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HMS Snake by Beef Wellington - FINISHED - Caldercraft - Scale 1: 64 - First wooden ship build


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very nice - i will be following with interest on what you find out

 

all the best

Its all part of Kev's journey, bit like going to the dark side, but with the lights on
 

All the best

Kevin :omg:


SAY NO TO PIRACY. SUPPORT ORIGINAL IDEAS AND MANUFACTURERS.
KEEP IT REAL!

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On the build table

HMS Indefatigable 1794 by Kevin - Vanguard Models - 1:64 - Feb 2023 

 

 

HMHS Britannic by Kevin 

SD 14  - Marcle Models - 1/70 - March 2022 -  Bluebell - Flower Class - Revel - 1/72   U552 German U Boat - Trumpeter - 1/48  Amerigo Vespucci     1/84 - Panart-   HMS Enterprise  -CAF -  1/48     

Finished     

St-Nectan-Mountfleet-models-steam-trawler-1/32 - Completed June 2020

HMS Victory - Caldercraft/Jotika - 1/72 - Finished   Dorade renamed Dora by Kevin - Amati - 1/20 - Completed March 2021 

Stage Coach 1848 - Artesania Latina - 1/10 -Finished Lady Eleanor by Kevin - FINISHED - Vanguard Models - 1/64 - Fifie fishing boat

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Don't really intend my log to become a historical treatise on carronades, but I thought I'd pass this on given that the subject seems to have generated so much discussion/interest.  I had asked the question to the HMS Trincomalee Trust, here is the reply.  On another side note, it was very interesting that the original manufacturer of the Carronades (Carron company originally in Selkirk) also made the famous British red telephone boxes and now makes kitchen sinks.  :)

 

Hello Jason

 

Thanks for your enquiry about our carronades.  As far as we know, they are either ‘of the ship’ or of the period and we consider them to be historically accurate.  To be honest, I’m not entirely sure what metal the elevation screws are made of.  They are ‘brass’ in appearance but this metal inevitably would be too soft to withstand the regular screw action.  Therefore I must conclude that they are made of a high brass content alloy – one which would withstand maritime conditions and also be hard enough to withstand the screw action.  For a definitive specification, it would be worth contacting the makers – Carron Phoenix in Manchester, England – www.carron.com – tel: 01324 638321

 

Hope that helps

 

Best wishes,

 

David McKnight

General Manager

Cheers,
 
Jason


"Which it will be ready when it is ready!"
 
In the shipyard:

HMS Jason (c.1794: Artois Class 38 gun frigate)

Queen Anne Royal Barge (c.1700)

Finished:

HMS Snake (c.1797: Cruizer Class, ship rigged sloop)

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Dont forget that Carron also used to make enameled cast iron bathubs. I think the screw if it were non ferrous would be a bronze rather than brass similar to thant used in cannons.

 

Norman

Norman

 

 

Current build Trumpeter Arizona 1:200 with White Ensign PE and a Nautilus Wooden Deck.

Built Caldercraft Convulsion, HM Brig Badger and HMS Snake.

Awaiting - Zvelda HMS Dreadnought planning to get the Pontos Deck and PE Upgrades, Panart 1:23 Gun deck model and couple of the cannon kits Manatu - French siege mortar, and American coastal cannon.

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Very interesting... Did not know the company still exists.

 

Based on your letter I'm suddenly thinking manganese-bronze as the metal... It has that silvery grey colour seen in your photo. Used nowadays for ship's propellors.... Although I don't know when it was first produced...

 

Andy

Quando Omni Flunkus, Moritati


Current Build:

USF Confederacy

 

 

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In actual use true brass (an alloy of copper and zinc) was not used on ships because it would corrode and turn green very quickly in the salt water environment. Bronze is an alloy of copper and tin which has very good resistance to corrosion and good strength but is much more reddish brown than brass. What was used was naval brass which is an alloy of copper with both tin (for corrosion resistance and strength) and zinc (for color and self-lubricating property). 

 

In my research into the Cruizers I found a definite description of Commander Peake of the Cruizer-class Peacock (which had the reputation of being a "yacht" for her tasteful appearance) keeping the "brass" elevating screws and the brackets for the traversing wheels highly polished instead of exercising his crew at the guns which resulted in USS Hornet all but sinking her in 15 minutes of battle with almost no damage received. Peacock sank shortly after striking taking several crew members of both vessels with her who were trying to save her.

