10th-11th century Byzantine dromon by Louie da fly - FINISHED - 1:50

[Louie da fly]

Carl, I realised I'd misread your post, thinking you simply meant seawater, not oil for the siphon.

 

You're quite right - I'll have to ensure the deck is horizontal, otherwise spilt oil could flow back into the ship. (it might anyway if the ship is bouncing around on the water, but that's a different problem. I can at least reduce the risk as much as possible.)

 

Thanks for pointing this out.

 

Steven

[BANYAN]

Hi Steven, if I may suggest that first you try and remove the legs and arches without damage (may be too difficult) so that if shortening the fore castle does not look right, then you have them there to reattach?  My 'leaning' is to lowering the castle height as first option.  I think the two mast version (based on your research that you have discussed) here is the better if you can preserve it?  But, either way sounds plausible and is down to your choice (and the amount of rework you wish to do).

 

cheers

 

Pat

Edited February 25, 2019 by BANYAN

[Louie da fly]

Hi Pat,

 

That's my thought as well. The arches should come off fairly easily and I can see how it goes from there. I still think the two mast option is the better one.

 

Steven

[Baker]

Do not know much about dromons.
But the best option seems to be to lower the forecastle. And a horizontal deck looks the most logical.

Greetings Patrick

[Louie da fly]

Thanks everybody for the likes.

 

Michael, sorry for not replying earlier. Your comments are much appreciated.

 

Patrick, I agree with your assessment. Several of the pics in my earlier post were also from Landstro"m's The Ship. Since that was written a lot more evidence has become available, which is why my model is somewhat different from his reconstruction. However, I agree about the forecastle, particularly that the deck should be horizontal and the forecastle itself should be lower. Unfortunately, it looks like I will have to completely rebuild it rather than just remove the arches.😖

 

Oh, well. Back to the drawing board . . .

 

Steven 

[cog]

No worries Steven. blame my foreign tongue

[John Allen]

Steven,

 

Maximum effort has produced maximum results. On a scale 1-10 a 12 Kudos

[donrobinson]

Wonderful work, I've just caught up on your build after months of being away from the forum. Looking forward to seeing more

[Louie da fly]

Thanks for the likes.

 

John, thanks - very much appreciated.

 

Don, welcome back! (and thanks for all the likes!). I really enjoyed following your liburnian build and I'm grateful for the comment on my own build.

 

After a certain amount of frustration in realising the forecastle wasn't going to work and couldn't be fixed but needed to be replaced by a new one 😭, I've made a start on the replacement. 

It's rather smaller than the previous version to make it fit better at the bow, while still having enough space for the siphon plus crew.

 

In some ways it's a relief - in making a new forecastle I get to re-do some things I wasn't completely happy with in the first one.

Because of the maindeck sheer and horizontal foredeck, the're'll be a larger gap below the after end of the foredeck than forward. This will be convenient for storing the anchors, which I hadn't previously been able to work a place for.

 

 Steven

Edited February 26, 2019 by Louie da fly

[BANYAN]

A silver lining can be found in everything (well almost), glad you can get some 'bonus' detail from the rebuild.

 

cheers

 

Pat

[Mark Pearse]

the unused forecastle is good enough to get a stand of its own

[Louie da fly]

Thanks, Pat.

 

Mark, comment appreciated. Maybe I will. I'm going to remove and re-use the siphon assembly, but it really would go against the grain to just throw the forecastle away. Heaven knows where I'd display it.

 

Steven

[cog]

3 hours ago, Louie da fly said:

Heaven knows where I'd display it.

On top of your car's dashboard ... might come in handy in traffic jams ...

 

Looks far more crisp than the first one. Practice ...

[Louie da fly]

New forecastle in progress, incorporating lessons I learnt when I did the first one. The main lesson was to get the sequence right. This time I put the siphon assembly in place before the side walls went on. Much easier to deal with.

 

Adding the deck planking.

Side walls - all the bits ready to put together.

