CUTTY SARK by keelhauled - Mantua - kit bashed - First wooden ship build

[popeye the sailor]

second that!   seriously nice work  

[keelhauled]

Thanks Dennis and Nenad.  The compliments mean a lot to me coming from you gentlemen.

I attached the fore course and started rigging the lines.  shouldn't have been that much work, but the chains for the lower top sail sheets were a pain and I ended up breaking a chain which meant I had to undo all of the work and replace the chain and start again.   I'll have to wait a couple of weeks to post photos.  

 

Another snag. My original thought was that I would rig the standing rigging of the fore mast, install the sails on the foremast.  I would then repeat the procedure with the main and mizzen masts respectively.  As opposed to installing all of the standing rigging and then installing the sails and running rigging.  My thought was that I would have unobstructed access to the aft of each mast as I was working on it and it would be easier.  Probably true.  However, the problem I have is that the Main Mast stay and Main top stay run extremely close to the spider bands, sheet blocks and lift blocks on the main mast.  In fact the stays run behind the blocks - that is between the blocks and the mast.  I might not be able to judge the correct distances or correct any issues due to scale issues.  Hopefully these photos show what I'm talking about.  I think that I need to install the stays and then the blocks with the running rigging.  I can adjust the hooks on the bottom blocks  for the main stays or the distance between the blocks to accommodate the main top mast stays, but I can't change to the location of the stays to accommodate the running rigging - at least not after the fore mast is rigged.  So I will revert to the traditional method of rigging.

 

Marc

 

[md1400cs]

Mark,

 

YES brilliant work indeed. Great to follow along.

 

Cheers

[Chasseur]

I concur she is outstanding!

[keelhauled]

Michael and Chasseur,

thank you for the kind words!

Marc

[mojofilter]

Marc - This is outstanding work!  You are a real inspiration.  Your log will be one of my go-to references when I start my CS this fall.  I have the exact same kit, and while I will no doubt have to (and be able to thanks to you) watch out for the kit's pitfalls, I do not have the skill to bash my way to perfection as you have done.

I see it's been a while since you've posted.  I hope you are well and able to continue your fine work.

I do have a question - I see you have rigged your jib and fore staysail with a port wind.  Which side will you display?

Thanks,

- Tim

Edited August 15, 2017 by mojofilter
double word

[keelhauled]

Hi Tim,

Sorry for the  late response. 

Life has gotten in the way.  Although I did get half of the shrouds on the main mast completed.  I'm hoping to return to building soon.  I had a few time sensitive projects that I've had to tackle. 

As to which side I'm displaying........that's a good question.  I haven't decided yet.  I keep going back and forth. I will probably leave it to the Admiral.  

All the best!!

Marc

[mojofilter]

No worries Marc - I've just laid the keel on my CS and heavy into research.  I've picked out the top six CS builds on MSW to study and like it or not, you're one of them. Like a kid in a candy store...

 

- Tim

[keelhauled]

Hi Tim,

I know what you mean about the candy store.  I spend hours and hours walking through builds on this site.  Let me know if I can help answer any questions you have.  If you haven't visited Nenad's build, you should - look at the top of this page and you'll see a post from him with a link to his build  He is a great guy and does great work.

all the best,

Marc

Edited September 14, 2017 by keelhauled

[keelhauled]

Hi everyone,

So I'm still alive.  And I have worked on the Cutty over the past few months with several long breaks due to travel etc. and a side track into improving my working area.

 

I'll cover the side track in improving my work space.  The side track was due to being aggravated that my gear was always boxed up. So I built a workbench on the opposite wall of the garage and then noticed that there was no lighting nor an electrical.  So I had two lines pulled to the garage and four new four outlet power boxes and seven LED shop lights installed.  Now I have lots of light!!

 

 

I also added more space for more tools! Excuse the mess,  I was in the middle of working when I took the photo

 

The other side of my workspace.  this is the new bench with my new toys from the past couple of years.  Finally out of the boxes (almost - the lathe is still back in its box, but it has its own storage shelf).  As I said, up to this point, if I needed to use the sander, table saw, drill press, etc, I had to unbox the tool.  Move the ship to another location, put the tool together put it on the bench where the ship was, use the tool, box the tool and put the ship back into its original location.  UGH!

Problem is now solved.

 

Almost all of the wood was left over from two pergolas that I had built for our house or other left-over scraps.  so the benches and carts are the prettiest, but the function well and I saved a ton of money.

