Slide or wheels

[KennethB]

I am attempting to build HMS President light Frigate model, it comes with what look like slides for the brass cannons, I think the ship is of the 1750/60s and I wasn't aware that cannons of this size ( I suspect 9 pounders) would be on wheel less carriages, can anyone help in this respect,? should I use wheeled carriages, should the guns be brass, bronze or iron?

Ken 

[wefalck]

As carronades came onto the 'market' only around 1770, I gather these would be cannon and cannon at that time were normally mounted on wheeled carriages.

[allanyed]

Ken, 

 

Your post sparked a bit of a search for me which for me is as much fun as the building itself 

 

Wefalck is correct that carronades came into use later.  According to Adrian Caruana in volume II of The History of English Sea Ordinance (pp.161-162) several folks are mentioned as the inventor but General Robert Melville claimed to have the idea in 1754.   But, he was not in a position to approach a gun foundry until 1774 when he went to the Carron Company.   Charles Gascoigne, a partner at Carron is given credit for leading in the development of the carronade.  The first actual use was in 1778 so there would not be any carronades in 1760.  She may have been refitted with them after 1778, but she would be well aged by then so there may be some doubt that these would be found on her at any time.    

 

Hopefully someone here can corroborate this but I doubt that carronades were ever made of brass and the shot weight was likely more than 9 pounds.   Fifth rate frigates (32-44 guns) would likely carry a least 18 pounders and the smallest frigates, sixth rates (20-28 guns),  and sloops (16-18 guns) would carry 12 pounders.   Originally 12 pounders were 20 inches long and 18 pounders 24 inches long.  In 1780 they were 26 inches and 28 inches long, then by 1798 they were 33 inches and 40 inches long respectively then reduced in length in 1815.   

 

In my looking on line and in a few books, unfortunately I could not find any British built frigate named President in the 1700s or 1800s so I wonder if this is a fictional ship.   

 

Sorry for droning on but I do hope some of this information is of help.  If you do go with the carronades, and the barrels in the kit are brass, you can always blacken them so as to represent them as iron rather than brass.  

 

Allan

Edited April 13, 2020 by allanyed

[mtaylor]

This is the Mantua/Sergal kit?  Looks like they simplified the carriages and didn't bother with any kind of accuracy.

[KennethB]

Thank you all, I think that 'Bilge Rat' has it right, they have made these parts as cheap as possible, I shall put these aside and buy small cannons from somewhere that at least look like cannons,

Having started this kit I am struggling with the planking using the information and pictures that have come with it, also the blocks do not look right and I will replace these also, but the dead eyes look good.

[mtaylor]

Kenneth, open a build log for her.  It's great way to get help.  There is also an index of kit builds in the Kit area which also might help.

[Bob Fraser]

Hi Kenneth.

If you do a search in the search box for President and tick "titles only" you'll find 13 results. About half are for this model.

I have one of these started as far as the hull planking, but am doing some research to kit bash into a real ship a distant relative was a lieutenant on.

As said, Carronade didn't come into use until 1774, so cannon would be the correct item if you wanted some accuracy.

The instructions are a little"sparse" shall we say 🤬.  Have a look on here for the planking tutorials which are really good if you haven't already got past that stage.

And as has been suggested, create a build log - so much help you won't get disheartened!

Best wishes, stay safe,

Bob