Winchelsea Nef 1274 A.D. by Louie da fly - FINISHED - 1:75

[Louie da fly]

2 hours ago, Tony Hunt said:

I like the cut of his jib! 

 

Silly man! This vessel doesn't have a jib! 

 

Steven

[Louie da fly]

And a bit more progress on the steersman:

 

       

 

       

 

 

      

 

I've yet to do his face and a few finer details - but I'm going to leave the arms as they are until I have the ship built and the side rudder installed, so I can get them just right.

 

And the next two figures (the guys in the aftercastle

 

 

playing the mediaeval trumpet, or buisine)

 

    

 

                                                                                                        

Steven                                                                                                                                               

 

Edited July 27, 2021 by Louie da fly

[Chuck Seiler]

    My copy of the Zimmerman book and plans has arrived.  The plans are slightly different than the model depicted by Christian.  Not sure why.  The plans include a crow's nest castle (mast castle?) whereas the model does not.

 

    I don't speak or read German, but I was able to follow the jist of the book.  In one chapter he traces the development of the ship from the Viking longboat and knarr thru the cog.  He makes references to various maritime archeological finds.  I concur that you are on the right track.

 

On 7/23/2021 at 6:20 PM, Louie da fly said:

Zimmerman's reconstruction looks most like the ships on the seals of Hythe and Haverford West

 

    I believe the Zimmerman model/plan is a composite of various nefs.  He features many sigels/seals from the Cinque Ports area and even has 'reconstructions' (diagrams) of them.  The Hythe seal is featured but the Haverford West is not.  For me, the Sandwich seal appears to be closest...but again, I believe his aim is a generic nef. 

[AnobiumPunctatum]

Chuck I didn't read the book for a long time, as far as I remember right, the drawings are showing a prototype for a nef. For a specific model you have to refer to the seals. If you need help by understanding a sentence ask me. For reading the book you can use deepl.com. It's a really good translation program.

[Louie da fly]

6 hours ago, Chuck Seiler said:

I believe his aim is a generic nef. 

 

 

Yes, I think you're right. I did consider that myself, merging several nefs that incorporated my favourite features, then I decided it would be better to portray one specific nef rather than a "conglomerate".

 

Steven

[Chuck Seiler]

Christian,

    On pages 23-27 he has 14 different seals; Santander, La Rochelle, Dunwich, Romney, Southampton, San  Sebastian, Pevesey, Hastings, Rye, Hythe, Yarmouth, Dover, Nieuport and Faversham.  He has Winchelsea and Sandwich prominently displayed elsewhere.  On pages 105 thru 111 he has the diagrams I mentioned of all but the first 2.

 

Steven,

    I think you made a good choice.  As you mentioned previously, Winnie is one of the more artistic seals and it is very clearly rendered.

 

  

[Louie da fly]

Those are really nice drawings - very faithful to the originals and very believable as seagoing vessels.

 

Steven

Edited August 1, 2021 by Louie da fly

[Louie da fly]

I've drawn the lines of the planks on the plug, basically using the technique outlined in the planking tutorials. And at the top you can see the wood I'm going to be using for the planking. Walnut from the dead tree of the guy next door, cut into sheets by the guy across the road. It's nice having good neighbours.

 

 

And covered it in cling-wrap so the planks don't get glued to the plug. 

 

 

I used packing tape to hold the clingwrap close to the plug, and to keep the keel and stem and sternposts in place.

 

 

 

And I've started carving the first trumpeter.

 

 

 

 

 

Steven

[Chuck Seiler]

Let me fill up the popcorn bowl before we get started.   ...okay, we are ready!!!!!

[Old Collingwood]

Crazy work  - so good.

 

OC.

[Chuck Seiler]

Steven,

 

    How long will your model be?  I know you said 1:75, but I saw no specific dimensions.

[Louie da fly]

Between the outside edges of the stem and sternposts - 360mm (14 inches).

 

Steven 

[Chuck Seiler]

Sounds like a nice manageable size.  If I make the Zimmerman model I would want to go 1:72 like my cog.  It pencils out t a little over 12 inches.

