HMS Renard 1872 by Draque - 1/24 - POF

[Tony Hunt]

Although these photos lack detail they are nicely broadside-on and far enough away that parallax error is trivial, so they will be good for a number of purposes for your model, such as scaling the lengths and angles of the rig.

[Tony Hunt]

You might find this interesting too:

 

https://issuu.com/anmmuseum/docs/signals136_pages/s/13338415

 

 

[Draque]

That last article was interesting. I wonder how hard it would be to get hold of a copy of the journal, or any of the journals or logbooks of the sailors on these vessels. I did a quick search on the ANMM website but found nothing. Your searching skills are definitely better than mine.

 

Thanks again for posting these photos.

[Tony Hunt]

You're welcome, I enjoy a bit of ship research!  I think you'd have to go in to the library at the Australian National Maritime Museum to see the journal, it doesn't appear to be digitised. They're very helpful people, I've been there often.

 

In an interesting twist, it turns out ETHEL wasn't built by Cuthbert, but by another well-known Sydney shipbuilder, Daniel Sheehy:

 

The schooner Ethel, built by Mr Sheehy at Woolloomooloo Bay, has been purchased by the Imperial Government, and will be armed and fitted as a gunboat, for the purpose of cruising among the islands.

The Sydney Morning Herald,  Fri 16 Aug 1872,  Page 4,  SHIPS' MAILS.

 

From The Sydney Morning Herald, Fri 19 Apr 1872,  Page 4,  ROYAL MAIL NOTICE, it appears she was launched in April 1872.

 

There is a nice picture of Sheehy's yard on Flickr, with the steam schooner Llewellyn ready to be launched, in 1874. The background action is interesting!

 

[Draque]

I love these old photos. Good find.

 

I've made some decisions about this model. Basically, I'm going to build Renard like this:

So, 1/24, plank on frame, fully rigged, planked on one side. I doubt that I'll have any crew figures though.
 

I've been trying to work out what the framing would look like. A few posts back Jaager provided some figures which I used to make a rough model of some frames in Blender:

The dimensions are:

• Distance between stations: 1682mm (~5'6")
• Three pairs of frames between stations
• Frame width: 200mm (8")
• Frame thickness ("moulded" per Jaager's post): 254mm (10")
• Keel depth: 280mm (11")
• Keel width: 254mm (10")

Am I doing this right? The ketch model above appears to only have single frames with larger spaces between. The frames that I've drawn look very chunky to me.

Edited January 4, 2023 by Draque
Added imperial unit conversion even though it hurt my soul

[Tony Hunt]

Fighting warships were usually pretty close-framed, but for a lot of commercial vessels the framing was often "room and space", where the gap between the frames more-or-less matches the width of the frames.  I'm guessing RENARD and her sisters would be more likely to be framed room and space, even though they were built for the RN they weren't really fighting ships intended for action in naval battles. So in the case above, if the frames are 10 inches moulded the space between would also be 10 inches.

Edited January 4, 2023 by Tony Hunt

[Wintergreen]

Cheers Michael!

Renard is quite similar in size to what I'm currently building. Even though Atlantica was build 1980 she is a direct descendant from Gratitude, built 1907. So not so far from 1872 when Renards was built. My point is that the discussion about framing pattern with room and space equal to each other is plausible. On Atlantica the frames are 240 and the space is 210 mm.

 

[No Idea]

I can't comment on your build but I find it so fascinating how you are going about finding the historical information that you need.  I look forward to your updates as this a proper school day for me.  This is such a lovely ship to build and good luck. 

[Draque]

Thanks, everyone.

 

Tony, thanks once more for your input.

 

On 1/4/2023 at 3:53 PM, Tony Hunt said:

I'm guessing RENARD and her sisters would be more likely to be framed room and space, even though they were built for the RN they weren't really fighting ships intended for action in naval battles

 

That was pretty much what I was thinking. I know these schooners would not have ever been expected to withstand any serious gunfire, but would room and space be sturdy enough to fire their own cannon from?

 

Håkan, I somehow overlooked your Atlantica build and now, having had a quick look, I love it. I'll read through your build log properly as soon as I have a chance. I hope mine comes along as nicely as yours looks.

 

@No Idea, to be honest, at this point I've got more information from Tony and Jaager and Craig than I've managed to dig up for myself. I'll be sending some emails out soon to some museums and historical societies in the hope that someone has some more information or a framing plan or a high resolution photo of one of the schooners framed up and unplanked on the slipway (I can hope, can't I?).

 

I haven't had time for much work on the plans over the last few days, so I don't really have an update for the build log. I have had time to think about what I want to do with it and I'm starting to lean towards making a model that represents all five schooners, rather than just Renard specifically. The only information I have about Renard specifically is the RMG model, but I have photos now of the others.

 

 

Edited January 8, 2023 by Draque

[Wintergreen]

7 hours ago, Draque said:

I hope mine comes along as nicely as yours looks

Take your time and it will probably come out nicer.

 

I also got the numbers wrong about room and space. It's the other way around, frames are 210 mm "sided" and space between is 240mm.

Also, the moulded dimension would lessen going up from the keel so that the frame don't look top heavy. On Atlantica they go from ca 300 at the keel to 120mm at the deck line or sheer if you like.

[Draque]

Thanks, Håkan.

