Karleop

Karl : thanks for your post. This, my first effort at rigging a “complicated” ship, is still a learning experience as I move along, and fairly confusing at best. Yes your suggestion will also be incorporated. Thanks for your thoughts.
 
That area will be much more involved than the just (finally) completed bow section. All those ropes were easy to place, and pin-holes were not hiding (;-).
 
Yes, I did some preliminary rope installations at the foremast section and, as I had mentioned - not enough pin-holes. I will add pins to tighten up the lines and also need to avoid crossing things up. Also Karl I am using the rigging sheets that you sent me (Billings), along with the Vasa museum profile sheet - almost ignoring the Corel sheets. In any case - when the Vasa II book is published whatever I do will be wrong - Not an issue for me any more. Just want to make sure that all lines don't cross each other up. Also with furled sails I need to be cautious how I locate certain lines (inside or outside other sail lines)
 
B,E. As always thanks for your continued visits – Your suggestion is very plausible. Much appreciated – I had not thought of that – thanks for your kind words as well.
 
So I have completed the bow section. I promise that these photos will be the last from there !!
 
As always mates thanks so much for your advice, and likes.
 
Cheers,
 

Hola Michael:
I see you are progressing well, despite the mistakes that always appear and those that you have been able to correct properly. Everything is part of the fun and also serves to exercise the mind and creativity.
I see in several of your photos (2017-11.1) that you place the rigging provisionally, leaving them loose and without fastening it to the pin-rails. I think this lends itself to confusion and complicates its placement. What I do is place each rigging on its corresponding pin, although provisionally, inserting each one into the corresponding hole and holding it with the pin (as you have done). This allows to verify the position of the rigging and check if they have enough space between them or do not cross each other or avoid other complications.
By the way, to make new holes, I use the drills of the dremel but using a manual drill.
 
Muchos saludos, Karl

Hola Michael:
I see you are progressing well, despite the mistakes that always appear and those that you have been able to correct properly. Everything is part of the fun and also serves to exercise the mind and creativity.
I see in several of your photos (2017-11.1) that you place the rigging provisionally, leaving them loose and without fastening it to the pin-rails. I think this lends itself to confusion and complicates its placement. What I do is place each rigging on its corresponding pin, although provisionally, inserting each one into the corresponding hole and holding it with the pin (as you have done). This allows to verify the position of the rigging and check if they have enough space between them or do not cross each other or avoid other complications.
By the way, to make new holes, I use the drills of the dremel but using a manual drill.
 
Muchos saludos, Karl

Hola Michael:
I see you are progressing well, despite the mistakes that always appear and those that you have been able to correct properly. Everything is part of the fun and also serves to exercise the mind and creativity.
I see in several of your photos (2017-11.1) that you place the rigging provisionally, leaving them loose and without fastening it to the pin-rails. I think this lends itself to confusion and complicates its placement. What I do is place each rigging on its corresponding pin, although provisionally, inserting each one into the corresponding hole and holding it with the pin (as you have done). This allows to verify the position of the rigging and check if they have enough space between them or do not cross each other or avoid other complications.
By the way, to make new holes, I use the drills of the dremel but using a manual drill.
 
Muchos saludos, Karl

Martyn – much appreciated thanks so much,
 
JanV: Thanks for still following along. Appreciate the compliment as well. Yes, you have been very busy with your house – well worth closing the shipyard for a while.
 
Update NO – but a badly avoided major issue. I share the fix in case others may end up with this problem….and could prevent the possibility beforehand.
 
Was finishing up the bowsprit area rigging details and sort of noticed over the last couple of weeks or so that the bowsprit platform was well “not looking right” wiggling a bit as well – then decided to pay it some real attention.
 
Curses here was the problem! (with the entire section on the verge of collapsing as well). Those of you kind enough to follow and also read along might remember that I had mentioned snapping the flagstaff mast twice. Well that problem was not limited to just that tiny mast.
 

