TJM

Also, be sure not to scale the supports, at least if you do resin 3D printing. They will quickly become too small and the print will fail as the (weak) supports are ripped off the piece. A print service should be able to re-scale and add new supports that fits the new scale.

Very interested to follow this build. I have version 2 of this kit for a (far...) future project, and while I understand that there are significant differences between version 2 and 3, especially on the rigging, it will still be a very nice reference to have your log to look into!

Hi B.E. I understand your caution - I am a chemist, so I am biased 😉. I must say I actually like your results, especially the lower square example. But I would much prefer to use a few select chemicals than the all natural route to achieve the result!! But your untreated hull also looks great as is - I am very much enjoying following your build!

Hi B.E. Very interesting tests with the copper patina. I have heard that a water solution of 2% urea with a few drops of ammonia will make a good patina. I guess this will emulate the 'natural' approach , but is perhaps more controlled and can be tuned in terms of strength of the solution and ratio between urea and ammonia. I will try that myself when I get the chance! BR TJM

Fantastic! 👏

Thank you Matthias. I do pre bend every plank in all directions needed, but I often snap one or bend too much, or mess up the bevel at the edge. I did the same on Flirt, but the planks on that ran much more naturally so it was much quicker. It is just my silly idea to use another wood below the waterline and the way I ended up making those planks that is causing me trouble now! I just may not do it this way on future projects 😅.

Log entry 23 - planking continued It has been a while since the last update. Things are moving forward, but it is painfully slow. This is in part because of my HDMS Elben detour, but more due to diving into resin 3D printing which has taken up quite some time lately. But I am getting the hang of that and will probably also be doing some ornaments for the Christiania with the 3D printer. I am playing around with the stern decorations and will show something soonish. In the meantime, more planks have been added, also at the stern. It is very time consuming to cut all the planks to size with none being full with all the length. And I often mess them up and have to re-do a plank. I think that on average I do almost all of them twice. Even then, the fit is not perfect with the strong curves and taper of the planks. But viewing from a few feet away, it looks reasonable to me. Still a ways to go, but we will get there eventually. The carrot is being able to move on with the very interesting steps that follow the planking. I am looking forward to doing the stern and the wales! BR TJM

I have a white window blind I can roll down and use as a background for photos. If you have a fixed spot you can use, that works great. The ship is looking great!

Thanks! That is a great input! I can make two engraving runs, one for the nails at much lower intensity. Or I can of course forego the nails entirely. I will run a few tests 😁

Thanks for looking ito this! I read that as well at some point 🙂. It is just that the text on the drawings usually distinguish between short canon and carronades. There were several foundries in Helsingør and Copenhagen at the tine, so even if they were trying to systematize, I am not sure it is possible to rule out other sizes being produced. I also think that Elben may be a bit too early for the 1833 system. But it is of course possible that the short canon on Elben was actual carronades. Their use and powder charge would have been very similar, it is only a matter of the shape of the barrel and carriage.

I admit that I had never expected anyone else to have heard about this little Schooner, much less considered building it! That is amazing 😃. Indeed, the loss of Schleswig-Holstein is probably the biggest trauma in recent history for Denmark. The effect cannot be overestimated. Every Dane hears about this period multiple times in school, but I think not too many appreciate the importance for the forming of the current nation. Denmark's power had been declining for 2 centuries at this point, first with the loss of the southern Swedish provinces and then with the almost complete loss of the Navy in the Napoleonic wars which also led to the loss of Norway. Denmark was already at this point a small country with just a few oversees possessions. The loss of all of southern Jutland in 1864 was a massive blow to the national pride. Denmark lost 40 % of its land (non-overseas) and 38.5% of its population, going from 2.6 mio to 1.6 mio people. It is also interesting that all of southern Jutland below Kongeåen was lost, as the northern part of Schleswig was a de jure part of the kingdom, unlike the southern part and Holstein, which were not part of the Kingdom proper, but owned by the king (it is a strange and complicated setup that went back many centuries). Denmark became in effect one of Europe's smallest nation states after this, and we were close to bankruptcy too. It informed the neutrality policies of Denmark during the Great War and the 'acceptance' policy during the occupation of WWII. In fact, Denmark did not engage in any active wars again until 1999. I had not considered that the ship Elben would have been transferred to the SH navy after 1864, but that makes total sense. Regarding armament, I only know that it was designed for 8 short 12 pounders - whether it was ever armed with that is not certain. I have not been able to find any drawings of these guns in the archive - many others, but not these. That is not to say that they are not there! I just haven't found them 😃. However, their length in calibres seem to be the same as for the short 18 pounders above, which were widely used on many different kind of ships, so I am quite confident that it is just a question of scaling them down to 12 pounders.

Thank you for the feedback - I have tried to do the planks as realistic as I can with the information I have. Apart from glancing at the Vanguard Models kits I have (Flirt and Sphinx) I have these contemporary drawings of deck planking, although for much larger ships than Elben: They are from the frigate Rota 1822 and the 3rd rate Dronning Marie 1824. I have used the drawing of Elben which shows the outer plank and one along the gratings: And i have placed the plank ends above where the beams are shown on the plans. The inaccuracy I know for sure I have in the current top deck is that I have not included the nails that are not at the plank ends. There should be two nails on all planks at all beam positions. I actually made the drawing like that, but found it became to busy/crowded. The Vanguard Models laser etched decks are correct in that way, but they have a more subdued brown tone. Mine get very dark, almost black and I was afraid it would distract too much. But I could just add those nails again and do another top deck. Perhaps I should try and then decide when I can make a direct comparison. If there are any other obvious inaccuracies that could be addressed, please ket me know. BR TJM

@Thukydides, I just went through the drawings I have of Najaden and it's sister Diana, and the vertical pin rack at the mizzen does not seem to appear on the drawings. There are two more copies like these, but they show the same. But then again, the skylight above the cabin (cahytten) depicted in Eckersbergs paintings are also not in these drawings. These features were likely added between the 1820 launch of the ship and 1833 when the pictures were painted.

It is from 1833, https://open.smk.dk/artwork/image/KMS2060 . Eckersberg had full access to the wharfs at Holmen and often sailed with the navy to paint various scenes. His painting are likely very accurate, as he was very interested in the ins and outs of the sailing ships of the time and spend considerable time studying them here are a few more paintings from this trip aboard Najaden, of the ship itself: He would take a ship boat and sketch the ship from that.

Oh, and I just remembered: I believe the canon had an 'eye' for the breach rope not shown on the drawings above! Here are a drawing and a painting by the famous marine painter C. W. Eckersberg, showing (likely) this pattern of short 18 pounder canon on the deck of the corvette Najaden: BR TJM