HMS Diana 1794 by DaveBaxt - Caldercraft - 1:64

[DaveBaxt]

Thanks Mark for the tip regarding taking off a bit of material off the stove feet if need be, something I had not thought of. Thank you also for your continued support. Best regards Dave

[DaveBaxt]

I have made a small jig for assembling the 18Lb gun carriages supplied by Vanguard for the bloomfield cannon. There is still some uncertainty as to whether of not these cannon were actually fitted to the Diana.However as I had previously  purchased the Bloomfield cannon I have decided to fit them anyway . Using the jig made life a bit  easier during  assembly. So will make up another jig for the 9Lb guns and keep them in a safe place for future projects.

 

 

I have also decided to use the Vanguard pear wood carriages because I think the edges were much more crisp than the supplied Caldercraft walnut carriages .I made the Quoins from of 2.7mm square boxwood and for the handles I used some small 8mm walnut belaying pins which were drilled and pinned with brass1mm brass rod.

 

 I have spent the day using my air brush to paint the carriages red orchre and after priming the cannon  barrels black Valjeo primer I then finished off with a top coat of  Caldercraft Iron black and added flow improver, thinners and retarder. This is the first time I have painted the resin made cannon using an air brush rather than brass cannon and using brass black. I am fairly pleased with the results. I would like to Thank Andrew and Allan amongst others for replying to my question on whether or not to paint the Vanguard  gun barrels to try and protect them in the future  There is still a fair amount of work to do on the 18Lb guns.

 

               and in the mean time I have also been looking at some of the other deck fittings and mainly the main jeer Bitts and top sail bitts but looking at there positions on the main gun deck and can see that the jeer bitts will not be accesable once the top deck is in place . Thanks to Dunnock who was kind enough to explain how he got around this ,so a big thank you to David ,who helped me on this matter and I can now move forward  with and  both the main Jeers and the main topsail sheets laniyards can be secured to the same topsail bitts which are only just accesable on the lower gun deck. Hopefully this will be seen better when I eventually get around to doing the rigging. If I ever get there.        

 

 

 

Edited January 26 by DaveBaxt

[AJohnson]

Quite the armament production line you have going there Dave!  I like the quoin details you have added. 

Edited January 27 by AJohnson

[DaveBaxt]

45 minutes ago, AJohnson said:

Quite the armament production line you have going there Dave!  Like quoin details you have added. 

Thank you Andrew for the heads up regards painting the gun barrels and I have also had a look at your cutter cannon, especially the trucks. How you managed to get those round axles is unbelievable workmanship on something so small, I am afraid probably beyond my skill level.

[allanyed]

Hi David

Not sure if you have seen the below in other posts.   It is hard to tell from the photos, but it looks like the axles are square rather than round.   Not too late to easily round them with a little home made cutter. Just drill out the cutter stock piece to the diameter you want then cross cut a couple slots to give a cutting edge.  Chuck the cutter in a small drill (press or hand drill) and it works easily, quickly and yields a much cleaner rod like protrusion than hand carving to round them.

Allan

Edited January 29 by allanyed

[DaveBaxt]

 

6 hours ago, allanyed said:

Hi David

Not sure if you have seen the below in other posts.   It is hard to tell from the photos, but it looks like the axles are square rather than round.   Not too late to easily round them with a little home made cutter. Just drill out the cutter stock piece to the diameter you want then cross cut a couple slots to give a cutting edge.  Chuck the cutter in a small drill (press or hand drill) and it works easily, quickly and yields a much cleaner rod like protrusion than hand carving to round them.

Allan

Thank you Allan for your input and I like the look of the tool you made and feel that is something I could make for the future. However for this model I am using pearwood carriages from Vanguard models rather than make my own which I have managed to do on my Endeavour.(6) In answer to your question the axles are aquare and I should have rounded the corners off before gluing the carriages together. However I am not sure if there is sufficient material to make a perfectly round axle. So instead I have decided to have a go at making my own as A Johnson did on his Trial cutter . (  A big thanks to Andrew for showing me how this is possible) I will pretty much remove all of the square part of the axle which  enters the truck and then attach round axles with  small pins for the linch pin and hopefully this will give a bit more detail look quite realistic.Here are a few photos of my progress son far. Its a slow process but hopefully I will get there in the end.

