Cutty Sark by bcochran - Revell - 1/96 - PLASTIC

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Both are worth the visit, but I hope you have plenty of years in you in order to see the Victory when they eventually put the masts back on. It's a bit reduced these days. Still something special, but not as awe-inspiring as it will be when finished. The Cutty is less to see in one sense but great if you enjoy detail. Although I took no photos inside the hold, I loved being able to see the iron framing and all that.

 

[bcochran]

What is amazing to me is that these relics from the past remain for us to admire today.   That these ships were built without the tools we have today just astounds me.  In my mind, I compare the methods of the builders in the 1700 and 1800's and what tools they used with methods and tools that would be used today to replicate those two ships exactly.  

 

In San Diego they have a replica of the San Salvador, the ship Cabrillo sailed here from Spain.  I watched them build it. It is in no way constructed like the real ship was.  Nobody has the skills used to build the original ship today.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

The tools may have been less sophisticated than all the mechanised and computerised kit at our disposal today, but the knowledge and skills were far superior. I spent a year of my apprenticeship with a good old fashioned blacksmith, arms like tree trunks and all that. What he didn't know about working heavy plate and section with heat wasn't worth knowing. I only picked up a tiny, tiny fraction but methaphorically dined out for many a year on a party trick that used exactly the same method used to bend the long, heavy beams on ships like the Victory: heating and rapidly cooling one face to cause the length to curve. In my case it was usually to straighten big, warped RSJ's or hollow sections but I was amazed when I read that they did the same thing, way back, to bend those thick oak sections.

[bcochran]

I think you have Campbell's book about Tea Clippers.  Read the part about building iron ships and the methods for forming the plates and the clothes they wore doing it.

[Kevin-the-lubber]

I think I do and I will. I'm getting fairly bored with reading the Game of Thrones set now, book three and I still haven't got a clue who's who. 

[bcochran]

I never got into Game of Thrones.  But then I am from a much older generation.  My favorite fiction as a kid was Aesop's Fables.

Edited June 10, 2022 by bcochran

[bcochran]

Today I received this Evergreen Styrene package of .030 quarter round.  It is perfect for the base of the deck houses.

Edited June 10, 2022 by bcochran

[Kevin-the-lubber]

Yep, that looks good. I hadn't realised you'd fitted the rail winches; looking at the Revell instructions just now, I have to confess when I read them through previously I thought they were paint pots as a symbol to "highlight pins with wood tan colour" 🙄. And I couldn't work out what those half circles were on parts 68 and 70 so omitted these from my remakes, thinking I'd make something suitable presently. That's the trouble with hopping between Revell and Campbell, you can lose things inbetween.

.

[bcochran]

I finally have the stern decorations added to my ship.  They are decals. Thanks to Kevin.

[bcochran]

Just for information

 

I was reading George Campbell's book, "China Tea Clippers".  On appearances, he wrote, "The raised poop decks were, as often as money permitted, of teak or an oiled hardwood, and the deck seams in white putty, purely for appearance. The white seams also appeared frequently on the tops of deck houses.

Edited June 11, 2022 by bcochran

[Kevin-the-lubber]

That's a great photo, isn't it. Might that be the little bell, safely wrapped up! See the chained block, possibly coming off the gaff. As I have to remake the quarterdeck there are a couple of things I'm noting from this (apart from the white seams, which I think will be beyond me): no water casks - I think these are plain ugly and look completely out of place, so I may omit them now; the height and shape of the skylight - quite a bit lower than the kit and with very little roof lip, and I quite like the louvres; the amount of deck space - just right for an extra boat or something. Talking of which, is it just me or does the kit seem a bit short on boat oars? I would have thought there would be 4 or 5 pairs for each boat as these were pretty large boats. In the same vein, all the boats have the 'socket' (I'm sure it has a proper name) for a mast and sail, does anyone know where these, and the rudder, would have been stowed? Logic tells me they'd be in the lifeboats.

 

 

 

I imagine, on a good day, this was a lovely spot on the ship.

[bcochran]

What I have read about the two casks, one was for salt pork and the other for salt beef.  Fresh water was  held in a tank under the main deck. That little pump next to the deck house was for the fresh water. The pump on the port head had a pipe that went down below the water line and out through the copper plates. It was a salt water pump. This was what I read in Campbell’s book. 
 

Another interesting thing he says, candles on board were of a mixture of tallow and rat poison. 

 

In that picture, I wonder if the kid is an apprentice who climbed the rat lines and worked out on the yards during a raging snow squall at a young age?