 

@Jaager said in an earlier post that on my plans the stations would have been spaced three frames apart and that I could work out my frame dimensions from that. Was this a standard way of drawing plans? If so, how do these dimensions look:

• Distance between stations: 1680mm
• Dividing by 3 gives 560mm for each room+space
• 560mm-305mm(1 foot) = 255mm (almost exactly 10 inches)

So, frames 255mm sided and spaces of 305mm?

 

So, is this about right (I haven't made the effort to taper the frames as they rise):

 

 

 

 

[iMustBeCrazy]

Michael, you might look at using this schooner as a template, she is roughly the same size and date.

 

She has a room and space of 24 inches versus your 22. Scaling the timbers and spaces (sided) down to suit gives:

 

Floor ..................... 5 5/8"
1st Futtock ............5 3/8"
2nd Futtock............5 1/8"
3rd Futtock.............4 7/8"
4th Futtock.............4 1/2"
Top Timber.............4 7/8"
Stanchions Heel.....4 7/8"
...................Head...4"

[Jaager]

I constantly use the term "bend" in framing because otherwise "frame" for everything that is wood becomes ambiguous - unless you use modifying adjectives.

 

A bend is a pair of frames.  The timbers of one overlap the timber butts of its partner. 

 

Efficient shipbuilders and POF modelers who do not wish to endure constant frustration (fighting nature) build their framing as bends.

 I sense in post #41 you are using "frame" to describe a bend.

I have no intuition when it comes to metric for something like this, but I will try.

 

Station  =  1680mm       A station is "always" the middle of a bend. 

Room and Space =  560mm

 

For POF - with frames on display:

Now, at this point there are some decisions to be made:   Absolute prototype replication or an attractive model

 

560mm / 3 = 186.7mm (7.3")   so a 2/3 room  1/3 space - which looks good, but has the individual frame  a bit thin.

An 8" frame = ~ 200mm

560mm - 200mm -200mm =  160mm    (6.3")  space.   Close enough to be attractive

 

Hahn style:  all bends,  frames wider such that for an individual R&S there is no space - every other bend is omitted.   Faster to build - significant savings on lumber - except that his method of fabrication is to lay up the timbers as wide planks,  bond two of these "U" shapes as a bend. ( This is a big piece of 2 ply - strong).

Place the pattern on this and free the the bend shape -  the waste is horrendous and the moulded shape of the middle most frame is not defined.   With one pattern on one side and 4 lines to cut to, only 3 of them can be used.  The appearance is a  bit snaggle toothed to me.

 

 

My favorite now is Navall framing.    It is similar in appearance to Navy Board but I see actual Navy Board as inappropriate after 1718. 

560mm R&S

All of the space is in the F1 frame.

560mm / 2 = 280mm  (11")    so the timbers are 280mm wide.

Floor - F2 - short Top  is all wood  and 280mm wide

Deadwood - F1 - long Top  is also 280mm 

Deadwood - F1    has a space

F1 - long Top    has a space.

 

I fill the two spaces with Pine that is bonded with a different agent than the PVA I use.  I am still looking for the perfect strong hold + easy release agent to do this.

Fabricating the hull as a solid and shaping and faring as a solid is easier because the hull is really strong.  The edges of the frames are protected from being rounded off, because they are not exposed until after all the planing and sanding is done.

 

Small vessel  I  would Have F1 be 6' long +/- 1 foot 

The heel of the long Top would be at the bottom of the wale.

The result looks like the model framing in post #35 -  except the model has two belts of outside planking to support the frames.   With Navall there is one belt that IS the framing. It is between where that model's planking is.

 

It is seriously strong in the lower hull and from the wale up it is a solid wall ( unless you leave off the upper part of the short Top.   If the inside of the bulwarks are not planked and there are visible stanchions - what you leave between the waterway and the rail is more work than a simple planked over wall.

 

Edited January 9, 2023 by Jaager

[Tony Hunt]

16 hours ago, Draque said:

Thanks, Håkan.

 

@Jaager said in an earlier post that on my plans the stations would have been spaced three frames apart and that I could work out my frame dimensions from that. Was this a standard way of drawing plans? If so, how do these dimensions look:

• Distance between stations: 1680mm
• Dividing by 3 gives 560mm for each room+space
• 560mm-305mm(1 foot) = 255mm (almost exactly 10 inches)

So, frames 255mm sided and spaces of 305mm?

 

So, is this about right (I haven't made the effort to taper the frames as they rise):

 

 

 

 

That looks pretty good to me.

 

In general, when a draughtsman is preparing a lines plan from measurements taken off an existing hull (or even a half model), as I suspect is the case for these drawings, then the station spacing is usually (but not always!) arrived at by divided the length of the hull into x number of even spaces (for a ship this size, usually about ten or twelve stations), without reference to the actual frame spacing.  The number of stations is usually determined by what is required to properly define the 3-dimensional shape of the hull.  The shipwrights would then use the plans to loft out the frames, and usually it was the shipwrights that made the decisions about practical matters such as frame spacing, scantling and planking sizes etc, with reference to the various framing standards put out by classification agencies such as Lloyds.  This would often be specified in the building contract, and this may be available as the author of the book about Cuthbert seems to have unearthed a lot of the original business papers. It might be worth contacting him and asking. A lot of these old Royal Navy documents are still around in dusty old archives somewhere!

[Roger Pellett]

Well said, Tony!