What are the rules for determining the thicknesses of rope for standing and running rigging?

[flying_dutchman2]

What are the rules for determining the thickness of rope for standing and running rigging and what formulas do you use to get to the dimensions? 

 

Especially large ships such as man-of-war, Pinas, East Indiaman, etc. 

 

When I scratch built the Utrecht, the Boyer and other smaller Dutch ships, I guessed the rigging and the results were good. Now I am building a larger ship en cannot guess the rigging anymore. 

 

Books I have:

C. G. Davis, The Ship model builder's assistant 

G. Biddlecombe, The art of rigging (pretty good explanations lots of tables but not how they got the numbers) 

R. C. Anderson, The rigging of ships in the days of the spritsail Topmast 1600-1720

W. zu Mondfeld, Historic ship models (reasonable explanation) 

M. Roth, Ship Modeling from stem to stern (very extensive explanations) 

D.Steel The Art of Rigging (1796) 

 

- Are there other books, Excel spreadsheets, and URLs where the given question is discussed? 

 

- What are the math formulas with answers?

 

- Can someone give me and write down an example? 

 

- How Do I read figures in tables? 

 

For example in Montfeld's book on page 308 and 309, Running rigging sizes. 

Mainmast, Main Course, Tye for 16th/17th century  it is 50%. 

 

-50% of what? 

- Where did this number come from? 

- What is the formula used? 

 

Then on page 308 (Montfeld), in the lower left corner there are a few sentences explaining that the figures refer to the thickness of the main stay, 0.166% of the diameter of the mainmast at the deck (100%) 

 

Again, how do I read this? 

It is confusing. 

 

Thank you in advance for answering my questions 

Marcus

[Bob Cleek]

Without pulling my copy off the shelf, I believe zu Montfeld refers to the diameter of the mainstay as a percentage of the diameter of the mainmast at the deck and then everything else as a percentage of the diameter of the mainstay, for cordage standing rigging, at least. In real life, I think it was left to the bosun's judgment and the cordage available. "Big enough to carry the load" was essential, of course. At some point, I believe the Admiralty standardized block sizes for purposes of procurement and store-keeping and the running rigging would be sized to match the blocks, but I doubt there was a lot of science to rigging sizes that could be reduced to absolute mathematical formulae back in those times. "Different ships, different long splices" was the order of the day.  There are many far more informed on the subject than I am, I'm sure. Perhaps one can add more than what i have or correct any errors in what I've stated. 

Edited April 21, 2021 by Bob Cleek

[allanyed]

Marcus,

Similar to Monfeld's formulas, and lacking other information, the formulas in Lees Masting and Rigging will give you every mast and spar dimension,  and rope circumference from 1625 to 1860.  He starts with formulas for various time periods to find the main mast length, then all mast and spar dimensions as well as all rope circumferences can be found easily.   As has been reviewed here at MSW recently, go to the Articles Data base here at MSW and bring up Danny Vadas' spread sheet.  It appears to be the same information that Lees gives with one exception.  The Vadas spread sheet cannot be used for the period from 1670-1711 as his base formula was not done correctly so all dimensions that follow are wrong as well for this time period.   If you have a vessel in that time period, Lees formulas work. 

 

[DelF]

Royal Navy masting and rigging was subject to very detailed and exhaustive standards, most based on various ratios and formulae related to dimensions such as the beam of the ship. As Bob says, individual captains and their bosuns would have had a degree of leeway, but these official standards are as good a source as any if you're modelling ships of the period - especially British ships. 

 

A quick and easy source is the spreadsheet created by Dan Vardas which you can access through the Articles Database on the 'More' button. A good written source is The Masting & Rigging of English Ships of War 1625 - 1860 by James Lees.

 

...oh, Allan just beat me to it. Still, great minds think alike, and all that.

Edited April 21, 2021 by DelF

[Bob Cleek]

15 minutes ago, Bob Cleek said:

There are many far more informed on the subject than I am, I'm sure. Perhaps one can add more than what i have or correct any errors in what I've stated. 

I knew I was right!  And it didn't take long, either. 

 

[flying_dutchman2]

@Bob Cleek, @allanyed and @DelF

 

Thank you all for de detailed information and I downloaded the spreadsheet from Danny Vadas.

Also downloaded the spreadsheet from the Schooner thread from Dr. P.

 

Furthermore, because I only build Dutch merchant ships from the 17th century I asked the same question on a Dutch model site (www.modelbouwforum.nl). They refered me to books written by Ab Hoving, a member here, and an expert on Dutch ships. I have all his books 

 

I am going to compare the British ship measurements to the Dutch ship measurements and see how much difference there is. 

 

Thanks again. 

