robdurant

A small update today. I spent my day off yesterday beginning the ratlines for the mainmast shrouds. I was pleased to complete the starboard side. I use 6mm lines placed behind the shrouds as a guide, and begin by adding spaced out lines, then filling in the gaps, gluing each row as I complete it. The ratlines are #20 DMC Cordonnet Crochet thread... The same stuff I use to make ropes. I'm pleased with how it looks, and how easy it was to tie. As a natural thread, it takes the watered down PVA really well, and is easy to clip to length once dried.
 


That's it for today. Happy building, all
 
Rob

Continued from previous post...
 

A Canvas Rack is built up, once again using the provided template to build directly over.
 

 
The two sides are then joined by some cross-braces.
 

 
Rolls of canvas are then made by cutting strips of tissue paper 30mm wide by about 250 long and rolling them around a 3/32” diameter piece of brass rod. The ends are secured with some diluted white PVA glue before the rolls are given a coat of diluted off-white paint and a final dusting of some dry chalk powder. Here is the completed canvas rack.
 

 
The Oil Drum Rack is built up in a similar fashion.
 

 
Here is the rack, ready for it’s occupant.
 

 
A previously prepared drum is then added together with a hose made from 1.0 mm diameter solder wire.
 

 
A number of “mini scenes” are then created from some of the previously prepared castings and some bits of scrap wood. These will each form part of a larger scene in the final diorama. The extreme close-up of the macro lens shows me that I need to go back and take care of some of the shiny bits of epoxy that are evident here.
 

 

 

 

 

 
I believe I am now ready to start adding the details to the diorama itself…

I really missed this site after only a few hours . It kind of went hand in hand with my cup of coffee. A big thank you to the technical guys or who ever brought it back to us. Well Done.

This one was an issue at the datacenter and not any issue with MSW itself. 
 
There was a problem with the power which supplied many server cabinets at the datacenter and the outage took probably many 1000s if not 100,000's sites offline what depended on that datacenter. We were simply a casualty of that. The engineers there upgraded the power supplies and now we are back. 

After slicing the tip of my thumb off (not even hobby related) back to getting the chain plates on so I can start the second planking.

For strength I like to key them in.  A little more work but I think worth it.  First step was to sand the facing edge flush against the hull side.  Important step is to get all the bevels correct so chain plate parallel to waterline and not perpendicular to hull.

I can still work the mating surface for an even better fit but keep remembering there is still a veneer planking which will cover the entire joint.

Mark

I've just finished the yards on the mainmast. It's a process of keeping the faith as you go, as it has to look like an explosion of rope before order then appears out of the chaos... Here are the footropes in process...

And then completed...
 
 

And here's a shot of the whole mast... the lower stunsails have had the stunsail yards attached to the tops, but haven't been rigged at all yet... None of these yards are finally attached, but are pretty much complete as units. 
 

To have a bit of a break from the yards, I think I'll do some ratlines on the lower shrouds. I think I probably need to tackle the futtock shrouds (metal bars?) first, though, otherwise they're going to be a bear to access.
 
Thanks for looking in

After what has been a very busy time with many competing interests, I’ve been trying to restore some momentum for the project.
 
I’ve been working steadily, albeit at a snail’s pace, on the bow and stern.  This pile of crooked pick-up sticks will eventually become my cambered head grating:

Each slat section is hand-fit and placed by eye.  It will not be possible to neatly align these next three tiers of fore and aft slats with the splayed set immediately aft.  This is an imperfect compromise that I can live with. In the end, after the grating surface has been sanded smooth and re-painted flat black, these small discrepancies will hardly matter.  It looks like it is going to work out just fine:

There’s a significant amount of paint re-touching that has to happen - which I have not been in the mood for - but the upper balcony rail is in-place now; again, imperfect in multiple ways, but I am happy with it:


When I really have the focus and determination to, I will re-visit the paint.
 
What has excited me, lately, is that I have finally reached the stage that the entire ornamental program has been inching towards for years - the coronation of the stern!
 
These past couple of days, I’ve been making up and fitting the two primary layers that make up the tafferal:

It will take a combination of subtraction and addition, but I am feeling pretty confident that the stock sculptures for Europe and Asia can be re-worked to fit my new cornice shape:

Unlike the stock kit, which has an interior backing plate that extends above the reverse-cyma curves of the tafferal, I will make it so that the tafferal shape is continuous to the poop deck.
 
I took some care to scribe-in plank lines for the tafferal backing boards:

I am happy that I increased the camber of the middle and upper window tiers because it lends an appropriate sense of lift for the big carving.  The extremities of the clouds will be slightly modified so that they sit lower against the frame.
 