The above photo clearly shows the square ends and then replaced by 2mm lime dowel and pinned  using part of a copper eyelet. Hopefully after cleaning up, touching up the paint and using  black card for the iron hoops on the ends of the dowel will look relistic. I now wish I used better material than the lime dowel as it does look a bit rough. Hopefull it will clean up a bit better.

        Thank you once again for your valued input and for have another look at my build log. I would also like to thank everyone for their likes and for taking anoth look at my Diana build log

Edited January 29 by DaveBaxt

[allanyed]

Hi David, 

 

Your work is truly well done, so this paragraph is meant only as a point of interest.  When you have a few minutes, there was a lengthy discussion on trucks on the carriages.   The conclusion SEEMS to be, based on contemporary sourced material, that trucks were not made in four pieces with bolts through them.  https://modelshipworld.com/topic/34538-gun-carriage-questions/page/3/  It would be really  interesting to know where Caldercraft came up with this idea of trucks made in pieces and iron rimmed, especially if they based it on contemporary sources.   I never doubt that there were variations in many aspects of these ships of the past but after a lot of searching on this I have yet to find one picture of a relic or contemporary based drawing or written description that describes assembled trucks other than the use of iron bands on the rim on land based carriages.   The iron would surely wear the deck planking and it would be far easier to replace a worn truck that had no iron rim than rip out the planking and replace it,

 

Allan

 

 

 

Edited January 29 by allanyed

[DaveBaxt]

1 hour ago, allanyed said:

Hi David, 

 

Your work is truly well done, so this paragraph is meant only as a point of interest.  When you have a few minutes, there was a lengthy discussion on trucks on the carriages.   The conclusion SEEMS to be, based on contemporary sourced material, that trucks were not made in four pieces with bolts through them.  https://modelshipworld.com/topic/34538-gun-carriage-questions/page/3/  It would be really  interesting to know where Caldercraft came up with this idea of trucks made in pieces and iron rimmed, especially if they based it on contemporary sources.   I never doubt that there were variations in many aspects of these ships of the past but after a lot of searching on this I have yet to find one picture of a relic or contemporary based drawing or written description that describes assembled trucks other than the use of iron bands on the rim on land based carriages.   The iron would surely wear the deck planking and it would be far easier to replace a worn truck that had no iron rim than rip out the planking and replace it,

 

Allan

 

 

 

The trucks themselves are not iron rimmed only the axles which is in the AOTS Diana book. For what it's worth there is no such detail on the Caldercraft drawing either. Thanks for the link which I will have another look at.

 

Edited January 29 by DaveBaxt

[allanyed]

The iron on axles make total sense. Going to look to see when this practice started.  Tx!!

[AJohnson]

I think that the darker rim is laser cutting char Alan, a manufacturing process by byproduct, not a deliberate addition of metal rims. It’s a pain to sand off and leave a round wheel, I spin trucks on a cocktail stick held in a Dremmel and spin them while lightly sanding with sanding stick. 

[allanyed]

Hi Andrew,

From the first photo of post #186 the slight light gap in the black rim of the truck on the left looks like a black band of paper or blackened copper or brass rather than char to me, but that may just be me.

