, the surgery can correct other vision problems at the same time.
 
Good luck Nenad. I hope things work out well for you.
 
Harvey

Spent an hour or so on the Glory of the Seas today finishing up the ratlines...here are some pics.
I hope to begin the backstays soon.
 
Rob

Young America - extreme clipper 1853
Part 207 – Reeving Deadeyes
 
The first picture shows deadeyes reeved on the two forward shrouds.  The other shrouds are left attached to the fixtures to avoid them getting out of order.
 

 
In the next picture the second shroud has been reeved on the port side.
 

 
Keen observers will note that the stop knot on the #1 starboard side is on the right side of the deadeye – viewed from the deck.  Alas, while this would be correct for left-handed shrouds, it is incorrect for my right-handed shrouds – a mistake I discovered only after reeving 10 shrouds.
 
In the next picture, those 10 have been redone and the two remaining shrouds completed – a few hours of avoidable rework.
 
 
 
The lanyards have been hauled up to tension the shrouds.  I stretched all this rope after laying it up.  Linen has very little stretch to it after this, so the deadeyes line up well after tensioning, as was the case in practice.
 
In practice, lanyards were hauled up using a tackle that was secured to the shroud some distance above the deadeye.  In earlier ships and perhaps in Naval ships of the time (?), tackles were hooked to burton pendants that went over the masthead before the shrouds.  Hence there are no burtons on the YA model.
 

 
The excess lanyard that is strewn about the deck will be trimmed off after it is wrapped around the shrouds and made fast.  This will be done after lashing on the iron sheer poles.  The next picture is a closer view
 

 
My dust problem is quite evident in this picture, but it would be premature to clean up at this stage, because I will make more dust when I replace the next two deadeyes and their chains to handle the larger topmast backstays.  This change was mentioned in an earlier post.
 
Finally, a view from above.
 

 
Next step is making and installing the iron sheer poles across the tops of the deadeyes and then winding up the lanyard excess.
 
Ed

Before cutting any of the frames, I decided to make the backbone.  It is now complete, I was terrified when it was time to cut the rabbet, but a V-gauge chisel made it easy.  It's not perfect, but I'm happy with it.  So without further ado, here are the pictures.  Tomorrow I start cutting frames and I'm hoping I don't screw any of them up, but I am expecting to have to remake at least a few of them.

I finished up the bentinck shrouds for the foremast and moved onto the futtock shrouds. After doing the starboard side offhand I realized there had to be an easier way to align the thimbles. I moved to the port side and tied off both ends first; then the center and finally the last two justifying the spacing at the stave. Next I used T-pins through the thimbles top and bottom to align them and then added the ratlines gluing each knot as each line was completed. The T-pins helped to hold the shroud lines in place when tying off and spacing the ratlines. Once all were completed I added CA at the hooks and rings to hold them then holding the stave tight to the shrouds I CA'ed them in place. Once all the excess lines were trimmed after the glue set all were painted with Ultra Flat Black spray paint. This gives them a uniform finish and stiffens the lines a little. 
 

 

 

 

 
Now on to the foremast.

Wow..Christian, Doug, Pat, Harvey, Carl, Tom, Wayne, VACorsair, Eamonn, and the likes, thanks guys for interest and the overly kind words.  Narrative below will explain more, but think I've irrevocably stepped off the 'being happy with kit parts' ledge...this can only mean even slower progress...but perhaps more fun
 
I know I'm bouncing around a bit so apologies for that, but continuing foundational aspects which seem easier with the ship careened over on a towel.
 
Challenging Cheeks:
 
The kit supplied cheeks are hair rail are not that great.  The cheeks themselves come nowhere near to fitting the hull, and I'm pretty sure the hull form is correct.  The only option was to scratch my own cheeks.  Aside from the fit, they are also seem rather undersized.

The next consideration was the hair rail and lower cheek, and decided to go whole hog and redo these as well.  Given that there needs to be two of everything, I cheated and sparingly glued with PVA glue some 3mm sheet together and then cut to shape.  The pieces were then separated using rubbing alcohol, and voila, 2 matching parts with the work of 1!  These parts are still very slighty oversized to allow them to be fine tuned once other parts are made - necessary given I don't have any true plans to work from and that these pieces form quite a complex shape. 
 
