Has anyone bought 8 mm Belaying Pins from Cast Your Anchor Hobbies?

[LucienL]

Has anyone bought the 8 mm boxwood belaying pins from Cast Your anchor hobbies? This is the image they have on their site

I'm somewhat skeptical that they actually look like the pins as pictured, as they have the same image for each size of pin. I'm worried it will turn out to still be the rounded head pins without that shape and will instead look like the image below. 

[allanyed]

Lucien,

I am curious to see the answer as well.  The length, assuming your scale is 1:60 is about right at 19" so hopefully the shape is right.  The handle diameter should be about 2" real world (0.033" or .84mm)   This is very small and maybe weak if they are wood.   For this size, you may be better off with brass pins that are painted a wood color.   I scaled the top picture in CAD and the handle diameter is way oversized at about 3.5",  nearly double what they should be.

They do look better than most but once in a pin rack, they will not look right.    As was posted quite a while ago by another member, try to put your hand around a too large diameter rod and you will understand better why this would not work.  The photo has a can 3.25" diameter so it would be even more uncomfortable and hard to hold a pin that is 3.5" diameter.   Again, the ones in the photo do look better than many other but they are really not close to scale.

Allan

[druxey]

I'm not sure if this company is still in business. I seem to recall other members of MSW having issues with them.

[rookie]

I have not purchased belaying pins but did buy wood strips last year

They are in Toronto and I think are on-line only now

 

[David Lester]

I am always leery of wooden belaying pins; in my experience they are almost always too heavy and in one of my models it wouldn't even have been possible to fit them all in, let alone have them look right.

I tried some of the wooden pins that come from one of the Russian companies ( I don't recall which one.) They were exquisite - very fine but utterly useless. They were so fine that they couldn't withstand even the gentlest wrapping of the line around them. They just snapped off. So I have committed to using only brass pins. They at least approximate the right proportions and are reliably robust. I have noticed that pins on real ships often have a grayed out colour, so I always paint mine with Tamiya XF55 Deck Tan, which is a terrific beigey-gray colour.

 

As for Cast Your Anchor, I believe they are still in business, but buying from them is not a great experience. You will get an automated response by email when you place the order, but you will never receive any further communication from them. They will charge your visa account the minute they receive the order and not wait until they ship it. You will never know when (or if) the order is shipped. If they do fill the order, it will take many weeks to arrive. I've only used them twice and I did ultimately receive the orders after several weeks, but I have heard of others who have not. If you email them, they will not respond and if you phone they don't answer the phone and you can't leave a message because the voice mailbox is always full. I would like to do business with them, as they seem to have a good inventory, and they're just a short distance away from me, but they're just so frustrating to deal with that I've given up. There are plenty of suppliers out there who are all great to deal with, so there's no need for an unpleasant experience.

 

David

[rookie]

Based on their diagram with the dimensions it seems the 8mm pins are 2mm diameter at the narrow end

it seems to me that is way  too thick 

the bras ones are much thinner  (  .5 mm ) and would look better

 

I am interested in these now; I may buy some brass and see

[rookie]

Hi David

 

They were better when they had a store in Scarborough ; I went there years ago and bought kits, etc

 

Colin

 

[Ian_Grant]

Recently (within past month) ordered 42 lpi chain from CYA.  Received an order acknowledgement via email, another when it had shipped, and the order arrived a few days later. Mind you, I am in Ontario same as them.

[glbarlow]

Crusty Sailor has correctly scale wood belay pins. They are the only first wood ones I’ve seen that other than brass ones that are correct, not the typical fat ones included in kits. 

[Thistle17]

Glenn I think you meant Crafty Sailor. The web site is Wooden Belaying Pins (10pcs) – Crafty Sailor Model Store

 

I first bought a couple packages just to see for myself. i was quite satisfied of with the quality so I went back and ordered more of each size. I spoke to him about updating the web site with the missing dimensions and now appears he has. They are quite good in my estimation and he too is a responsive business person.

Joe

[rookie]

I like the 'Crusty Sailor' name better - too bad it was not that 

[LucienL]

Hey everyone, thanks for all the responses

14 hours ago, allanyed said:

Lucien,

I am curious to see the answer as well.  The length, assuming your scale is 1:60 is about right at 19" so hopefully the shape is right.  The handle diameter should be about 2" real world (0.033" or .84mm)   This is very small and maybe weak if they are wood.   For this size, you may be better off with brass pins that are painted a wood color.   I scaled the top picture in CAD and the handle diameter is way oversized at about 3.5",  nearly double what they should be.

They do look better than most but once in a pin rack, they will not look right.    As was posted quite a while ago by another member, try to put your hand around a too large diameter rod and you will understand better why this would not work.  The photo has a can 3.25" diameter so it would be even more uncomfortable and hard to hold a pin that is 3.5" diameter.   Again, the ones in the photo do look better than many other but they are really not close to scale.

Allan

I sent cast your anchor an email about the pins. They responded quite quickly (given that I am on the wrong side of the globe), but it seems like those top pins are indeed a fairy tale. I like your thinking and you are probably right that even 2 mm is out of scale, however I have already drilled 2 mm holes for all of the kit belaying pins and would need to order more material to drill some smaller ones, so I will probably have to live with ‘somewhat close to scale’ rather than completely out of scale.