Marcus 

[Dr PR]

Marcus,

 

zu Mondfeld's "Standing rigging sizes" table on page 272 and "Running rigging sizes" table on page 308 have an error. This had me scratching my head for a while. They say

 

"The figures given refer to the thickness of the main stay, 0.166% of the diameter of the mainmast at the deck (100%)."

 

The actual number is mast diameter x 0.166,  or 16.6% of the mast diameter.

 

The resulting number is the circumference of the rope, not the diameter. Divide the circumference by Pi (3.14159) to get the diameter of the rope.

 

****

 

Before I figured this out I was getting really strange rope sizes. For example, 0.166% = 0.0016. If a model's mast was 0.375 inch diameter I thought the rope diameter was 0.0016 x 0.375 = 0.0006 inch!  That is about 1/5 the thickness of a sheet of 24# printer paper! That is way too small and obviously incorrect.

 

So I tried 0.375 inch times 16.6% = 0.375 x 0.166 = 0.062 inch, or about 1/16 inch. But 1/16 inch diameter seemed much too large.

 

Then I realized it meant a 1/16 inch circumference, or 0.0625/3.14159 = 0.019894 or 0.02 inch diameter rope for the main stay.

 

All other rigging circumferences are based upon the main stay circumference.

 

****

 

In my schooner rigging spreadsheet I used Lees' formulas for English square rigged ships. But mast diameters are smaller on schooners that on full rigged ships. So reducing the mast diameter for schooners also reduced the size of the ropes used for the rigging.

 

However, the rigging size section of the spreadsheet is not linked to the masting part. There is a separate cell (BH9) for the rigging calculations where you enter the model's mast diameter. So for any ship type just enter the mast diameter and the spreadsheet will use Lees' rules and calculate all the rigging sizes. However, I only include the rigging used on a schooner (and not all of that it turns out - I am learning). But the spreadsheet is not locked so you can modify it however you please.

 

CAUTION: The spreadsheet uses Lees' English unit formulas and some calculations contain English feet to inch conversions, so entering metric values for the mast diameter will result in some meaningless Metlish measurements! If you want metric values enter the mast diameter in inches and then add a column to the calculations to convert the English units to metric units. Or just rewrite the spreadsheet.

Mast spar and rigging calculations.xlsx

Edited April 23, 2021 by Dr PR

[amateur]

Hi Marcus,

 

Look at this site, and more specifically the book by Witsen: Witsen Scheepsbouw

On page 121 (page 234 in the digital version)  he shows the tables for the rigging, related to the mast-thickness.

Basically, all measures are circumferences, and related to the thickness of the mast(s). 

 

These tables are the underlying tables for what Hoving has in his books. Rescaling the tables in his books,

based on the mast-thickness of his Pinas and your model gives convincing looking results.

 

Jan 

 

 

 

Edited April 23, 2021 by amateur

[allanyed]

Marcus,  I hope you report back with your findings regarding comparison of English and Dutch rigging sizes.  From a practical standpoint, I would think they will be similar even if not exactly the same.

Thanks in advance......

[flying_dutchman2]

@Dr PR Thank you for the lengthy information, especially the method of how you got to the answers.

 

@amateur  Thanks and I will check Witsen.

 

@allanyed  I will let you know.

 

Marcus 

[Lieste]

On 4/21/2021 at 9:35 PM, Bob Cleek said:

Without pulling my copy off the shelf, I believe zu Montfeld refers to the diameter of the mainstay as a percentage of the diameter of the mainmast at the deck and then everything else as a percentage of the diameter of the mainstay, for cordage standing rigging, at least. In real life, I think it was left to the bosun's judgment and the cordage available. "Big enough to carry the load" was essential, of course. At some point, I believe the Admiralty standardized block sizes for purposes of procurement and store-keeping and the running rigging would be sized to match the blocks, but I doubt there was a lot of science to rigging sizes that could be reduced to absolute mathematical formulae back in those times. "Different ships, different long splices" was the order of the day.  There are many far more informed on the subject than I am, I'm sure. Perhaps one can add more than what i have or correct any errors in what I've stated. 

It would be rope *circumference* as a proportion of mast or spar maximum diameter it is referred from.

