Lancha Chilota by JacquesCousteau – Scale 1:32 – Chilean Coasting Sloop

[JacquesCousteau]

Thanks, all!

 

It took a bit longer than I thought, but the sails are now just about done, needing only the boltrope. As mentioned earlier, I began by painting a large coffee filter in a mix of acrylic paint, white glue, and water and letting it dry on stretched plastic wrap.

 

Looking at photos of lanchas, there was a lot of variety in sail panel widths. The lancha below, for instance, has 8 panels across the gaff sail:

Source: https://www.bibliotecanacionaldigital.gob.cl/bnd/629/w3-article-164339.html

 

While this one has twelve or thirteen (and also shows lots of repairs). 

Source: https://www.bibliotecanacionaldigital.gob.cl/bnd/629/w3-article-613540.html

 

And at the other end of the scale, this one has six:

Source: https://www.bibliotecanacionaldigital.gob.cl/bnd/629/w3-article-164310.html

 

I'm not really sure why there was such variation. As far as I can tell, there isn't a strong correlation between fewer panels and more recent dates, which you would expect if larger strips of fabric or stronger fabric came into use over time. I suspect it just depended on what materials were available at the time where the lancha was built. In any case, I decided that making a six-panel gaff sail would be as accurate as one with a lot of smaller panels, but would have fewer chances for something to go wrong. I cut the panels accordingly, as well as some thin strips for the edge bands.

 

To glue the panels together, I used Aleene's Fabric Fusion glue, which dries strong but transparent and doesn't wrinkle the filter paper nearly as much as white glue would. I put plastic wrap over the template, and then began gluing the panels together. I overlapped them by about 3/64-1/16 of an inch, which is maybe a little oversized for scale, but I was worried that the sail wouldn't hold together well if I went smaller. Once it dried, I took out the template, outlined the sail, and cut.

 

 

I then did the same to make the jib.

 

This process seemed to work all right, but I did run into some trouble with the thin cheap plastic wrap sticking to the glue residue and ripping rather than peeling off. This was especially true for the jib. In the future, I might go for a thicker, sturdier plastic sheet instead of the cheapest plastic wrap around (which also, I should note, was tricky to get flat as it bunched to itself extremely easily). I also noticed that, between the gluing and peeling the plastic off, the sails got a little more wrinkled than I would have liked.

 

I posted about the wrinkling issue in a separate thread, and received a lot of helpful comments. While I figured out how to deal with the wrinkling, I added the reinforcement strips along the edges and the corner reinforcements. In hindsight, I probably could have made the edge strips a bit thinner.

 

After considering the advice I received about how to iron (or not) the sail, I decided to run some tests on scrap material. Unable to get baking parchment paper, I placed the sail material between two sheets of wax paper and put a rag over the top. On low heat, the iron didn't do anything, probably because the rag is pretty thick. Higher heat did press the sail material a little flatter. On a whim, I then slightly dampened the sail material and tried that (still in the wax paper and under the rag), which caused the paint to run. Lesson learned! For the actual sails, I carefully ironed them without moisture between wax paper and under the cloth. It helped a bit, although they're not the smoothest of sails.

 

At this point, all that the sails need before being added to the mast/spars is the bolt rope. I should note that I have not seen any photos showing reef points on a lancha sail. I'm not entirely sure why, as they certainly faced strong winds. According to Clinton R. Edwards's article on the Lancha Chilota, they usually hugged the coast and simply put into the nearest bay whenever the weather got too rough.

 

Unfortunately, at this point I realized that I made a mistake somewhere in the process, and the jib is slightly too large to properly fit under the jib halyard block--the tip of the sail will be basically in the block. I'm not sure how that happened, given that I had checked with the template. I think I'll redo the jib halyard block strop to be shorter which should raise it sufficiently to work with this sail.

[Jim Lad]

Very nice looking sails!

 

John

[Glen McGuire]

37 minutes ago, JacquesCousteau said:

This process seemed to work all right, but I did run into some trouble with the thin cheap plastic wrap sticking to the glue residue and ripping rather than peeling off.

Instead of plastic wrap, you might try wax paper.  It's easier to handle than thin plastic wrap.  That's what I use for similar applications.  

 

Regardless, great job on those sails, JC!  They really look nice. 

Edited Saturday at 10:30 PM by Glen McGuire

[Keith Black]

 I echo Glen's comments. 

[JacquesCousteau]

Thanks, all! I'll give wax paper a try next time instead of plastic.

 

Some minor progress to report. First, I remade the jib halyard block's stropping and the loop around the forestay. It's much shorter now, which is more accurate to photos and will allow the jib to fit properly. After fitting it, I tensioned everything with thread and applied a bit of watered-down white glue so that it would properly hold the tight fold into the eye of the forestay.

 

 

I also worked more on the jib. The bolt rope is made of .35mm rope from Ropes of Scale, glued in place with more Aleene's Fabric Fusion.

 

As can be seen above, a lot of the seams had shiny glue residue. To get rid of this, I took advantage of a brief bit of sun--Mexico City is quite rainy these days--to apply a matte transparent spray. A couple of coats on each side later, and the residue is practically invisible. The spray also adds a bit of strength and resistance to the sail, which is a nice bonus.

 

Next, I need to do the same to the gaff sail, and add the running rigging. I also need to work out how best to make the hanks (to hold the jib to the forestay) and mast hoops. According to Vairo, by the 1980s these were usually made of wire. I think I'll do some tests with 28-gauge galvanized wire and with thin black rope.

[Paul Le Wol]

Jacques, that is a fine looking sail.