 
The brass wire certainly saved the entire section from collapsing.
 
So the fix:
 
Disconnected those six futtock shrouds as well as that block
 
Slivered in lots of glue into the open gashes,
 
Used forward pressure with other hand to close the wound, re-adjusted the platform - then impaled a drill bit through both masts.
 
Kept adding drill bit depth into the masts by re-adjusting the bit bite on the Dremel – to the point where the drill bit was almost totally inserted.
 
Drill bit stayed there – then used locking tweezers to secure the mess and let the glue cure.
 

 
Added bits of wood to add substantive filler within the gaps – also hoping to add rigidity.
 

 
Then went to another area of the house carrying an empty glass that needed filling (it was Sat night J) and let this wound close up overnight.
 

 
Today: snapped off the end of the drill bit, Dremeled the left over shard.
 
Decided to add a camouflage to the scars, it got really fixed but post-surgery was ugly (:-) and there were unacceptable visible gaps. The slivers of wood do hide the fix, even though not correct.
 
     A                                                            
 

Denis,
 
Yes it’s a good technique. It also adds temporary tension to a line with just the pin holding in place allowing for later re-adjusting the lines as needed.
 
Then cutting the extra and adding the coiled rope covers seems to work very well.
 
=======================
 
Also for making coiled ropes:
 
Using painter’s trim tape coil the rope.
Add a film of CA Gel
This will “lock” the spooled coil. And the gel will not bleed through to what will serve as the topside of the coil.
 
I then used small beads of Gorilla wood glue to secure the coil in place on the deck.
 
Had I thought of this much earlier I would have tried to coil all of the canon ropes. Though those ropes are super small almost like thick thread. Hmmm
 
 

 
Almost fished with this section - Last night started the three foremast sails- now that's a mess to figure out.
 
PS: Peter, I'm so happy that you know very little about Viking ships - what a personal relief (:-)))
 
Don Thanks !
 

 
 

Hi Mates,
 Minor update. Started locating all of the bow area pin locations.
 Now starting with securing most of the shrouds, a few will wait until I get to the foremast. These lines connect to the foresails as well as to the lower forestay rope.
 Need to be sure that no tension bends occur later.
 

 
Also started doing rope wraps for the pins. One at a time will take way too long – need to get some kind of mass assembly of sorts. I’ll search out of logs for ideas in the rigging section.
 
Need to determine visual spool lengths as some shrouds connect to furled sails, others not. Also need to do some coiled wraps on the deck. For that purpose, I’ve ordered double sided clear tape as one of the members suggested in his log.
 

 
Rotating the boat back and forth on that small table of mine – the side of the gallery hit the recess of the inside the deep double-glazed window frame – Grrrr fix came out OK.
Moved the small table a bit away from the window ledge.
 

 
 
 
As always, thanks for your comments and likes.
 
Regards,
 
 
 
 
 

Some other pictures of lower masts (woolding hoops and wooldings, iron hoops).

Thank you guys, the answer to the jdbondy question: See the picture in my post dated 4 August. There is an aid tool which I use to make networks. After thread stretching is important thoroughly to overlap the netting with diluted PVA glue. After drying is possible to cut the netting into the required shape.
Work is now slower, thanks to my own stupidity, I often have to make some parts agani and again. Some pictures from lower mast production for today.

Slow, but steady progress still happening.
 
Worked on a bit more deck furniture. I also have some of the other deck boxes built but not fully painted yet. I think have three or four more to install.
 

The fuzzies you see were cleaned up before installation.

 
And as she sits today. Still needs a bit of touchup on the black on the hull to cover up the yellow smudges. I will most likely be painting the windows onto the various furniture as  I did on the forward most one. I need to make some templates first. I'm still unsure if I'm going to install the cannons since they are so out of scale. I may just close the ports and call it done.
 

