Roman Quinquereme and Claw by Glen McGuire - FINISHED - 1/500 - BOTTLE

[Glen McGuire]

23 minutes ago, BANYAN said:

Mark, best ask the 'war' dolphins    sorry Glen high-jacking your great build yet again.

 

I've heard of War Pigs (Ozzy Osborne - 1970), but not War Dogs or War Dolphins.  So Mark and Pat, please take the hijack further and explain! 

[Keith Black]

 It's hard not to be drawn into this discussion when you have penguin addiction. I will not speak of it, I take a vow of silence. 🐧

 

[Ian_Grant]

Speaking of penguins ... 🫢... here are a couple of crappy pictures I took of a Galapagos penguin during one of our snorkels on our recent trip. My camera was one of those cheap "rentals" made of a roll of Fuji film encased in a plastic enclosure. I'm quite proud I managed to capture this little torpedo while peering through the tiny viewfinder with a snorkel mask on. Not too impressed with the film though; back in the day I used ASA400 for u/w shots. Not sure what this was. Should have bought a go-pro for this once-in-a-lifetime trip. I did get some better pics, a couple of which I added below. A couple of marine iguanas (the only iguanas in the world that swim and eat underwater), and a nice one of a sea turtle which shows improved quality when camera is pointing more horizontal as opposed to towards the bottom. By the way these iguanas get rid of excess salt intake by sneezing it out when lying in the sun on black volcanic rock on land to warm up again. On one of our walks we passed by hundreds/thousands of them with someone sneezing out white salt particles every few seconds.

 

Oh, and my wife shot about 1800 pics on land with her digital SLR.

 

Trip of a lifetime!!!!  If you are at all interested in wildlife, I highly recommend the Galapagos.

 

Glen, sorry to hijack your log! Carry on.....

[gjdale]

13 hours ago, Glen McGuire said:

So I did a little more research and found out that Archimedes' first line of defense was actually an army of penguins protecting the wall!!  Who woulda guessed??  

 

Cry Havoc and let slip the Penguins of war!

[Glen McGuire]

8 hours ago, Ian_Grant said:

By the way these iguanas get rid of excess salt intake by sneezing it out when lying in the sun on black volcanic rock on land to warm up again.

Those are amazing pictures, Ian!  Sounds like an incredible trip.  Thanks for sharing. 

 

However, I guess now you are telling me that in addition to seagull poop, I need to add some iguana snot to my seawall for added realism???

[Canute]

Well, I've heard the nickname for the F-35 is Battle Penguin.

 

The wall is superb. Bring on the Legions.

[Keith Black]

7 hours ago, Canute said:

I've heard the nickname for the F-35 is Battle Penguin.

 -35 Battle Penguins flying in tight formation.

 

 

 After joining PA I was penguin free for almost two months but alas......the road to recovery is hard. 

Edited June 27, 2023 by Keith Black

[mtaylor]

20 hours ago, Glen McGuire said:

 

I've heard of War Pigs (Ozzy Osborne - 1970), but not War Dogs or War Dolphins.  So Mark and Pat, please take the hijack further and explain! 

War dogs are not uncommon.  The military uses them for guard dogs and also other tasks like helping to clean out bunkers, etc  Currently, there are war dolphins being used by the Russians (alledgedly) to help guard their Black Sea fleet.  

[Keith Black]

27 minutes ago, mtaylor said:

Currently, there are war dolphins being used by the Russians (alledgedly) to help guard their Black Sea fleet.  

 

[mtaylor]

Not quite, Keith but I love that photo.   The Russians are using, if I recall correctly, Limpet mines that are magnetic.  

[FriedClams]

A great start to another creative and interesting build, Glen!  Looking forward to following along.

 

Gary

 

[Glen McGuire]

Thank you, Gary!  Glad to have you on board.

 

In the meantime, I did a search of the entire website to see if "iguana snot" had ever came up as a topic for discussion in the history of MSW.  Thanks to @Ian_Grant, I can proudly say my build log has the distinction of being the first one!   

 

Now, back to a far less interesting topic - the build.  When @Javelin asked earlier about the orientation of the water in the bottle, it made me realize I needed to make a jig to figure out what my maximum ship dimensions could be.  Normally, it's easy and I do it with an empty bottle.  However, with the water in the bottle at an angle, the available space is different and I need to make sure I know how much room I've got to work with from back to front and top to bottom.  The "test water" in the bottle below is a special flavor of Mountain Dew called "Liberty Brew" made for our upcoming 4th of July Independence Day.  

 

Originally, I was estimating a ship length of 3.75" which is how I came up with the approximate scale of 1/450 given the reported 45 meter length of a real quinquereme.  However, with the orientation below, the length of my ship needs to be 3.5", giving me a new scale of 1/500.  From the quinquereme illustrations I've found, I estimate the mast height at about 40% of the ship's length, so that would be only 1.4".  I've got 2.25 inches of room inside the bottle at the point where the mast will be, so I've got plenty of room there.  

