druxey

Fascinating and amazing detail!

Coming along nicely! I've noticed that a framed model tends to spread at the toptimbers until things are tied together by deck beams, etc. Glad you spotted this early enough to correct.

On a smaller vessel, the bowsprit was sometimes constrained by an iron hoop attached to the bulwark. The heel was secured to the bowsprit step with an iron fid.

The bow ports were not armed: no space for working a gun! The were used as bridle ports for anchor handling. The vertical half-port lids illustrated were 'for example' and not drawn for all the other ports. You could not have a conventional lid as there was nothing but the rail above the port opening. There was no place to fit a hinge to! The advantage of these lids was that in a heavy sea you would not ship as much water over the decks as would happen with open ports.

Nice to see you back at it, Marc!

mnl is correct; watercolor is a transparent medium. You can also see the background through the ships' masts and the knee of the head.

There are several suggested routes you might take. Try this first, though:

If you used white glue, rubbing alcohol will soften it so that you can disassemble the planks and try again. Wetting the planks , you can re-shape them, then let them dry. The second time you now know what to look for and check on. It's always a learning process, no matter how long you've been building models!

'Sea' what you can do! (groan)

Lovely touch and a tip of the hat to SeaWatch!

Only 1,100km or 684 miles for me! More economy with a Honda Civic....

Jaager: Your reference to the Unimat saw attachment made me smile. Back in 1970 that was the only way I could cut plank and other stock. A lot of hit and miss with any cut depths or widths! And the dust everywhere....

Perhaps a thin wash of brown to tone it down a bit more? It draws my eye just a little too much. Again, it's a matter of personal taste.

You would definitely need a wider stance on board anyway with the motion of the ship under you, as well as bracing yourself against the pressure of the rudder/tiller combination.

I see you've been at Mots d'heures gousse râmes again, Steven. Sometimes I worry about you!

Interesting solution, Chuck. Does it account for the angle of the deck that the cupola sits on?

Lovely clean work, Erik!

Spare spars might have been lashed to the bulwark tops except that, in your case, the rail does not continue over the ports! Possibly they were lashed vertically to the foremost shrouds.

Very nice work on the spars and the finish looks excellent.

Very effective and grungy!

Looking excellent, Patrick.

Both nicely done and enhanced! I really like the neat 'flaked  down' coils of line.

A head stick was certainly in use in the 18th century on fore and jib sails, as shown above, but I've never seen a contemporary 17th century English yacht drawing or painting that even hints at their use. If anyone can point to the arrangement this at that time, I'd be appreciative of the evidence.

I rather like the 'greasy' bars, actually, Mark! A nice inadvertent touch. Good start to planking. I hope you'll leave some of those frames showing.

Lucky for you that the two Bellonas (Belloni?) were on display! Otherwise you'd have had to arrange a visit to the 'reserve collection' in Chatham and request the models that you wished to study.

Lovely progress, Mark. Looks like the grill bars could use de-greasing!  

Hope you are recovering well.

Very, very impressive all round, Erik.

Steven: You need to stretch the SilkSpan, wet it with water alone first and let it dry to make it drum-tight. Then, when you re-wet it with dilute acrylic, it will initially sag, but re-dry tight and smooth again.  

A very nice result, MC, your frustrations notwithstanding!