flyer

Thank you very much Nils, but the congratulations may be a bit premature. I still have to finish the little dinghy and then the boats must be stowed. But I'm really looking forward to 'go west', to America. peter

Hi John Galaxies aren't that far away anymore as they used to be! Who knows, you might find a suitable wormhole. Trying to understand rigging is almost as complicated as to understand women. The enormous difference however is that there are handbooks for rigging while on the other hand a working handbook for women..... Do you mean the bolt ropes around each sail? According to those rigging handbooks a boltrope was sewn around each sail to strengthen it and to provide means to attach ropes to the sail and the sail to the yards. The strength of the boltrope varies according to the size of the sail and the position on it (top, foot). You should find the details for example in Lees book. As an average value and because I had it and it looked right I took 0,5 natural thread for the boltropes on all of pickle sails. First the edges and all the seams of the sail were drawn with pencil onto both sides of the cotton. Then I gave an extra 3mm around it for the hem. This is too wide and out of scale but I wanted to be sure that the whole sail holds. The sail was now cut and the corners of the hem trimmed to allow it to lie flat. The hem was then folded over in a 'dry run' and the boltrope laid into the hem. The hem was now glued with a textile glue. Don't forget to give some extra rope length on the corners for the cringles. Now the linings or tablings were glued onto the sail and eventual reef lines added. Make sure the tablings are on the correct side. When the glue was dry the whole sail was ironed to fix the glue and straighten the sail. With this method a sail is rather easily done and quickly finished and it my opinion looks more to scale that those made painstakingly on a sewing machine where most of the time the seams are too prominent. Warning: While there is no question about the longevity of sewn sails I have no idea if and when glued hems may come apart again because glue may change with age. See also my post #215. This sail making method was found somewhere in the MSW techniques and research section. Cheers peter

Thanks everybody for the compliments. @B.E. Considering what an astonishing build you make of Pegasus I especially value your opinion. Pickles rig proportions are mainly those of the proposed rig for the Adonis class in Marquardts book. This book really is a great help. @Tony The next project will also have all sails set. I'm hooked. @Martin & John The next project is Mamoli's schooner yacht America. If the rumour sadly is true that Mamoli goes out of business I got probably one of the last kits. I like the graceful lines of that vessel as well as her history. I mean, she is not less than a forerunner of Alinghi. I will however try to improve the kit a bit. It comes in 1/66 which should be close enough to 1/64 to allow the use of Amati and Caldercraft parts on America. The coppering will be Amaty and from them and CC I hope to get metal davits and boats. Also rigging thread and other small parts may be replaced. I promised a friend to make a model for dust collection in his office. We choose this because, although he is no sailor at all, he has some family connections to the US. John - Diana is in fact on my list of probable next builds. If Surprise is still not on the market in a year or so, I might start on Diana. Fly on the other hand is no option as I have already her sister ship Pegasus collecting dust in the living room. Cheers peter

Hi Tim That's a very nice America you are building here. I also noticed your excellent coppering. Did you make your own copper plates? My kit has arrived today and the build will start in a few weeks after the completion of my Pickle. The point about the probably superfluous companionway forward of the fore mast is taken and I will check it. There are pictures of several scratch build Americas available in the internet and they all seem to miss that companionway. In the internet I also found that painting below of the original America with 2 boats stowed amidships with metal davits and plan to include them (Amati davits and Caldercraft boats). Did Mamoli really go out of business? This would be sad as their kits seem quite well done and of above average quality. Cheers peter

Outer jib Perhaps a bit regretful I took the last sail in hand. Working on that build really was fun and now the finish line is pretty close. The only problem this sail presented was to find out a fitting size for it. After trials with differently sized paper sails, I opted for a medium size with the peak reaching up to the height of the fore mast cap. The rope work is similar to the jib except that the tack is hooked to the traveller. While setting this up I found a remark in Lees' book that the down hauler of the outer jib has a second duty as in hauler of the traveller. This worked fine and I could remove the previously fixed in hauler. While working on the sheets I also started to clean up and belay all those loose ends as the completely set up jib sheets are restricting the access to the fore deck. The anchors - I bought a second identical one from Caldercraft - were completed while the glued sail was drying. To imitate the bolts holding the anchor stock together I just drilled small holes into the wood, smeared a mixture of black colour and glue over them and scratched the excess away. I've seen this method used to imitate treenails and it works fine. The iron bands are made from cartridge paper. Now the anchors have to be attached to the cable and stowed. Finally the small boat must be detailed and both boats must securely be stowed between the masts.