 

Manganese was not identified as a separate metal until just a few years before this period and was not isolated (it is naturally occurring in most iron ores) until a later time so there was no manganese bronze is this period. 

 

I have also seen photos of period carronades that show a threaded bushing in the cascabel that the elevating screw passes through. This bushing may have threaded into the cascabel or may have been a press or interference fit. This would be a much better arrangement than having threads for the elevating screw cut directly into the cascabel for several very technical reasons which I won't go into here.

 

Jason, your cannons and carronades look great with the added details 

post-70-0-74663700-1362476559.jpg


Current Builds:  ESMERALDA Chilean Navy School Ship, 1/640 in a bottle


insanity Dan Clapp's hard water race boat in a bottle


Completed Build:  Prairie Schooner OGALLALA 1/96 in a bottle


Research Project:  Cruizer-class Brig-Sloops


 


 


"Beer is proof that God loves us and wants us to be happy." - Benjamin Franklin

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What impress me in a model ship are transom and detailed cannon work...

I envy you the work you have shown to simulate cannons...

Edited by ashiponthehorizon

Best Regards…

Ferit KUTLU

 

Under construction: Frigate Berlin (Brandenburg Navy)

Hope: Frigate Wappen Von Hamburg (Brandenburg Navy)

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This will probably be my last update for a while, we leave next weekend for a family trip back home to the UK, its been 5yrs since I've been home and seen my sisters side of the family so should be fun.

 

I've been spending so much time on the canons/carronades and other deck fittings that I needed a complete change of pace so decided to start tackling the bowsprit.  This proved to be pretty enjoyable but had its share of 'challenge'  The instructions are not overly helpful, and in some cases misleading...at least to me. Sorry for the wordy update but think this may be useful to others.

 

First off I cut the bowsprit dowel to length and shaped the end that will sit on the deck.  Its important to understand how the bits will be positioned as this anchors one end.  This has to be balanced with ensuring that the angle of the bowsprit is correct, and I judged this by measuring he clearance above the  highest part of the bow.  Once all that was done, I measured the length of the bowsprit from the end of the bow to match the plans.  Comparing this to the plans showed that the total length of my bowsprit is about 1.5cm longer than the plan, but should match the plans once installed.  I suspect other's results will be a little different given the variances in each build.

 

Next I cut the angle onto the end of the bowsprit to take the cap and started shaping the cap.  The holes in the cap are round and the instructions/plan give no insight into how to do this other than 'form a tenon'.  I made it round because the hole in the cap is round, which was a mistake.  Basically there is no way that the hole in the cap can be angled so this fits neatly with no gap.  Looking at some reference material ("Rigging Period Ship Models") I saw that the tenon should be square.  To try to correct this I rebated a section and glued in some scrap wood to simulate the square tenon.

 

Next issue was with the top hole for the flying jib.  The hole is cut with 4mm diameter at 90deg to the cap, the flying jib is 4mm diameter and needs to sit at the same angle as the bowsprit  Basically there is no way the hole can be angled without requiring some element of filling which I did with some scrap.

 

Results are in photo below.  Another error instructions (I believe) is that they indicate that the cap should be at 90 degrees to the keel, and as the keel is quite angled on the Snake this seemed odd, and is contradictory to the plans which the show the cap 90 degrees to the waterline.  I went with the plan.

 

post-891-0-77866300-1396051014_thumb.jpg

 

Touch of paint to see how everything ended up....realized that all the work to get the square tenon correct was barely visible once painted.

 

post-891-0-49652900-1396051018_thumb.jpg

 

Next came figuring out the jib boom saddle.  The supplied piece (left) was dimensionally out in a number of places, so I ended up making my own (right) which I was much happier with

 

post-891-0-01654200-1396051022_thumb.jpg

 

Dryfitted for now, but the 4mm dowel sample shows how everything will fit eventually.

 

post-891-0-90746900-1396051025_thumb.jpg

Edited by Beef Wellington

Cheers,
 
Jason


"Which it will be ready when it is ready!"
 