12 hours ago, rookie said:

Based on their diagram with the dimensions it seems the 8mm pins are 2mm diameter at the narrow end

it seems to me that is way  too thick 

the bras ones are much thinner  (  .5 mm ) and would look better

 

I am interested in these now; I may buy some brass and see

hmm yes, they do say .5mm on the site, but I think they have done the conversion wrong or there is some other mistake. The next size up is 2 mm (for the 11 mm pins) and the inches on the 9 mm pin list 5/64ths of an inch, which I believe comes to around 2 mm as well

 

I think I’ll go with the brass pins this time around, but thank you everyone for your thoughts.

 

With that said, does anyone know anything about the actual use of brass pins during the age of sail? The ship I’m building is from 1820 (HMS Beagle) and there are some photos of actual brass belaying pins in a google image search but they seem more recent. Were brass pins ever used, or should I paint them a brown/beige colour to mimic wood?

Edited May 28, 2021 by LucienL

[LucienL]

Alternatively, I could blacken them. How realistic would black belaying pins be?

[allanyed]

This first photo is of a wood belaying pin that has been stained black and  varnished.  It is from the HMS Discovery 1925.  The next one is from HMS Coriolanus 1876 and is made of metal and the paint long gone.  The last one is from HMS Worcester 1860 and is wood, and very dark in color.  I see no way of knowing for sure what was on Beagle, be it painted wood or metal or unpainted wood.   If that is indeed the case, you probably cannot be faulted no matter what you choose, but based on contemporary models, wood color is probably most appropriate. If you go with brass you can darken them without making them totally black.  Birchwood Technologies makes an antique brown gel for brass and copper that could be just the ticket for you.  Allan

 

Edited May 29, 2021 by allanyed

[glbarlow]

19 hours ago, Thistle17 said:

Glenn I think you meant Crafty Sailor.

Crafty is correct, but crusty is more fun 😊

[LucienL]

12 hours ago, allanyed said:

This first photo is of a wood belaying pin that has been stained black and  varnished.  It is from the HMS Discovery 1925.  The next one is from HMS Coriolanus 1876 and is made of metal and the paint long gone.  The last one is from HMS Worcester 1860 and is wood, and very dark in color.  I see know way of knowing for sure what was on Beagle, be it painted wood or metal or unpainted wood.   If that is indeed the case, you probably cannot be faulted no matter what you choose, but based on contemporary models, wood color is probably most appropriate. If you go with brass you can darken them without making them totally black.  Birchwood Technologies makes an antique brown gel for brass and copper that could be just the ticket for you.  Allan

 

Thanks Allan, it almost looks like you wouldn't be able to tell that those pins weren't black from a distance. I have a blackening solution that I might use, but thanks for the tip on Birchwood technologies.

[Roger Pellett]

IMHO belaying pins are one of those things where under scale looks better than over scale.  Plus, much of the pin is covered up by the line that it is belaying.  

 

They are are very easy to turn on a lathe from brass rod.  Even if you don’t have a lathe a piece of brass rod can be chucked in a Dremel tool and the top rounded.  Painted black, brown or grey they’ll look better than those shown above.

 

Roger

[Keith Black]

Birchwood also makes a Plum Brown liquid. I've never used but have wanted to. 

 

 

Edited May 29, 2021 by Keith Black

[Gregory]

55 minutes ago, Roger Pellett said:

..piece of brass rod can be chucked in a Dremel tool and the top rounded.

The wood  " bowling pin " versions can be made to look better also..

 

[Dr PR]

I have also been wondering about size and color of belaying pins for a 1:48 scale model.

 

Here is a photo of pins on the Lady Washington replica ship. This is a working ship so these pins are not museum pieces.

 

 

Notice how the lesser used pins are a bit shinier than the two with the ropes on them. These may just be spare pins or for occasional use, or maybe new replacement pins.  I suspect these were varnished, but a couple hundred years ago the pins probably weren't varnished (too expensive). Oil from sailor's hands might well have darkened them after decades of handling, along with the common fungi that cause wood to turn gray over time.

 

The pin at bottom right sows the "correct" way (according to some people) to attach coils of rope to a pin by pulling one of the last turns through the center of the coil and looping it over the pin - the entire coil does not hang over the pin so much of the pin is visible.

 

Also, the crew was hauling in the line around the second pin from bottom right when the photo was taken. The line runs down through a runner block, then up and around the pin, and was being pulled to the left. The friction of lines on the pins would soon wear off any varnish, so these pins look more weathered.

[allanyed]

Love the photo Phil.   For anyone who has not seen a video of how to belay a line on a pin, this video is quick and clear.

Allan

 

[MEDDO]

Very nice video Allan 

[allanyed]

Thank you Michael.

I do wonder if the ropes were ever just coiled on the pins like we often see, even on contemporary models.   For real world the method on the video is more convenient, and for models, it is much easier to get the coils to hang nicely.

Allan