Thank you John. Those pictures are a great help. Mobbsie, thanks and the booze is no problem as long as I have enough and am still abble to hit allll the rigth keylkjbecfduzlvcgssssssssssss And yes, to the future and beyond - as Capt'n Jack Sparrow probably would declare. My mind is set for the Americas - in singular. Cheers peter

Hi John Of course you could learn to splice in 1/64 - and then possibly move on to a career in microsurgery. Or you could perhaps use the same 'false splice' I picked up in this forum (page 11 in this topic). I find it looks good enough and is quickly done. So, you already know and like the lizard wine! Now you only have to master fondue cooking, yodelling and money laundering and you're well on your way to become a honorary Swiss. Cheers peter

Hi Michael Excellent work on your Vasa. I very much like the look of that ropes and the way they are set up. If you ever consider to part with your bosun - I'll hire him on the spot. One thought (of a landlubber) about the setting up of the shrouds: In my opinion the placing of the upper deadeyes in an exact line is a bit overrated. In the prototype the most important thing would be the correct tension in each shroud. The ropes are working and change individually and are individually adjusted with their lanyards. I would expect a reset of the upper deadeyes only occasionally when they differ just too much in height. So go ahead with eyeballing. And I keep telling myself that a slight variation in the deadeyes heights just looks more natural. Cheers peter

Hi Martin Very considerate of your admiralty to allow you to reserve the safest place in your house for your ships! Well, my yard is in the basement as well but not in the shelter. My (compulsory) shelter is in my neighbours house. She uses it as a wine cellar which will be a great benefit if we ever have to sit out an air raid there. I hope you didn't have to drink that bottle entirely on your own - merlot or not. But you earned it with the jump from that bridge. (I couldn't do that with my fear of heights.) Thanks for the compliments - building Pickle really is much more fun than expected. Hi John No problem. Martin's jump was actually from an old bridge into an ice cold rivulet about 15m below it. Wow. And there would be much more fine Swiss wines to try! Yep - I forgot that picture. And the line is actually spliced to the ringbolt - the whole business with that special knot was not necessary. But I will repeat it for the outer jib and hope it's a valuable alternative. Cheers peter

Jib The sail itself was rather quickly done. But when checking its size and form the jib stay parted at the eye and was beyond repair. A new one had to be made and put up through all the existing rope work. Fortunately that work could be done in the wharf and not on the open sea in some weather. The sail was made similar to the fore stay sail. The peak halyard was set up in a mirrored fashion. The way to attach the fixed end and the necessary block was not fully clear. They are either on the mast or somewhere under the crosstrees, depending on source. Finally I opted for a simple solution as Pickle should be an unpretentious ship. The standing part was simply hitched around the forward crosstree. The halyard then leads through the peak block and back through a block slung under the opposite crosstree leg and down to the pin rack behind the mast. the right block is the jib's peak block, the left one the fixed block for the fore stay sail halyard The down hauler was set up similar to the stay sail. The sheets however are double with a sheet block in each short end. How to set up the pendants was a tricky question. According Lees usually the knightheads on the bow were used but Pickle doesn't have any. In Lees' book a belaying plan of ship from 1850 shows some cleats on the inside of the capping rail in the bow. As such cleats were already used for the backstays I added four more forward of the fore mast. Ringbolts for the standing end are set into the waterways below those cleats. The pendant of the sheet is now hitched to the ringbolt(with a knot for attaching a line to a ringbolt I found in the internet - setting this up was the most difficult bit of the whole sail). Marquardt talks of splicing it but this seemed a bit too definite to me. cleat and ringbolt for the sheet pendant in front of the carronade There are still a lot of loose lines which I will definitely stow when also the remaining outer jib is in place.