Allan

[DaveBaxt]

Allan sorry for the confusion. Andrew is correct . Please forgive me as I should have removed the char from the trucks, the gap you see is where the truck is joined to the pear sheet to keep it all together. My plan is to keep this on the bottom when fixed to the axles where it wont be seen. My original plan was to paint the trucks red orche  once everything is sealed with shellac but have decided to leave the trucks clear to show off the nice detail . I am afraid its poor workmanship on my behalf and really I should have removed the char. I have no evidence as to whether or not Trucks were  painted other than modellers preference. Thank you for the tip regarding the cocktail stick Andrew but unfortunately the hole is too large for a cocktail stick...... now if I could just find a couple of nuts and some threaded  bar...... perhaps I could pop these into my lathe and sand  the rest , these ones I could use where the cannon won't be seen Andrew .......Thanks  for giving me the idea anyway..Best regards Dave

Edited January 30 by DaveBaxt

[DaveBaxt]

Unfortunately I  did not have any bolts or threaded bar to enable me to remove the char on several trucks at once. Nor did I have any dowel the correct size . My solution was to use what was in front of my eyes and use the piece of the round axle at the back and grip each piece indivifually. This was a slow process and  required a bit of patience. Once this was completed I then cut off the excess and drilled a small recess . After removing the square end of the axle  using a copy of Allans rounding off tool but leaving 1 mm protruding to fit into the recess ,The newly formed trucks with the round axle is then glued into position. 

I

I still need to add all the small fittings which I have previously blackened  using brass black and I also  need to add the trucks to some more of the carriages to complete the 18Lb cannon. However in the mean time I am off on a winter holiday in a couple of days ( packing tomorrow) but who knows I might get a chance to do a few more trucks before I go haha. Although I am away on a Carribean adventure hopefully I will still get to look in on you guys from time to time. Thanks again for all your likes and support. Best regards Dave

[DaveBaxt]

Returned from holiday and whilst waiting for a few spare parts( dome head pins for gun carrgages) and a number of smaller items I changed tack and  instead of continueing with the 18lb guns, I made a start on the jeer and topsail biits together with the brake handle posts and Chain pumps. I am currently attempting to make the bushes for the chain pump brakes out of styrene but finding styrene difficult to work with as it does not cut too well and is impossible to machine as it just melts. I suppose I will just have to make them by hand I suppose. The height of the chain pump cisterns still need to be determined once I have made and fitted the chain pump brakes

[DaveBaxt]

It has been a while but I am still here. In between working on jobs around the house I returned to working on the 18Lb cannon and started adding some of the many brass fittings to the carriages . Unfortunately some of the fittings were too small for my skill level but I managed to attach most of them.I ended up destroying a few of the capsquares due leaving them in the pickling process pryor to blacking them too long and it took me a couple of attempts as to the best approach for bending them over the trunnion.

Whilst working on the 18Lb cannon and waiting for some brass eye bolts for the chain pump brake bushes, which unfortunatetly turned out to be too large for the 1:64 scale, so have decided to try and make these bushes out of styrene or purhaps brass would be better. Next up for deck fittings will be the capstan which is supplied by  Vanguard models as again I think the Caldercraft ones are not so great.

Here are lots more trucks, axle and linch pins to make up.

A bit of overthinking bending the capsquares around some brass rod . I found the best approach was to glue one of the capsquare to the one side side of the carrage and just bend the capsquare  over the trunnion. There is still a fair way to go with the finer brass parts such as the capsquare eyebolt and cap square bolt and not forgetting the breeching ropes and tackle before I think of adding the top deck.

 

 

Edited March 22 by DaveBaxt

[AJohnson]

Looking good Dave, that is a lot of work with the improvements you have made to the gun carriages.

[DaveBaxt]

1 hour ago, AJohnson said:

Looking good Dave, that is a lot of work with the improvements you have made to the gun carriages.

Thank you Andrew for your kkind remarks. I still need to do a fair bit yet but you are correct I have spent alot of time on the gun carrages but hopefully it will be worth it in the end. 

[Beef Wellington]

Looking very nice Dave, all the deck details coming together very nicely.  Upper deck armament is definitely an ultra-marathon and not a sprint.

[DaveBaxt]

38 minutes ago, Beef Wellington said:

Looking very nice Dave, all the deck details coming together very nicely.  Upper deck armament is definitely an ultra-marathon and not a sprint.

Thank you for the kind comments and building such a fine Diana which I have used your log on many occasions.