There isn't a huge amount of work left before the deck is fully furnished. Unfortunately I'm only working on her at best a couple hours a week.
 
A couple of older pics as well. These were taken before I worked on cleaning up the hull paint. I switched the black to a different acrylic and it made a HUGE difference in the quality.

Progress continues, slowly. I primed the hull, sanded, filled low spots, sanded, and primed it again. I then mounted it to the stand and drew the water line.
 
I only have on photo of the result. The holes for the mount aren't perfect and it draws up a bit. It takes almost no force to push back down so when I mount the blocks to the final display stand I will glue or screw them down flush.
 
Next up is the green up to the waterline and the black above. Once painted I'll have to permanently mount it to the stand since the MS paint is pretty fragile stuff and tends to lift if handled too much.
 

 
Most likely I will leave the screws and outboard drive off the side of the hull. I realize the real ship has them but the castings that come with the kit are quite ugly and I feel they ruin the lines of the hull. I also don't really want fragile little things hanging off the side of the hull. They'll almost certainly get knocked off at some point.

I started working on the PoB II again last weekend.
 
I started by installing these pieces at the bow. I can't remember what they're called right now but they hold the anchors.
 

 
After that I decided to start finishing the deck from aft to fore. I built the binnacle and installed it, the wheel house, a rear hatch, and a block for the boom. This is the second binnacle I made. The first came out awful because I tried to replicate the molding. at 1:64 scale that molding at 3/4" or so only sits proud of the binnacle about 0.011". It's not worth the effort to reproduce.
 

 
Then I remembered that I needed to finish the hull first and get it attached to the base. So I applied a primer wash (thinned about 30%). There are several cracks from the planking that I'm not happy with so I'll be filling those with a bit of filler, sanding the whole hull, applying another layer of primer and then the final layers of hull paint.
 

 
While I was waiting on the primer to try I started working on the yards. Unfortunately I've completely forgotten how to make yards so I'll have to figure that out again.

Hi Mates,
 
Installed the mizzen yards and the last furled sail.
 Well, I do believe that all rigging has mostly been attached, except for a few upper mizzen sail lines, and other bits.
 =================
 An observation: I had initially a lot of doubts about adding sails. In retrospect happy that I took the leap. That said, the sails added (I’m estimating) probably 60% more required rigging than if I had just hung the yardarms without any sails at all.
 
Though as I had mentioned earlier – much appreciated the learning experience this provided.
 Now will start at the bowsprit attach, and pin locate all of the 100s of ropes leading through to the stern.
 
Steven Thanks so much for your kind compliment, remarks, AND for your link. Excellent indeed.
 
 Here are a few updated pics.
 
Cheers,

 
 

The aft platform was fairly simple to craft. Edge-glued after using a #2 pencil to simulate the caulking. After I was satisfied with the shape of my template I traced it onto my maple strips. Straight cuts were made with several passes of an exact knife for the general shape. The rotory tool with sanding disk got the wood close to the outline so I could fine sand the rest.
 
Since the strips were edge-glued, there was a slight bend. I braced the back with a single strip of wood. One more sanding and coat of finish is needed before it is glued. 
Steve

Peter,
 
Thanks, as always for your superlative level of knowledge regarding the Vasa and its mysteries. I very much appreciate your information.
I did find another photo of the Norske løve.
 
Made a couple of notations. Thanks for the thought, and the link. Very interesting that you “got one” over on Fred –
And indeed the rigging is very similar to Vasa.
===================================

 
Minor update; getting the mizzen sail and its two yards ready for mounting. Here are a few updated shots along with comments.
 
Yes, nearly done – thanks so much for your very nice compliment as well.
 
Cheers,

 

Below are the process photos of the floorboard installation. Shaping the planks was accomplished first. I traced a cap to create the rounded shape at the bow. Next step was to install the middle plank. After this dried, the next two outer planks were glued. Finally, the last two planks were installed. Wipe-on-Poly was applied the following day. Five non-consecutive days to complete this process. 
 
