HMS Pegasus by flyer - FINISHED - Victory Models

[flyer]

Hi B.E.

 

Thank you, for the compliments.

 

I rechecked your Pegasus and saw the difference you built into those rails and bumkins.

Sigh.

Well, while working on the sails, I will have ample time to consider a rebuild.

 

Did you bend the finished bumkins or work that form out of a bigger piece of wood?

 

Cheers

Peter

[Blue Ensign]

The thing about the False Rails Peter is that as they just sit on top of the Main rail they can be added later, just need drawing out on a bit of thin stuff and shaping..

 

The Bumkins are just a length of tapered dowel that I soaked and curved using my fingers. I haven't fixed them yet, will leave that as late as possible.

 

B.E.

[riverboat]

Hi Peter, just wishing you and yours a Merry Christmas and a Happy New Year!!!

Frank

[flyer]

Hi Frank

 

Thank you.

All the best for you and your loved ones!

 

Take care

Peter

 

[Landlubber Mike]

Nice work Peter - did you decide to go with sails on this build? 

 

Happy holidays to you and your family!

[flyer]

Hi Mike

 

Thank you and all the best for you and your family as well!

 

Yes, there will be furled sails. I’m still in the experimenting phase but pulling the threads to simulate seams seems to work OK. Following your lead I will glue the seams as far as needed (I found glue which seems to work fine but of course there is always room for improvement). So far I intent to sew on those parts of the boltrope which are needed but there will also be some experiments with gluing.

 

By the way – your Badger is looking mighty fine!

 

Cheers

Peter

 

[flyer]

The 19’ launch from CC was constructed similar to the longboat but with slight improvements.

It will be fitted out with oars etc. It looks a bit better than the longboat and there might an improvement of the later become necessary.

 

 

The captain inspects the new launch

 

 

Unfortunately the skipper seems to like it and the look in his eye tells me that he would like the longboat to be of the same standard. (In fact you see the bosun already calling the carpenters to work on that. I’m afraid they will be busy elsewhere and the work will end up on my table – as almost every time.)

Edited April 1, 2014 by flyer

[flyer]

Well, of course it went the way I dreaded, the way the skipper wanted. I had to remake the rear bench and that little deck in the bow of the longboat.

 

The details of the launch were completed and fortunately it fit into the reworked longboat without any additional supports.

Provisional stowing on the spare spars seems to show a piece of luck - that it should be possible to fix those two boats there just as they are.

 

Reworked longboat and detailed launch

 

Boats provisionally stowed

Edited April 1, 2014 by flyer

[Martin W]

That Captain runs a tight ship, and the results show up beautifully! 

 

Bravo!

 

Martin

[md1400cs]

Peter,

 

Oddly as a follower of your build, this, most resent update, is the first I've gotten in a while (must be my settings)

 

Well, nice update your ship is looking very splendid indeed.

 

10/4

 

Michael

[flyer]

Hi Martin

 

Thank you very much.   But sometimes I hate that skipper.

 

Peter

[flyer]

Hi Michael

 

Strange. I was able to follow your beautiful, beautiful Vasa uninterrupted. Perhaps the connection was reestablished both ways by the fact that I eventually could stay again 2 days in LA after a long interval. Spending some time on the beach at Point Dume certainly connects me somehow to California – a truly nice place.

 

Take care

Peter

[flyer]

While working on the boats I also tried to figure out how to make Pegasus’ furled sails.

Earlier solutions included sails sewn by my mother (35 years ago, for Dolphyn), bought whole from the kit supplier (for La Gloire, ugh), sewn by a professional seamstress with self applied bolt ropes (on Granado, still much room for improvement) and all were not truly satisfying.