[Louie da fly]

Yes, it seems to work quite well. So full size yours would be somewhat smaller than mine, but well within the "permitted variation" for ships of that type. Mine's at a slightly smaller scale, but of a bigger ship - its dimensions are taken from Hedeby 3.

 

Steven 

[Louie da fly]

I discovered a small problem. Due to the shape of the hull, I've had to include stop planks, but I was "stopping" them as though they were carvel planks - with both the plank above and below the stopped plank taking its place. But that doesn't work with a clinker built vessel. The overlapping of the planks means that only the plank above the stopped plank overlaps. So instead of this:

 

I had to change the overlap to this:

 

Which means I had to take off the clingwrap and start again.

 

The first buisine player is complete except for removing him from his bit of wood.

 

 

   

 

 

And I experimented with the buisine. I first thought of making it out of wood, but wood painted to look like brass doesn't look like brass. So I decided to try making one out of brass. Found an old piece of brass welding rod and put it in my "poor man's lathe".

 

 

 

And worked it up, bit by bit. To keep the thing from bending uncontrollably I kept my working surface close to the drill chuck, only letting it out bit by bit as I needed to.

 

 

 

 

 

Pretty happy with the way it turned out. The only problem is that I seem to have made it too thick - more like a bazooka than a trumpet.

 

 

And now it's been cut off I can't fix it. So I think I'll have another try and see if I can make a thinner one. I hope I can make it work this way - otherwise I'll have to go back to wood, which I'd rather not do, for the reason above.

 

Steven

[Chuck Seiler]

9 hours ago, Louie da fly said:

I discovered a small problem.

    Huh?  I have never seen clinker with drop/stop planks.  Is this viable?  The other option would be to slightly increase the rise at bow and stern.

 

9 hours ago, Louie da fly said:

And I experimented with the buisine.

     Your lathe looks like mine.   Good thing they didn't have tubas.

[druxey]

My 'take' on clinker planking is with Chuck. I suspect Chuck's suggestion of a higher rise of sheer is the answer, which explains the height of the ends of these early vessels.

 

Nice first go at a real brass instrument!

[Louie da fly]

Thanks for the likes and comments, people.

 

2 hours ago, druxey said:

My 'take' on clinker planking is with Chuck. I suspect Chuck's suggestion of a higher rise of sheer is the answer, which explains the height of the ends of these early vessels.

 

I'm now in two minds about the drop planks. What I was working off was this drawing of a knarr -

 

 

unfortunately, I didn't make a note at the time where I got it from and now I can't find the original again.

 

But the Winchelsea seal does show considerably more sheer than this knarr

 

 

(though of course it may be due to artistic license).

 

Now I have to decide which way to go - if I increase the sheer it might mean that I have to make new stem and sternposts so they come up high enough above the top of the planking at the ends of the vessel.

 

Time to do a bit of thinking . . .

 

Steven

 

 

Edited August 5, 2021 by Louie da fly

[AnobiumPunctatum]

Quote

 

unfortunately, I didn't make a note at the time where I got it from and now I can't find the original again.

 

I think I can give you some information about this drawing,. This is a reconstruction drawing of Skuldelev I from 1971.

It was as far as I know the base for the presentation of the ship in the musuem. I own a copy of this but there are in the meantime some newer reconstructions which are giving a slightly different hull. But you can build a very nice model with this information.

I am searching a reconstruction of the Haithabu knarr and longship. I hoppe to find someday one good drawing. of the find

[Louie da fly]

Well, I've been offline for awhile but I haven't been idle.

 

I've made a new buisine (trumpetty thing) with a finer shaft, so it looks more like a trumpet than a bazooka. And a second one. Terribly worried I was going to cut the shafts so thin they would break, but they turned out ok. 

 

 

 

 

  

 

And I've carved the second buisinier, so now I have both.

 

     

 

   

 

    

 

So here's the three figures so far - A and B on the seal below - (the helmsman isn't finished - I won't finalise his arms till I have the steering oar made and in position)

 

     

 

The next people to carve will be the guys amidships (C on the seal). And looking carefully at them for the first time I realise they are working a windlass!

