Frigate Essex by Heronguy - Aeropiccola - Cross-section

[mikiek]

Nice color on the decks.

[Heronguy]

Derek, Don and Mike,  thank you - maybe I have a future in doll houses!  🤡  

[Heronguy]

I have a problem on the gun deck.

 

The Quarterdeck cannon fits well

The gunports on the gun deck are too low causing the cannon barrels to hit the top of the ports at a depressed(ing) angle. 

 

 

 

The fixes seem to be:

1) take the wheels off the carriages

2) take the wheels off and modify the bottom of the carriage so the axle and wheels are more inset in the frame

3) take the wheels off, discard the axles and glue the wheels on the carriage frame 

4) lower the deck 2-1/2 to 3 mm

 

 

Kinda leaning toward 2 or 3.  I've simulated the height of the cannon in cases 2 or 3 and it is better but not perfect.

Approach 4 may have undesirable side effects - crowding the deck below, exposing some inner bulwarks that aren't currently planked.

Too bad approach 1 is the easiest but looks odd.

 

 

 

[mikiek]

I'd go for bringing the axle(s) up with your groove in the carriage. Possibly combine that with a little reduction of wheel size.

 

Don't take this the wrong way Doug but sometimes the wheels on cannons are different sizes for front & back. Any chance this is the case with your kit? Maybe you grabbed all large wheels? Gotta ask.

[Heronguy]

Thanks Mike,  It also occurred to me that I could lose the wooden dowel used for the axle and replace it with a brass rod.  The dowel itself is 2mm so right way a could gain most of that back before digging into the frame.

 

The wheels on this model were just 5mm dowel with a 2mm hole for the axle.  Nothing pre-made for me there.  Your observation that the wheels may be different sizes will help out too if I can make the front wheels smaller diameter.  I'll check out whether it is normally the small in front - do you know why the wheels were different sizes?

 

Edited November 24, 2017 by Heronguy

[Heronguy]

Pity - looks like the larger wheels are in the front.  I still wonder why?

[mikiek]

I can dig a little but a couple of quick thoughts

 

1. To keep the barrel pointed upwards?

2. To deal with the slope of the deck - highest at the centerline and sloped down as it moves outwards?

3. Sometimes you don't shoot straight out - a little bit of an angle. The guns were incredibly heavy so moving them was accomplished with the tackles. Haul in a tackle one one side or the other to turn the gun. A bigger wheel would be a better pivot.

 

All just guesses. There's probably some better scientific answer.

[mikiek]

From THE source - English Sea Ordinaces - the larger a wheel (truck) is the easier its load will roll. Guns had to be able to roll forward to fire and roll backwards for recoil. Rolling forward required men hauling tackles so a larger wheel helped with that effort. On the other hand, recoil needed to be slowed down quickly and a smaller wheel helped with that.

 

I was right about the sloping deck. The varying wheel sizes kept the carriage horizontal.

[Heronguy]

 

11 hours ago, mikiek said:

I can dig a little but a couple of quick thoughts

 

1. To keep the barrel pointed upwards?

2. To deal with the slope of the deck - highest at the centerline and sloped down as it moves outwards?

3. Sometimes you don't shoot straight out - a little bit of an angle. The guns were incredibly heavy so moving them was accomplished with the tackles. Haul in a tackle one one side or the other to turn the gun. A bigger wheel would be a better pivot.

 

All just guesses. There's probably some better scientific answer.

 

 

10 hours ago, mikiek said:

From THE source - English Sea Ordinaces - the larger a wheel (truck) is the easier its load will roll. Guns had to be able to roll forward to fire and roll backwards for recoil. Rolling forward required men hauling tackles so a larger wheel helped with that effort. On the other hand, recoil needed to be slowed down quickly and a smaller wheel helped with that.

 

I was right about the sloping deck. The varying wheel sizes kept the carriage horizontal.

 

Nicely explained!  Thank you.  

[mikiek]

You're welcome. It's an incredible set of books. Any and every thing you wanted to know about naval guns.

[donrobinson]

I`m thinking it`s time to put your mill skills to use and build new carriages. If you still need more adjustment after the axles have been adjusted deepening  the trunion grooves will also lower them a bit. You could also flatten the upper side of the axles. 

[Heronguy]

Good suggestions Don (except for the new carriages!).  I'll make a couple of experiments to see what works out most reasonably.

