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

[Louie da fly]

9 hours ago, druxey said:

Is there evidence for the layout of the planking  butts as you've drawn them? I'm just curious.

 

Not that I know of. Contemporary representations just show a 2-shift, with the butts of one strake central to the length of the next,

 

   

 

 

but I think that's likely to be artistic licence and that in the real world there would have been at least a 3-shift. I was trying to get a layout that allowed for the planks to be as near as possible to 20-24 feet, which Mondfeld recommends, while avoiding having the end planks too short, as they seemed to be with any other layout.

 

BTW, to my shame, I got one of the plank shifts wrong, so the two sides other aren't mirror images of each other at one point. But I'm committed now, (planks are already glued in place) so I'll just have to put it down to experience. 

 

Steven

Edited August 20, 2021 by Louie da fly

[Chuck Seiler]

3 hours ago, Louie da fly said:

BTW, to my shame, I got one of the plank shifts wrong, so the two sides other aren't mirror images of each other at one point. But I'm committed now, (planks are already glued in place) so I'll just have to put it down to experience. 

1.  Who is really going to notice?

B.  In real life is it ever really symmetrical?

[Louie da fly]

Planking in progress. Note the rubber spaces as recommended by Liteflite (though sometimes I use wooden spacers when stiffness is needed).

 

 

 

And a sliver to close up a gap. 

 

 

And trimmed off.
 

 

 

More planking:

 

 

 

 

 

 

I've been thinking about Druxey's question regarding the layout of the planking butts - it makes sense that the further they are apart the stronger the structure. But only one of my books (Mondfeld) has a diagram showing how they are supposed to be done. And even then I misinterpreted the layout. 

 

So now that I've got this far, I've decided to change the layout in future strakes so the spacing is more equal (see the black marks)

 

More to come.

 

Steven 

 

Edited August 22, 2021 by Louie da fly

[Louie da fly]

I suddenly realised the planks at the bow didn't line up properly from port to starboard.

 

The planks for the stern were ok (apart from a bit of a problem with them merging with the sternpost - which I'll get to later).

 

 

It's the stempost (i.e. at the bow) where the planks were wrongly placed - the starboard and port planks didn't line up with each other (my bad - I should have checked before I got to gluing):

 

 

This what the planks at the bow look like:

 

 

And here is the planking at the stern - you can see the difference.

 

 

 

I took the outer two planks off and glued the first one back in a better place.

 

But this brought up another problem - never having done clinker planking before, I had considerable difficulty getting the ends of the planks to sit properly at the stem and sternpost. In fact with these planks I was removing I'd ended up bodging the ends - to the degree that I decided - "They're already stuffed - I might as well just make new ones".

 

So I did. All three.

 

 

I'm getting better at doing the plank ends - the last couple look ok - but you can see the difficulty with the earlier ones. I'll have to go back to them and fix them later - perhaps by gluing slivers of wood in the gaps and trimming them down to shape.

 

 

And here are the bow planks lined up properly.

 

 

Having sorted out this hiccup I've done some more planking, but I haven't taken any photos yet. So you'll just have to wait. 

 

Steven

 

 

 

Edited August 26, 2021 by Louie da fly

[druxey]

Dear Steven. I hope my comments aren't too much of a pain! The issue of planks at bow and stern is because the overlap has to disappear by what is known as the gain. It is achieved by one of two methods. One, a rolling bevel is cut on the adjacent plank edges over the last foot or so into the rabbet (the bevel is 45 degrees at the extreme ends, so that the clinker has become carvel), Or, two, an increasing half-lap is cut into adjacent plank edges to give the same result. A simple example of the easier first option is attached.

Illustration 4.psd Dory photo 21a.psd

[Chuck Seiler]

Steven,

 

    You are progressing well. 

 

    I had problems with the issue of transitioning the clinker into the rabbet at both ends of my cog.  My efforts to transition from clinker to carvel did not work very well.  I eventually did a version of Druxey's option 2.

[Louie da fly]

Firstly, thanks everybody for the likes and comments.

 

Druxey, your comments are very welcome, not a pain at all. They do make me think about things that would otherwise not occur to me.

 

Unfortunately, I couldn't open your attachments - they seem to be in Photoshop, which I don't have.

 

I'm not really sure what I'm doing and whether it fits with either of the methods you advise, but somehow it now seems to be working (!) - see the two most recent planks at the bow.

 

 

And I have to say, I'm really liking the look of this clinker planking.

 

 

Steven

[Tony Hunt]

Druxey makes an interesting point about the "gain" at the ends of the plank making the overlap of the clinker planks disappear as they approach the stem and stern posts. It raises the question about when the practice of using gains was first developed?  Did the Vikings use it on their ships?  It's way outside the date range that I'm familiar with for shipbuilding practices, but someone must surely know.

[mtaylor]

Steven, I converted them for you....

[Louie da fly]

Thanks, Mark. Now I need to sit down and try to absorb the pictures and get my head around them.

 

Steven

Edited August 27, 2021 by Louie da fly

[druxey]

Thanks, Mark. I didn't realize that they were not universally openable files.

[mtaylor]

8 minutes ago, druxey said:

Thanks, Mark. I didn't realize that they were not universally openable files.

No worries.   There a bunch of "proprietary" file types that won't open on just about any web site.

[woodrat]

 

4 hours ago, Tony Hunt said:

It raises the question about when the practice of using gains was first developed? 