Side wall under construction.

 

Decking and side walls complete, and siphon assembly (and lion's head) removed from old forecastle for recycling into the new one.

Forward wall built and in position, with riser support in place.

Pump lever, showing underside where the connecting rods for the cylinders will be fixed.

Pump lever dry fitted.

Pump cylinders dry fitted.

Pump and oil reservoir glued in place.

 

More to come.

 

Steven

[Louie da fly]

Siphon assembly in place. Adding "pipes" to convey the oil from the reservoir to the pump and thence under the decking (didn't take a photo of that, but it's the same as in the previous iteration of the forecastle) to the riser. The nozzle itself won't be added till I have the fore wall planked etc and the lion's head in place. Again, experience having taught me a better assembly sequence.

  Side walls in place.

Making the arches for the awning over the poop deck. This time I used pear wood - easier than planetree wood to carve fine detail at this scale, and less prone to splitting.

 

Roughly sawn to shape.

 Carving the concave parts of the arches. One arcade with the arches cut out. Paper removed and ready to carve the convex sides of the arches. One arcade cut to shape. And both arcades cut to shape and smoothed off.

 

Steven

Edited March 6, 2019 by Louie da fly

[cog]

Lovely work Steven. The typical "practice makes perfect" example

[Mark Pearse]

very neat work Steven, 

[BANYAN]

Looks good Steven; hopefully all continues going well with this redo.  The carvings look smoother than before with the pear wood.

 

cheers

 

Pat

[Louie da fly]

More work on the new forecastle. Parapet planking started:

And continuing:

  And complete:

 

Steven

[Louie da fly]

Planks trimmed:

  Adding the battens (if that's the right name for them):

 

 

More to do . . . 

 

And the awning over the poop deck:

 

Gluing the support arcades to the roof arches:

Column capitals glued on the bottoms of the arcade arches and columns made (no lathe, so all carved by hand):

Dry fitting the columns.

Steven

 
 
 

 

 

Edited March 11, 2019 by Louie da fly

[BANYAN]

That awning structure looks terrific Steven.

 

cheers

 

Pat

[Louie da fly]

Thanks for all the likes, everybody. They're much appreciated.

 

Pat, you ain't seen nuthin' yet! Here it is almost complete

and (dry fitted) in place on the poop.

  I had intended to have the tenons at the column bases go through the deck to hold the assembly in place, but then decided I just can't place holes in the deck accurately enough, so I cut them off. I hope that wasn't a mistake . . .

 

(The masts seem out of line because they're currently only dry fitted. I have no idea how the Byzantines kept masts in place - did they use wedges as was done later, or were they lashed to through-beams or fixed posts, or a combination of those, or what? The earliest definite pictures I know of that show wedges date to the late 12th century - maybe 200 years too late. If anybody has any ideas or evidence, I'd appreciate your input.)

 

Steven 

Edited March 11, 2019 by Louie da fly

[BANYAN]

Hi Steven, a bit late for you now but one technique I have used to work out the positions of holes was either:

 

1.  if confident I can place pins accurately into the tenons, or the flat bottom piece, place accurately on the deck in-situ, apply a 'little pressure' - just enough to see where the pins land; then drill holes to size.  This may still work for you?

 

2.  add some pencil/graphite or ink (be quick before ink dries) and place onto a bit of thicker paper or thin card and apply light pressure to get a mark.  Drill holes into card/paper to make a template.  Cut paper/card to shape to fit area and/or register with known marks/parts on the deck.

 

 

cheers

 

Pat

 

 

 

[woodrat]

Steven that foremast looks like it has a curve to it. Love the poop super structure. It would make sense to use wedges. Don't forget the coin under the mast foot.

Dick

[Louie da fly]

Pat, that's a good idea. I'll have to try it (on another model - unless I can retrieve the situation - I might just put pins in the forward two columns and let the rest just sit on the deck.) Thing is, I'm not all that confident of my accuracy with a drill. Always seems to wander, even though I put in a "dimple" to start the hole off.

