Le Soleil Royal by Bill97 - FINISHED - Heller - 1/100

[Hubac's Historian]

Thanks Ian!  Just call me Ol’ HMS Indefatigable when it comes to searching for SR arcana 😀 

[Bill97]

On no Ian don’t be sorry. The intellectual debate is mental stimulation. None of us want to be in those frequently displayed videos of people blindlessly following each other down the street. And so to model ship building instructions.  Hopefully this will help the next Soleli Royal builder who looks to this build for help and assistance. Which is by far the most valuable benefit of. MSW. So I will do the repair to the deck and reinstall the knight head off center. Then back to the stern. 
Marc I will definitely review your alternate belay pin screen shots. While we are briefly talking about belay pins I have an opinion question. Some may have noticed in my photos that the belay pins along the bulwarks are gone. When I unboxed the kit I found a number of the fragile plastic belay pins broken off or bent.   I just cut them all off and drilled holes for future metal pins. For this purpose I am thinking about using needles with the head still attached and cut to the appropriate length for above and below the rail. My idea for leaving the head would be to eliminate the sharp points that would be left on the tops if the head was removed, possibly leading to scratches here and there about my arms and ultimate blood letting 😳
Thanks guys. 
Bill

[Ferrus Manus]

Sorry to rain on your parade, here, but i think you have to move the main knighthead as well (to the other side). The instructions show a singular stay on the mizzen top that goes down to the main base. Henry didn't even do this. However, we have the same issue on the main. 

Edited May 28, 2023 by Ferrus Manus

[Ferrus Manus]

[Bill97]

Ferrus I am about to get an umbrella with all the rain you’re bringing 😀.  I am afraid the main knighthead would be most difficult to move at this stage in my build. Not a lot of work room and I distinctly remember the base of the main knighthead spreads out below the deck and was captured between the two deck halves when they were glued together. Would require a rather large hole in the deck to get it free. I will probably just have to tap dance around what ever happens here during the rigging to make it look OK. 

 

In other news I added all the statuary on stern and finished all the necessary paint touch up. Now to go back and add some highlight gold leaf and the stern will be complete except for the three lanterns I will add near the end of the build. 

Edited May 28, 2023 by Bill97

[Ferrus Manus]

Or, you could split the stay behind the knight and that would solve it. 

[popeye2sea]

3 hours ago, Ferrus Manus said:

Sorry to rain on your parade, here, but i think you have to move the main knighthead as well (to the other side). The instructions show a singular stay on the mizzen top that goes down to the main base. Henry didn't even do this. However, we have the same issue on the main. 

You are correct. The main halliard knight has the same interference problems. But for the same reasons that Bill mentioned in his post above, I did not move my main halliard knight.  Making the collar of the mizzen stay longer around the mast to pass on either side of the halliard will alleviate this problem.  The reason I chose to make the change for the fore knight is because the main stay is much more complicated and of much heavier construction than the mizzen stay.

 

Regards.

Henry

[Bill97]

I am going to need to look ahead to the rigging area to refresh myself on all the rigging terminology and steps. I got pretty knowledgeable while building my HMS Victory using Longridge’s book and Ian’s excellent advice. Hopefully looking back at all my reference materials, when the time comes, will be helpful. 

[Bill97]

Henry how did you treat the back side of these two guys (paint I mean). Did you paint the back to match the front even though the moldings are not present, or did you paint the back one solid color?  Also do the top ends attach to the sides off the bowsprit or do they just flank it without being attached?  I am moving in that direction and I am wondering if I need to go ahead and install the bowsprit first. These guys also need gold leaf. 

[Ferrus Manus]

Looks like it's almost time to start on the masts! I have no idea, but i would assume those pieces would be painted blue on the back, or whatever the interior wall color is. At least that's what i would personally do with them. 

[Hubac's Historian]

I went with black because my grating is black and I am mostly trying to minimize inconsistencies between what is and what should be.

[popeye2sea]

19 hours ago, Bill97 said:

Henry how did you treat the back side of these two guys (paint I mean). Did you paint the back to match the front even though the moldings are not present, or did you paint the back one solid color?  Also do the top ends attach to the sides off the bowsprit or do they just flank it without being attached?  I am moving in that direction and I am wondering if I need to go ahead and install the bowsprit first. These guys also need gold leaf. 

I actually have not painted the inside of mine yet beyond the bit of gold detail that is on the reverse of the medallion.  I will be painting them blue to match the outside.  The medallion does not actually attach to the bowsprit.  In fact these head rails do not sit very well into position at all and there is very little to attach them to.  I may even have to pare away some of the round house for the seats of ease in order to make them fit. And I am pretty sure that I have to remake my forward most headrail support timber; it is not long enough to reach the inside of the head rails.

 

All of this adjusting and fiddling is the reason for not painting the inboard side yet. I am thinking that I may also make some small pockets on the inside surface to take the ends of the support timbers in order to make a stronger joint with more glue surface area. Or, I may make small pins to join them. There seems to be a lot of bending stress to get the head rails into place.

 

Regards,

 

Henry

 

[Bill97]

Great advice Henry. I have painted them already the dark mahogany that is prominent at the bow of the ship but have since about sanding it off and painting it the same blue as you plan. Will see what fiddling I have to do to get a solid strong mount. 

Edited May 30, 2023 by Bill97

[Bill97]

By the way Henry I am now spending a great deal of time reading and rereading through your section on making your deadeye chains. I will be begin practicing making my stropes and chains fairly soon. 

