Chafing mats or Service on lines

[Dr PR]

Chafing mats, also referred to as "service," were placed on ropes that rubbed against sails and caused wear on both the rope and sail. Here are some examples:

 

 

These photos are of the replica vessel Lynx.

 

Several sources indicate they were made up of bits of worn rope and canvas, sometimes called "baggy winkle."

 

I am looking for ideas for making representations of this stuff for scale models.

Edited Sunday at 08:56 PM by Dr PR

[mtaylor]

I'd suggest using the thinest paper you can find such as tissues or toilet paper.  As for glue....  water and white glue.  Some experimentation will probably be needed for "how to"..... wrap frist then paint with thinned glue or paint the paper and then wrap.   I've not done that but other, as I recall, have.

[Dr PR]

Mark,

 

Thanks. Tissue paper and diluted white glue would be easy. I don't know if it would have a smooth finish.

 

I was wondering if there is a way to make the "fuzzy" finish. But at 1:48 scale maybe just painting with flat paint would be enough.

[davyboy]

Interesting names,Chafing mats or Service. I've always known these by the old name baggywrinkles.

 

Dave 

[paul ron]

use fuzzy thread? you can serve the line where needed.

 

https://www.amazon.com/s?k=fuzzy+thread&adgrpid=1339207666051656&hvadid=83700754322849&hvbmt=be&hvdev=m&hvlocphy=100579&hvnetw=o&hvqmt=e&hvtargid=kwd-83701623121842%3Aloc-190&hydadcr=15588_13519113&mcid=1d2e051e4bdb3006a261c61713a11689&msclkid=3cbdc71cc53a19c0aac1a0c4db3940bf&tag=hydusmmsn-20&ref=pd_sl_46dpobdf8z_e

 

ive seen fuzzy thread in joann's used for needle point to make little bears and trees in their artwork.

 

 

 

 

Edited yesterday at 01:10 PM by paul ron

[popeye2sea]

If you are feeling ambitious, The Ashley Book of Knots describes several ways to make up baggywrinkle. Picked apart rope yarns (thrums) are knotted around or through a line and packed together tightly. Winding the line around the article to to be protected completes the baggywrinkle.

 

Regards,

Henry

[Kenchington]

14 hours ago, davyboy said:

Interesting names,Chafing mats or Service. I've always known these by the old name baggywrinkles.

 

Dave 

Three different things. Dr.PR's arrows point to baggywrinkle. "Service" is twine (usually tarred marline) wound very tightly around a larger rope. Chafing mats come in multiple forms but they are rope mats.

 

Ashley's shows them all.

 

Trevor

[BANYAN]

19 minutes ago, Kenchington said:

Chafing mats come in multiple forms but they are rope mats.

Agree with Trevor. The contract for Victoria called for mats as well as baggywrinkles.  The best I have been able to determine so far,. is that the mats were  usually laid across yards whereas the baggywrinkles were applied to lines (both at any point of contact or potential contact with sails).

 

cheers

 

Pat

Edited 14 hours ago by BANYAN

[Dr PR]

Paul,

 

Thanks. I hadn't heard of fuzzy thread. I'll have to look around at Joann's to see what it looks like.

 

As far as the nomenclature goes, here are some references.

 

Chapelle's The American Fishing Schooner (page 401) said chafing matts were wrapped around schooner topping lifts - what I am interested in. He said "Chafing gear was of rope yarns, made up into 'baggy winkle' and wrapped around the lifts or jacks ..."

 

Falconer's Universal Dictionary of the Marine (1769) said "Mat ...  a sort of thick web or texture, formed of spun-yarn, or a variety of strands, or separate parts of small rope, or a number of rope-yarns twisted into foxes. The foxes are therefore larger or smaller, containing a greater or lesser number of rope-yarns, in proportion to the thickness of the mat intended to be woven. Mats are commonly used to fasten upon the outside of such parts of the standing rigging as are exposed to friction of other ropes ... The largest and strongest sort of these mats are called panches."

 

Bjorn Landstrom's Sailing Ships (page 179) says "To protect the [schooner] mainsail from wear the boom lifts have been given baggywrinkles."

 

Underhill's Sailing Ship Rigs and Rigging (pages 108 and 112) says "chafing gear" is also called "puddening." "... old rope, canvas, oakum, rope-yarns, etc., made up to required shape an fixed on stays, rails, etc., to prevent chafing the sails."

 

Lever's The Young Sea Officer's Sheet Anchor (page 68) says the rope/yarn wrapped around the anchor ring is called puddening. Nothing else that I could find about protecting sails from chafing.

 

"Service" is commonly used to describe line wrapped around ropes, or "serving" the line. However I have seen a reference (which I can't find right now) saying that anything wrapped around ropes to prevent chafing is called "service."

 

Most of the references I searched through don't say anything about chafing gear, mats, baggy winkles/baggywrinkles, panches, puddening, service or such.

 

So take your pick!

Edited 9 hours ago by Dr PR

[davyboy]

8 hours ago, Kenchington said:

Three different things. Dr.PR's arrows point to baggywrinkle. "Service" is twine (usually tarred marline) wound very tightly around a larger rope. Chafing mats come in multiple forms but they are rope mats.

 

Ashley's shows them all.

 

Trevor

Thank you Trevor,one always learns something new. At the end of the day however they all serve the same purpose.

 

Dave 

[Kenchington]

13 minutes ago, davyboy said:

they all serve the same purpose

Maybe parallel purposes.

 

Baggywrinkle mostly keeps sails away from contact with rope to protect the canvas from wear. It forms a thick layer, to hold the sail at some distance, such that you don't need to encase entire lengths of rope in the stuff.

 

Service mostly keeps stuff (solid stuff but also water) away from the rope within. Since service is usually coated in tar, sails have to be kept away from it where possible -- hence baggywrinkle over a served backstay, for example.

 

I usually think of chafing mats as being more for where two rigid things would otherwise rub together, such as between two spars. But Dr.PR is right: Chapelle used the term for the baggywrinkle on schooner topping lifts.

[David Lester]

Does anyone have a really good method of making them for a model? I have pored over fly tying websites looking for something, and tried many different things without success. The real problem is getting a result that is small enough to be in scale.

 

A few of my models have called for them, but I only actually added them in one case and it's only somewhat successful. I used pieces of tapestry wool of approximately the right colour. I was able to fluff them up quite a bit, but as soon as I used a bit of glue to attach them, they tended to flatten. I know they don't look quite right, but this is the closest I've been able to get.

 

It would be great to be able to add really credible looking ones when they're called for.

 

David