In the shipyard:

HMS Jason (c.1794: Artois Class 38 gun frigate)

Queen Anne Royal Barge (c.1700)

Finished:

HMS Snake (c.1797: Cruizer Class, ship rigged sloop)

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Looks a good result Jason, those pre- drilled bowsprit caps are a pain because as you say the cap should be in a vertical plane when viewed from the side and the hole for the jibboom needs to be angled to suit the stive of the bowsprit. To make it so the hole becomes too big.

 

An additional problem on Pegasus was that there was no provision on the starboard side to take the Jack staff; I got around the problem by scratching a new cap and fixing angled inserts in the vice to give the correct stive for the hole before drilling.

 

Enjoy your trip back home.

 

Cheers,

 

B.E.

 

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Bon voyage my friend.

 

Mort

Current Build - Caldercraft Victory

 

Completed - Artesiana Latina Swift, Harvey, MGS Prince de Neufchatel, Imai USS Susquehanna, Mamoli Constitution, Rattlesnake per Hunt Practium, Caldercraft Snake, Diana, Kammerlander Duke William 

 

Waiting to be Launched -  Bluejacket Constitution

 

 

Proud member of The New Jersey Ship Model Society

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  • 1 month later...

Feels like a long time since I've made a post.  With a bit of focused effort all 16 carronades are ready for final assembly (last cannon is getting close), I'm taking maybe a rather convoluted approach but hoping it will work OK.  The pedestals are all attached to the deck, but I'm leaving the slides unattached for now so I can rig the breaching ropes off the ship.  It also give me a chance to align the elevations individually using the small elevation screws before attaching the turning handles.  I'm not sure of the correct elevation for these, but think it would make most practical sense to have a small gap at the top of the gunport as I've tried to achieve.

 

I'll leave off the deck fittings until everything is rigged to hopefully make this task as easy as possible.  Think I'm finally homing in on the approach to the rigging which I suspect will be the next never-ending task, but hope not.

 

post-891-0-04007400-1377379366_thumb.jpgpost-891-0-99340900-1377379368_thumb.jpgpost-891-0-80343500-1377379371_thumb.jpg

 

 

 

 

Cheers,
 
Jason


"Which it will be ready when it is ready!"
 
In the shipyard:

HMS Jason (c.1794: Artois Class 38 gun frigate)

Queen Anne Royal Barge (c.1700)

Finished:

HMS Snake (c.1797: Cruizer Class, ship rigged sloop)

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Welcome back. I look forward to more posts.

 

Mort

Current Build - Caldercraft Victory

 

Completed - Artesiana Latina Swift, Harvey, MGS Prince de Neufchatel, Imai USS Susquehanna, Mamoli Constitution, Rattlesnake per Hunt Practium, Caldercraft Snake, Diana, Kammerlander Duke William 

 

Waiting to be Launched -  Bluejacket Constitution

 

 

Proud member of The New Jersey Ship Model Society

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CaptCraig, Ferit, Mort, Sjors and BE - thanks gents for the continuing support.

 

Some slow but steady progress, finally getting a chance to try the various different things that I've thinking about for the last month or more:

 

Have one carronade attached with breech rope.  Unfortunately my seized knot ended up looking more like a baguette than a knot after all the manhandling, hopefully this will get a little easier with practice.  I'll probably play with this some more to get final placement so it looks natural.

 

Made up a couple of hooks and attached to a double and single 3mm block to see how this would look.  Hooks are made from the small 0.3mm brass etch eyebolts bent to shape.  Once rigged, managed to get one of the crew to test things out - thumbs up.  Pretty happy with the way my first carronade is shaping up.

 

I'm probably going to frap the tackle falls around the blocks as per current practice on HMS Victory rather than cheese them on the deck - no Admirals inspection for me...

 

As always, suggestions welcome.

 

post-891-0-25336600-1377487195_thumb.jpgpost-891-0-06345300-1377487204_thumb.jpgpost-891-0-43912000-1377487968_thumb.jpgpost-891-0-03687800-1377487964_thumb.jpg

Edited by Beef Wellington

Cheers,
 
Jason


"Which it will be ready when it is ready!"
 
