18th Century English Longboat by Blue Ensign - FINISHED - Model Shipways - 1:48 Scale

[Mirabell61]

Congrats B.E.

 

to your new little gem. A wonderful model.....

 

Nils

[Derek C]

Yea she is a beautiful boat 

[md1400cs]

B.E.,

 

Apologies - I have mostly (are double adverbs ok in your neck of the woods? haha) silently followed this one - I owe you at least 30+ Like clicks and comments.

As Nils just said - Yes a little gem indeed

 

Regards,

[Blue Ensign]

Many thanks to Al, Nils, Derek, and Mike for your interest and comments. 

Mast and spars.

I have not gone into further research regarding the mast dimensions, I will fine tune it by eye.

I divided the length from the thwart to the shoulder into quarters for the purpose of taper. From the plan 4mm at thwart, 3.6mm (1stQ) 3.5mm (2ndQ) 3.1mm (3rd Q) 2.5mm (Shoulder)

From the shoulder to mast cap; 2.2mm 2mm at centre, 1.8mm at truck.

A card gauge is used to monitor progress at the Quarters.

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The tapering was done on the Proxxon wood lathe.

 

Making of the Bowsprit, Gaff and Boom are fairly straightforward.

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The Gaff jaws were fashioned from some Boxwood sheet,  and it should be noted that the Boom is tapered each end from the centre where it thickens slightly.

Boom Iron

Always seeking the easy route I initially followed the kit instruction for making this; c.a. the ends and twist the extension to the horizontal before drilling the  hole for the Boom Gooseneck.

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This didn't work for me the c.a. failed to hold following the twist, so I reverted to silver soldering which achieved the objective.

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Trial fitting of the Boom iron.

The mast dowel takes some distress during the iron fitting process. Would have been better to use Boxwood for the spars I think.

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The completed iron set.

 

Mast colouring.

The problem with using the provided dowel is that getting a good finish using just varnish is tricky. Patchiness, uneven coverage, and strange over-scale grain patterns show thro'.

I found that sealing the dowel with matt varnish was necessary to seal the surface before applying my tinted varnish mix.

Several coats later with light in-between fine paper rub downs and I get the look I'm after.

So here's the completed masting set.

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The varnished parts were of a satin finish, and to complete they were coated with matt varnish.

 

B.E.

 

[Martin W]

Hi BE -- Nice work as always, especially with the iron fittings.  Curious about the difficulties with the spar coloring.  I take it that the dowel is pine or fir?

 

Cheers,

 

Martin

[Blue Ensign]

Thanks Martin, I think the dowel is Limewood, or Basswood as you American cousins call it. Very soft and unless it is sealed doesn't cover evenly, I really should have turned some Boxwood square stuff down  or at least ordered some Ramin dowel.

 

B,E,

[Blue Ensign]

Fitting out

With the spars completed the iron work for the Bowsprit is put into place.

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A little bit of fiddling to get the position right and give the Bowsprit a slight downward tilt. A shallow notch was cut into the first Thwart to assist a secure fix.

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Now back to the exterior to fabricate the deadeye chainplates.

 

B.E.

 

[Martin W]

Basswood / limewood -- harumph!  I just finished a carving project with an 8x10" piece of lime/bass/whatever, and have grown to dislike the "wood" thoroughly.  You're absolutely right about its unevenness in coloring, though in itself it's supposed to be neutral.  But any cutting opens the grain so that it takes on a different shade.  It's also hard to keep it from developing fuzzies (and sanding is a no-no).  I recall that your previous build had lime planking and that they presented certain annoyances. 

 

I am impressed, again, at your skills in overcoming these problems in order to come up with a lovely build.

 

Cheers,

Martin

[Blue Ensign]

Thanks Martin, Limewood is really only of any use as  first planking on a double planked hull, for any sort of  finished wood items it is useless. Limewood dowel is also very suspect particularly in longer lengths, warping is a perennial problem. I do wish kit manufacturers would be more selective in the purposes for which it is provided.

Bowsprit iron re-fit

I realised that I had fitted the bowsprit ring at the stem at the wrong angle, pointing down rather than upwards as indicated on the Medway boat.

The original was a bit tight anyway so I took the opportunity to re-make the item with a slightly longer stem. Again I used silver solder to fabricate the ring.

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Deadeyes and Chainplates.

The supplied Deadeyes are of 3.86mm Ø which equates to a full scale of 7.29"Ø. By comparison the Topmast Deadeyes of a 14 gun sloop such as Pegasus are 7"Ø.

According to Steel the deadeyes for larger boats such as carried by ships of 110 - 64 guns were of 5" Ø =2.64mm at scale; and for below that (ie smaller Longboats) thimbles were listed.

As the Medway long boat model which is the basis of our model  had deadeyes I have decided to go with Chuck's Syren 3mm versions.

Chainplates

The instruction indicate the use of 28 gauge wire to make these.