After applying the finish I noticed a plank was a bit loose. This will be fastened before the next steps. 
Steve

Peter, Dave: Thanks appreciated. I have decided to do something about the "problem" that I have with those two blocks. I'll update when I have a plan.
 
Hubac: Very kind of you to follow along. Your work is indeed very impressive.
 
Here is the answer to your question.
MORE than you probably ever wanted to know 
 
VASA II will be the companion to the first book.
 
Here I copied and pasted from the Vasa specific forum Fred Hocker's information; for us Vasa builders it has been so frustrating waiting for this "bible" of the ship's rigging.
 

 
=================================================
Since everyone wants to know, I thought I would start a thread here for status updates on the Vasa rigging volume (Vasa II). PS: thread is from 2014
 
Part 1 – The archaeological evidence (Hocker)
The first part of the book presents and analyzes the find material from Vasa which is relevant to the understanding of how the ship was rigged and sailed. Chapters are organized by functional groups and vary in length, depending on the amount of find material. In each chapter, the relevant finds are described and illustrated in sufficient detail to allow useful conclusions to be drawn. Due to the number of finds and the fact that many of them were made on a production basis in specialized workshops, it is not necessary to present every object individually – readers are referred to the Vasa Museum’s online finds database for such information.

Chapter 2: Hull, including construction (Hocker)
This covers the fixed part of the rigging material which was part of the ship’s structure or fastened permanently to it:
1. Mast steps and partners
2. Chainwales
3. Bitts
4. Catheads and fish davit
5. Fixed sheaves in bulwarks, chesstree, etc.
6. Belaying devices (kevels, pinrails, etc.)
7. Ironwork

Chapter 3: Spars (Hocker, Nilsson)
Spars are the masts and yards, the wooden poles which carry the sails and allow them to be adjusted to meet the wind at an optimum angle and transfer the wind’s energy to the ship.
Chapter 4: Tops (Hocker)

Tops are the round platforms at the heads of the masts which provide working space for handling the rigging as well as sharpshooter positions in battle.

Chapter 5: Tackle (Howe, Lindblom, Hocker) 
Tackle is all of the movable wooden and metal parts of the rigging which connect the sails to the spars and the hull and allow them to be raised, lowered and controlled
1. Deadeyes (Lindblom)
2. Blocks (Howe)
3. Parrels (Hocker)
4. Euphroes (Hocker)
5. Fairleads (Hocker)
6. Other (Hocker)

Chapter 6: Rope (Magnus, Seeberg, Hocker)
The rope represents one of the groundbreaking studies in this volume. It is a common find on archaeological sites but rarely presented or studied in detail, so this chapter receives special emphasis and extra material on the materials and manufacturing processes.

Chapter 7: Sails (Bartoš, Bengtsson)
The sails are the most unusual find among all of the artefacts found with Vasa, and so this chapter is also given extra weight. 

Chapter 8: Capstans and windlass (Donohue)
Capstans are the human-powered machines mounted on the deck, which make it possible to lift the heavy weights of the anchors and sails.

Chapter 9: Steering (Hocker)
Vasa preserves the only known complete example of the whipstaff steering system, the most common form of steering gear on large ships from the late Middle Ages until about 1700. 

Chapter 10: Anchors (Hocker, Ward)
Anchors are essential for operation of the ship, and all parts of the anchoring system survive, including anchors, stocks, buoys and cables. 
Chapter 11: Navigation equipment (Hocker, Pipping)
The navigation equipment (compasses,timekeeping devices, sounding leads, etc.) is included in this volume as it is essential to sailing the ship.

Chapter 12: Reconstructing Vasa’s rig (Hocker, Pipping, Stolt)
This chapter synthesizes all of the archaeological evidence and comparative material in a reconstruction of the rigging of Vasa.