Edited June 11, 2022 by bcochran

[Kevin-the-lubber]

3 hours ago, bcochran said:

I wonder if the kid is an apprentice

I expect so. The picture is both interesting and, to me anyway, a little sad. Even allowing for the fact that everyone was a bit smaller back then, I'd guess that he's maybe 13 or 14 years old. But look at his posture. It's that of a grown man. I don't think I've ever seen a child stand like that. The point being that I guess they had to be, at 13 or 14, what I didn't have to be until I was maybe 18 or 19. Still the case in many parts of the world.

[rwiederrich]

48 minutes ago, Kevin-the-lubber said:

I expect so. The picture is both interesting and, to me anyway, a little sad. Even allowing for the fact that everyone was a bit smaller back then, I'd guess that he's maybe 13 or 14 years old. But look at his posture. It's that of a grown man. I don't think I've ever seen a child stand like that. The point being that I guess they had to be, at 13 or 14, what I didn't have to be until I was maybe 18 or 19. Still the case in many parts of the world.

Most clippers shipped 2 to 6 boys.   They did most of the furling and letting out of the royals and sky sails and the stun sails.  Their size permitted then easy access to scurry up the royal mast and mount the royal and sky sail yards.

 

Rob

[shipman]

Re ~370 photo of the boy.

 

Times change. I'm from a family of Yorkshire coal miners. My father began working underground at 14. His father started at 10. There's a National Mine's Museum not too far from me, where you actually tour down a disused coal mine.

Various tableau's illustrate graphically conditions. In Victorian times (Cutty's period) men's wives accompanied them, even with their babies or toddlers. So hot due to no ventilation, they often worked naked.

There's a monument in Barnsley (1866) remembering a mine explosion. 334 men women and children perished, plus 27 miners attempting a rescue. One survivor.

 

Hard times indeed.

 

[Kevin-the-lubber]

My mother was sent across to England from Ireland at 13 to work as a domestic. I doubt my grandfather even went through school - on my mum's birth certificate, his occupation was given as 'peasant'. Me, I started work at 16; looking at my 17 yr old daughter, I think the world will be lucky to see her start before about 30 🙄. There's progress for you. (I'm being a bit unfair, she's the apple of my eye).

[bcochran]

My grandmother on my mom's side was from Naples.   She always said in Italian, "If you don't work, you don't eat."  My parents found jobs for us when we were in the fourth grade, when I was 10.  I retired at 70.  So it was either school or work for me for 60 years.  But what I did was nothing compared to boys on ships or in the mines.

 

These boys risked their lives, so some others could sit and sip tea.

Edited June 12, 2022 by bcochran

[bcochran]

This is what my edging along the bottom of the deck house looks like.  So now to complete the rest of it and the aft deck house.

[bcochran]

Here is something about ship's boats.

 

I want to build Lindberg's Sea Witch at some point, so I was reading Charles W Davis's book, which is about building a model of the Sea Witch.

The Sea Witch was built in 1946 in New York.

 

Davis says that the number of ships boats on merchantmen was determined by the insurance companies.

[Snug Harbor Johnny]

On 6/8/2022 at 12:29 AM, bcochran said:

I am sorry to say to Snug Harbor Johnny that I did not see the Rose (Surprise) today.  The Coast Guard condemned the ship due to rotting of the hull, especially the rudder.

 

This morning, she was being towed to the Navy Yard to dry dock and be repaired.  While doing this, she ran aground.  So now there may be even more damage.

 

I got this information from men who work on up keeping and repairing the ships at the museum.

 

    I've attached a photo of the aftermath of the aftermath of the collision of HMS Surprise (formerly Rose) with a seawall while being nudged by a small tug to a repair facility about 3/4 mile from her museum berth (presumably for hull planking repair).  The photo speaks for itself, but I found a Youtube video showing the collision in real time with sound ... like a train wreck in slow motion (crunch).  I'm not a tech, and the file may not work on the forum, but anyone can search under 'HMS Surprise crashes into a wall'.  'Not sure what they were trying to do, but the tug was on the 'blind side' of the Surprise ... and had no line of sight with the seawall.  The backing speed was much too fast, and the lookout had communication difficulties with the tug.