Hi Martin I Just read, that Oklahoma lies in the tornado alley. Well, I'd rather have a little Föhn-induced headaches than a twister trying to screw the same off. Hi B.E. Good question about the strips. Checking Lees again, I found that indeed the standard width of the cloth was 24'' which results in my 9,3mm. But he also mentions that in the 19th century often 18'' strips were used for jibs and general for fore and aft sails. Changing the strip with for the fore stay sail would need 2 strips more and so provide room for 2 hanks more. I will change to 18'' strips but only for the next build. For Pickles jib and outer jib I will use up the 'existing' 24'' cloth. Hi John The connection between Föhn and headaches is still debated, however I wouldn't debate the quality of the Merlot del Ticino although merlot from the north is by all means drinkable. What a astonishing library you have! And if you check the last part of Lees you will find some helpful belaying plans there. Cheers peter

Fore stay sail One definition of insanity is that you do the same things again and again - and expect a different outcome every time. Although I made that sail more than once it seems that I'm not completely insane. For the first try I took measurements from the build again. For the length off the luff I took the distance between mouse and the upper deadeye of the forestay. The leach is parallel to the mast and the foot must run clear of the belfry and forms a right angle with the leach. A trial with a paper sail looked ok. But when hoisting the finished sail I got an impression of a small tablecloth acting as a sail with a huge gap between sail and mast. Checking different pictures and paintings I found that the peak was too low but as it was not fixed to the stay and only held up by the peak halyard I could pull it above the mouse. I'm not sure if this is correct but it works on the model. For the second try I increased thus the distance between peak and foot and gained 15 - 20% of sail area. It looked better and definitely different... the fore stay sail still seems a bit small the peak is above the mouse The next problem were the hanks to attach the sail to the stay. Originally they are iron or wooden open hoops, formed like an Ω where the open ends are connected with a lashing going through the sails eyelets. I thought that by putting a ring with overlapping ends through the eyelets and then bend the ends backwards I could imitate the Ω. It looks quite ok but I'm still asking myself if I should double the number of hanks. Initially I put one on each seam of the sail cloths as shown e.g. in Lees' book. a single hank perhaps I should double the number of hanks... The down hauler leads from the peak through a block on the stay to the on a pin below the belfry. Another problem was the sheet. Originally I thought that I must install double sheets as for the jib but didn't know how. But Marquardt simply states that '...the sheet belayed before the mast.' Therefore a sheet similar to the one of the fore gaff was rigged. Finally the tack was lashed to the upper deadeye of the fore stay. down hauler and single sheet

Hi John You have been there, I think. Yes the Föhn may give you a headache and he was also famous for helping to burn down whole villages in earlier times. Hi Nils Right. This one was a bit more complicated but manageable. I remember that you sort of printed yours but painting it was fun and quickly done. Hi Spy Thank you for your inputs. I fully agree with your solution of the problem with the two free ends. Only it would perhaps be a bit too straightforward and logical for the navy... In Marquardts book I found Johns ledges. They were used from the early 19th century, called reef combs and guided reef pendants. Those pendants were used to haul down the sail when taking in a reef. The holes therefore had to lie directly below the reef cringles. Thanks for all the likes peter

Hi Jonathan My first approach to this problem was with logic - as you did. You may see the result on Pegasus where I took the flag line through a block on the outer end of the boom and belayed it on a cleat, put into the side of the boom. However for some reason it seems that the usual solution was not logical. I believe it was Jack Aubrey who once stated that there were two ways to do something: The right way and the way the navy does it. In Pickles excellent building manual the rigging of the flag halyard is described in detail. The flag line block should be placed on the outer part of the gaff. However I placed it on an eyebolt in the end of the gaff as mentioned by Marquardt. The halyard now runs through that block with 2 free ends - one holding the flag. Both ends are belayed on the same cleat on the inner bulwark. An identical cleat would be available on the opposite bulwark. This arrangement seems to confirm several illustrations and paintings where the flag line leads from the tip of the gaff somewhere towards the bulwark some distance forward of the taffrail. You would have to rearrange that flag halyard frequently when tacking - but this was probably the navy way. And by the way - your Rattlesnake is a very impressive reptile. peter flag halyard arrangement on Pegasus - probably wrong that seaman stands just forward of the flag line cleat

