Soleil Royal by EricWiberg - Heller - 1/100 - started 45 years ago

[EricWiberg]

I found this example of a tapered cutwater on another blog of Model Ship World... granted, it is a clipper ship some 150 years AFTER Soleil Royal, but it really shows the taper of the cuwater as it descends downward...

 

[Hubac's Historian]

Post #167 of Yankee D’s Provincien blog:

[EricWiberg]

Marc, that second photo is very helpful and really shows the taper

[EricWiberg]

I carved out some early morning time today, and the goal was to start tapering the cutwater appearance for the knee of the head. First, I wanted to subtly change the shape of the knee of the head so that it is not one long curve from base to the figurehead, so where my finger is pointed, there is a now a slight indent.

 

 

Next, I established the waterline, as my operating assumption is that from the waterline up to to base of the figurehead, there is little to no taper.

 

 

Nexy, I sketched in some very rough guidelines to indicate how all of the pieces of the knee of the head were attached. Not the final lines, of course, but I will scribe in the final lines after the tapering process. I did this because my assumption is that only pieces "A" and "B" were tapered ("A" and  "B" is penciled in on the piece) in other words, just the very leading edge of cutwater.

 

 

Finally, this is a head on view. Believe it or not, the width at the top (i.e. above the waterline) is 6.25mm, and it gradually tapers down to 4.25mm at the base. Too me, there seems to be very little visible taper at this point, even though it is there. Again, my assumption that only "A" and "B" pieces will be tapered might be wrong, but I can't believe that all of the individual pieces that make up the knee of the head would all be tapered in unison, starting at the stem and marching forward to the cutwater, at least below the waterline. It is not razor blade sharp as in the clipper photo that I posted just abve this, but it does seem to be more in line with the Zeven Provincean photo that Marc also posted just above.

 

Edited 2 hours ago by EricWiberg