 

Sample sails:      left side: one unused staysail from Pegasus, made by a seamstress, no bolt ropes yet

                                middle: glued sail with hand sewn bolt rope – sigh

                               right: glued hem with boltrope glued into the hem, seams are penciled on – the best

 

An example of a sail from the store, bought for La Gloire

 

Edited April 1, 2014 by flyer

[flyer]

First the finest cotton I could find in a drapery was lightly colored with a mixture of black and sage tea. Here I was following again the advice of Wolfram zu Mondfeld. The aim was to get a light brown-grey tone.

 

The sail maker inspects the original cotton, lying on top of a dyed part

 

This is the finest fabric I could find

 

 

Edited April 1, 2014 by flyer

[flyer]

Then I tried to make the seams by ‘pulling threads’.

 

First tries were encouraging but trying to do it in grander scale brought some problems forward: The progress was very slow and the thread kept snapping, making a whole sail useless. Then I saw that a lightly penciled seam looks practically the same way as a laboriously pulled thread.

 

The boltrope was first hand -sewn on. This looked too ugly. It was then glued into the hem according to the following very interesting link:

http://modelshipworldforum.com/resources/Rigging_and_Sails/ScaleSails.pdf

 

This provided so far the best result with a moderate amount of work.

The sail was shortened by about 30% to reduce its bulk when furled.

 

Pulling threads provides a fine result but...

 

A pencilled seam looks adequate with less work, producing no rejects

 

Finished sail on the drawing of the sail in full size

Edited April 1, 2014 by flyer

[flyer]

Presently I’m bending on the first sail, the mizzen topsail.

 

Sometimes I wish I was only a dumb officer, just having to order what has to be done. But being also an unskilled sail maker, carpenter, seaman etc. provides me with a lot of repetitive work where I find nobody to delegate to. Perhaps a hobby with fewer repetitions would be better. I wonder if I should try base jumping...

 

Bending on the sail with 2 robands per cloth

 

Setting the sail makers crew to work on it somehow achieved no progress

Edited April 1, 2014 by flyer

[Blue Ensign]

That looks like hard work Peter, but I applaud your tenacity in trying to get it as good as you can. I certainly agree that the pencilled on stitching looks good, I've always felt that real stitching at this scale looks too heavy. 

 

I look forward to the grand furling of the first sail. Fortunately I won't be taxed by such endeavours on my build.

 

B.E.

[flyer]

Hi B.E.

 

I’m bowing to the applause. Thank you.

 

You are absolutely right about the heaviness of real stitching. Even pulling the threads looks already a bit heavy.

 

If you will not trouble yourself with furled sails I then presume you will show full sails in all their glory on your Pegasus!?

Certainly, a sailing ship, especially one with those outstanding qualities as yours, will look a bit incomplete without sails, won’t it?

 

Cheers

Peter

[ccoyle]

I've been an advocate of penciled panel lines and glued boltropes for years.  Properly sewn sails certainly don't look bad on a model, but the actual-size sitching of real sails can't be duplicated in the scales we work at, and besides such lines are practically invisible at scale viewing distances.

 

Cheers!

[md1400cs]

Hi Michael

 

Strange. I was able to follow your beautiful, beautiful Vasa uninterrupted. Perhaps the connection was reestablished both ways by the fact that I eventually could stay again 2 days in LA after a long interval. Spending some time on the beach at Point Dume certainly connects me somehow to California – a truly nice place.

 

Take care

 

Peter,

 

Well you certainly chose a beautiful place in which to stay. It is also our season for the whales traveling north from Hawaii as well. Hope that you sighted a few spouts. Point Dume is a well known sighting area.

 

Regards,

 

Michael

[Modeler12]

Great work!!!

 

Where did you get the sailors, Peter? If you painted them, what kind of prep and paint?

They really add a touch of scale and mean a lot more when you take pictures.

Keep up the great modeling.

[mobbsie]

I like what you are doing with the sails here Peter, I'm sure your patience and tenacity will pay off.

 

Just a quickie mate, what size thread are you using to tie the robands, I'm just wondering if a sowing thread might be a bit smaller.

