HM Cutter Speedy 1828 by oakheart - from plans drawn by Bill Shoulders in 1972

[oakheart]

Bowsprit shaped from square and  placed on model, shown in front of Bill Shoulders rigging plan

 

 

with main mast and bowsprit It all begins to take shape.

I have now got a copy of Lennarth Petersson's book rigging period fore and aft craft, which has all the details for rigging a cutter of this period so I will follow his drawings to do the rigging instead of Bills instructions / drawings.

 

Tim

 

 

[Thunder]

Hi Tim, 

 

Not looked in on this website for a long time. It was one of your updated that prompted me.

 

Your Speedy is looking really great, you should be proud of what you have done.

 

You are right to sort your own rigging, i found some errors with what Bill Shoulders did, mainly with the bowsprit. He was suggesting what would be more for a sloop which would be a shame as it is the rig of the bowsprit that stands out for a cutter.

 

I will try to keep an eye on your work from here to completion.

 

Adrian

[oakheart]

25 minutes ago, Thunder said:

from here to completion

Hi Adrian
Thanks for the compliment, I am please with the way it's going.

You may be in for a bit of a wait for completion, I really should finish the deck fittings before moving on to the rigging but as usual I get side-tracked....

Tim

[vossiewulf]

Tim I was recently trying to sort out cutter rigging also, and found that Lennarth Petersson makes his own errors, for example he shows two sheaves in the lower yard but his plan only makes use of one of them. I eventually decided to use Chuck's Cheerful rigging plan since the contemporary model is in the gallery and I can confirm everything there.

[Thunder]

Hi Tim,

 

Just had a catch up on your build - seriously impressed. Has put mine to shame.

 

Adrian

[oakheart]

2 hours ago, Thunder said:

Has put mine to shame

No, It was your model and log that inspired me in the first place, thank you.

 

Tim

Edited Thursday at 09:45 PM by oakheart

[oakheart]

3 hours ago, vossiewulf said:

Lennarth Petersson makes his own errors

Thanks @vossiewulf I will look out for those errors and take a look at Chucks Cheerful log, I have seen the Science  Museum photos online of the  Model that Petersson used for his book, I did not know we had other photos in the gallery.

Tim

[Gregory]

1 hour ago, oakheart said:

I have seen the Science  Museum photos online of the  Model that Petersson used for his book,

I found that Model:  Rigged model of a late 18th century naval Revenue Cutter .   The pictures are very high resolution and provide some interesting detail.

As we discussed in another topic, It looks like the main stay does go over that collar as shown in his drawing but it looks more robust than the apparent band in the drawing with the actual band being below the collar.  The stay itself has a lot of  parceling and serving, so it looks workable as shown on the model.

The double sheave on the lower yard is apparent, but the Petersson drawings doesn't  show one of the sheaves being used.

 

I traced the line to a block at the top of the mast, and can't really tell where it leads down to at the mast.

The other end of the line is hooked through an eyebolt at the channel.

 

I questioned Chuck about this tackle shown by Petersson on the backstay  when I was using the Cheerful rigging for my resolution.  Chuck said it was just wrong and didn't belong, and indeed it's not present on the Cheerful model.

However, it is clearly present on this model, and I'm thinking it may a working/loading tackle.

 

There is a lot of detail to be gleaned from those images at the Science Museum, and gives the opportunity to be a little different from all the other cutter models, while still being accurate as far as the contemporary model builder was accurate.

 

Tim, if I've cluttered up your log too much, let me know, and I can move this stuff over to the topic where we discussed Petersson's drawings.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[vossiewulf]

Gregory, thanks for that link. I'd like to comment on it/ask questions, we should probably move the discussion back to the other topic.

[oakheart]

7 hours ago, Gregory said:

if I've cluttered up your log too much

wow @Gregory, that is going to be really helpful, thanks so much. Not clutter just good research and explanation.

 I will keep plodding away until I get to that point, then I'm sure there will be a few questions.

7 hours ago, vossiewulf said:

I'd like to comment on it/ask questions,

@vossiewulf I am happy to host the discussion here if you like, but it might be better over in the other discussion as it would save that from becoming fragmented.

 

Having printed out Bill's rigging diagram full scale ( I did 12 A4 sheets and taped them together ), one thing is very apparent already,

I will have to extend my rope walk, I can only do about a 950mm, which for some of the 'lines' is too short.

Tim

Edited Friday at 08:27 AM by oakheart

[oakheart]

10 hours ago, Gregory said:

The pictures are very high resolution and provide some interesting detail.

