Gjoa 1872 by Jond - 1:48 scale - Amundson's Cutter

[Jond]

 

01 The Beginning.

This build is the first of three I plan for the next series of stories.  Over the next year, I plan to return to Greenland via Iceland following the Viking trail. That is to the best of my knowledge the beginning of the story of European explorers.  To Complete the story of the Northwest Passage, begun with my recent build HMS Terror, I will have two Norwegian builds, Gjoa and Fram.  Finally, my last of three builds will be to go along with my planned trip to the Greenland settlements.  I will build a Viking vessel.  First up will be the two Norwegian vessels. Fram will be a kit build and follow this scratch build of Gjoa.  So let’s get to it!

 

The cutter Gjoa was the ultimate winner in the search for a sailing route through the Northwest passage.  I first learned of this vessel several years ago while studying the life and times of Donald MacMillan and the schooner Bowdoin.  The Schooner Bowdoin was built in our town here on the Maine coast in 1921. That story is with my build of Bowdoin that I display as a diorama showing her second overwinter experience in the summer of 1924.  In the story of MacMillan’s early life, and the issues that led to his having the Schooner built to his specification, was his research into other experiences.  He was fascinated with the Fram story of a round bottomed vessel designed to survive mid arctic ocean ice.  He also realized after all of his personal experience, that Amundson got it right when he chose the small sailing vessel with its auxiliary engine to find his way through. The relationship of Macmillan study of these two vessels demonstrates the value of their design.  

By example, Admiral Peary had MacMillan with him on his last venture to try to get to the pole. Their vessel the Roosevelt, built in 1905 at Bucksport, Maine,  was quite different.  It was quite big and powered by a 1600 horsepower engine. It had in Bob Bartlett a great captain to smash their way up through the Kennedy and Robeson channels to the shore of the Lincoln Sea on the North coast of Ellesmere Island. They got there yes, but when they returned to New York the following year, the vessel was in sad shape.

Gjoa did not smash its way anywhere.  She was the right size to squeeze through the shallow inshore waterways south of King Williams Island.  After staying in Gjoa Haven for two winters and spending one more winter further west, she sailed into San Francisco harbor as a hero.

 

There are other builds of the vessel and a current one that is a must read for both research and beautiful craftmanship of this vessel.   My build is once again to build a prop for telling a tale.  I am scratch building it in the same scale as the Schooner Bowdoin, so they can sit side by side and one can appreciate the comparison.   One tale will be about Gjoa and Fram and their influence on Macmillan and the other is of the great man Amundson at both ends of the globe. As I understand it, he took Fram South in his race against Scott to get to the South Pole.  

Time to chase up some drawings. 
 

Edited September 15 by ccoyle
corrected log title

[Jond]

02 Starting the reading and preparing Drawings

In preparing for my builds there is always a lot of fun reading.  I just added about 8 books to my library, [ it's like stacking fireplace wood before winter] and I am sure more are in the wings.  I got the Fram Museum illustrated diary of Amundsen’s voyage through the passage, a joy.  I also bought the two-volume reprinted [ English] diary that Roald wrote.  The publisher printed it in the faint broken font of a 1910 typewriter. What fun

 

This build is but a chapter in the tale of the Scandinavians.  I believe my tale will include:
•    Nordenskiold on the Vega making the Northeast passage 1878 to 1880
•    Nansen- Sverdrup  [FRAM to be another build but same story} 1893-1896
•    Sverdrup FRAM. Canadian Arctic 1898 – 1902
•    Amundsen Gjoa  Northwest passage 1902-1906
•    Amundsen  FRAM Antarctica 1910 -1912
•    Sverdrup/Amundsen Maud 1917-1926

 

Before deeper study these are my understood points of reference.  Mostly from other reading or recent internet sources. I hope to expand my understanding though this winter as I build the two models.

• Nordenskiold is our starting point. There is some cross reference as Sweden and Norway were not separated until 1905.  My reason to pull this story in is the geographical relevance, but more to our mission, a study in the evolution of active exploration vessels.  The  Vega  was a steam powered bark, a Sealer. She was launched in 1872.  Many of the vessels used by explorers up through 1913 included a wide selection of similar whaling/ sealing steam powered barks.  Robert Peary used them, including the Winward which the year before had recused Nansen from Franz Josef land. Greely and Hall used them 1860’s to 1880's, and MacMillan used them from USA up through 1913 and found much difficulty. He was finally rescued by Robert Bartlett in 1913 after being in Etah, Greenland for 4 years.    

• Nansen understood the effects of ice on the hulls though over wintering, and FRAM was all about the shape.  She was quite successful. The fact that Amundsen not only took her to the Antarctic but used her design for the third vessel Maud speaks to the correctness of “fit for purpose”. 

• Gjoa was a 1872 Norwegian fishing sloop [ cutter rig ]. Amundsen understood the need for less than 10 feet of draft, and a small profile to be able to maneuver through the narrow and shallow inshore passages which he both expected and indeed did find. He had a new type 13 horsepower engine that could burn many things.  I hope to learn more about it.  I look forward to the details by reading his diary.

Off to the drawings.  

There are several exchanges in the MSW logs about drawings for these vessels.  The models of Gjoa are apparently not currently available as kits.  Dialogues suggested that the Model Shipways 1950 vintage drawings for their solid hull kit were even better than the expensive ones from the Oslo museum.  I found an old Model shipway kit on eBay and thus I have a set of prints.

Scale….I plan to build this vessel at 1:48 as that is the same scale as my Schooner Bowdoin. I will show these vessels side by side as an extended chapter. It will discuss the influence of this little gem of a vessel and its impact on MacMillan programing his schooner in 1920.

 

The scene….it is too early now but starting out I think it be good to show her moored in ice /water as she spent over 14 months in what today is Gjoa Haven, Nunavut.

 

Working
To change the scale of the drawings I scanned the lines, added them to TurboCad…simple 2d cad… and traced out the stations and what I call the “keelson” assembly. 

• The first 3 images show the Turbocad effort.  First is the rescaled line drawing followed by a typical station layer. I added lines to mark the top plank [ planks are thicker below this line][ then the deck and the top rail.  The 3rd image shows the transom that needed to be stretched to accommodate the angle of the transom from the vertical line.

• The next two images show the keelson drawing rescaled in front of the old kit box.  Not sure what I will use the hull for and all the other stuff all went into general supplies. The stations are all printed out and glued to 4mm plywood.

• The next two images show the marking and cut out of the keelson assembly. I used a maple blank for this piece.  The paper plan is glued with kids glue, so with a simple brush of water it will all come off.

• The final three images show front or back views of the glued stations and then the overall with the outer blocking supports.
• 

Next up is a slower process...it is all the prep needed before planking
 

[sheepsail]

Amazing to think this was a San Francisco landmark for many years albeit before my time.   Such things are so underappreciated outside the local cultural context.  Similar things happened to the cities clock and watch collection, which no longer fit in with the Academy of Sciences desire to teach the fear and hate of technology.  At least that collection is still complete in the national museum in Lancaster PA, but it is a bit difficult to visit.   One has to learn to enjoy such things while available. The Vaillancourt fountain is next on the deacquisition list. 

 

Really need a ♥️ emoji in the likes.   Looking forward to following along on this one.  I like ships with a local connection.