Part 2 – Rigging and Sailing Vasa (Pipping)

The second part takes the archaeological data as the departure point for a more wide-ranging contextual examination of the rigging and sailing of a large ship such as Vasa. Where the first part focused more on objects, this part focuses on process and meaning to explore the relevance of this find to larger questions of ergonomics and organisation, resource utilization, and operational implications.

Chapter 13: Ship performance and the sailing environment of the Baltic Sea
The geographic and climatological context is examined, as are the operational environment and the strategic limits within which the ship functioned. The essential parameters of the ship’s performance, such as speed, stability and weatherliness, are discussed in order to establish how well the ship was suited to its likely sailing routes and conditions. 

Chapter 14: Money, materials and men (Hocker)
This chapter concentrates on the administrative framework for outfitting Swedish naval vessels and the resource base from which the raw material were drawn, as well as the organization of the processes of producing rigging and assembling it into a functioning rig. It addresses the economic, environmental and social factors influencing the production of sails, rope and tackle. It makes use of the historical documents relating to the operation of the Stockholm navy yard, where the ship was rigged and fitted out, as well as the remains of the ship itself.

Chapter 15: Rigging the ship
The process of rigging, starting with a bare hull and progressing to a fully outfitted ship ready to sail, is followed in detail, with attention on the manpower requirements, the organizational challenges, and the technical limitations imposed by the particular materials and methods used.
Chapter 16: Sailing the ship

The chapter opens with an analysis of crew organization and Vasa’s one, brief sailing passage for what they say about the ship’s performance and the level of competence of the crew. The rest of the chapter follows a typical passage across the Baltic, based on the sequence of sailing orders recorded for the Swedish navy in the 17th century. It presents the different maneuvers which the ship was expected to perform and how they should have been carried out. The ergonomic requirements are analyzed, and the ship is placed in the context of what is known about Baltic sailing in the 17th century.

Chapter 17: Sailing a modern reconstruction (Morgens and Litcofsky)
Trials made using the modern reconstruction Kalmar Nyckel both confirmed certain hypotheses about the how this rig functioned and raised new questions about the nature of the evidence used to study 17th-century seamanship. The relevance of Kalmar Nyckel for the study of how Vasa sailed is studied, as are the basic limitations of experimental archaeology.

Chapter 18: Conclusions (Pipping and Hocker)
 
 

Peter,
 
Thanks again for your very astute observations. Your constructive expertise is really very much appreciated. It certainly adds to my novice nautical knowledge. Rigging this ship along with sails is demanding a steep learning curve on my part.
 
That said much of my learning, for this Vasa, has been based on looking at photos of the 1:1, the 1/10th, Clayton’s, the museum plans sheets, and of course other Vasa builders here on MSW.
 
This build has gone through many stages of work, sitting collecting dust, and returning to the project. Between these absences I have increased my skills, discovered techniques as well as reading from the likes of experts such as Anderson.
 
Adding to this mix of learning was also the occasional excellent constructive criticism from member’s posts. These in the aggregate have increased my core knowledge base. AND the so many amazing compliments that have nurtured this build along the way as well!! 
 
Peter, comments regarding the size of the mizzenmast blocks will now gnaw at me as this overkill stares me in the face. You are, of course 100% correct – AND I do appreciate that you mentioned this. That said I’m just not sure that I want to remove that stay, re-serve a new thinner rope, add a mouse, seriously shave down the size of those two triple blocks, and try to re-attach re worked bits to the main mast (with an off-set) that will also require moving the knight back to center. My concern is also removing, and then having to re-attach the line around the mast with so many shrouds and lines already in place. Hmmm?? –But I will be staring at this every time I look at it. PS: I probably will go back to fix this - it is SO out of scale indeed. grrrrr
 
I “sorta" new that those two blocks were too big. Thought of using two of Chuck’s 1/4” triple blocks, but they “looked” way too small. Corel’s two smaller triple blocks were also too small, and were, well disgusting. So went with the Corel larger - that I “detailed”.
 