The national coat of arms now fits within the dome:

While these arms are centered on the central window pilaster, they won’t be perfectly centered within that dome shape.  I checked the dimensions of the tafferal framing, and that dome shape is perfectly centered.  This discrepancy has likely to do with cumulative error stemming from some aspect of the layout for my lowest or maybe the middle window tier.
 
At this stage, there’s no fixing it, and like all of these discrepancies they will kind of fade to the peripheries of consciousness when the completed stern is considered in its entirety.  For the most part, the important details look more right than they do wrong.  Most especially, I think I have nailed the correct shape for the big carving panel and the shape of the cornice:

There is very much work and layering of detail to come, but I am pleased with where it is all going.
 
Thank you all for your interest!
 

Not much work done on this recently as I've been on a push to get Barque Stefano completed... but we're making progress. The sails are complete, and being attached to the yards...  However, tomorrow I have an exciting day planned. I'm visiting the National Archives in Kew, London, to look at the Captain's and Master's logs of HMS Bristol. I'm hoping to read the logs for a few major events in Bristol's history - in particular her dismasting during the Great Hurricane in 1780, and a few other events.
 
So... watch this space, and I'll try and share some of what I discover. I find this part of the process really helpful in building the desire to really dig into the design and build. The connection with the vessel drives me on to see the model completed.
 
Thanks for looking in.

I've just finished the yards on the mainmast. It's a process of keeping the faith as you go, as it has to look like an explosion of rope before order then appears out of the chaos... Here are the footropes in process...

And then completed...
 
 

And here's a shot of the whole mast... the lower stunsails have had the stunsail yards attached to the tops, but haven't been rigged at all yet... None of these yards are finally attached, but are pretty much complete as units. 
 

To have a bit of a break from the yards, I think I'll do some ratlines on the lower shrouds. I think I probably need to tackle the futtock shrouds (metal bars?) first, though, otherwise they're going to be a bear to access.
 
Thanks for looking in

Not much work done on this recently as I've been on a push to get Barque Stefano completed... but we're making progress. The sails are complete, and being attached to the yards...  However, tomorrow I have an exciting day planned. I'm visiting the National Archives in Kew, London, to look at the Captain's and Master's logs of HMS Bristol. I'm hoping to read the logs for a few major events in Bristol's history - in particular her dismasting during the Great Hurricane in 1780, and a few other events.
 
So... watch this space, and I'll try and share some of what I discover. I find this part of the process really helpful in building the desire to really dig into the design and build. The connection with the vessel drives me on to see the model completed.
 
Thanks for looking in.

Aah - thank you, my better half has ordered this for my birthday, so I'm looking forward to having a good look through and getting some inspiration. To return to your earlier comments, I've pondered them, and I think I'm looking to get past plank on bulkhead, but with simplified frames... so probably using the stations rather than re-lofting each frame, and with a simplified structure without cant frames at the bow and stern. 
 
I've had another crack at the transom using an angled frame (16 degrees from perpendicular) aft of station 25 - this goes out to the wale. I've re-drafted the transoms and hopefully now it is something more workable... Some pictures... It's not quite perfect yet (and I haven't drafted the inside flow of the transom pieces), but I feel like I'm making progress. It's certainly helpful to be able to make multiple designs and try them all out.

 

 

Thanks again for all your help
 
Rob

I've spent a little time working on the stern of Bristol to see how it all shapes up... here's my progress. The stern structure was drawn out from the plans, taking care to note how the balcony and accompanying cabin walls fitted, and then the transom was stretched vertically by a factor of 1/Cos(14.2) to make it fit when it was at an angle.
 
Here's the stretched outline... 
 

 
And the part cut out in two parts and glued back to back - the recessed cornice over the cutout was removed on the outer layer, creating a 3d effect - this will be bevelled as well on the final 1:64 model, but as a proof of concept it works.  It's also confirmed that the upper deck (third down in the photo below) comes too far back, and will interfere with the stern upper counter as it is.

 
Happy building to you all
 
Rob
 
 

Progress on the 1:128 mockup from my CAD drawings. I've finished cutting out the stations and added the quarterdeck, fo'csle and poop. It's been a helpful exercise in seeing the lines of the vessel, any conflicts in terms of masts / deck cutouts / etc... Now, it's helping me think through how the stern will be constructed. I'm pleased to say that none of the frames look particularly out, except for one (frame 5) where I suspect I probably cut over the line a little... But now I can go back and take a look at this before I move onto the 1:64 scale version!
 