 

So under the bench are four carts that roll out and are full of equipment storage.  There are two short and two tall carts. 

 

The short carts have the Byrne saw and sander as well as the Proxxon table saw and a chop saw permanently housed on their tops.  I also made drawers for these carts and lined them with velvet from several yards of velvet from the bargain bin I found in the fabric store.

 

 

The two tall carts are exactly the same height and can be clamped together to create larger work tables.  They are also the correct height to act as out-feed tables for the Byrne's.  I made a bridge that attaches to the Byrnes saw and the edge of the tall carts for that purpose.

 

 Now on to the ship!

 

I have the fore sail in place as well as all of it's rigging is attached, but not belayed yet.  In a previous post I spoke about the need to step the Main mast and install all of it's standing rigging before I can continue with the fore sail.  I've also rigged and jibs and have belayed all of their rigging except the halyards which are run through the blocks but not belayed yet, waiting for the Main mast standing rigging to be executed.

 

I think that the shape of the sails look good.  To me they look like they actually have wind blowing on them.

 

In the next photo you can see the sheet chains from the lower top sail sheet running through the fore course yard.  I can tell you that these chains are a royal pain to rig through the mast and blocks.

the fore rat lines with the bunt and clew from the course sail feeding through the fairleads

detail  of the fairleads - nothing is had been pulled tight yet or belayed.

 

Last night I built the spencer gaff goose neck and other rigging eyes and installed the gear into the main mast and spencer gaff.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Sorry for the great delay in posting, but a great deal of work was in serving all of the standing rigging for the main mast, which took forever because the cutty has the standing rigging 100% served!  UGH!  Also, I didn't think showing progress of rigging the ratlines on the fore and main mast exciting so I didn't take any photos or post that work.  I ended up having to tear all of the upper ratlines out and re-rigging them because I used the wrong size line!!!  oh well, I'm always doing one step forward two to four steps back!  But I'm still having fun!

 

thanks for checking in!

Marc

 

Edited May 10, 2018 by keelhauled

[Chasseur]

Wow, Marc! You definitely have the ultimate man cave. Love the work on the Cutty. As we age light is definitely an asset. I find I can't have too much light when I work now. Keep posting!

 

Jeff

[md1400cs]

Marc, 

 

Your close up shots  are so great. Your attention to, and executions of these details are excellent indeed. Sails are superb - an area that is very hard to scale properly IMHO.

 

As Jeff just said Ultimate man cave indeed. I would add a 60" 4K, sound system, sound proof the room And add an inside lock bolt hahaha  

Maybe in my next life.

[popeye the sailor]

hey there Marc!   so good to see your continuing and posting     you must never think that a step your doing might be boring.......we miss out on ideas that may be a stroke of genius     I thought I had a huge inventory of parts..........I'm definitely NOT hoarding enough!   your work area looks really good...very functional.

    I'd die for an area like that.......totally green with envy.  I don't feel so bad now for the thoughts I've had.........down in the cellar,  the landlord has a corner section of counter top.  it's a big section.....'L' shaped,  and I've had the major urge to bring it up,  now that our youngest has moved out.  what keeps me from doing it, is I think the landlord would have a fit....even if I brought the idea up to him   still love to see the look on his face!

 

my god!!!!  I'm working on a 1:124 scale Thermopylae at the moment......I see all the lines you've got set up there,  and I think to myself that I'd never get all those lines on the model.  your Cutty is much larger.......awesome progress you've done so far!  I believe though that you encountered the rigging issue when you last posted progress........glad to see you've gotten past it and are moving ahead.  looking forward in seeing more.......  

[keelhauled]

Hi Jeff ,Michael, and Dennis!

 

thanks for all of the kind words and encouragement! 

 

Michael, I like the idea about the TV and Stereo, but I think the admiral would shut down the ship yard.  I already feel bad that I'm spending too much time in the ship yard.  However, I do have a 4K 60 inch screen (she picked it out) with a 1500 watt stereo system about 20 feet away!   - Just in case I need something to do while I have to wait for glue to dry.

 

Dennis, you are always too kind.  Sometimes I worry that  I have too many supplies, until I need something that I don't have and can't make (usually wood).  Then I'm furious.    It's also why I build more and more scratch built items including metal and wood fittings.  I've made brass and wood thimbles, brass eye bolts, bollards, etc.  That way I never worry about loosing, running out or breaking items.  If I need another fitting, I can just make it.  It's very liberating.  But you're right I have bought a crap load of stuff prior to learning how to make it or having the equipment to do so or items that I won't be able to easily make - like very fine brass chain.

