HMS Bellona 1760 by SJSoane - Scale 1:64 - English 74-gun - as designed

[SJSoane]

I had to take off time from the ship for some overdue dermatology treatments. Living for so many years in Denver at 5280 feet altitude (1609 meters) put my skin way too close to the sun. Now I live at a measly 2930 feet (892 meters) I can hardly see the sun.😎

 

So back in the shop, I have finished up one more strake of 4" planking above the main wales. In this photo you can see just how much the planking forms an S curve at the stern, as the bulging tumblehome flows into the straight edge at the stern structure.

 

You can see from the pencil marks on the planking that this is yet to be sanded on the surface, and yet to have sawdust cleared out of the corners of the ports. It also looks a little raw white. The nice golden patina seen on the rest of the hull will come after 5-6 months of exposure to the air once it is finish sanded.  And once the finish is applied, it should eventually look the color of the frames below the wales. The wale will of course be painted black.

 

Just one more strake before the channel Wales between the black lines!

 

Mark

[druxey]

Nice to see another strake completed, Mark. Sorry to read of your skin issues. Hope all is well now.

[SJSoane]

Thanks, druxey. I have a very nice Frankenstein's monster seam at the front of my forehead. I don't really care anymore about what it looks like, but it kept me from wearing my magnifying visor until the stitches came out!

[Hubac's Historian]

I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again: exquisite!

[Tony Hunt]

Gorgeous work.

[SJSoane]

Thanks so much, Marc and Tony, for your kind comments. As you know, it is kind of a lonely process building a ship model; feedback definitely helps keep me focused!

 

Mark

[Borden]

Can only say WOW!

Great work of art a joy to look at!

[SJSoane]

Thanks, Borden, for your support. One of the greatest pleasures of working on this ship is viewing its beautiful lines. It is endlessly mesmerizing to look at the flow of the curves in three dimensions.

 

While waiting for some more planks to steam, I looked a little more carefully at what happens at the stern windows in relation to the external planking. In order to keep the windows all the same width on the outside, the window into the quarter gallery really starts to intrude into the hull frame at the frame's aft most edge. It looks to me like the frame needs to be cut away to the dotted line I am showing below, to leave room for the glass and its inboard stop.

 

And the planking, which at this point is the channel wale, is 5 1/2" thick. It seems it needs to stop short of the window frame as I have shown here. That means there is a gap in the quarter gallery wall, where the glass seems to disappear into the wall behind the planking. Perhaps the channel wale needs to be thinned down more at its aft most end, maybe aft of the door into the quarter gallery? This seems a pretty awkward detail.

 

I have not been able to find any drawings or photos that show this detail. Is anyone aware of how this detail is handled, other than what I am showing here?

 

Best wishes,

 

Mark

 

 

[Hubac's Historian]

Is it possible that the aft-most QG window is merely a vestigial, or dummy window, so that it doesn’t matter where the channel wale lands, inside the QG, because you wouldn’t be able to see it?

[druxey]

If I understand your question correctly, your issue is with the varied thicknesses of planking as you approach the outer counter timbers. I believe that the wale thickness diminishes as it approaches the stern to that of the planking between the wales. I think this is 3" in your instance. This partially solves the issue. Secondly, the outer light of the stern gallery is a dummy one, so is boarded in anyway. One will not see the plank ends here. I recall this being the only reasonable solution when I built Polyphemus, 64 guns of 1781, some years ago. 

[SJSoane]

Hi Marc and druxey,

 

So the quarter gallery window at the stern is a dummy? Does that mean it still has glass but the glass is backed by a panel of wood? Or the internal side of the window is painted a color? It seems it would have glass because the reflectivity in photos of models seems to be the same across all the windows.

 

Mark

[druxey]

Yes, glass aft of the wood panelling. As for tapering planks see:

 

https://collections.rmg.co.uk/collections/objects/66299.html

 

Look at the upper edge of the black strake. There the tapering is obvious. Unfortunately, Steel and others don't mention this in their texts!

Edited February 24, 2020 by druxey

[SJSoane]

Hi druxey,

 

Ahah, that link to the photos of the Bellona model at the NMM clearly shows in the black and white photo that the end windows are blind. I never noticed that before. Do you recall if you modeled the wood paneling right up flush to the glass, or is there a gap between glass and paneling?

 

 

 

Mark

[druxey]

Flush, Mark. Yes, the dummy lights fooled me years ago as well!

[Gaetan Bordeleau]

Again , as comparison, french 74 also had false windows, no glass, the wall behind was painted in black. These windows made you believe that is was bigger than what it really was, not only on the sides but in the back also in the back.

[Beef Wellington]

Mark, this is a good question.  I know its a different period but Trincomalee clearly shows dummy lights, in her case painted green.  It would seem odd to me to put glass in front of the wood as I can't see any purpose to it, and it was very common during this period to paint windows on houses with black background and simulated white frames to represent windows to maintain the symmetry in Georgian architecture - often windows were filled in to respond to the 1696 'window' tax - I jest not!  Interestingly, the fore and rear light in the side gallery are similarly false.  I suspect it is model makers whimsy to panel these with simulated glass for aesthetic purposes.