For those who may not know, the higher the gauge number, the thinner the wire. 28 gauge is the thinnest of the kit supplied wire and equates on the AWG scale to  0.32mm Ø wire. In practice the kit wire is 0.40mm.

I formed them as suggested in the instructions but I silver soldered along the join as a more secure method. I also formed the Chainplates for the Shrouds with two eyes so that the deadeyes can be hooked into the plates as with the contemporary 'Medway' Longboat.

It took a bit of thinking about how to attach the hooks to the Deadeyes, and the best size of hooks to use to avoid an overscale look.

I finally settled on Syren 3mm brass etched hooks. 28 gauge wire was passed thro' the hook eye and secured with a spot of silver solder; the wire was then passed around the deadeye, nipped and secured with a spot of ca.

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These were fiddly little things to make and the combined chainplate/ deadeye strop is certainly the easier option.

Still some fettlin' to do to finish them off.

Fairly straightforward to attach the chainplates to the hull, just need to ensure that the pins go into the frames to secure.

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Just about ready for rigging now.

 

B.E.

 

 

[Blue Ensign]

Rigging the Longboat

I put the supplied rigging line aside, seems under-scale  and I didn't like the look of it, black too black and tan too shiny. The black line was supplied  presumably for the shrouds and stay, but would these items be heavily tarred on small boats where the rigging would be taken up and down regularly? in any case the stark black line didn't look good to my eye.

The kit instructions mention two line sizes only; 0.012" and 0.018" (0.30mm and 0.45mm Ø ) The instructions don't seem to specifically mention the size for the shrouds but I found on Chuck's log mention of 0.021" line (0.53mm Ø) which is the third supplied line in the box

These equate to 1.7" 2.7" 3.2" circ line at full scale.

Chuck comments - No....you should use smaller rope to seize the .021 rope around the mast.  Use smaller .008 or .012 black for that.  The rope is .021 because Expo doesnt have anything else other than really large rope above that size.   My .025 brown line is perfect size for the shrouds.  But for the kit they have to supply only what they have available.

Chuck  

Chuck's 0.025" (0.63mm) line equates to 3.74" circ at full size.

 

W.E May's book The boats of men of war gives Steel's 1794 rigging table for boats, in relation to ship rates.

From this table I have calculated the rigging sizes for our model.

Not a direct correlation for a given size of Long- boat and Steel does not mention the use of Running Backstays in relation to Long-boat rigging.

 

Rigging item    size circ  scale mm Ø   line used.

Shrouds             3½"        0.59mm          0.63mm

deadeye             5" Ø       2.64mm           3mm

Lanyard             1½"         0.25mm         0.25mm (Morope)

B'stay pendant    2½"        0.42mm         0.45mm

B'stay tackles      1½"        0.25mm         0.20mm

Fore Stay            4"          0.67mm          0.63mm

Deadeye            5" Ø       2.64mm           3mm

Lanyard            1½"         0.25mm          0.25mm (Morope)

Halyard             1½"         0.25mm         0.20mm

Sheets              1½"         0.25mm         0.25mm (Morope)

Single block       6"           3.17mm          3mm

Topping Lift      1½"         0.25mm          0.30mm

Peak Halyard    1½"         0.25mm          0.30mm

Throat Halyard  1½"         0.25mm          0.30mm

Jib Halyard         2"          0.33mm          0.30mm

Jib outhauler      2½"        0.42mm         0.45mm

Single block       7"           3.7mm           3.50mm

Boat Rope         7½"         1.26mm         1.14mm

Grapnel rope     3½"        0.59mm          0.63mm

Painter              3½"        0.59mm         0.63mm

The line, blocks, and deadeyes, used in each case are Syren, except where otherwise noted.

 

The first item of rigging is the Topping lift for the Boom.

This is spliced around the Boom end taken up thro' the top block on the mast and down to belay on the aft s/b side  thwart pin.

The boom sheet runs between two blocks one on the boom the other seized to the iron horse. I used Morope 0.25mm line for this.

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The mast is quite slender and to avoid pulling it out of vertical when adjusting the lift and sheet lines I found it  useful to rig a temporary forestay to counter the pull of the sheet.

I have also rigged a temporary line to hold down the Gaff whilst rigging.

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I used 1/8" Syren blocks for the Topping lift and Peak Halyard lines, hooked to the masthead rather than seized.

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Peak Halyard secured to the Gaff.

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I used Boxwood Parrel trucks to rig the Gaff.

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It is relaxing to be engaged with such a simple rig for a change.

 

B.E.

[Derek C]

Your boat is looking spot on B.E. , makes me want to sink mine lol.

Derek

[MEDDO]

Wonderful!  

 

(I really wish we still had post numbers so it could be easier to bookmark super useful posts such as this one for later)

[Tigersteve]

Nice technical analysis. She's looking sharp!

Steve

[Blue Ensign]

Thanks for looking in Derek - there were times early in the build when I thought about sinking mine too

Thanks Michael, at least we have the new log lists  per boat type at the head of this section to better locate builds (thanks to Danny) and this one won't extend beyond three pages or so.

