keelhauled

The office is looking good. Hothead seems to know what he's doing. I like hiding the wire in the molding. Great Idea!

Alexandru, Thank you for the detailed explanation! I really appreciate you taking the time to fix your old computer to get the photos and then providing such a detailed explanation! I've been wondering how to tackle this for quite some time. You really nailed the stern. I'm just amazed with your work. It was a pleasure to follow and I continue to go back to again and again for inspiration! thanks for sharing with us! Marc

Very nice work! She looks like a fast boat! Love the details. Marc

Thanks Popeye and Ir3! Marc

looks great! Nice job on the shrouds and ratline repairs! Marc

Beautiful build. rigging is looking great!

Alexandru I went to your sight. Beautiful photos. I saw that you did more work on the stern gallery. Can you explain how you did the balusters? I saw the photos, but I wasn't sure how you formed them. thanks Marc

Hi Nenad! I used to work calculus problems for relaxation - partly because I liked solving the problems and partly because I was always afraid that I would forget how to do calculus if I needed it for work of If I went back to school. (24 years as a chemist and I only used calculus for work twice - although I did teach it for a year). I tried Sudoku. The admiral loves these games and goes through several books a year of NINJA level Sudoku. I tried these puzzles, but find them too tedious. Nenad, my hat is of too you for your skills with these games! I was blown away at how much work the sails required. I'm sure that they will be worth it. I'm now trying to figure out what deck features have to be put into place before rigging the mast verses what deck features will block rigging that mast. Now that is a puzzle!! Take care and enjoy your Sudoku and chess! Marc

Hi, Worked on the anchors. They came from the kit, but required quite a bit of grinding work (still under progress in the photos). Also I had to plug and re-drill the shank for the anchor stocks - the opening was much too large. Here they are assembled And painted

Thanks Popeye and Nenad! I'm started working on the anchors today. I think that I will just stow them on the sides. Longridge has his anchors on deck - see page 82. Had to find photos of the anchor stowed. Here a a couple. Hopefully it will help when you get to this point. I believe that the first photo is before the restoration. It has the fluke on the billboard and the has the shank painter chain made fast similar to Campbell's plans I think that this is after the restoration and has the fluke up on the rail. This is true for photos after the restoration. Not sure why the fluke is on deck instead of the billboard. The billboard is to protect the ship from the flukes. Also the shank/fluke chain is forward which wouldn't have been stable. Anyway. Hope this might help when you get to this point. I'll photo my anchors after I'm done grinding the seams. Here are a couple of paintings of the cutty with sails. Nenad, here she is with almost everything set. In this painting she is still missing several stunsails!! You'll need a big case, she is about as wide as she is tall! This is probably how I will have mine set (approximately) Thanks Marc

Congratulations!! What a beautiful piece of art!!

Congratulations!! What a beautiful piece of art!!

Thanks for the thoughts Popeye. I'll probably end up just having the anchors on the sides. As far as the sails, I do have a set of full size sails for the ones that I have furled, Just in case I changed my mind (I'm crazy - all the extra work). I would just have to switch them out on the yards. thanks! Marc

shiny and bright! it looks like her Captain and master are driving their crew when it comes to cleaning. I've read that during the tea trade, the captains kept their ships clean and painted like yachts.

Hi Nenad, years ago when I was at the University I built the Revell model of the Constitution, which is a plastic model about 1:98. I set all the sails including the stunsails. The model looks great, but it really blocked most of the details and also created a massive bulk to the look. So I decided to set the Cutty so that it was easier to see the deck and less bulky looking. I saw a painting that had a cutter with a sail arrangement that I though would work well. So I'm setting the Cutty as if she is close to the bowline with strong wind. The royals and sky sails will be furled. The main and mizzen courses will raised up into their gear to give an unobstructed view of the deck. The fore course will be set as will the upper and lower topsails and the t'gallents. Three jibs will be set as will the spanker and probably the t'gallent stay sails (I don't want to block the details of the back of the masts so if I don't have them set I'll remove them). I will probably furl the lower stay sails so that the deck isn't obstructed. also there won't be any stunsails set. I was thinking of only setting one jib, but I think that she would look better with them set. Also if they were furled, either on the boom or fo'cle they would block all of that detail and look sloppy to anyone without the knowledge of how they should look. The next question is the anchors. I was thinking of having one anchor being shipped onto the deck with the rail removed and the deck anchor davit lifting the fluke. As I understand it, The bertrum pendant was used to raise the anchor during catting as well as lifting the shaft or ring during shipping the anchor onto deck. If anyone knows differently, please let me know. I was going to have the other anchor stowed on the side. However, they probably wouldn't have done this during the whether that would require shortening of sail. Does it matter? If they had been at sea for any period of time the chains would have been removed from the anchors. But then to most people looking at the model it will probably look like I forgot the chains. Also I was going to run the chains around the windlass to the chain pipes. I think it would look more interesting. But if the chains were removed from the anchors they would have been stored in the locker and wouldn't be left on deck where they can cause damage and be a danger to the crew. So many decisions. Nenad, are you going to put sails on your Cutty. If so, which ones? thanks Marc

Oh, I forgot. Here is photos of the third attempt at the furled sails. It is about 25 to 30 percent of the original length. The bulk has been drastically reduced. Here is what it looked like before: From the front And the top And trimmed down: From the front And the top By the way, in case you wondered, it is faster to bend a fully set said than a furled one. Much faster! thanks marc