 

So those numbers above have been refined again by cross referencing back and forwards from the half breadth and station plans... I got to the stage where I wanted to see how things fitted together, and particularly the deck levels and openings on the decks, and where the masts land compared to the stations, etc... 
 
So here is a 1:192 styrene half hull in construction. It's only got half its stations in so far, but it's starting to give an idea of how the whole might look.
 

 

 

Thanks Dusan,
 
I've been working on the table of offsets. 
 
1. I traced the stations, giving the following table: (note negative values are because I've maintained the right of centre and left of centre frames so I can easily do a visual check of the output with a line graph.)
 
  TRACED FROM PLAN           Distance from centre (mm, 1:1) Station WL0 WL1 WL2 WL3 WL4 WL5 U       735 1476 2268 S   303 1120 2056 3019 3825 Q   921 2068 3202 4162 4820 O   1560 2929 4102 4976 5438 M   2153 3618 4747 5490 5805 K   2775 4218 5207 5784 5972 H   3247 4617 5485 5923 6025 F   3604 4856 5635 5999 6066 D   3787 4975 5688 6014 6066 B   3908 5019 5712 6015 6066 Ø   3990 5065 5737 6015 6066 Ø (bow)   -4001 -5064 -5740 -6031 -6069 1   -3940 -5016 -5724 -6032 -6069 3   -3848 -4949 -5675 -6022 -6059 5   -3631 -4811 -5602 -5992 -6049 7   -3428 -4640 -5486 -5934 -6029 9   -3088 -4394 -5324 -5850 -5976 11   -2541 -4027 -5078 -5692 -5912 13   -2029 -3581 -4754 -5507 -5795 15   -1505 -2997 -4272 -5192 -5591 17   -1062 -2348 -3706 -4805 -5364 19   -718 -1636 -2855 -4236 -5062 21   -434 -981 -1936 -3344 -4582 23   -229 -496 -1050 -2163 -3725 25   -111 -210 -416 -879 -2079 AP          
   
The second task was to cross-check these against the half-breadth plan, which gave the following offsets:
 
  Distance from centre (updated by half-breadth) (mm, 1:1) Station WL0 WL1 WL2 WL3 WL4 WL5 U       732 1490 2343 S   267 1052 2027 2925 3830 Q   910 2025 3120 4090 4803 O   1535 2878 4001 4922 5435 M   2131 3608 4679 5446 5788 K   2694 4186 5161 5763 5975 H 93 3181 4575 5454 5922 6055 F 960 3563 4826 5620 5983 6080 D 1453 3784 4968 5696 6005 6084 B 1717 3896 5046 5731 6022 6080 (B) 1824 3938 5075 5744 6030 6076 Ø 1845 3930 5062 5741 6024 6048 Ø (bow) -1844 -3923 -5054 -5739 -6020 -6048 1 -1794 -3868 -4997 -5724 -6003 -6045 3 -1619 -3770 -4904 -5687 -5992 -6038 5 -1342 -3639 -4803 -5630 -5978 -6033 7 -854 -3411 -4641 -5526 -5931 -6024 9 -111 -3055 -4389 -5360 -5845 -5996 11   -2571 -4028 -5118 -5720 -5920 13   -2031 -3562 -4782 -5528 -5795 15   -1492 -2972 -4308 -5220 -5630 17   -1062 -2334 -3704 -4831 -5421 19   -707 -1638 -2883 -4232 -5121 21   -434 -991 -1930 -3307 -4624 23   -235 -509 -1093 -2134 -3670 25   -106 -211 -429 -885 -2042 AP              
Finally, I copied these back over the plans, and made a few modifications to the U and S stations at WL5 and WL4 so that the stations flowed smoothly.
 
The following changes were made:
U, WL5 = 2190
S, WL4 = 3018, WL5 = 3788
 
The following image shows the original lines traced off the plans in white, and the updated lines taken from the half-breadth in green. As can be seen, the differences are fairly negligible, except at the extreme breadth, where they become a little more significant. The difference amounts to a maximum of 7.7 centimetres at 1:1 scale, so nothing too dramatic.

This image shows some of the differences more closely - cyan is the plan lines, and orange the updated lines from the half-breadth.

The next step is to begin working out framing distances, and lofting the frames using the curves these stations produce...

 
Anyway - that's enough from me for now. Happy building, all.