 

Dick, I'm afraid you're right. Curses! Looks like I'll have to make another mast (sigh). OTOH I've recently come across a calcet in an archaeological find (the only one I know of) and it has two sheaves, rather than the one I've put in each of my own calcets. As that's from a carrack the dating's well different, but the yards and sails of a dromon would have been pretty hefty, so maybe I need to replace the calcets anyway. So making a new mast isn't all that much extra work . . .😐

 

Here is the calcet - it's from a Genoese nave built in 1503, and must relate only to the lateen mizzen.

 

The two illustrations seem to be of different calcets. The first is from the wreck; the second I believe to come from a contemporary manuscript - the text doesn't make it very clear.

 

Glad you like the poop superstructure. Rather fiddly, but I seem to be taking more care with this kind of thing as my experience grows. Slows me down, but worth it in the long run, I think. Still learning lessons, though. Using butt joints to put together the two halves of the arches that go over the top meant that when you pick the structure up to work on it the arches squeeze inward and you have to pull them out again. PVA glue is fairly flexible, so it's somewhat forgiving in this regard, but perhaps if I'd used a more "rigid" glue the problem wouldn't have arisen anyway.

 

I'd pretty much decided to use wedges. The earliest ships I know that show the fixing of the masts are in the 12th century Spanish Cantigas de Santa Maria and have what I thought were huge wedges, but I now believe to be posts coming up from below decks, to which the mast is lashed. Some seem to be merely fore and aft of the mast, others are all around it as in the picture below.

As I've seen a reconstruction of one of the Yenikapi ships with a vertical post below decks with the mast lashed to it and to the (horizontal) mast partner, perhaps that's the way to go, especially as mediaeval galleys customarily fought with their masts lowered so they must have had a means to do it fairly quickly and easily - though I suppose wedges are probably just as good for that.

 

Or perhaps just wedged in place at the mast step and lashed to the mast partner? The mast step is of the form found in the Yenikapi wrecks, so perhaps this is the way to go. (The wedge and fixing block are my own idea of how it may have worked).

Oh and I suppose I'll have to mint a coin to scale to put at the base of the mast . . .

 

Steven 

  

Edited March 12, 2019 by Louie da fly

[Mark Pearse]

Hi Steven

 

the mast could well be salvageable. I've had good success using a heat gun & gently manual pressure to put in / take out bends in timber. If you don't have a heat gun, maybe there's some simple household alternative to warm the timber without scorching it.

 

 

[Louie da fly]

Hi Mark,

 

I thought of the heat gun method (I do have one), but wood tends to return to its natural shape after a while - at least it has with me . . .

 

Steven

[woodrat]

2 hours ago, Louie da fly said:

 

 

.

 

Or perhaps just wedged in place at the mast step and lashed to the mast partner? The mast step is of the form found in the Yenikapi wrecks, so perhaps this is the way to go. (The wedge and fixing block are my own idea of how it may have worked).

 

Oh and I suppose I'll have to mint a coin to scale to put at the base of the mast . . .

 

Steven 

  

The structures surrounding the mast base at deck level are indeed wedges inserted around the mast at the mast partners. These wedges are then tightly woolded with stout rope (see my cocha build).

 

Without these wedges at deck level, the strain on the mast foot would lead to early failure.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The coin needs to be byzantine of the correct period, I agree.

Dick

Edited March 12, 2019 by woodrat

[Louie da fly]

56 minutes ago, woodrat said:

The coin needs to be byzantine of the correct period, I agree.

Ah well, that's ok. I have a solidus from the reign of Michael VII. I'll just have to copy that, won't I?

 

Steven

[cog]

Dick,

 

with reference to you statement:

Without these wedges at deck level, the strain on the mast foot would lead to early failure.

 

How do you explain the fact that the wedges were sometimes taken out to increase speed? At least that is something I read about ... (unfortunately age didn't help me remembering where)