Hi everyone. Sorry I haven't posted with updates in quite a long time. I've been traveling internationally pretty heavy since January - about one to three weeks a month. At least half of my weekends were taken up with this as well. But.......I have made progress on the model. So some updates. I've been working hard on the sails for what seems like years. All of the sails have their bolt ropes, earrings, foots, and reef lines. All of the corners of the bolt ropes were served before attaching. All of the staysails except the jibs need their hanks. All of the courses, top sails, t'gallent, and royal and sky sails have been bent to their yards. So today, I realized I didn't take photos of any of this. I'll take some photos of the sails as they are and post soon. Until then, here is my sewing machine. Apparently I had the mind to take a photo of this and not the progress on the sails. You can see my sail cloth and sails behind the machine. (Edit - I just realized that I didn't address the sail cloth in the background. In addition to the sails that I commissioned, I ended up sewing some replacement sails for the jib, royal, some stay sails and the furled sails. what I found is that they are tedious and a real pain to sew. took several attempts. So the sewing part of the sails represents work by Radek and myself). So while, I was making hanks for the jibs I realized that I never made the mast head preventer clamps. I took a break from making and sewing hanks. I think that this detail is important to the character of the Cutty's mast. I made them from brass. I guess you can see from the shrouds in the photos. I never took photos of this step either. So that brings me to the shrouds. I looked at all of the rigging photos, The comments on Campbell's plans. ALL of the Shrouds are completely served!!! Well, I have become very close friends with Chuck's serving machine and have become good at dealing with serving three foot lengths of shrouds. I have to tell you through, it gets pretty tedious and boring at the same time. But they look great! . During this process, I also learned that they need to be hung with weights to straighten them out. Now here comes my first screw up. while I was working on the serving, I wanted to make the jig for the top deadeyes. So I made one spacing jig based on the distance between the deadeyes as they should be according to Campbells plans. I did a test run with unserved lines set up with deadeyes using the spacers. After the glue dried, I ran the lanyards. The shrouds ended up stretching over a couple of days under tension. I figured they would, which was the point of the test run, so that I would know how much they would end up stretching. So I re-made the spacing jig for the top deadeyes ran the test again and the change worked perfectly. Yeah So I ran the served shrouds around the mast and seized them according to the books. I used the new spacer and secured the shrouds around the deadeyes. the next day I set up the lanyards through the deadeyes and let the mast sit for a few days. No stretch. Two weeks, no stretch. A month later, no stretch! Now the decision about what to do. It took hours and hours to serve those shrouds. start from scratch. or try to save them. I decided to try to save them. They had been glued with Elmer's wood glue. So I was able to unglue the shrouds and remove the deadyes. The shrouds wanted to stay in a curved shape where the deadeyes had been glued. I was going to soften the risidual glue, then it hit me that the serving was kept in place by the same glue. If I wasn't careful, I'd end up removing the serving. I applied alcohol and rolled the line through my fingers which helped relax the bend in the line. For the most part this worked ok. I made a new jig and refastened the deadeyes and setup the lanyards. This rig sat for several months due to travel, but I also wanted to make sure that there wasn't much stretch if any. I adjusted the tension the lanyards made sure that the masts were straight in all directions. I don't think that it turned out too bad. And since the sails will probably obstruct the entire rig, it probably doesn't matter anyway. Now on to the ratlines. So here I screw up again!! I did the calculations and had to decide between a diameter that was much less than what it should be or one that was slightly larger. I tried both and ended up going with the slightly large diameter (actually it was slightly thinner than the same diameter that Mantua supplied for the ratlines. Above IS NOT a photo of the mast with the slightly larger ratlines, but is a photo of the completed t'gallent ratlines - that's right BOTH sides - with line that is TWICE the diameter of the line that I chose and intended to use!! So..........luckily, I had used diluted carpenters glue. So, I removed two nights work and replaced it with the correct line. And the top ratlines Here's a photo of the cow hitch used on the lanyards I attached it as semi close to the way that is shown in campbell's plans Thanks marc

Ahhh details no one will ever see! wait to you see how much painstaking details of the mast and rigging will be covered by the sails!!! I believe we are crazy

Your Cutty is Beautiful!! Also Hothead's work was great! very nice!

Tasmanian, When I reworked the furled sails they were about 25 percent of the original size, which is slightly less than the size you remembered seeing. They may still be too bulky, but they are good enough. thanks for the info! Popeye, thanks for the encouragement. I'll try to get some post done this weekend.

I've been traveling, but I've been building! I'll post all the updates soon! Marc

Hi Frankie, I actually used your video to furl the sails originally. I followed the video pausing and executing step by step. Fairly close at least. But as you say, too much bulk. However it was fun and challenging to furl the sail as close to that video as I could. The biggest trouble is the tucking in of the sail under the skin. AVSJerome and spyglass. I'm planning on having the main and fore courses brought up into its gear as you have posted. thanks for the help. Marc

I posted a question about the furled sails: http://modelshipworld.com/index.php/topic/12588-need-opinions-on-furled-sails/ It sounds like the consensus is that there is too much bulk. Right now they are only 50% of the length. I'll cut another 25% out. I'm not going to start from scratch. I'm going to just literally cut the bottom half off and furl the upper half and stick the corners out the top. If i really screw this up, I already have a full set of full length that are almost completely finished for these yards. My plan was to only have the royals and the sky furled with the main and fore courses pulled up in their gear. The rest of the sails set (excluding stunsuls which I wasn't going to include). Thanks for the feedback guys. I really appreciate it. I've learned that it's much easier just to set the sails then it is to furl them. Just in case anyone thinks that they will be saving work by furling their sails!

Thanks for the responses guys! I'll get rid of more sail to reduce the bulk. Maybe play with other material. I also made full versions. If I can't get a better furled version, I can go to set versions of the sails. Marc

Nenad, Really nice work on the stand! I miss it when I am not able to stay up with what you are doing. However, I love catching up. Hope all is well with you and the kids, Marc