And now I also learn that the 1/10th is just a rigging mess (did not follow all the forum during Clayton’s brilliant example).
 
I did know that the 1981 museum rigging plan sheet is not accurate.  This sheet, as well as the Billings rigging plans have been my “go to” sources for attaching lines, pulleys to all of the yards and sails. There are no alternatives. I will use Billings regarding pin locations. Those sheets include the sail rope locations.
 
In the meantime the VASA II is years behind being published as it is facing its Swedish bureaucratic perfect storm; a book that has been completed, along with the latest rigging details for the entire ship. Still unavailable as of the end of 017.
 
============================
 
Yes you are correct given scaling - it is hard to accurately replicate scale for pulleys, or deadeyes (which should not exceed half the width of its corresponding mast) learned this from a member who kindly posted this during my bowsprit platform work – I changed the deadeyes after reading his post – I had used the kit mid-size, not the smallest. BTW even those are a bit “off” scale. being larger than half the width of that small bowsprit area mast.
 
===========================
 
Apologies for this inordinately long venting post.  I need to be done here. Just need to attach the two mizzen yards, and the one furled sail. Then go from bow to stern searching for the correct pin locations for the 100’s of lines --- Then it’s an 8th century visit. JUST WOOD - I plan on an open cut-out hull project. I'll add the truncated mast.
 
Again I DO very much appreciate the expertise, the likes, and compliments that members have shared on this log. Thanks Mates (;-)
 
Sincerely,
 

Second part of pictures.

It's a challenging kit for sure. Thank you everyone for the support!
Steve

Frank: Using Chuck's at Syren as well as all of his blocks - (except those 6 big ones for the three mast stays those were Corel's).
At one time Syren also had pear wood blocks, that I really liked (miss those)- sorta blended the few that I had left over here-and there.
 
Regarding his ropes and blocks I find them to be superb. Order after order the quality stays 100%. And he ships right away. 
PS: his blocks out-of-the-box are excellent but "tweak" them just a bit. hardly needed (:-)
 
FYI: His company link is on the home page right side. I'm sure that you've seen it.
 
Kier - thanks SO much for your likes 
 
Zappto: thanks for your kind words.
 
Regards,
 

Hi Mates,
Apologies for the late thanks - for the likes, and super nice comments.
Denis, Martin – so overly kind indeed.
 
Frank, she’s actually my second build. There was a 40-year gap between the Santa Maria and this current Vasa. Again you are also so kind with your compliments.
         PS: Your HMAT Supply with its “years” of weathering and barnacled hull are way beyond my skill set. Love that build of yours!
 
Henry, Somehow I intuitively sorta new that that specific ramshead needed to be off center from the mast knowing that the mizzen mast stay would attach to the lower part of the main. It wasn’t knowledge – especially looking at the three plans that I was using. Nonetheless mounted the knight off center.
Thanks for your knowledgeable clarification –luck on my end.
 
Lower main yard is now attached. Added most needed lines as well; now onto the mizzen.
 
Cheers,

 

I think I made some progress!!!
 
     The hull structure is in a pretty good shape and I think I can actually move on. I faired the deck surface and then moved on to the bulkhead. There was a LOT OF GAP between the bottom of the bulkhead and the rabbit line. I added some filler wood and sanded them down using little dowels with sandpaper glued to them. They look pretty good now. Also, I carved (actually sanded) the filler block into position on the stern of the ship. As I stated before, the plans and parts don't quite match up, but a little extra work makes everything smooth. Hope you all are having fun!

And that is exactly why the knight is always offset from the centerline of the mast.  In reality, that rams head block would need to travel almost to the trestle trees under the top when the lower yard was lowered.
 
Regards,

Hola Steve:
As others say, the planking looks very nice to me, probably you use a microscope to check your planking!!  hahaha
Saludos, Karl