 

Best!

Marc

 

 

 

[mtaylor]

It's been awhile since I looked in.   I like what you did to the shop and Cutty seems to be back in the yard and progress being made.

[keelhauled]

Thanks Mark!

I wish that I had your building skills.  Your Licorne build is beautiful!

 

[hof00]

Hi Chap,

Looking at your build, I have one word, "Outstanding!!"

The detail is absolutely superb.

 

I thought my version of this kit was good, and, I was happy the outcome but yours just takes it to another level altogether!! 

 

Cheers....HOF.

[keelhauled]

Thanks Harry!!

You did a great job with your build.

I'll be down in your part of the world - sort of. 

I'll be down in Melbourne and Craigieburn (Rather be in Wellington!)

But since I'll be in the office all day, it probably doesn't matter.

Cheers!

Marc

 

Edited May 30, 2018 by keelhauled

[hof00]

Hi Chap,

Your probably better off in Aussie. (Warmer)

 

It's getting rather "Chilly" here....

 

Cheers....HOF.

 

[keelhauled]

Harry, 

Melbourne was cold and extremely rainy and windy!!! A long two weeks of work.

Since my return, I've been working in the dock yard 

I've been serving yards and yards of lines (the Cutty has all of here standing rigging 100% served!!!)  Chuck's serving machine is still holding up fine.

 

I rigged the spencer  sail to the main mast.  I took photos, but can't seem to locate them neither on my phone or camera! 

It was actually a fun sail to rig, I really liked the brails.  After learning how the operate and I had fun playing with them until finally furling the sail.  One interesting aspect was that it appeared that three brails shared the same pin as the halyard and downhaul.  There are some photos of the cutty and other ships where you can see clearly that two or three lines share the same belaying pin.  I guess it makes total since that the brails would share the same pins as the lines to take in our out the sail that they are attached to, however it makes rigging the model a little challenging.  I was able to belay the lines and then applied coils made off ship, although I wasn't able to attach four coils to each pin, so I chose to attach three to one and two to the other to assess how they look.  It maybe hard to see, but the starboard pin in view has four lines figure eight belayed and three coils belayed to a single pin.  It looks like the photos of the Cutty's pins. Actually mine are neater than the coils in most of the old photos of the Cutty.

 

a View of the spencer

Here's a photo of the lower shrouds attached and the lanyards temporarily tensioned.

And on to fitting the backstays!

And onto dry fitting all of the main shrouds, backstays, and stays.  All of the backstays and shrouds are completely set up and ready for the lanyards to be set with the cow hitch.  The fore stays are just clamped in place.  I wanted to tension everything up, let it sit for a couple of days to make sure that there wasn't any stretching or adjustments in tension that needed to be made before finally setting the lanyard.  all of the lanyards are waxed and will actually hold the tension, but the lanyard running through the last hole in the deadeye sometimes relaxes slightly while I'm tying the cow hitch,  so when I'm a confident of the tension, I add a little bit of dilute wood glue to the line and hole -just enough to hold the line from moving but easily unglued with alcohol. 

 

The white tags on the stays have writing reminding me that I need to mount the stay sails before finally rigging the stays.  I spent tonight making hanks for the sails!!

 

 

The hemostats are for keeping tension on the lanyards from the other side.  Helps me when I'm adjusting the tension of the line.

 

Best

marc

 

[NenadM]

Veri nice job !!!!!!

 

[hof00]

Nice Chap!!

Plans, (Mantua/AL), don't show Main Royal/Sky Sail Backstays, but, I'm sure your aware of this....)

Braces: There are a couple of Mizzen Braces that terminate on the Lower Mainmast just under "Hounds."
 

Double Blocks, not Single, as shown on plans....

 

Apologies, probably teaching you to suck eggs.... 🙂

 

Cheers....HOF.