[Bill97]

Henry I also looked back a good ways into my build and remembered Daniel (Dafi) has a pretty good tutorial on making chain plates. Hopefully with your’s and his I can do a pretty good job of making the chains. Now that I have pretty much wrapped up the stern (except for the lanterns and cannon hatch covers) I am moving back up to the bow.  Installed the cat heads today and the two round houses. Had a little unfortunate glue squeeze out where the catheads are glued to the deck. Removing the squeeze out resulted in a little deck paint damage so I sanded it out and applied some undercoat to the bear plastic. Hopefully with a little patience I can touch up the paint to where it is not noticeable. Marc I don’t know if you have experienced this yet but I think you might. Back earlier in my build I followed your lead and put a second rail and lower panels in the rail at the top of the beakhead bulkhead. Not realizing that when it came time to install the catheads they needed to pass from inside to out along the bottom of the rail. I simply cut out the far left and right extra rail sections and panels, cleaned up the rough cut edges, and installed the catheads and (corbels?) under the catheads. Some touch up painting a little later and this step should be good. Of course I will not be surprised if you guys respond back that I did the catheads completely wrong thus my issue with the rail 😊.

 

 

 

Edited May 31, 2023 by Bill97

[Hubac's Historian]

Yeah, Bill - the issue of piercing through the beakhead bulkhead for the cat-head timbers was a tricky one.  With some effort, I was able to file tight-fitting holes at the correct angle.  This was an issue that I had not thought through, in the beginning, when I was modifying the bulkhead.

Edited June 1, 2023 by Hubac's Historian

[Bill97]

Marc do you have photos of what you did posted to your build?  If so I will look to see what you did. 

 

Bill

[Hubac's Historian]

These pics are from trying to get the fit and alignment of everything right:

Edited June 1, 2023 by Hubac's Historian

[Bill97]

Thanks Marc. I immediately see I need to make some adjustments to mine. I did not realize the catheads are to set on top of the head of the figurine. I have the support corbels set in very close to the steps. I need to move them out further and turn the cat heads out more. Looks like a bunch more paint repair ahead of me 😞

Edited June 1, 2023 by Bill97

[Hubac's Historian]

Not necessarily Bill - you’re cathead placement most likely is perfectly fine.  Bear in mind that my beakhead bulkhead has been widened on both sides because I widened the hull at the stem.  Consequently, there is now space between the bulkhead ladders and the cathead/supporting knees.

[Bill97]

In theory now I have it. Now I just need to make it reality when glue joins the party!  Marc my catheads were off a little bit. Do some repair work on the deck and beakhead bulkhead then see if I can glue this puzzle together.  

[Ferrus Manus]

Oh man, what a mess. That's Heller's fault for not adding locator pins. Your fix looks perfectly convincing, no more alterations needed. The beakhead really comes together with the side rails added. 

[Bill97]

Ok they are glued in place!  Fingers crossed all the glue points will hold when clamps released. Will definitely be a good bit of paint touch up over the entire area. I noticed there are even curved areas on the back of each to work as glue points to the round houses. 

[Bill97]

The glue has dried and everything seems to be holding n place!! Woo Hoo. Now to clean it all up, put the catheads back in, and touch up a butt load of paint. Also while waiting on the glue to set up I started tinkering with the deadeye strop prototype. A little solder and blackening and I think this first part of chains will work. 

[Bill97]

With these few issues successfully tackled I am going to close up the ship yard for a week and send the workers home for a short vacation. My family and I are leaving tomorrow for our annual trip to the beaches of South Carolina to spend some great time with our feet in the sand, swimming in the ocean, and enjoying some great low country cooking. Be back next weekend anxious to get back to my Soleli Royal. I admit I will still frequently check MSW for interesting conversations that I most likely will comment on from time to time. 

[Bill97]

Spent a great afternoon exploring the aircraft carrier Yorktown in Charleston harbor. Very interesting the life of sailors on these incredible old ships. To think modern day aircraft carriers are so much larger.  

[Bill97]

While I am away from the “shipyard” I am of course from time to time peeking in on MSW and reading other builds. I see different opinions on mast construction and wonder what a little debate about the subject might reveal. I see some build the entire mast to include the yards off the ship and then drop it into place and start adding the shrouds. Others build the mast off the ship, drop it into place, then add the shrouds, and finally the yards. Others work their way up from the lower mast.  First installing the lower mast section and then its shrouds, then the next section and its shrouds, then the next section and so on. Then finally installing the yards. I have done it all three ways over the years without a sure fire favorite. What is your favorite mast construction sequence? Will be coming up on that in the next month on my SR and will need to decide my plan of action. 

[Hubac's Historian]

The following build is one that I have been following with tremendous admiration.  The rigging is among the very best I have  ever seen, and his particular sequence of masting and sparing and working through the standing and running rigging makes the most sense to me.  I think I will follow his lead when the time comes to it:

 

 

[Bill97]

Back home from the beach. Long drive yesterday. Wife and I decided to punch through and do it in one day. At our age with creeky old bodies we usually like to plan to stop driving after about 6 hours. Yesterday we were anxious to get home so acted like young kids and pushed all the way through the 11 hours. Great vacation with two of my incredible grandsons. Peeked in the “shipyard” when we got back. All is well. Too late and too tired last night to risk doing anything on it. However, the lovely wife needs to be out most of the day today so guess where I will be?  Woo Hoo!  Back to my SR. Going to focus on finishing up a lot of the cosmetic work around the bow. 

[Bill97]

Have a question my friends. It is a bit off the topic of my build so maybe I should make it a new MSW topic question. 
 

My son-in-law is a high school math teacher. He teaches those upper level math courses like trigonometry and calculus, which thankfully I never took and know nothing about. Geometry was my niche. Several times while looking at and talking about my ships he has contemplated out loud how these crews of the past must have used trigonometry (probably was not called that in the 1700 hundreds) to plot there course across the vast seas they sailed? His thought is to use these real world examples as teaching tools.