AON

Thank you Don, At my last place of employment, they were my supplier of choice, and we would hold our orders until we had a substantial amount to reduce the overall delivery charge. I could get the odd personal item free of charge that way. As of late, I've been trying to support my countries economy. I cannot say this any differently without getting political.

Part 2...

This post is in two parts. War is Hell. This story was related by a young man to his parents about a 'skirmish' with the French fleet. We jump into the letter in the midst of battle. well after the transcribed opening following directly... Kentish Gazette - Friday 20 June 1794 Copy of a letter from "William Knight, of the Brunswick, to his Father and Mother at Sandwich, dated Spithead the 12th of June, 1794 "I here send you the proceedings of Earl Howe's fleet...."

Assuming you're not referring to the leeches. Yikes! I'll bet they would have preferred medicine and care from the late 20th century or now (21st century.

Ach, it's nothing but a flesh wound. Throw some leeches on it and walk it off.

Being anywhere near ships not a sea was dangerous. (1787) Broken collar bone Broken leg

I suppose beer kept better over time than fresh water. Although called fresh, beer was cleaner. Beer kept the sailors in a much better mood than water ever could.

It is in the thick of the fight, the Battle of the Nile (1798), guns booming, smoke and fire all around you, wood exploding and splinters fill the air. All the Officers around you on the quarterdeck are killed, the Captains wounded and taken below. What do you do..... Assume command until an adult shows up of course!

Ship returning home fires a salute to the town and takes off one mans arm, opens another's chest, and kills one other. I wonder what happened to that Captain? 1798

Speaking of Captain Bligh.... I wonder what ever happened to him after the mutiny and he was cast afloat by the crew? Well he became an Admiral of course!

Possibly a little top heavy in upper management??? 1794

Bad and good news for me. The Bolt and Nut supplier in St. Catharines failed to fill my order for the #6-32 stainless steel helicoil inserts. Amazon.com has the item and advertises they will ship it to Canada but try to place the order... sorry! Amazon.ca does not offer it. I have since found Ackland-Grainger has the item and at half the price. Placed the order on line yesterday. Now we wait to see if they follow through. Going to visit the local wood carving club this afternoon.

I believe 414 ships listed. I cannot imagine the sight of that many sails. Good time to have shares in wood, cloth, rope and gun barrel businesses.

(Not sure if this warrants a warning but... ) Which reminds me of a joke: Did you know that the Navy invented sex.... it was the Army that introduced it to women.

and this poor bugger had to live in the shadow of his brothers sacrifice. (1798)

I am waiting with baited breath for this hillarious topic to come full circle.... with corners.

here is one you wouldn't think of.... dated 1799

Also found an article from 1790 listing every ship in the British Navy, where it is, and who was the commander. I suppose this made the spy's job easier.

I stumbled on the following letter printed in 1799 that I thought was quite interesting. It relates to the nicknames of ships...

Had a most enjoyable afternoon. Started fairing the hull. Just wanted to be the first person in history to ever write those words. Also, my #6-32 helicoil inserts came in today. One problem, they were not stainless steel. The supplier in Cambridge is overnighting them by courier to St. Catharines. I should pick them up Monday afternoon.

yes it does just test a moment ago see below

And Lloyd's went by tonnage to size everything per Wooden Ship Building, Charles Desmond, 1919

Here is a video showing the method of making treenails that was shown to me by a very talented model maker that is in our local club. making treenails -1.wmv Of course, for all that have done it over and over before, it is quite a simple process... but for the rest of us, a picture is worth a thousand words and a video is priceless. I always tend to make more out of things then they are. Other things I'd learned. Treenails and bolts are used in the planks on the sides of the hull. The deck planks were spiked and plugged and the plugs were barely (if at all) noticeable. The thickness of the hull planking determined the diameter of the bolt or treenail which were not the same size. Bolting/treenailing patterns differed outside versus inside. Wedges were driven into the ends of treenails to make them hold better. Deck planking did not always run straight on the upper (weather) decks, in the earlier periods, up to somewhere in the mid 1700's, they bent inwards at the bow and stern. The head of a deck spike was about 5/8" diameter. Thickness of hull planking / Diameter of Bolts / Diameter of Treenails (Wooden Ship Building, Charles Desmond, 1919 - same as ASA dated 1885) 1" / 1/2" / 7/8" 2-1/2" / 5/8" / 1" 3" to 3-1/2" / 3/4" / 1-1/8" 4" to 4-1/2" / 7/8" / 1-1/4" 5" to 5-1/2" / 15/16" / 1-3/8" 6" and over / 1" / 1-1/2"

Thank you Mark. Still needs some metal work but I will get to that at a later date.

RUDDER: So here are some photos of my last and final rudder. Major differences are: 1) the chatter groove is cleaner 2) the tiller holes are tapered at 12" square opening inboard; smaller square hole outboard measuring 1/3rd the width of the rudder head. 3) the table joint was made in two different shades of Castello to try to make the joint more visible After comments at our local club meeting yesterday I will be softening the rudder corners/edges some more with a fine grade sand paper, and squaring the tiller holes a bit cleaner with a micro chisel. Files can only do so much to a make a round hole square... and I am certain talent plays a bigger part than the file. TREENAILS: Regarding my tutorial in making treenails last week... I was shown to hold the skewer perpendicular to the floor, flat end up, tightly against the edge of a work table with your thumb clamping it there (thumb safely below the top surface of the table so as not to cut your self). There should be about an inch ( 25 mm) or more protruding above the table edge. Using a sharp knife place the cutting edge on top of the end of the skewer, across the centre as best as you can and push down slightly increasing pressure so the blade slices through to the table top in a controlled cut. Do not do this at your good dining room table unless you are a bachelor and want to remain so. Once scored remove the skewer from the table and turn it 90° so it is horizontal to the floor and place the knife blade back in the scored/cut end. Grab the parted end with your free hand and pull it through the knife. You now have two clean straight cut halves (I haven't tried this yet but I saw it done multiple times). Now repeat with one half, and again with one quarter until you have a length at a size that will feed into the largest hole in your draw plate. You might have to sharpen one end of the piece to aid feeding it into the tiny hole. Grab it with your parallel pliers and pull it through a couple times, then jump a hole and go down to a smaller hole and repeat the process until you reach the size/diameter treenail you need. The draw plate has tapered holes so the smaller diameter on one side is the cutting edge. On mine, the hole sizes are stamped on the large hole side, the out feed side. You feed into the small hole side. I was told that if the wood sliver piece is ever so slightly too large to feed into the small hole you can try pushing it in the out feed side to crush the fibres down to allow it to feed into the infeed side... or resharpen it to a point with a knife. I have ordered the parallel pliers Druxey recommended in an earlier post (#999 above) as they are indeed instrumental in causing less damage to the tiny bamboo. They have not come in yet. I may make a video when the darn pliers show up. It is a simple enough process once you've see it and have done it.