 

[keelhauled]

Hi Harry,

You and I are on the same page. But, thank you very much about pointing out the brace info.  I have the eyes and tackle ready mounted to the main mast for the braces, but if I didn't and you hadn't pointed it out, I would have had some real issues! Somewhere earlier in the postings I rant about the Mantua treatment of the backstays and incorrect number of deadeyes.  Unfortunately it was too late in the build when I caught it.  It's also why I'll never build another kit.  I have some kits on the shelf, but I'll only use them for parts not the plans, frames, etc.  I'm using Campbell's plans for the rigging. That being said, since the model doesn't have the correct number of deadeyes, I have had to make adjustments.  These are as follows for the main mast (bow to aft):  5 shrouds correct, topmast backstay 3 is missing , capstay present, top mast 2 missing, topmast backstay 1 present, 2nd t'gallent backstay missing, 1st t'gallent backstay present, royal backstay present, sky backstay present.  The deadeyes for the last three stays are raised to a higher level as those backstays are on the cutty.

 

The rest of the rigging is according to campbell.  Wherever Campbell is silent I go to photos and Longridge, then to Underhill.

 

Nenad,

Thanks for the complement!!!  I hope all is going well with you and that you are enjoying the summer!

 

So, I'm currently making hanks from wire and a jig for the main stay sails.  I'm only going to fly two of the three.  They are complete minus the hanks.  Hopefully by the end of the week I can add the sails and actually rig the stays, then I'll finalize tension of the backstays then onto ratlines.

 

best

marc

Edited July 31, 2018 by keelhauled

[popeye the sailor]

MAN!!!   you really have been busy    you've made quite a bit of progress on the rigging...she's look'in great!   good to see your back  

[keelhauled]

Thanks Dennis!

I'm sewing hanks on the stay sails tonight.  I hate this particular job; not sure why.  I have to finish the main stay sail hanks and bend those sails then I can get back to the stays.  It's been about a year since I realized that I needed the main stays in place to go any further on the fore mast rigging. However, it's still progress, just in different places!

 

Best

Marc

[Ric Smith]

I just found this build an what great work you are doing. I am IMPRESSED. and a bit jealous as well.

 

I just started the Cutty Sark and I have a very old kit that is I believe 1976 vintage. I hope that all the parts are here. Very crude materials that are no doubt aging. It doesn't help that the plans are all in Italian and I have to try to translate each entry online.

 

I would like to use your build log as my  instructions and guidance (if you don't mind that is)

 

Looking forward to your completion.

 

Thanks

Ric

Edited September 3, 2018 by Ric Smith
Left out a statement

[keelhauled]

Hi Ric,

thanks for the compliments.  I'm happy to help you any way that I can!  

As far as the plans - my recommendation is to get Campbell's plans and Longridge's books and put the plans in a drawer somewhere.  The kit plans are wrong in numerous ways- I've listed many here.  I ended up not using 90% of the kit.  The pumps, anchors, bells, figurehead, maple strips, walnut strips, the side pin rails (huge mistake!) and some mast fittings are about all that I kept.  Everything else was build and rebuilt from scratch, including the deck houses (although I did keep some decoration of the panels).

Best

Marc

Edited September 6, 2018 by keelhauled

[keelhauled]

Hi everyone, 

I've been traveling quite a bit for work, but I have made progress.  I rigged all of the main mast stays and the lower main shrouds.

As part of rigging the main mast stays in place I rigged the main stays that I intend to fly.

You may also notice the levels on the turn table, across the waist of the ship as well as deck abeam and fore and aft as well as a plumb bob hanging in the back next to the wall.  I was continuously checking the alignment of the masts as I went along.

 

You may remember that I was concerned about the sheet blocks and main mast shrouds intersecting at the fore mast.  There isn't much room for the two to exist with out being fouled. Here is a photo showing that after the shrouds and blocks were put into place they just clear.  The dental tools are making sure that the glue on my seizing isn't adhering to the sheets.  I'll get a photo of everything in place next time.  I ended up rigging the block first and then the shrouds.  It would have been almost impossible the other way around.

 

 

I started rigging the shrouds on the mizzen.  In these photos I'm checking the tension of the shrouds and the alignment of the mizzen mast. To make sure that it is straight I have levels and plumb bobs.  in one photo my camera angle is off making it look like the  mast isn't straight and in the other photo my flash makes it look like there are two plumb lines, but hopefully you get the idea.

 

Here is some shots of the lanyards and cow hitches being rigged

 

I just started rigging the ratlines on the mizzen tonight.  

best

marc

[popeye the sailor]

she's looking splendid Marc....good to see your getting some play time in   

[keelhauled]

thanks Dennis!!  I never seem to get as much play time as I'd like, but I guess I'm not alone in that!