 

[druxey]

Whether or not the actual ships' dummy lights were glazed or not is uncertain. However, contemporary models all show glazing. Draw your own inferences....

[SJSoane]

Hi Gaetan and Jason,

 

Thanks, this is additional confirmation for what I now see would have been a clearly common practice.

I remember reading about false windows on buildings in England, so there would have been a cultural precedent.

Interesting in the photo Jason provided above that the fore and aft windows were also false, except for what appears to be one upper sash of one window. The captain must have desired exceptional privacy when docked!

Good point about whether there was glass on the outside of the false window paneling. Maybe that was just a modeler's conceit, because it would have been expensive and vulnerable to provide glass for no functional purpose in the real ship. But then there were a lot of expensive, vulnerable and functionally useless things on these ships like the carvings and friezes. Maybe aesthetics counted far more than we assume today.

 

Mark

[SJSoane]

Hi druxey,

 

Just saw your post after I posted mine. Thanks for the observation of the actual models. I am likely to continue with that tradition, because I think it would just look better! See, now I am thinking like an 18th century shipwright!

 

Mark

[Siggi52]

On 2/24/2020 at 10:17 PM, druxey said:

However, contemporary models all show glazing. Draw your own inferences....

Hello,

Druxey, there are always exceptions from the rule. With other words, there are no rules.

 

Here some pictures from my collection. At the Dragon I painted the wood behind the window frames just black, but if you look from the side it glazed a little

The Bellona, it did't look like glas. There is no glazing!

and the other Bellona, Mark you did the picture

and the Superb, without any window to the back

and the last window to the side is blind without glazing

 

 

Edited February 26, 2020 by Siggi52

[SJSoane]

Thanks, Siggi,

 

I just drew up two different versions of the window, one with glass and a wood panel, the other with just the wood panel.

 

Here is with the glass:

 

And here is with only a wood panel:

 

 

The construction certainly is simplified with just the wood panel, particularly since my glass sheets in the model are thicker than they should be to scale. In the examples you have seen, was the black paint glossy, or Matt? I can try some experiments with glass, wood and paint to see what makes sense for the model.

 

Mark

 

 

[Siggi52]

Hello Mark,

 

I looked through my pictures and books again and found all, 1. real windows, 2. fake windows with glas or mica and 3. just black painted backgrounds.

So you have the choice.

 

1. I don't know how they did it. But because there is the door to the gallery, you have not to build the channel wales up to the back. They have there no more function and if you make the space between the windows here a little larger it may work.

 

2. I don't think that they build that in real, as some stated also earlier. No one would see it and I think it's only for the beauty of the model.

 

3. Because the paint in those days based on linseed oil, it would shine after some layers. 

 

How you build your model is now your decision. 

 

[SJSoane]

Thanks, Siggi, this is very helpful. druxey has also explained to me how I might use mica for the glass, and this would certainly work better in the sense of much thinner windows.

Here is what that the detail would look like:

 

I will pick up some mica and see how this might work.

 

Mark

[Beef Wellington]

Mark - where does one buy mica for this purpose?  

[Siggi52]

Mark,

 

why would you use mica? It's not easy to work with. I made the windows for the Dragon with it. If you give your black wood panel a good coat of clear lacquer, you have the same effect and it's authentic. 

 

Jason, if you send my your address(PM), I send you the rest of my mica.

[paulsutcliffe]

44 minutes ago, Beef Wellington said:

Mark - where does one buy mica for this purpose?  

I was just going to ask the same question, I have searched for I to use on the sirius but couldn't find any

 

[Kris Avonts]

If you are looking for mica, take look here:

I tried to cut mica and found that you can also split it into thinner pieces (kind of peeling off).

Then it also gets easier to cut with a knife, chisel or scissors.

To find where you can buy mica as it is used in electronic circuits, just google 'TO-3 mica insulator'.

 

regards,

   Kris

[SJSoane]

Thanks so much, Kris, it sounds like a number of us are going to try this!

 

Mark

[GrandpaPhil]

I like to use the clear plastic off store boxes to make windows.  Anytime anyone in the family buys something that comes in a box with a clear plastic front, I always scavenge the plastic for model building.

[SJSoane]

Thanks, GrandpaPhil, It is always a good reminder to look for tools and materials wherever they might be found.

 

While waiting for the glue to dry on the foremost of the top 4" strake under the channel wales, I have looked more closely at the detail around the rudder head and window into the upper deck. I have finally figured out where the transom goes, and there is likely a curved beam just in front of the rudder head, with a thickened piece around the rudder head for landing planks between the two:

 

The drawing I made many years ago did not quite get it right (see below). It really helps to see the actual structure built so far, and envision what has to happen to make it all work.

 

Best wishes,

 

Mark