Hi John From a complete landlubber to somebody who lives at least a lot nearer to a coastline: I understand you very well. But I'm afraid that you have to learn the ropes a bit. However it's made easier by the fact that it's actually a kind of a matrix: - you have the masts: fore, main mizzen - you have the floors: ground floor, topmast, topgallant mast, royal - you have sails: - square sails with top(head), sides(leach) and underside(foot) - fore-and-aft sails with uppermost corner(peak), head, upper corner on mast(throat), mast side(luff), lower corner on mast(tack), foot, lower aft corner(clew) and aft side(leech) - you have the yards: basically named as the sails On each yard and each sail you have the same kind of lines. - yards: lifts to hold them up, braces to turn them, truss and sling to fix them - square sails: sheets to hold the lower corners(clews), clew lines to pull the clews up, bowlines to pull the sides of the sail forward, reef tackles to lift the sail towards the yard for reefing - fore and aft sails: vangs to fix the gaff(replaces the yard), brails to pull the sail towards gaff and yard Of course there are about a zillion more but those above should cover the most important. And if you know one rig, you know them all. I often find the books of the 'Anatomy of the Ship' series quite helpful. If you find one of a vessel which is close to the one you are building (perhaps Alert or Granado) it may help to see how those lines work together on a specific ship. And if I'm completely desperate I find some solace in Patrick O'Brian's Stephen Maturin and his never ending struggle with the incomprehensible language of the sailors. Cheers peter PS Yes, Wolfram zu Mondfelds book is a gem. But I have the German original and therefore the happiness to struggle with those expressions in two different languages!

Hi Nils I'm sorry to hear about your health problems. As you must avoid lifting heavy loads it will indeed be difficult to work on your iron behemoth. Another reason to get well soon. Gute Besserung! peter

Jason and B.E. - thank you. Martin, don't underestimate sailing conditions in Switzerland. On some lakes they got winds up to 80 kts. Winds blowing across the alps and through the valleys can get quite strong, sometimes aided also by a Venturi effect caused by high mountains framing the lake. John and Spy, thanks for the compliments Looking through Lees' 'The Masting and Riggging of English Ships of War' and Harlands 'Seamanship in the Age of Sail' I find that furling the spanker or gaff by lowering the boom wasn't always practiced. Depending on size of the ship (and boom), the wind and how fast the sail should be available it seems they also could brail in a 'boomed' sail. (See Lees' page 113). Harland mentions the possibility to leave the gaff hoisted in harbour for example if you wanted to fly the ensign(!). John, thanks again for the picture but fortunately there is more than one way to furl a gaff sail. Spy, hoisting an ensign seems enough to justify a hoisted gaff. Thank you for the likes peter

Showing the flag As a little brake in sail 'stitching' I made and set the flag. Pickle probably started her marine life under the blue ensign while being on the Jamaica station but apparently all ships present at Trafalgar flew a white ensign. So, a white ensign it had to be and of course the one used after 1800 with the cross of St Patrick included. I hand painted (here I really was glad that the Welsh dragon was never included in the union jack) the flag on the same but untreated cotton I use for the sails. The inaccuracies of the painter will hopefully be masked by the folds of the flag, hanging almost limp in a very light breeze. I wasn't sure if I would have to set it on the windward or lee side but opted for the first as the view onto starboard will be the favoured one with the sails set for the expected breeze from this side. Both running ends of the flag line are therefore belayed on the starboard side. both sides of the flag are hand painted

Congratulations Frank - very clean and crisp 'dirty' work created a beauty. BTW - how did you fix the staysails on the stays? Metal rings? Cheers peter

Hi B.E. Thank you. For the roach I just tried a depth of about 1,5 times the width of a cloth, an average value measured in several drafts of schooners under sail. This would be about 3 feet and coincides nicely with Lees' chapter about sail making. Trials with the paper sail showed that it works. The sail still would chafe a bit on the stay - something that would ask for crowfeet on a larger ship. Unfortunately the paper sail trials concealed the fact that the sail was a bit too long for the position of the already established crossjack and I had to re-rig it (or remake the sail). Congratulations on your new working space. I bet, a lot of modellers in this forum now know what to wish for next Christmas. But how you will bring yourself to make some dust there, I cannot imagine. BTW what did you use on the floor? In my workspace I have cork and I did swear a thousand times, while crawling on it and searching for a tiny dropped part, that the next floor would be in a smooth clinical white. peter