 

 

HMS Surprise crashes into a WALL at Marine Group!! - YouTubehttps-::www.youtube.com › watch.weblocHMS Surprise crashes into a WALL at Marine Group!! - YouTubehttps-::www.youtube.com › watch.weblocHMS Surprise crashes into a WALL at Marine Group!! - YouTubehttps-::www.youtube.com › watch.webloc

Edited June 12, 2022 by Snug Harbor Johnny
typos

[bcochran]

Oh wow!   That happened while I was at the museum on Tuesday.  The day before, I could have seen her in her place at the museum, though you could not board her.

 

I asked a worker how long would she be gone, and that's when he told me she went aground and was probably even more damaged. He said she was being towed.  At that time, he wasn't sure what happened.

Edited June 12, 2022 by bcochran

[bcochran]

Both anchors are stowed per Campbell's plan.

[Ian_Grant]

Just wondering how accurate that is - I'm not a CS expert - but there would be a lot of force on that railing stanchion from the chain holding the fluke end! Or are those stanchions iron too?

[bcochran]

2 hours ago, Ian_Grant said:

Just wondering how accurate that is - I'm not a CS expert - but there would be a lot of force on that railing stanchion from the chain holding the fluke end! Or are those stanchions iron too?

Actually, it is not just like Campbell.  It looks like one end of the chain should be attached to the outside of the bulwark.  Though, Revell has a small fairlead where my chain is.  Campbell would have me ignore it. I'll change it so that the chain does not touch the stanchion,  thanks for the suggestion.

 

I welcome any and all suggestions and critiques. They are signs people are paying attention and the wealth of ship knowledge you all have is a reservoir of ideas I like to incorporate in to my ship.

 

Edited June 13, 2022 by bcochran

[bcochran]

Here is a compromise between Revell and Campbell. The chain used the fairlead, but does not touch the stanchion.

 

Edited June 13, 2022 by bcochran

[rwiederrich]

She's looking very nice.  Clean, and ship shape.

 

Wonderful job.

 

Rob

[bcochran]

Here are two thin books I've had in my "library" for many years. Both have valuable information and tips that I am using, or I am going to use.

[bcochran]

Working on the jib-boom  guys today.

Edited June 14, 2022 by bcochran

[bcochran]

I have my first question for the rigging experts out there.

 

I want to attach the jib boom guy to the bullseye that will have lanyards attaching it to the bulls eye tied to the hull.  On the real ship, the guy wraps around the bullseye and is seized in three places.  I don't think I can replicate that.

 

How would you go about attaching the guy to the bullseye? I've tried seizing the guy to the bullseye like the seizing on a noose as is shown in a YouTube video.  I could not do it.  If that is the way to go, I guess I need to practice for about a month.   I feel rigging is going to take me a long time until I can learn to handle the different types of seizing etc.   It looks like the seizing on shrouds, so how do you do that?

 

I am afraid I am stopped until I learn this.  I don't want to just tie everything like Revell says to do because it doesn't look right with big knots everywhere.  The chain was easy because I just tied it to the bullseye, but rope or wire guys are not so easy.

Edited June 14, 2022 by bcochran

[rwiederrich]

54 minutes ago, bcochran said:

I have my first question for the rigging experts out there.

 

I want to attach the jib boom guy to the bullseye that will have lanyards attaching it to the bulls eye tied to the hull.  On the real ship, the guy wraps around the bullseye and is seized in three places.  I don't think I can replicate that.

 

How would you go about attaching the guy to the bullseye? I've tried seizing the guy to the bullseye like the seizing on a noose as is shown in a YouTube video.  I could not do it.  If that is the way to go, I guess I need to practice for about a month.   I feel rigging is going to take me a long time until I can learn to handle the different types of seizing ect.   It looks like the seizing on shrouds, so how do you do that?

 

I am afraid I am stopped until I learn this.  I don't want to just tie everything like Revell says to do because it doesn't look right.  The chain was easy because I just tied it to the bullseye but rope or ire guys are not so eassy.

Take the lead end of the lanyard from the bullseye......pull it snug, tightening the lanyard and then use a small alligator clip and clip it to the stay...leaving ample room.  Then tie off the lanyard in 3 places as it runs along the stay.  Glue then simply trim off the excess thread used to tie the lanyard to the stay.  Easy.  I wouldn't worry about painting the ties as you se in the image....this was generally done while she was in port or on display to brighten her up and make her look shipshape.  This is generally how the bullseye lanyards were secured to the stay.

 

If you are simply attaching the stay/guy to the outer bullseye...wrap the stay around the bullseye and secure like I explained for the lanyard.  Generally they were seized at least twice.  Keep it simple.

 

Rob