 

 

 

[Glen McGuire]

Work on the hull continues at a snail's pace.  Shaping the hull is the part of the build I struggle with the most.  I have a hard time getting the contours right and then getting them symmetrical on both halves.  I know when the ship is in the bottle, you can only see 1 half at a time, but I still want to get it right, or as close as I can within reason.

 

The first couple of pics are what I'm trying to mirror.  I'm using @Ian_Grant's plan for the Trireme Olympias as my guide for the ship's basic outline and profile.  I know Ian said it was a Greek trireme and not a Roman one, but at my SIB scale, I don't think there's a material difference in the outline and profile.  The 2nd pic shows the 7 "layers" of the hull that I will construct.

 

Layer 1 - bottom part of hull that sits mostly below waterline

Layer 2 - lowest oar deck (flush with bottom part of hull)

Layer 3 - spacer (I think it's more of a decorative line than actually part of the hull structure) 

Layer 4 - middle oar deck (protrudes out from main hull profile)

Layer 5 - upper oar deck (protrudes out like middle oar deck)

Layer 6 - slanted roof (extends back to main hull profile)

Layer 7 - deck

 

   

 

 

Using my usual laminated hull construction process, here are my corresponding layers 1 thru 7 from bottom to top.  Respective thicknesses from layers 1 - 7 in mm are:  2.5, 1.5, 0.5, 1.5, 1.5, 1.5, 0.5.  Add a 1.5mm bulwark for a total of 11.5mm and I should have plenty of room to add the bow and stern decorative upsweeps and still easily fit inside the bottle opening.

 

  

 

One thing's for certain though.  I will have to split the hull and rejoin inside the bottle to accommodate for the outstretched oars.  All 180 of them!

 

 

Still got a way's to go on the hull construction, but slowly getting there.

 

 

 

 

Edited July 2, 2023 by Glen McGuire

[Keith Black]

Coming along nicely, Glen.

[AnchorClanker]

My prayers are for you and your friend.  It is great to have someone like her by your side.  Keep up the good work.  

[Glen McGuire]

@Chief Mark   Thank you so much, Chief.

[Glen McGuire]

Now the more challenging step - carving out the upsweep on the bow and sternpost.  I'm using a couple of different pictures as a guide.  I want the bow to have a scroll-look like the first pic, and the stern to have the fishtail look like in Ian's Olympias plan.

 

 

Here's the work in progress.  Everything is dry-fitted for now and the extended bases of the bow and stern carvings will be cut back to join with the bulwarks when added.

 

 

With the basic shapes carved out, time to go cross-eyed and drill 180 tiny holes for the oar ports.  😵😵😵

 

 

And finally, a little test fit for a few of the oars.  I would prefer to make the oars out of wood, but I can't get them that tiny, so 0.5mm brass will have to do.  Plus, the flexibility of the brass makes it easy to bend them to their proper angle towards the water.  I will smash the end of each brass oar to resemble the paddle.

 

 

Edited July 4, 2023 by Glen McGuire

[Knocklouder]

Nice progress  my friend,   

[gjdale]

Very nice work on the bow and stern carvings Glen. And good thinking re the oars too! This is really starting to take shape now.

[Keith Black]

 Glen, you just keep getting better and better with the ship portion of your builds. The Quinquereme is really neat in her current state but she's going to be stunning when you complete her. Hats off. 

[Ian_Grant]

Glen, the hull looks great, and amazing job drilling so many tiny holes consistently!  I wondered how you were getting the angles right; bending the brass oars is another great idea. I'm certain this will end up being my favourite among your builds so far. 👍

[Landlubber Mike]

Glen, I'm just catching up and you're doing an amazing job my friend!!  So creative!

[Landlubber Mike]

On 6/26/2023 at 11:48 PM, Ian_Grant said:

Oh, and my wife shot about 1800 pics on land with her digital SLR.

 

Trip of a lifetime!!!!  If you are at all interested in wildlife, I highly recommend the Galapagos.

 

I couldn't resist going back to Ian's post - I went to the Galapagos 15 or so years ago, and it was the most incredible, magical trip I've ever been on.  I probably took the same number of pictures.  I highly recommend going there to anyone.  Most animals don't have natural predators there so you can get up close with all the wildlife - red and blue footed boobies, frigate birds, iguanas, tortoises, etc. on land, and then you can snorkel in the water with sea lions, sea turtles, sharks, etc.  Really an incredible place.

[Javelin]

Great progress Glen, rapidly catching up with me! 

That's a lot of patience drilling that many oar supports and making that many oars 

Edited July 4, 2023 by Javelin

[Ian_Grant]

2 hours ago, Landlubber Mike said:

I couldn't resist going back to Ian's post - I went to the Galapagos 15 or so years ago, and it was the most incredible, magical trip I've ever been on.  I probably took the same number of pictures.  I highly recommend going there to anyone.  Most animals don't have natural predators there so you can get up close with all the wildlife - red and blue footed boobies, frigate birds, iguanas, tortoises, etc. on land, and then you can snorkel in the water with sea lions, sea turtles, sharks, etc.  Really an incredible place.