Photos below show hair rail prior to separation.  The difference in dimensions is quite evident to that appearing in AOTS which I used as a guide for the scratch piece.

As a side note, the quality of the walnut parts are just not good, the main/false rail would need a lot a work to get presentable so suspect these will also be remade at some point.

The cheeks themselves took a long time (days) to get right due to the angled concave curve and lack of plans.  Pretty happy with the results, though the parts still need some fine tuning as the rails are a little thick still I think.  I'm hoping to use a scraper to give a profile to the edges, and a quick test shows that this should work OK even for a quick test.  This also commits me to what will probably be my first simple carvings on the scrolls, but that's for another day.
 

Side by side comparison of scratch vs kit supplied pieces..

Beautiful! I like how crisp and clean everything is!
 
Harvey

Thank you Michael and welcome to all other visitors.
 
After a bit of time away I got back to finishing the cleats - now all done. In the end I decided to simplify the construction by eliminating the stem tube spacer - see earlier post.
 
I used a simple jig to make sure that the pins went in at right angles to the top. The pins were glued in place using CA.
 

The feet were attached to the deck first. The hold down bolts are from a spectacle repair kit - hundreds of very small size screws for a few pounds - ebay. I drilled a thin sheet of steel to create a template for drilling the deck.

The central holes in the foot were drilled through to the deck to take the tops.
 

A few more shots of the deck:-
 

Having completed the cleats I made the 4 secondary winches. As I think I said previously these are omitted in error from the plans but are very clear on web based photographs / videos. The winches are .325 max diameter x .300 high.
 

Thanks, Dave. I see you have overtaken me with your own Constitution build. I'm enjoying following that very much. Unfortunately, I haven't made much progress lately, as I am struggling to make the transom line up with the hull properly. I'll post an update soon to show what I mean. It well could be that the problem lies with my limited skills ... or it could be, as I am currently suspecting, that the problem is with the kit itself.
 
O'course, it cannot be ruled out that stubbornness is a part of the problem, as I still intend to light up the Captain's quarters and go for an 1812-style of stern.
 
Thanks for dropping by everyone. I'll get back to building soon ...

Hi Tom - 
 
Your Connie is coming together nicely.  Really good work on the tops.
 
And now, welcome to the wonderful world of rigging.  This takes a completely different set of skills from the woodwork, etc. that goes into building a hull.  This is more like learning to knit, or embroider.  Best of success with the craft.  I have been doing it for 30 or so years, and I am still learning and experimenting.
 
For example, I have found that when I have a deadeye that is a little too high or low, I unlace the lanyard and spin it around before relacing.  In one direction the shroud will unwind and lengthen, in the other, it will tighten and shorten.  If you do that with two or so of the most out of line ones the deadeyes on your foremast will straighten right out.  Don't worry that the upper deadeyes may end up at an angle, the sheer pole that you will be setting up later will take care of that.
 
Hope that helps.
 
Dan
 

Yep. Makes sense to me. I'll be getting there someday. . .
 
Harvey

Now you tell me about the chopsitcks!!
 
Question-did you tie your ratlines fore to aft on both sides or fore to aft on the port side and aft to fore on the starboard side? For whatever reason, I've always tried to do fore to aft on both sides, and had a devil of a time on the starboard side (I'm right handed).
 
Thanks! It's been fun and educational following your build.
 
Harvey

All of the templates are glued to the blanks.  I used rubber cement, I figure if it worked for Hahn, then it should work for me.  I don't think that any of the paper templates stretched, but I plan to check the frames against the plans once they are cut.  I also built me a jig to ensure that all of the frames are cut to the same height.  I plan to start cutting the frames in the next day or two (work and life depending).  I have also started to remove all of the laser char on the pieces for the keel.  Pics of the keel will be posted once that is all cleaned up and glued together.  So without further ado, here are a couple of pics of the jig and the current state of the frames.