 

 

It turns out this seal is not just a picture of a ship - it's captured a moment in time!

 

This ship is getting ready to set sail: The helmsman (A) is in place to steer the vessel, and two buisiniers (B) are announcing the ship's departure. The windlass (C) is raising the yard , two crewmen at the bow are weighing in the anchor (D), another crewman (E) is climbing a backstay to unfurl the sail when the yard is fully hoisted.

 

Steven

 

Edited August 16, 2021 by Louie da fly

[Louie da fly]

Having decided to "drop" the drop planks the planking came up higher and I found I had to make higher stem and stern posts. I was fortunate that I had some wood with a curved grain to make them stronger.

 

 

I needed to keep them the same orientation as the old ones, but I only had a scarph joint to keep them aligned. So before I pulled the stempost/keel/sternpost asembly apart I traced over the old set-up and used it as a pattern for the new one.

 

 

 

 

 

New planking layout marked out on the plug, with the plank shift also marked.

 

 

 

 

And picked out in red to make it easier to see. Cling-wrap on the plug again, to stop the planks adhering to the plug.

 

 

The planks of the garboard strake.

 

 

Dry fitted

 

 

Glued in place. I was fortunate to find a set of tiny clothes pegs made out of plastic instead of wood, so the glue didn't stick them to the ship.

 

The scarph joining two planks didn't quite work, so I glued in a bit of wood to fill the gap; to be sanded off later.

 

 

 

And here's the sequence of planking so far:

 

 

I used push pins to hold the planks down - the plug was made of pine, but it was rather tougher than I'd been expecting, so I needed to drill pilot holes in the plug so they'd go in far enough. And I used scraps of wood to spread the load, or concentrate it as needed. 

 

 

     

 

    

 

    

 

 

 

 

That's it so far . . .
 

Steven

Edited August 17, 2021 by Louie da fly

[AnobiumPunctatum]

Really nice progress

[Chuck Seiler]

How is the walnut working out?  I assume you are spiling and not edge bending.

[Louie da fly]

Thanks for the likes and the comments.

 

Chuck, yes I'm spiling. I've only had one plank break so far, but note that the planks are only about 0.8 mm (0.03 inch or 30 thou) thick, and there are no particularly tight curves. The broken plank broke when I was trying to induce a curve in it - I think I tried too hard too fast.

 

Steven

[BANYAN]

Nice work with the 'plug', look forward to seeing all the planking in-situ Steven.  What you have done looks great.

 

Pat

[liteflight]

Lovely and interesting work, Steven

 

tiny suggestionette in relation to your pushpins holding the planks in position.  A circle of rubber about the diameter of the head of your pin would exert more grip with less precision of driving required.

My first thought was to slice a good draughstmans rubber into sat 3 mm slices, then make circles with a wet sharpened tube ( I use Readily-available-wetting-agent ( saliva) which is also a perfect accelerator for cyano)

 

Love your crew, and the remade and delicate instruments

andrew

[Louie da fly]

Thanks, Andrew. Sounds like a good idea.

 

Steven

[Cathead]

On 8/18/2021 at 3:32 AM, liteflight said:

My first thought was to slice a good draughstmans rubber into sat 3 mm slices, then make circles with a wet sharpened tube

Your idea is great, but is there any reason they need to be circles? Squares would be much easier to make and seem like they'd grip just as well since the essential point is the surface, not the shape of the edge.

[druxey]

Is there evidence for the layout of the planking  butts as you've drawn them? I'm just curious. The new shape of the hull with higher rise fore and aft looks very convincing now.

[liteflight]

9 hours ago, Cathead said:

Your idea is great, but is there any reason they need to be circles? Squares would be much easier to make and seem like they'd grip just as well since the essential point is the surface, not the shape of the edge.

I suggested circles only because the base of Steven's map pins is circular - depending on the clamping force required and the stiffness of the rubber , squares could well be a better shape

andrew