 

Be Good

 

mobbsie

[flyer]

Hi Michael

 

No, but I didn’t know about the whales. Maybe next time.

 

Cheers

Peter

[flyer]

Hi Chris

 

Yes, I was hesitant to give up the idea of properly stitched sails but when even pulling threads looks out of scale, you have to go with the small, penciled line or leave the seams off altogether.

 

Cheers

Peter

[flyer]

Hi Jay

 

Thank you!

The crew was hired from Amati via http://www.cornwallmodelboats.co.uk/acatalog/amati_crew.html

They come in cast metal. I cleaned them with some cleaning agent from the kitchen and painted with Caldercrafts ‘Admiralty Water Based Paints’. They even have a decent ‘Flesh’ color.

 

Cheers

Peter

[flyer]

Hi Mobbsie

 

What patience? You should hear some comments about my driving style.

About the robands: I didn’t find any dimensions in Lees and took the smallest thread delivered with the kit (0.1).

You could take some smaller sewing thread but this often has a fuzzy appearance and I wonder what size they actually used. Of course you spread the pull of the sail on all robands, but hardly equally and there is the thing about the weakest link to consider. Do you feel they are a bit heavy?

 

Cheers

Peter

[mobbsie]

Hello Mate,

 

I take your point about spreading the weight on all Robands.

 

At first I did think they were a little heavy but on reflection I think you have it about right and at 0.1mm you're not going to get much smaller.

 

I hope I haven't put doubt in your mind mate, that wasn't my intension at all.

 

Be Good

 

mobbsie

[flyer]

Mobbsie!

 

But you did put some doubt into my mind and that’s good. Sharing thoughts that way not only may improve our builds but is also fun. Mankind is a communicative species and men are just now gradually catching up on communication. Don’t let admiralty and other communication professionals keep a monopoly on doubts, hints, questions and shared thoughts.

 

Cheers, mate

Peter

[flyer]

First the lines for sail handling were checked. I will not rig leech lines or reef-tackles but buntlines, where necessary. When no mizzen topgallant sail is carried, the topsail doesn’t need buntlines (fortunately). But on main and fore topsails I will have to add the missing buntlines and necessary blocks.

 

Then the sail was wetted with a little water. In former projects I found it could be tighter packed this way.

Now it was furled and fixed with gaskets. The sail was first pulled up by the clues, but leaving a little way to the corners. Then it was rolled up over the front, leaving the corners protruding. The gaskets were put on alternately left and right from outboard inwards. The corners fall down over the front. The furling is not very tight and my excuse is that it is not supposed to be a rigid harbour stow but just for lying at anchor, ready to sail on short notice.

 

While furling some of the glued hems opened a bit. Lesson learned: use more glue and above all fix it with a smoothing iron as recommended. The furl is not yet tight enough. I will try to rework it.

 

The yard with the sail will not be mounted yet. I think it will be easier to fix first gaff and boom with the spanker, then the crossjack and then the topsail yard.

 

By the way – while trying to figure how to attach the driver boom I couldn’t see how its jaw would be fixed in height. I think a saddle on the mizzen mast is missing altogether and I will have to attach one.

 

The corners of the wet sail are pulled up

 

Now it is rolled up over the front side

 

Gaskets added, corners remain protruding

 

Corners pulled down over the front. When dry I will try to tighten the furl and perhaps add a few more and tighter gaskets before attaching the yard to the mast.

Edited April 1, 2014 by flyer

[flyer]

While checking which blocks might be missing to put up the furled spanker I couldn’t figure how to put up the boom.

The gaff is held up by halliards at both ends but the boom’s inner end seems to be levitating. Lees wasn’t too clear either and therefore I decided to attach a saddle to the mizzen in a similar fashion as on Granado.

To fit it around the finished mast I fabricated a ring from leftover ply wood, cut it in two (and made a small quoin to fill the gap resulting from some mistake with the measurements) and glued all together with 4 supports to the mast.

The boom should hopefully mask the tinkering.