I couldn't resist seeing the model so far jump off the drawing board into real life, so I've started to make a basic paper half-hull mockup at 1:96 scale to get a sense of the lines. At the moment there's no lateral support for the frames, so they're all over the place, but an interesting exercise nonetheless, and adding the poop / quarterdeck / upper gun deck will help matters no end. The deck locations are marked with solid lines and waterlines are marked with dashed lines. This half-hull should help me work out how to go about realising the internal structure.
 
Progress so far... 
 

Some progress to show. I've started getting the plans into CAD ready to begin designing the skeleton of the model.

 
A long way to go, but it's good to make a start. The actual plans are colorised, with different parts on different layers so I can separate them easily. Near the stern on the half-breadth plan some of the waterlines divide into two lines as they approach the rabbet. I've never noticed that on plans before, so if anyone knows what that represents I'd be interested to know.
 
More soon  
 
Rob

A little history - Bristol was caught in the great hurricane of 1780, and dismasted along with HMS Hector... the image below is public domain:
 
 
 
There's a particularly lovely model of Bristol in the Art Gallery of Ontario, in Toronto; pictures of which can be found on Wikimedia. The link below from the Art Gallery itself suggests this model was built in 1774, making it contemporary - perhaps even the builder's model. https://ago.ca/collection/object/agoid.106283
 

I've just finished the yards on the mainmast. It's a process of keeping the faith as you go, as it has to look like an explosion of rope before order then appears out of the chaos... Here are the footropes in process...

And then completed...
 
 

And here's a shot of the whole mast... the lower stunsails have had the stunsail yards attached to the tops, but haven't been rigged at all yet... None of these yards are finally attached, but are pretty much complete as units. 
 

To have a bit of a break from the yards, I think I'll do some ratlines on the lower shrouds. I think I probably need to tackle the futtock shrouds (metal bars?) first, though, otherwise they're going to be a bear to access.
 
Thanks for looking in

Thanks, George.
 
Yes the work being done now all seems to make a difference to how the final model will look, which is spurring me on. 
 
It's startling how much sail these vessels can spread. Stefano must have been an amazing sight, even though she was a humble working vessel.

Not much work done on this recently as I've been on a push to get Barque Stefano completed... but we're making progress. The sails are complete, and being attached to the yards...  However, tomorrow I have an exciting day planned. I'm visiting the National Archives in Kew, London, to look at the Captain's and Master's logs of HMS Bristol. I'm hoping to read the logs for a few major events in Bristol's history - in particular her dismasting during the Great Hurricane in 1780, and a few other events.
 
So... watch this space, and I'll try and share some of what I discover. I find this part of the process really helpful in building the desire to really dig into the design and build. The connection with the vessel drives me on to see the model completed.
 
Thanks for looking in.

I've just finished the yards on the mainmast. It's a process of keeping the faith as you go, as it has to look like an explosion of rope before order then appears out of the chaos... Here are the footropes in process...

And then completed...
 
 

And here's a shot of the whole mast... the lower stunsails have had the stunsail yards attached to the tops, but haven't been rigged at all yet... None of these yards are finally attached, but are pretty much complete as units. 
 

To have a bit of a break from the yards, I think I'll do some ratlines on the lower shrouds. I think I probably need to tackle the futtock shrouds (metal bars?) first, though, otherwise they're going to be a bear to access.
 
Thanks for looking in

Hi all,
 
Not much more to show, except the reefing points that are now stiffened using watered down PVA front and back. This was done before they were trimmed to length, by placing a small ruler behind the reefing points. Then they were trimmed to the bottom of the ruler giving a nice neat line.. The second photo is the progress on the mainmast lower-topsail yard with the footropes in progress....
.
 
As always, thanks for the likes and encouragement.
 
Rob

I've just finished the yards on the mainmast. It's a process of keeping the faith as you go, as it has to look like an explosion of rope before order then appears out of the chaos... Here are the footropes in process...

And then completed...
 
 

And here's a shot of the whole mast... the lower stunsails have had the stunsail yards attached to the tops, but haven't been rigged at all yet... None of these yards are finally attached, but are pretty much complete as units. 
 

To have a bit of a break from the yards, I think I'll do some ratlines on the lower shrouds. I think I probably need to tackle the futtock shrouds (metal bars?) first, though, otherwise they're going to be a bear to access.
 
Thanks for looking in

Hi all,
 
Not much more to show, except the reefing points that are now stiffened using watered down PVA front and back. This was done before they were trimmed to length, by placing a small ruler behind the reefing points. Then they were trimmed to the bottom of the ruler giving a nice neat line.. The second photo is the progress on the mainmast lower-topsail yard with the footropes in progress....
.
 
As always, thanks for the likes and encouragement.
 
Rob