I'm not sure this helps. The Nydam Ship  from the western Baltic has been dated to circa 320 CE. If I am interpreting the photos well the clinker overlap seems to be maintained to the rabbet. So the use of gains probably postdates this

 

 

The Gokstad   faering uses a different method again. So they were obviously experimenting

 

Dick

 

 

[Tony Hunt]

Thanks Dick, interesting. It does look there aren't any gains on those planks, although it is a little hard to be sure from the photos, as you say.

[GrandpaPhil]

That planking is looking good!

Edited August 27, 2021 by GrandpaPhil

[bolin]

On my medieval long-ship I made the planking overlapping all the way into the stem and stern.

This is how it is made on the reconstruction which I based the model on.

The archeological find that the reconstruction is based on did only have a small piece of the stem left. However, the "stepped" rabbet is visible.

The same type of rabbet can be found in the Kalmar boat I from the middle of the 13th century.

 

Boat IV from the same site shows a similar rabbet. The date for this boat is more uncertain, but 15th century seems to fit the evidence best.

 

[Tony Hunt]

That's really interesting. It looks like gains might be a relatively recent innovation. 

[druxey]

Well, that seems to indicate a late introduction of gain. I wonder when this innovation occurred and  where? Thanks to Bolin for the excellent photo and archaeological evidence of a stepped rabbet. I stand corrected!

[Louie da fly]

Thanks everybody for the likes and i particular thanks Woodrat, Druxey and Bolin for the info on bow/sternpost planking.

 

Well, I've reached something of a milestone - I seem to recall Druxey saying the hardest bit of planking is getting to the turn of the bilge. Which I have now done! 

 

I've found that I'm doing an average of one pair of strakes every two days. Here's a pair of end planks.

 

 

I've been joining the planks in a strake with scarphs in the thickness of the plank. There's a lot of trial and error involved and quite a bit of adjustment needed to get the planks to fit properly and follow the line of the strake smoothly. Of course the upper side of the plank isn't as important as the upper, because it will be hidden by the next plank overlapping it. 

 

Sometimes it doesn't quite work at the ends and I have to put in slivers of wood to fill the gaps.

 

 

 

And then trim them off smooth.

 

So here's the sequence - progress photos as the planking gradually gets done.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Some more gap filling needed here. I'll get onto it in due course.

 

 

This end is rather better.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I'm pretty happy with this. And the pattern of the planking is unexpectedly attractive. It's made me appreciate clinker construction a lot more.

 

Steven

 

 

 

 

 

[Roger Pellett]

Some “Viking ships,” a loose term, had an extra deep stem posts with the ends of the clinker posts carved into them.  The planking butted against their respective plank shapes carved into the posts.

 

I realize that this explanation is confusing.  I’ll post a picture later.

 

Roger

[Chuck Seiler]

Steven,

 

    It doesn't appear that your planks/strakes taper at the ends.  Are they uniform width end to end or am I not seeing it properly?

[Louie da fly]

Thanks people for the likes.

 

Roger, I know about these carved stem and sternposts. Not a problem, but I decided to do it a different way, as nefs are later and further south than Viking ships (there's one on a seal from as far south as Spain!) and could well have followed a different tradition of construction.

 

Chuck, the planks do taper but perhaps not as much as they should, and the taper is not terribly obvious in the photos.

 

Steven

Edited September 3, 2021 by Louie da fly

[Tony Hunt]

That's looking really good Steven. It looks to be about a foot long?  It will be a very striking model when it's finished.

[Chuck Seiler]

1 hour ago, Louie da fly said:

 

Chuck, the planks do taper but perhaps not as much as they should, and the taper is not terribly obvious in the photos.

Many thanks

[Louie da fly]

Thanks, Tony. It's just on 14 inches in the old money (35.5 cm).

 

Steven

[Louie da fly]

Just checked the taper in the strakes. The visible part (i.e. not taking the overlap into account) goes from 5 millimetres amidships to 3 mm at the ends. So a taper of 2mm in 5 - not all that shabby after all.

 

Steven

[Roger Pellett]

Steven,

 

I was not suggesting that you should have used the “Viking ship” stem as your build is of a different vessel.  Like many threads, this was wandering, however slightly, as different posters discussed different ways of attaching clinker planking to stem and sternposts.  I was adding my two cents worth!

 

In building these ancient ships, your research is always thorough.  You are giving us a window into an unknown world.

 

Roger

 

 

[Louie da fly]

No worries, Roger. Taken in the spirit it was offered, and your interest is appreciated.

 

Steven

Edited September 4, 2021 by Louie da fly

[Louie da fly]

Current progress on the planking:

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I was just about to finish the second-last strake, when - AGHAST! I've been using a 1mm drill to make the holes for the push pins (after nasty painful experiences pushing them in when I was making the dromon), and I just broke my last drill bit. We're currently in lockdown, so I have to wait till I can get new ones click-and-collect from Bunnings . . .

 

Interesting - I'm not exactly following the lines I drew on the plug for the planks - I think the planks are trying to tell me something - that my own lines weren't right. Certainly the planking looks better than what I'd drawn.  So, pretty happy with it all.

 

Steven 

[Chuck Seiler]

On 9/2/2021 at 6:55 PM, Louie da fly said:

 

Chuck, the planks do taper but perhaps not as much as they should, and the taper is not terribly obvious in the photos.

Many thanks