Danstream

I followed with much interest this conversation and I would like to bring some considerations about the physics involved. I found that the argumentation of Mark P. are fundamentally correct from a 'first principles' approach point of view. Adding a lot of details about 'real effects' (as powder, distribution of forces, ...) do not help to shed light on the underlying concepts. One can consider two extreme 'ideal' pictures, i.e. a gun free to recoil and a gun rigidly bolted to a large (infinite for our considerations) mass. If you do correctly the math, applying the conservation of energy and the conservation of momentum principles (do not get involved into the details of forces), you find out that the velocity of the cannon ball (measured w.r.t. the ship) is higher in the second case. Clearly these are 'idealizations' but they show in a simple way the trends of the phenomena. Of course, in a real case you have to consider practical implementation issues, like the forces that the gun transmits to its attachment points which might be a weak bottleneck or the strength any other structural link that connects the gun to the closest hard point of the ship structure. Increasing the energy and the efficiency of the guns, the reaction to these forces in the case of rigid connections and not recoiling guns might become prohibitive, especially considering a technology based on wood and nails. In addition, the need of having a gun that can be retracted for a quicker recharging, might have prevailed over the design of having a fixed gun at the cost of a small loss of velocity. As far as the entity of the forces, for a given amount of energy delivered as useful energy for propelling the cannonball (i.e. net useful energy purged by the energy lost into heat, friction, noise, ...), this energy must be ultimately transformed into 'work' of the reaction points, being 'work' made of a force multiplied by a 'stroke' (i.e. Energy = force x displacement). Now, if the stroke is only the elastic deformation of a stiff supporting structure (case of a rigid connection of the gun to a structure), being this normally of the order of a fraction of a millimeter, it occurs that the forces are of huge entity. If, instead, a compliant structure is interposed (a kind of 'spring'), the stroke becomes much longer and consequently the forces to be reacted are much smaller. I hope that the above is of help, best regards, Dan.

Hi Jonathan, your model looks great! I like everything you have done and the colored parts look well the part. Best regards, D.

Your craftmanship is amazing! The planking of the stern might well have taken longer, but the result is gorgeous. Best regards, D.

Soon after opening the box, I realized that A.L. took several obvious artistic licenses in the design of the model. I could not really understand the reason for that and I found that a bit disappointing. If I can, I will try to correct at least some of these inaccuracies to bring the look of the ship more in line with the existing pictures of her replica available on the web. After assembling the basic structure, I started fairing the frames. In doing that, I found that I needed to shim the top of frame #6 in order to get the main deck to lie on top of the frames making a regular and not too sharp curvature. I also added a shim on the contour of frame #5 to avoid a local depression of the planks. I also added the bottom to the openings of the decks which I painted black and glued the main deck. At this point, I tackled the window openings on the transom that are obviously inaccurate. This how they look out of the box: And this is how they look after my correction: Finally, I put on the first two planks of the hull. It took me quite some time to shape the planks reasonably and at the end, this was the result: It is not perfect, but as a first attempt I cannot complain too hard. The plank bends quite regularly around the bow and the sides of the ship. This is all for now, any comment is welcome. Thanks for looking and best regards, D.

Mayflower 1620 - 2020 Dutch Cargo Fluyt - ca. 1608 Artesania Latina 1:64 scale Hi all, this is my first instalment of my first ship model. Ship modeling is a new genre for me, having built so far only aircraft plastic scale models. For this start-off of mine, I chose the kit of the Mayflower from Artesania Latina. My choice was driven by its reasonable price and by its rating as a kit of medium difficulty. In addition, this month, on September 16th, it is exactly 400 years since when the Mayflower finally set out from Plymouth for her historical voyage that brought the Pilgrim Fathers to America after a first attempt from Southampton in August of the same year. I live in the Netherlands, in the outskirt of the city of Leiden, the city where the Pilgrims Fathers resided for 12 years before their departure. The city of Leiden is celebrating this anniversary with several events spread over the year. Considering all these connections, I though that the Mayflower was a nice and motivated choice for my first build. The parts of the kit are of good wood quality and are quite precisely cut. The bulkheads and the keel need just a bit of filing to facilitate their assembling. This is the basic structure just assembled out of the box on my workbench.

Thanks Rynland. I have selected my kit and I have already started it. Tonight I will try to upload my first instalment so you will see it (under ships from 1501 to 1750).

Dear all, my name is Daniele, I am Italian, but I have spent my last 30 years in the Netherlands where I live and work at present. The country here is a very good country for sailing (and also for other things) and in the past I used to enjoy sailing. I was also a proficient scuba diver and I enjoyed diving here and in few most interesting places around the world. Now, I just watch sailing boats and I thought it would be nice for me to try building models as an alternative different way of continuing cultivating interests in the marine world. I have just joined this fine forum which I have been following for a while. I do not have previous ship modeling experience, although I watched my father and my brother building quite fine models. I thought that joining this forum would be an excellent way to facilitate learning and getting first hand advices from experienced modelers. In addition, sharing my work on a forum, surely will add an additional dimension to the hobby. Soon, I will be starting a build log so I can present my work to you. Thanks for reading and my best regards to all, D.