Hi Nils Thank you. Now, after setting up just one square sail with most of its lines, I really can appreciate the huge amount of sisyphusian work you did on your Pegasus while setting up dozens of them! Frank, Thanks a lot. Tony, Nice comment. Thank you. peter

The topsail - a long story The topsail proved to be the most complicated sail to make so far. The concave foot of the sail was drawn free handed and the resulting glued seam shows it a bit. I added bowlines and reef tackles to the kits clew lines, sheets and braces. Lifts and tye were installed as per instructions. The strange parrel however was changed to double rows similar to those on Pegasus. The topsail yard got some simple horses and was, as far as possible, prepared with the necessary lines. The sail was bent to the topsail yard and hoisted - only to find that it was a bit too large. I had to lower the crossjack yard a few mm and to re-rig the sling , truss and the sheet and lift blocks in the process. The sail still looks a little large compared to the usual illustrations of schooners but for all that effort it needed to set up that piece of cloth, I want my skipper to really get some extra thrust out of it. The yards are braced to port a bit as explained above. The reef tackles lead up through holes in the outer yard ends, through small blocks in a span at the mast head and are belayed on the foremost capping pin rail. The bowlines presented a problem. One usual method was to lead them through the outer sheaves of a triple block on the jibboom end. My intention was to replace the kits single block with a treble one but several laborious attempts of my carpenter to make one failed spectacularly - mostly braking apart at the holes. Then the same carpenter reminded me of the alternative method to set up topgallant stay and bowlines via a treble thimble strap and we decided to combine the single block with a double thimble strap for the bowlines. My excuse for this perhaps unorthodox mix is Marquardt's statement that no other rig was as individual as that of the schooner. Double bridles were applied to the sail and the bowlines led via my reliable wooden thimbles to my pin rail on the bowsprit step. They will be definitely belayed only after setting up all the stay sails. There is still some stowing of loose ends to do before starting on those stay sails. I've got the feeling that the effort and time to set up the topsail was about three times that of any fore and aft sail. If this compares to the prototypes, I see now another good reason to rather use fore and aft sails on smaller vessels with a relatively small crew or on modern yachts. topsail the sailmaker sets the last few stitches topsail yard is ready block and thimbles arrangement on the jibboom end topsail hoisted Pickles topsail may be a bit large

The fore yard (similar to a crossjack) was now prepared. Generally I followed the manual. Only for the lift I used two of my wooden thimbles to set up the lanyard. Sometimes I needed to check the setup in Lees' book. The manual could use some additional pictures here, e.g. for the sling. For the stirrups of the footropes I used the same 0,25 black thread as for the footropes themselves. The manual asks for some wire but I find B.E.'s solution much better - but definitely not easier to make. The yard will later be braced about 30° to port, depicting a situation of a becalmed Pickle ready to catch a breeze somewhere from the starboard. (The master said it will certainly come, he can feel it in his bones.) There is quite some fiddling work to do for the fore and the fore topsail yard. I only hope that bit of additional thrust Pickle will get from the fore topsail will be worth all that work for setting up, handling and maintaining those two yards. The yard is ready. The prepared sling lies on the left. yard installed detail with the sling

Hi Tony Truly great looking sail! As we are more or less at the same stage of our respective builds, it's quite interesting to compare modelspan and cotton sails. On my Pickle I was too lazy to form the lower edge of the main sail and the reef bands in a curve. I read somewhere that you hardly notice the difference once the sail is hoisted. I'm quite happy with the result of my shortcut but of course yours is the real thing. About your Sherbourne's windless sails: Sailing ships quite often were and are becalmed. While you could use engine power today you had just to wait it out then. So I imagine my Pickle on a beautiful Sunday morning, lying there on a calm empty sea, with all the sails ready to catch that breeze, the master said, he can feel in his bones to come up. No Elysium yet. Cheers peter

Trying to find out how to set all the jib sails I noticed that the fore stay seemed to lead too far out onto the bowsprit. When changing the bowsprit proportions I didn't change the fore stay accordingly. Moving the attachment point about 20mm inboard provided a better spread of the stays and their sails and also a more harmonic picture. old distribution of stays fore stay adjusted