[Heronguy]

Addressed the cannon carriage issue with a 2 step modification.

 

 I removed the trucks from the carriage and sanded down the bottom of the carriages.  That bought me about 1mm.

Secondly I sanded the axles have a flat surface for mounting onto the carriage.  That got me another mm.

Those were enough to let the gun deck cannons sit nicely.

Went on to permanently glue the decks (up to the gun deck) and am now rigging the cannons on that deck. (fiddly job!)5

 

 

 

 

[Heronguy]

Progress has consisted largely of fittings and cannons being installed.  

 

It is certainly clear that the kit designer was not concerned much about creating a realistic interpretation of the ship with this cross-section.  Nevertheless it is still instructive as a model building exercise and I'm having a very enjoyable time with it. 

 

A simple example of the designer's cop out from accuracy is the rigging of the cannons.  It would be hard to fire any of these a 2nd time!  (You know a year ago when I started this hobby I wouldn't have realized how poorly this arrangement would have been - maybe a year from now I won't build a model with these kinds of glaring errors - here's hoping)

 

 

Current state of the build:

 

 

 

[Worldway]

Looks great

[donrobinson]

May not be historically accurate but it surer looks good

[Estoy_Listo]

I'm more inclined towards working boats, but I can see why you're enthused about this build.  It looks great.  

[Heronguy]

On 2018-01-09 at 12:15 PM, Estoy_Listo said:

I'm more inclined towards working boats, but I can see why you're enthused about this build.  It looks great.  

Thanks.  "It's fun to have fun ..." - Dr. Seuss

 

One might claim these were working boats - just wouldn't want that work myself!  Are you currently building a boat?

Edited January 14, 2018 by Heronguy

[mikiek]

Doug - I found scale to be all out of whack on the cross section I did. A handrail that would have hit a scale person right about the chin.

 

I like the brass rails.

[Heronguy]

Mike I guess we can consider some of  these cross-sections as eye-candy.  Nothing wrong with that!

[mikiek]

Agreed Doug - while some eyes would notice those things, most do not. It took some time before I realized it. The cutaway build I did is very attractive despite the design drawbacks. Yours will come out nicely I'm sure of it.

[Heronguy]

I get to add some detail to the hull now.  The wales and the ladder and then on to the gunport lids.   The lids are a bit fussy to make.  The hinges straps are folded over a small hingepin then nailed to the gunport lid and finally to the hull.  A short rope acts as the opening mechanism for the port lid but the plans offer no advice on interior rigging of the rope.

 

 

The next challenge comes as I am missing one hinge strap and one hinge pin. I am contemplating whether to try to make a hinge from some brass sheet (a bit tricky due to the small size)

 make one out of paper treated to look like the hinge (easier but will it hold?), or use of of the Syren Ship Company hinges (which look quite different).

 

 

 

 

[popeye the sailor]

looks very good Doug.......you've done some amazing things with this old kit   

[Heronguy]

very kind of you popeye,  but it is still daunting to compare to what you accomplish on your builds!

[David Lester]

That's looking pretty good Doug. I'm surprised at how finely detailed those gunport hinges are. They're really nice. As for your missing one, I know I'd never manage to successfully cut anything from thin brass. I'd be inclined to make one from card stock, roughly the same thickness as the originals. Considering it's just one, I think it will hold up just fine.

David 

[Heronguy]

I’m leaning that way though I haven’t made one yet.  I do have some copper paint nd the hinges are pretty well obscured by the ope gunport lid so I hope it  will be ok

[Worldway]

Looks good Doug. Nice brass work and great detail.

[Heronguy]

thanks Derek

[mikiek]

Doug - re: gunport rope, it usually runs through a hole right above the ports and into the gundeck area. The rope would then be reaved thru some blocks hanging from the beams to make it easier to get the lid up.

 

If you want I can snap a few pix from the plans of the gundeck section build I did. At that scale you may or may not want to go to the trouble. The section build was 1:24 so it was easy enough to rig it up. It actually works too.

[Heronguy]

Thanks Mike.  I do have sources that show the rigging of the rope.  At the scale of this model and with all of it essentially out of sight beneath the main deck I just settled for tying it off on the inside end.  Looking at Wolfram zu Mondfeld I see that the hinges are not representative of how they were done.  I also have Portia Takakjian's AOS Essex that does a nice job of diagramming the gun tackle  including the port lid rope and tackle.  Just as you described.