[DaveBaxt]

I have now started to consider the rigging to use for the guns and their aopropriate diameters. The popular choices used include the synthetic ropes made by Ropes of scale. The diameters of the ropes were supplied by Allen . Here is the link for the circumference of the Breeching ropes and for our 18lb guns is 5.5 " = 0.7mm. and according to Lees book  gun tackles for 5th and 6th rates is generally 2" which equals 0.25mm

There is also the length of the breeching rope to consider and again another great chart from Allan

We can see from the above chart for a 4th rate  ship with  18lb guns the Breeching rope would be 27 ft which equates to 129mm . As discussed with Allan the difficulty is this ring to ring or does it include the half hitch knots and seizing at the ends. But this will give me a good idea as to how much rope I will require for the Breech ropes and have decided to use the synthetic rope supplied by 'Ropes of Scale'.

         I would also like to thank  Andrew Johnson for a very good link which I found very interesting regarding the position of the breeching ropes and their eyebolts on the inside of the bulwarks. It is shown in here ,there are in fact two eye bolts on each side .2 of the eye bolts I think are for running out the gun and 2 are swinging the barrel fore and aft.  There are also two rings attached to eyebolts  for the Breech ropes .All good stuff.

I have also been looking into ordering some of the ropes I would need for the 9Lbs guns and the Canonades to try and save on the postage costs, so once again I will use the combination of the above charts together with Lees book ' The masting and rigging of English ships of war' The Breechings for the 9Lb cannon from the above charts  have a diameter of 4.5" and a length  f 25ft which is 0.568mm and 119 mm respectively. Looks like a lot of rope for the Cannon alone.

Length chart (1).xlsx

Edited March 24 by DaveBaxt

[DaveBaxt]

Few! Almost completed adding the brass fitting to the cannon but cannot make up the rigging for the cannon as I am still waiting for the breeching rope from 'Ropes of scale'  I had some difficulty fitting the capsquare bolt to the 18lb gun carriages as these were tiny, so ended up drilling out the capsquare on  my Proxxon milling m/c and using blackened brass wire. 

I also ended up removing one of the eye bolts on each side as I realised that it was easier to attach the 3mm brass rings to the eye bolt before attaching to the carriage.

Whilst waiting for the breeching ropes I have a few small jobs which need attending to mainly adding the Cavel blocks and securing the brass lings to the or ports. I can also drill the holes for the breeching rope gun tackle eye bolts . This should be enough to be getting on with but will be taking a little break during the Easter period.

Another mistake . I should not of glued the Quoins into position until I checked the hieght of the gun barrels in the ports but hopefully they are fairly central . The  of the gun barrels look to be all a similar height so fingers crossed they look ok

I also forgot to mention that I ended up fitting the Bloomfield cannon , although I am still uncerain if these were actually fitted to the Diana. I quite like the look of them, although I did not attempt to fit the very tiny gun lock or the chain for the cap ssquare key.

Edited March 27 by DaveBaxt

[AJohnson]

Great looking cannon and carriages. I made the same mistake with the quoins on my Trial. I think I got away with it for heights, but it would have been better for spacing them all at the same height in the ports if I’d waited until fitting the cannon to the deck. 

Edited March 27 by AJohnson

[DaveBaxt]

Thank you Andrew for kind words. Hopefully the heights should be fine. If not I might have to add a shim or remove a sliver of material from quoins but that could be tricky. Perhaps I could take a bit off the front or the back of the trucks but that might look a bit odd with a flat tyre. I have a couple of spare trucks if there is only an odd one or two. So could make another if all else fails but really hoping it works out OK.

Edited March 27 by DaveBaxt

[DaveBaxt]

Received the required rope from Ropes of scale and it does look rather good to start on the gun tackle. .The sizes for the 18lb Cannon Breeching ropes work out to be 0.7mm and 0.25mm for the gun tackle. I have made a small jig for drilling the inside of the bulwarks to take eyebolts and rings for securing the cannon. There is also an additional 2 holes for the outer eybolts for swinging the cannon fore and aft. The idea of the jig is to stop me drilling too deep and coming out the other side. Hopefully once I have drilled all the holes I am hoping to use the jig for ensuring I get the correct lengths of Breeching ropes.I

Edited April 7 by DaveBaxt

[allanyed]

On 4/6/2024 at 7:28 AM, DaveBaxt said:

There is also an additional 2 holes for the outer eybolts for swinging the cannon fore and aft.