Hi Gregory @Gregory, thanks for sharing the link I just took another look at those images and they do show a lot of details that are hard to find elsewhere.

I just noticed the model has 5 shrouds and deadeyes, my Speedy and chucks Cheerful only have 4 ?

 

tim

Edited Friday at 11:03 AM by oakheart

[Gregory]

10 hours ago, vossiewulf said:

Gregory, thanks for that link. I'd like to comment on it/ask questions, we should probably move the discussion back to the other topic.

Sounds like a good idea.  I have more observations also.

[oakheart]

I got some Seahorse 3D printed blocks from ModelNet on eBay in the post today . see https://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/165760407676

I am really pleased, they are very good.
Did not like the dark brown they are printed, so painted it to be more like boxwood, not quite the right colour yet, but not bad.
They could maybe do with a quick sand down as well.

But from a normal viewing distance you may not see the print lines

 

 

it looks worse from some angles

 

 

here are a couple very close up, warts and all.

 

 

 

I have to remember that nobody would ever see this kind of detail when viewing the model.

 

Tim

 

[Paul Le Wol]

Hi Tim, the blocks look great. It’s nice the way the rope runs around the sheave. Did you have to shape them at all?

[oakheart]

9 hours ago, Paul Le Wol said:

Did you have to shape them at all?

Hi Paul,  Love your Cheerful build, many ideas there that will help me with speedy.

What sizes of blocks did you use?

On these blocks no shaping was required at all.
I did add a slight groove with a triangle file across the top and bottom for the seized rope that runs across the face, then just gave them a lick of paint.

Now I need to practice my seizing, that in the photo above makes me think I have a lot to learn.

I have been lent a "whip finishing tool" by a fly tying mate, so off to YouTube to find out how to use it.

Tim

 

Edited Sunday at 07:30 AM by oakheart

[Paul Le Wol]

Hi Tim, thank you. Chuck has a Rope and Block list as part of Cheerful’s monograph. I picked up whatever was on that list. They are very nice. They just needed a bit of material removed where the rope enters and exits around the sheave. From looking on the Syren website the new ones look even more nice. Good luck with your Speedy. She looks amazing!

[oakheart]

2 hours ago, Paul Le Wol said:

Chuck has a Rope and Block list as part of Cheerful’s monograph

Thanks Paul, I will go and take a look at what he listed.
The compliment is most welcome , thank you.

Tim

[oakheart]

 

Mixed a better colour for the blocks, very happy now.

 

 

Tim

[oakheart]

Here is yet more practice at stropping the blocks. This is a 5 and 4mm block with 0.5mm rope.

 

My seizing is getting a little better, still a long way to go.

Hope I am using all  the correct terms here?

 

Tim

 

[Thukydides]

1 hour ago, oakheart said:

Here is yet more practice at stropping the blocks. This is a 5 and 4mm block with 0.5mm rope.

 

My seizing is getting a little better, still a long way to go.

Hope I am using all  the correct terms here?

 

Tim

 

Looking really good, practice really does help with the rigging.

 

If you would like a small suggestion, I believe the end would have been spliced into the rope and then the strop go over it. You can achieve this by doing a false splice (take a look at my alert log for some ideas), and then do the splice over top of it.

 

I have also found some indications that many of these blocks would have been served all of the way round the block (though I have not really dug into this enough to be confident in this assertion). If you want to add that detail (completely up to you if you think it will add something), then the best way is to serve the length you need to get round the block leaving enough unserved end to do the false splice. Then you serve over the false splice bringing the whole thing together. See below for an example of what I mean:

Edited Monday at 01:21 PM by Thukydides

[oakheart]

8 hours ago, Thukydides said:

If you would like a small suggestion

Thanks @Thukydides I need all the help I can get.

Your example helps a lot.

Thanks for the compliment too.

 

8 hours ago, Thukydides said:

doing a false splice (take a look at my alert log for some ideas)

I will go and take a look at your alert log.

 

tim

[oakheart]

looking closer at the Science Museum Cutter model, the rope does not appear to be seized around the block and the length that is seized is much longer than what I have been trying to do, it looks very much like your example @Thukydides

 

 

I think I will try and emulate this style on Speedy, I still have to go and find out how to do the fake splice.

Tim

[archjofo]

 

Hello Tim,
this will be a very nice model.
Here you can see how a fake splice is made. Follow the LINK.

[oakheart]

Still a bit lumpy but better, as they say practice makes perfect.... we shall see.

 

 

Tim

[oakheart]

19 minutes ago, archjofo said:

this will be a very nice model.

Thanks for the compliment @archjofo, you have perfect timing thanks for the link, just what I needed.

 

Tim