HMS Sophie by TBlack - kit-bashing Jack Aubrey's first command from the Vanguard Models HMS Speedy

[Nipper]

1 hour ago, TBlack said:

Nipper,

Speaking of Chris Watton's resin offerings, you have prompted me to mention that I think I will go with his resin ship's boats rather than the wooden kit included. If Hollowneck can do it, so can I! Besides, I think I need 2, one for the davits and one for the deck? Or should I just put one on the davits? How many boats would a brig have had?

Tom

Tom

I've looked in Lavery's "Arming and Fitting" and he says that at the end of the 18th century "large sloops of 300+ tons would have three boats, and smaller vessels 2".  Speedy was 207 tons, so I think it is right to assume 2 boats for Sophie.  But sometimes captains or masters and commanders might decide differently.  Is there anything in Patrick O'Brian to indicate that Jack Aubrey had more than 2 boats?

 

Nipper

[Theodosius]

What I have read about Cochrane is, that he did very successfull a lot of raids at land, so I'm very sure that he was able to not only his whole crew, but also some soldiers, to transfer them to/of/from-to land/ship in one go. I have no Idear how many boats of what size he had used for that. But that was Speedy and perhaps not during her whole career.  But while your Ship is more based on a novel, I would just go with 'what looks best' and not what might have been. I'm sure you will find a good solution 🙂

[TBlack]

Nothing in the book mentions the number of boats, so I’ll go with 2.

Tom

[TBlack]

Just an up-date. I'm on my 4th attempt at the ship's wheel. No point in showing you my failures. But the issue is using the right wood (I tried cherry; no good). I'm reluctant to use boxwood because the color is not what I want to see, so I'll try pear next (Ed Tosti recommends it as a substitute). And it also turns out that the glue is critical; not only its application, but also the type. Here's a photo of my last effort:

[Keith Black]

 Tom, I think making a nice ship's wheel is one of the hardest task. I'm pulling for you. 

Edited November 18, 2023 by Keith Black

[bruce d]

On 9/16/2023 at 5:06 PM, TBlack said:

Nothing in the book mentions the number of boats, so I’ll go with 2.

Tom

Found on page 287 of my paperback that 'the launch and the cutter' pulled Sophie when becalmed. 

 

EDIT: A couple of pages later 'the jolly boat' is launched to rescue a man in the water. 

 

HTH, 

Bruce 

Edited November 18, 2023 by bruce d

[TBlack]

On 11/18/2023 at 2:38 AM, bruce d said:

Found on page 287 of my paperback that 'the launch and the cutter' pulled Sophie when becalmed. 

 

EDIT: A couple of pages later 'the jolly boat' is launched to rescue a man in the water. 

 

HTH, 

Bruce 

Bruce, the pages on my edition don't match yours. I have found the "man overboard" incident on page 285, but I cannot find the reference to the launch and cutter. Additionally, a jolly boat is about the same size as a cutter; could they be one and the same?

[bruce d]

OK, found the smoking gun.

First, my mistake, I should have said '10 pages earlier' you will find the jolly boat. My pages are:

277, jolly boat away for Ellis overboard;

287, hoisted in the launch and cutter; and 346, '...the cutter and launch began watering at once [while] the jolly -boat carried the purser ashore...'.

This last entry is three pages before Mowett's song '___ old Harte, ____ old Harte'.

 

Page 356 again mentions all three boats. 

HTH, 

Bruce 

 

Edited November 20, 2023 by bruce d

[TBlack]

Fabulous find. Thanks for the reference, Bruce.

[TBlack]

Brief up-date: still working on the wheel, following Ed Tosti's instructions from Naiad. I can get to this step, no problem:

Then he has me cutting off a cap and setting it aside, so I can make slits for the spokes; again, no problem:

Then I cement the cap back on and hollow out between the wheel's rim and the center hub. And here is where lies the problem which is the  same as with the previous (4th) 

attempt:

As you can see, the rim (1.5mm wide) keeps getting torn up. The 4th attempt, above was in the mill, while this one was in the lathe. Unless someone has a brilliant idea, I'm giving up and buying a wheel. I've spent too much time on this and I need to move on.

[barkeater]

You may want to try this. I work in 1/48 scale. I take thin sheets of wood (2mm or 1/16 in my scale) and cut out 3 circles of the desired diameter. I have used cherry and pear. Glue these together at 45 and 90 degrees oriented to the grain. You now have a plywood type piece with strength in all directions. Next trace the inside diameter of your wheel. Using a thin hand drill you drill all along this line cutting out the center. Microfile to smooth. If your tri-ply piece is too thick you can sand to thin. Next figure out where your spokes go and drill the center thickness of your wheel to insert the spokes. The spokes are actually two pieces, inside and outside the circular wheel so your drill holes do not have to be as large as the spokes as you can taper the ends to fit into the holes. Now repeat the drilling on a piece of dowel for your center pin or axle. You then cut tapered spokes to fit in between your central pin and the wheel. Once this is assembled and glued add your spoke ends exterior to the wheel. 

Rich

Edited December 1, 2023 by barkeater
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[TBlack]

Rich,

Your wheel looks spectacular @ 1:48. Mine is 1:64, 75% of your size which means the rim of the wheel has to be 1/32" square, and I can't get the wood down that fine on either the lathe or the milling machine without it tearing up.