This is really interesting and great that you included it as it is not often seen.  Lavery discusses it briefly in the Arming and Fitting of English Ships of War on page 143.   He states that by an order of 1779 additional eyebolts were to be fitted between the ports to give extra leverage to the side tackles, when the gun was being trained.  It is not clear to what extent this order applied, or how long it lasted.

 

Allan

[DaveBaxt]

Thank you Allan for your input and confirming what was also in David Whites AOTS Diana. In his drawing he also has two eye bolts either side of the gun port and has these horizontal as I have fitted them. I am unsure if this is accurate but thought it would be better this way for accomidating the gun tackle hooks and does not have rings like the eyebolt below for the breeching rope  which is verticle ( not yet fitted on the below photograph for ease of fitting) I have looked at many different photographs and there seems to be many different ways to fit these eyebolts bolts

Edited April 8 by DaveBaxt

[DaveBaxt]

There has been some confusion for me as regarding how the breeching ropes are attached to the bulwarks.I have read somewhere that it was tied to the ring and ringbolt by 2 half hitches. however not seeing much evidence of this from other than by Jason( Beef Wellington) I decided to post the question here on MSW.So another big thank you to Allan for finding this great explaination for me.Here is the lik to the discussion

I have decided to follow the above piece supplied by Allan  which states that evidence from a drawing in the Science Museum that a thimble is inserted into the ring and the Breeching is seized to this at the throat and then knotted. I am unsure what kind of knot is used but decided on a half hitch due to knots tend to tighten when subjected to heavy sudden loads . I did not add the thimble  but added and  a seizing to the ends of the ropes as well as the throat seizing  as mentioned.Unfortuantely I do not have any tan coloured seizing rope but have ordered some and whilst I am waiting I will be  using black seizing whilst working on the guns which will be hidden under the deck above..

 

According  to the tables previously shown, the Breeching ropes work out at 0.7 diameter and 133mm long. I am not sure if this included the excess for wrapping around the bends or not so maked the 133mm on the breeching fope and the above is what it looked like. I used diluted pva glue on the ropes in the hope they would be easier to work with and will use some drops of superglue to stick them down in places if need be.The length of the Breeching rope worked out well from the previous table but the length of the gun tackle was much longer than the 85mm. from the tables.    It was more like 150mm, so not sure if the extra was the wrapping around itself. For the gun hooks I used some copper eyelets and shaped them to look like hooks. After seizing the 0.25 mm rope around the single block , I soaked the block in pva glue and after allowing the pva to dry, I drilled the block to take the copper hook( blackened) I also did the same to the double block. Anyway here is the first completed cannon but still need to glue in place . Just another 25 to go.

[RossR]

I would love it if you shared some details on how you rigged the Servomatic with the alligator clips.  Are you able to adjust the distance between them?

[DaveBaxt]

9 minutes ago, RossR said:

I would love it if you shared some details on how you rigged the Servomatic with the alligator clips.  Are you able to adjust the distance between them?

Yes. You just find yourself some dowel to fit through  the hollow tube and reduce the diameter at the ends of the dowel to get them into the alligator clips. I also glued them onto the dowel  using superglue. I measured what I thought  would be the correct length  on the model plus a little bit more and just pushed one of the dowels to the correct distance and drilled holes either side of the servomatic uprights thus locking the distance between the alligator clips. Both  clips are adjustable but I only adjusted one in this case. There is proabably a more scientific way of adjustng the distance between the clips but this way works ok. I have used it quite a few times already and is very handy for exactly this sort of job. Hope this helps

[allanyed]

David,

Looks like it was a case of necessity being the mother of invention,  Very well thought out and relatively simple.

Allan