In the shipyard:

HMS Jason (c.1794: Artois Class 38 gun frigate)

Queen Anne Royal Barge (c.1700)

Finished:

HMS Snake (c.1797: Cruizer Class, ship rigged sloop)

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Fantastic work, Jason!

What;s the need of the sliding bed posterior eyelets you have fixed?

Thanks

 

Thanks Stergios - Those would be for the training tackles, I'm not going to rig those however, they would also need a set of eyebolts in the bulwark as well which again I'm not going to attach - although it could look good, it could make the the whole deck a bit too cluttered.  The aftermarket carronade supports are definitely longer as you've probably seen and take up more deck space that those supplied.  If you haven't seen it already, you should check the photo at link below, Len's carronades are definitely something to aspire to and show the full rigging. http://modelshipworld.com/index.php?/topic/2107-hms-bellerophon-by-len-semi-scratchbuilt-victory-models-kit/?p=83285

Edited by Beef Wellington

Cheers,
 
Jason


"Which it will be ready when it is ready!"
 
In the shipyard:

HMS Jason (c.1794: Artois Class 38 gun frigate)

Queen Anne Royal Barge (c.1700)

Finished:

HMS Snake (c.1797: Cruizer Class, ship rigged sloop)

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A little bit of info on the technique I'm using on the breech rope, I'm using the Victory carronade photo below as reference.  

 

1)  One end of the breech rope is knotted to eyebolt and seized (I believe a 'half-hitch').  1.0mm Amati line was used for breech rope (purchased separately) and 0.1mm Caldercraft line was used for the seizing.  Used the Amati line because the supplied 1.0mm line just did not look good (flat and loosely wound).  The seizing looks a bit overscale in the photos but I'm happy with how it looks in person.  Dilute PVA was used to secure before trimming.

2) Threaded the unfinished end through the various ring bolts.

3) Used a spare bed as a jig and drilled holes in same place as on the ship to get correct length at 'fully recoiled' position.  Note why I had spares' below.

4) Knoted and seized the unfinished end and its ready for installation.  Photos below show ends both finished and untrimmed

 

The height of the elevation screws has also been reduced as these seemed to be too high as supplied.  This needed to be done after installation as screw thread gets ruined.

 

Other side note for those considering the aftermarket CC carronades.  I encountered some problems with the screw thread not being drilled correctly which resulted in a stripped elevation screw.  Only solution was to buy replacement barrels/screws.  Next problem was the supplied barrels were missing the screws, so had to buy yet another replacement as it was pretty hard to determine who was at fault. (These were purchased through Cornwall Model boats as there is no US supplier which means high shipping costs for trivial items)

 

post-891-0-09041600-1377704497_thumb.jpgpost-891-0-92557000-1377704499_thumb.jpgpost-891-0-84502600-1377704502_thumb.png

Edited by Beef Wellington

Cheers,
 
Jason


"Which it will be ready when it is ready!"
 
In the shipyard:

HMS Jason (c.1794: Artois Class 38 gun frigate)

Queen Anne Royal Barge (c.1700)

Finished:

HMS Snake (c.1797: Cruizer Class, ship rigged sloop)

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Spending my time with the aftermarket carronades assembly...

Two questions for you Jason, in brief:

1] how have you created the rope-hole on the barrel (in front of the elevation screw)? I cant'r find your tip even I have read it somewhere!

2] did you glue the carriage on the sliding bed or simply you left it unglued sliding on it via its 1,5 mm rod wire?

Thanks again

 

Stergios

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Pete, Jim - just muddling through trying to find things that work for me...

 

Stergios - take a look here http://modelshipworld.com/index.php?/topic/509-hms-snake-by-beef-wellington-caldercraft-scale-1-64-first-wooden-ship-build/?p=76645.  Once rigged, carriages will be glued to the sliding bed so its secure on model.  These are unglued while being rigged and the pin seems to hold them in position as needed together with the small piece of wood holding it in correct place.

Cheers,
 
Jason


"Which it will be ready when it is ready!"
 
In the shipyard:

HMS Jason (c.1794: Artois Class 38 gun frigate)

Queen Anne Royal Barge (c.1700)

Finished:

HMS Snake (c.1797: Cruizer Class, ship rigged sloop)

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