Color of standing rigging, 1820

[markjay]

I'll be doing the Grecian and am wondering if the standing rigging would be brown rather than black. I understand there was a shift in the type of tar or coating around that time and the color was different. Your knowledge would be appreciated.

[BenD]

I have an article about pine tar that might interest you https://maritime.org/conf/conf-kaye-tar.php It states that the production went on well into the 1900s.

 

I'm pretty certain the industrial process for coal tar didn't pick up until the 1850s (Can't seem to find my article on it). The Grecian being an American vessel I'm not sure about what tar would be used. The Royal Navy would have used Pine tar to the bitter end no doubt. 

 

On tall ships today they use pine tar and coal tar mixed together from what I've read.

[Bob Cleek]

17 minutes ago, BenD said:

The Grecian being an American vessel I'm not sure about what tar would be used. The Royal Navy would have used Pine tar to the bitter end no doubt. 

 

See: 

 

Pine tar is a very dark brown, close to black. "Coca Cola color" is really the best description I've heard. The degree of brown depends upon how much tar is put on the cordage. Standing rigging was heavily tarred (as much as it would soak up) to preserve it and so was so brown it was nearly black. At scale viewing distances, standing rigging would appear black.

 

 

 

Pine tar applied to a baseball bat to afford a "sticky' grip for the batter's hands:

 

 

Coal tar, essentially creosote, is entirely jet black:

 

 

In the Age of Sail, pine tar was a "naval store," and an " essential strategic material." The finest pine tar came from the forests of Sweden and was generically called "Stockholm tar." Obviously, every European navy required pine tar and they all had to be in Sweden's good graces if they wanted to have access to Swedish "Stockholm tar." As with strategic materials even today, nations would try to influence third party producer nations not to sell such materials to their enemies. Britain was forever fighting with her neighbors and a reliable supply of pine tar was virtually essential to her survival. One of the more important reasons England was so possessive of her American colonies was because they ensured that England had her own supply of pine tar and was immune to the vagaries of the European pine tar market. Coal tar is a by-product of the production of coke and coal gas from coal.  When the Industrial Revolution powered by coal commenced, coal-rich Britain found itself with plenty of coal tar and less need for pine tar. It would stand to reason that ships built and maintained in the Colonies would have used pine tar, which was readily available in America, for longer than would the British maritime industry that had coal tar more readily available. It would also be presumed that as America joined in the Industrial Revolution, with her rich coal resources, she also would have gone over to the less expensive and more readily available coal tar, as well. 

 

 

 

 

[Roger Pellett]

Coke made from coal is one of the three essential ingredients in smelting iron ore into iron which is then further processed into steel.  Close proximity to deposits of coal and cheap waterbourne transportation of iron ore (Minnesota) and limestone (Michigan) over the Great Lakes caused the American steel industry to locate in Western Pennsylvania and Eastern Ohio.

 

Steel was not commonly available in bulk quantity prior to the invention of the Bessemer Converter in the 1850’s. Before that iron ore was smelted into high carbon cast iron and wrought iron, a mixture of low carbon iron and slag.  I believe that this was usually done using charcoal as fuel/ reducing agent.

 

Coal was also reduced to provide gas for lighting.  Many cities had their “City Gas” plants; one being located in Washington DC’s Foggy Bottom of Watergate fame.  Presumably coal tar would have been a byproduct of this had anyone bothered to collect It.

 

I, therefore, wonder if Coal tar was available in the US prior to the development of the industrial steel making process and widespread gas lighting in the later years of the Nineteenth Century.

 

Roger

[markjay]

Ben, Bob and Roger, thanks guys for sharing your knowledge. Ben, I will check out the article you mentioned and by the way I have some of your brown cordage that was for the PdN which was demolished during the early stages of my build. I agree at this scale it would make little difference, but I'm leaning towards brown. Now the next puzzlement is to paint or not to paint. I'll have to work that out in my head before I start the build and after I see my planking job.