[barkeater]

Okay, back to the drawing board. My wheel is 3.5 mm thick. In your scale it would be 2.525 mm. This is the best I can come up with If you want to give it a try. In cigar boxes they use a divider for top and bottom layers which is 1mm sheet of what I presume is cedar. I have used it to simulate complex mast construction (see picture). If you used this, it would give you a thickness of 3mm which you could sand down to 2 1/2 mm. Spokes would be tiny. Perhaps you could use bamboo thinned like a you make trenails with a draw plate.

Rich 

Rich

[TBlack]

Rich,

I figured that a wheel is about 2-3" thick, which in my scale is about 1 mm. I can't get that small and have room for spokes. My spoke grooves are 1/32" square, so the total thickness will come out to something like what you are suggesting (2.5mm), depending on how fine I can sand the rim. BTW, I had been trying to get to the thin size, using my end mill. Too brutal. Your suggestion of sanding to final shape is the way to go.

Tom

P.S. Do you have a brand of cigar you can recommend? Mine don't have the cedar separator.

[barkeater]

San Cristobal especially Revelation series but you could probably get as many as you want from a cigar store as they get thrown away.

Rich

[JacquesCousteau]

This is a very cool build! On the ship's wheel, if you're willing to consider other materials, card and wire might work? I just saw this post and thought it might be helpful: 

 

[TBlack]

Well, I'm getting there. This is not as good as Alan O'Neil's (which is the same scale), but as close as I'm going to get (I think this is the 8th attempt!).

[Keith Black]

 Very nice ship's wheel, Tom. Bob's your uncle. 

[TBlack]

19 hours ago, Keith Black said:

 Very nice ship's wheel, Tom. Bob's your uncle. 

That means he is your uncle too?

[Keith Black]

Bob's your uncle is my favorite UK expression. 'There it is or there you have it' is very appropriate after all the trials and tribulations you went through to get to the final ship's wheel. 

Edited January 8 by Keith Black

[Knocklouder]

Very nice ships wheel, I see talent runs in your family.  Nice work   

Uncle Bob M. 

[TBlack]

Now I've completed the helm and on to the spars and/or boats. For boats it will be a 12' jolly boat, an 18' cutter and a 24' launch. I'm going to take a shortcut and buy the resin hulls, just doing the finish out.

[TBlack]

On pages 98-101 of my edition of the book bo'sun mate Mowett is explaining to Stephen Maturin the various masts of Sophie. He states that the main mast is 56 feet long. In 1:64 scale that's 10.5". Chris has the mast of Speedy at just under 10": OK close enough. The foremast, according to Mowett is 49 feet, or 9.2". Chris has it at just under 9, again close enough. For mast material I'm at a quandary. Here is a comparison of what is in the kit vs. a cherry dowel:

The picture doesn't really show the difference, but the kit supplied dowel has a gray tint to it while the cherry is a reddish brown. What are mast supposed to look like?

I just noticed that in Ron Neilson's build of Camilla, he uses Swiss pear for his masts. I might try that as well.

Tom

Edited January 12 by TBlack

[Keith Black]

 Tom, what was the custom durning Sophie's time period, painted mast and spars or unpainted? 

[TBlack]

Keith, bro,

The spars are painted and the masts only at the doubling.

Tom

[TBlack]

So, Keith, I see we have an Uncle Bob (knocklouder) in Manitoba who, hopefully, is over his sickness and back on to Pegasus, mice notwithstanding. And, Bob, welcome to the family!

Tom

[Keith Black]

 Ole Bob is going through a rough patch and seems to be out of action till May. Bob needs a cat, maybe we should send him one. 

[Knocklouder]

Thanks so much Tom. The family is doing great  we are all smiling today. No pest movement for two days.😁. They were Norway rats. It will take a couple of months to clean up, disinfect everything  and repair the walls and ceiling. 

 Enjoy following along your attention to detail is amazing  great work. The Pegasus will have to wait a few months but I will be back 

 

[Keith Black]

40 minutes ago, Knocklouder said:

They were Norway rats

 When we lived in North Dallas we had a raccoon take up residency in the attic and of course it was a female and of course she proceeded to bare a litter of kits. We didn't want to evict mom till the kits were old enough to survive the move. The mom nested directly on the sheetrock ceiling above our TV room  upstairs and that winter we put up with the most godawful noises of clawing and scratching from the wee little buggers crawling about in the attic from one end of the house to the other. Finally summer came along and when the Texas heat hit about a thousand degrees in the attic, mom and the kits moved on. Relieved we didn't think much more about it till the following winter when mom came back for another safe littering experience.

 

 While animal residency in one's attic sounds kinda like a neat experience it's anything but. My sympathies Bob, I know exactly what you're going through. Resist the temptation to burn the house down, I know it sounds like a viable option but.........

[TBlack]

Must be cold and windy in Manitoba about now, Anyway, back to my masts: after due consideration, I’ve decided to make them out of the cherry dowels that I have on hand. Making them out of pear would have required that I first repair my 55 year old Rockwell Delta 9” table saw, and then borrow the use of a friend’s wood working lathe. All of that was getting too complicated for a minor color difference. I’ve sized the two masts and will put in the flats this afternoon.

Tom