Cheers Steve, in the home straight now 

 

B.E.

[Martin W]

Hi BE -- Your thinking about the black line sounds logical to me.  And this is a tidy little build that I assume is serving as an intermezzo for a larger project, eh . . . . ?

 

Cheers,

 

Martin

[Blue Ensign]

You may very well be right Martin   I viewed these two builds as a refresher before I started Chuck's Cheerful, but that may be pushed back in the light of Chuck's new offering the Queen Anne style Barge, which has me sorely tempted. 

 

The final stretch.

Rigging the shrouds.

I decided not to darken the shroud line.

 

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Using Syren 0.63mmØ line the first starboard pair were  secured around the masthead using a needle to hold them in position whilst I did the seizing.

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For the seizing I used 0.20mm line.

The port side pair were then added.

For the  lower deadeyes I use Chuck's self assembly 3mm ones, and 3mm slightly modified brass hooks.

I have gone for the 'quick release' shroud attachment rather than strop the deadeyes in a Chainplate ring.

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I also made a 'deadeye claw' as shown in the instructions, mainly to hold the deadeye assembly together whilst I got the shroud around the upper deadeye.

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Even so it was a fiddly exercise.

From this point on it was a fairly straightforward exercise to put the remaining rigging lines in place altho' I don't tie off the lines as I go along except for the ones around the Mast thwart.

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The Jib outhaul completed.

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Forestay rigging.

Masthead rigging.

I found that when I came to tighten the shroud deadeye lanyards that the shrouds had slipped down the mast somewhat. To counter this I inserted a pin thro' the mast below the Masthead shroud rigging.

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Line belaying completed, separate coils were made to hang over the pins.

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Flag Halyard

The kit indicates 0.12" line but this seems a little heavy; a 1" or ¾" circ line scaling to 0.17mmØ  seems more appropriate to me. I used Syren 0.20mmØ line.

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Nearly at the end now, some fussing about with the detail, and oars and grapnel to place.

B.E.

Edited November 16, 2017 by Blue Ensign

[MEDDO]

I like the replacement line.  Also am waiting for the barge.

[Blue Ensign]

A two month project Completed.

Grapnel.

The kit provides a soft white metal boat grapnel which at first  look seemed somewhat over-scale, particularly in the spread of the claws.

Checking against Steel ;

A 112lb boat grapnel had a shank length of 3'with length of claws ½ the length of the shank. This equates to scale lengths of 19mm and 9.5mm, pretty much spot on for the provided grapnel, altho' this relates to largest size of grapnel.

Even so the curve  of the claws seems less pronounced than the version shown in the Medway Long-boat, and therefore takes up more room.

As with the Pinnace version I added a ring thro' which a 300mm length of 0.63mm Ø line was attached with a Fisherman's Bend.

Boat Hook

Not provided in the kit, but at least one would have been provided as basic boat equipment.

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As with the Pinnace version I knocked one up from a soft metal hairgrip and a length of Boxwood square stock.

Completion photo's.

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I have now made both of the Model Shipways 18th c boats, and there is a lot of modelling to be had from these two little modestly priced kits and fine little models to be had as a result.

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They are also excellent for skill honing particularly in terms of single plank hull planking, and simple ironwork fabrication.

It helps if you can replace some of the rather poor Limewood strips and use Syren replacement rigging line and blocks etc. which the kits really deserve.

 

My thanks once again to Chuck for making this possible and I look forward to the issue of his latest small boat offering.

 

B.E.

 

 

 

 

Edited November 18, 2017 by Blue Ensign

[Derek C]

Excellent work BE 

Derek

[Mirabell61]

lovely B.E.,

both boats in the same color scheme,..... no wonder they`re unmistakable from the same well known build-yard.....

 

Nils

[Tigersteve]

Very well done! I enjoyed your technical analysis on these projects and it added to the result. You finished them up quick. They look great together. 

Steve

[rafine]

A wonderful piece of work B.E. Why would we expect anything less from you. Are you going to do Cheerful next? I think that you would really enjoy it.

 

Bob

[Beef Wellington]

Beautiful results as to be expected, really nice to see the side by side comparison.

[jwvolz]

Fantastic job B.E. 

[md1400cs]

As always B.E. - superb!!

[gjdale]

Congratulations on completing yet another excellent build B.E. Like others, I’ll be keenly awaiting your next project to follow.

[MEDDO]

Outstanding!  I especially love the two projects together.  The pictures really show the differences in scale.

[Blue Ensign]

Thank you Guys for your comments, and for the 'likes' throughout this build, much appreciated. 

 

B.E.

[Martin W]

Oh, yes, BE, that's a lovely duo!  Well done, and ONWARD!

 

Cheers,

 

Martin

[tomganc]

Wow really nice looking build. Great detail and quality of work. I'm sure I will learn something new every day here

 

Thanks

Tom