To carry on a little more with this distraction:

 

My wife really wanted to see the marine iguanas; she is a vet who looks after exotic animals (birds, reptiles, and plain old cats and dogs too) and this species is unique. I on the other hand really wanted to see blue-footed boobies, which we did, literally walking right by them. In fact, you are only allowed to walk on a designated path but some of the boobies, which nest on the ground, were sitting on their eggs in the middle of the path and you had to tip-toe around them as they stared at you. I can now say, to quote Dr. Maturin, "I have beheld the blue-footed boobie!".

 

Mike, did you leave a postcard at Post Office Bay? Background for the uninitiated: in the 19th century whalers had a mail barrel on the beach here hence the name. Newly arrived whalers from Nantucket would bring mail for all the crews already in the Pacific and drop it in the barrel. When a whaler watered in the islands, they dropped mail for home into the barrel and picked up any incoming mail for them. When a whaler was leaving for home, they picked up all the mail for home and took it with them.

 

Nowadays you buy a postcard, address it to yourself, and leave it unstamped in the barrel. While there you search through all the postcards to see if you can find one addressed to somewhere very close to your house. If so, you are to take it home and go to the peoples' house, knock on their door, and hand it over "special delivery".  I was amazed to find a card from people a few streets over. We've been over a couple of times but they weren't home. Unfortunately, we recently received OUR postcard in the mail; someone brought it back to somewhere in Canada, stamped it, and mailed it to us. 😒 Idiots. It would have been a great surprise and pleasure to have someone come to our door with it instead, someday.

[Glen McGuire]

 

11 hours ago, Keith Black said:

you just keep getting better and better with the ship portion of your builds. The Quinquereme is really neat in her current state but she's going to be stunning when you complete her. Hats off. 

Thank you, Keith.  That's my goal - to try and get better with each build.  The biggest help is being able to follow the build logs from so many master craftsmen here on MSW.  I am forever getting new ideas and learning new techniques from all of y'all.

 

11 hours ago, Ian_Grant said:

amazing job drilling so many tiny holes consistently! 

 

8 hours ago, Javelin said:

That's a lot of patience drilling that many oar supports and making that many oar

Thank you, Ian and Javelin.  About halfway thru I was cussing the Romans for not attacking Syracuse with a fleet of uniremes.  😬

 

 

 

@Ian_Grant and @Landlubber Mike, very interesting comments on the Galapagos - particularly the Post Office Bay tradition with the unstamped letters!

 

 

Edited July 5, 2023 by Glen McGuire

[BANYAN]

Wow - that's coming along very nicely Glen; looks great!  The proportions and level of detail are spot on, especially for such a small model.  Now, I have a little carving job if you are interes.....  (quickly ducking for cover)

 

cheers

 

Pat

[Glen McGuire]

8 minutes ago, BANYAN said:

Now, I have a little carving job if you are interes.....  (quickly ducking for cover)

Does it involve one of these......  🐧???  

[Ian_Grant]

1 hour ago, Glen McGuire said:

 

Thank you, Ian and Javelin.  About halfway thru I was cussing the Romans for not attacking Syracuse with a fleet of uniremes.  😬

 

 HaHa! 😃

 

I read quite a bit of Polybius at the cottage on the weekend.  Haven't yet reached the attack on Syracuse in the 2nd Punic war, but there was an interesting story about a battle between two of the restive Greek states between the Punic wars, not involving Rome. One side lashed their ships together in fours and put many marines on board. They then allowed them to go broadside on to tempt the enemy fleet. When the enemy ships rammed the outer ships of the lashed sets and became stuck in them, they were overwhelmed by marines boarding while the inner ships of the lashed sets held all afloat. Many quinquiremes were captured.

 

Polybius has a good opinion of himself. He considered himself a "serious" historian and did research (and was actually present at some engagements) but he decries some other historians who recorded, in today's parlance, misinformation. Reporting on previous "historians'" discussions of a Roman senate meeting, he says,

 

"All of this is as implausible as it is untrue - unless, of course, one of the gifts with which Fortune has blessed the Romans is that every one of them is born wise. But I need say no more about the work of writers such as Chaereas and Sosylus. Their work seems to me to have the status and importance of the common gossip of the barber's shop. It is not history."   ......  LOL

[Glen McGuire]

37 minutes ago, Ian_Grant said:

Their work seems to me to have the status and importance of the common gossip of the barber's shop. It is not history."   ......  LOL

Such an elegant way to ruthlessly insult your peers!  Reminds me of the way our US Supreme Court justices will basically call each other complete idiots in their dissenting opinions, but they do it in the most polite and professional language!