[Bob Cleek]

And just to make life a bit more miserable for the anally constrained obsessives, let's not forget that the measurement of a "foot" was not internationally standardized in the times discussed here. Individual nations and even individual cities had their own "foot" measurement standards and even some trades had their own "foot" measurements.  Where some may have updated their measurement standards or political boundaries may have shifted, there were simultaneously "old feet" and "new feet" in some locations. This is often a cause of confusion today when a contemporary draughts and records list the length of a particular vessel in "feet" and the contemporary model doesn't measure out to scale in the present "Imperial foot" which was only internationally standardized in 1959. I once had a terrible time trying to resolve the published discrepancy in the length of a yacht built as recently as 1939 until I realized the naval architect's drawings were done in the UK to British feet and inches, while the vessel was built to the offsets in British measurement units by a yard in Sweden using Swedish feet and inches!  See: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Foot_(unit)

Edited April 24, 2021 by Bob Cleek

[Mark P]

Good Evening Marcus;

 

To follow on from Bob's post above, the United Provinces, as the Netherlands was then known, were probably the worst offenders in the variable foot field. Each of the administrative districts had its own foot. Must have been a bit of a nightmare for journeyman shipwrights.

 

Regarding the rigging, the essential point is that it was done by rule of thumb, and in most countries everything started off with the length of the mainmast, with everything else based on a particular fraction of its length. The divisor applied varied from country to country and from period to period, but knowing the mast length meant that those with the correct knowledge could calculate the diameter of all other ropes. The length of the mast was, in Britain at least, based on calculations using the length of the keel and the ship's beam.

 

On the subject of Cook and Australia, it was indeed known that there was something in the area; I have seen a French map dating from around 1715, which showed a line south of the main East Indies, marked as some kind of unknown land. But Cook was the first to prove its size and survey so much of its coastline. 

 

All the best,

 

Mark P

Edited April 24, 2021 by Mark P

[Lieste]

According to Steel, British masting was based on "half the lower deck plus beam" at least in the period close to his writing... rather than on the keel.

[Mark P]

Good Morning Lieste;

 

You are quite right regarding Steel; however, that is a good example of why his authority cannot necessarily be extrapolated backwards in time. The method he uses was introduced in 1794, I believe. Prior to that, the mast length was either based on calculations using the beam, or the keel and beam. In the 17th century, keel, beam and depth were used in the calculations.

 

All the best,

 

Mark P

Edited April 25, 2021 by Mark P

[DelF]

On 4/23/2021 at 7:20 AM, Dr PR said:

In my schooner rigging spreadsheet I used Lees' formulas for English square rigged ships.

Very useful resource - thanks for sharing. I have Lees's book and Danny's spreadsheet and refer to both frequently, but the ability to focus on the mast diameter and edit makes your spreadsheet particularly helpful.

 

Derek

[wade13]

As a rough guide of thumb / rule, the mainstays are the thickest ropes holding the masts. The basic rule is whatever the main mast measures in diameter, the mainstay is 1/6th of that. So if the model measures 7mm diameter, the mainstays will be 1/6th of 7mm (1.16666r). Then as a general guide, the shrouds are half the thickness of the mainstays (1/2 of 1.1666r) which is about 0.58mm, guide down to .55 or up to .6mm for the pitched shroud lines.

 

The thickness of the ratlines is then done to the scale of your average 'ships hand'... for his feet and hands... This is the clever rule of scale Harry Houdini uses on his Youtube channel about ship rigging... and I am doing a 1/168 scale Sovereign of the Seas and find his guide quite astute. 

Edited March 5, 2023 by wade13

[allanyed]

16 hours ago, wade13 said:

The basic rule is whatever the main mast measures in diameter, the mainstay is 1/6th of that.

Hi Wade,

Welcome to MSW!   I checked out a couple minutes of his videos and they look to be nicely done. 

 

The figures you give are pretty close to the sources given in posts  #2 and #3 so that at your scale of 1:168  any differences probably would not be noticed at all.  How will you determine the sizes for all of the other standing rigging and all of the running rigging lines?

 

Allan

[wade13]

Sorry Allan,

I've been lost in gun carriage rigging chaos for over a month.

 

I haven't checked in for quite a while. I have to admit I bought loads of thread thickness variations to research what would be right at a later date (miles away from doing the masts, let alone the rigging). Any advise would be much appreciated Allan, thank you.

 

All the best

Wade

[allanyed]

23 hours ago, wade13 said:

Any advise would be much appreciated

Post 3 above is probably the best advice I can think of.  Add to that, the type of line you use.  At your scale, you will probably be limited to very few circumferences but that may be a plus in the end.  Regardless, if you can find the sizes you need in rope rather than thread go for it.  

 

For English ships regarding the cannon,  contemporary models sometimes left off all the cannon and when they did have them they were rarely fully rigged (just the breech is often seen).  I know most of us like to show the cannon, me included, so if you are making them fully rigged keep in mind for less than 32 pounders they used two single blocks, not a single and a double, which seems to be prevalent in modern day models.  This includes both the running out tackles and the train tackle. 

 

Allan

 

Edited March 24, 2023 by allanyed