HMS Surprise by Navis Factorem - FINISHED - 1:75

[Navis Factorem]

Ship's Boats.

 

After a bit of a break I have got back into construction and have completed the first of the 5 ship's boats, the 28'launch.

 

I shaped a solid balsa block template rather than the previous method i had used for the Bounty boats when I made up the template from individual balsa strips spaced to the rib pattern.

 

Cheers,

 

David.

 

     

 

                                               

 

 

[HIPEXEC]

Very nice work

[gjdale]

Very nicely done David!

[Navis Factorem]

Boat 2, 26' pinnace

 

This boat has now been completed, only 3 to go, 2 x 25' cutters and the 18' jolly boat.

 

I think the pinnace and the launch have been the easiest to make as they are carvall construction. Planking of these 2 was started at the gunwale and proceeded down to the keel. With a small amount of filler the smooth hull was OK to build. The other 3 are clinker built. On the real things I assume that the planks would be laid from the keel up to achieve the overlaps. I'm not sure how to do this on the 1:75 versions, some thought required.

 

I used 2 different methods for the construction of the sacrificial balsa templates for the launch and the pinnace. The launch was a solid block shaped using cut out negative profiles to achieve the overall shape. The pinnace template was made from individual 5mm thick sections cut out using the profiles and then faired to get the right shape. I think the second method resulted in a better template and I will use this again for the other 3 boats.  

 

The launch and the pinnace are probably the most different of the 5 ship's boats. The launch is big and beamy and capable of heavy duty tasks such as anchor transportation for warping and carrying of stores. My understanding is that the the pinnace is basically for transporting officers between ships or to shore and other light duties so is more built for speed as evidenced by it's comparatively narrow design and the small compartment at the stern for the boatswain. Additional gunwale height at the stern also makes for dryer ride. It wouldn't do to get Captain Jack wet!

 

Building the ship's boats has been a nice change from the main construction. Unfortunately I have run out of the 4 x 0.5mm planking used for construction and will need to source more before the other 3 boats can be built. I might do some more work on the main hull.

 

Cheers,

 

David.

 

 

 

[albert]

Very nice.

[Mirabell61]

Excellent built ships boats David,

 

Nils

[usedtosail]

David, those boats are perfect and so realistic looking. I will have to try your method of making plugs from individual strips of each hull profile on a future build. Thanks for the tip.

[michael mott]

David the boats are beautifully executed.

 

Michael

[Navis Factorem]

Rudder.

 

While waiting for more timber to continue construction of the ship's boats some more hull detailing has been completed.

 

Cheers,

 

David.

 

[aviaamator]

I'm sorry if rude, but I don't like the rudder! It still needs to be finalized in thickness and profile. At the bottom of it needs to be much thinner! Once again, sorry!

[Navis Factorem]

Dave,

 

Thanks for the feedback, I am really enjoying building the ship's boats.  More walnut planking arrived so I can have a try at the clinker built 25' cutter.

 

The accompanying pics are based on scans from the Lavery & Hunt book "The Frigate Surprise" which has been a great source of information. I have also sourced much information from the web including lots of images of the movie version of the ship at San Diego.

 

Unfortunately the L & H book doesn't show the rig so I will need additional sources of information. My main source will be Lennarth Petersson's book "Rigging Period Ship Models" which is based on a 36 gun frigate model from the period very similar to Surprise. If you haven't come across this book it consists of drawings of each individual rig line including the belaying layout. I'm not too sure how much of the rig I will end up including on the model.

 

If I experience problems that I need additional information to resolve I will certainly be in touch.

 

Thanks and cheers,

 

David.

 

Drawing scanned from L & H book and resized to 1:75

 

Base drawing for hull profiles to be glued to balsa as rib guides.

[Navis Factorem]

25' Cutter progress.

 

The outer shell of the hull of the first of the 2 x 25' cutters is complete.

 

The template made from individual profiles worked fine, for me, definitely easier than trying to shape a template out of a solid block.

 

As Surprise carried a pair of these cutters it would be easier for me if I could preserve the template instead of extracting it from the inside of the hull in small pieces as I have done previously. To make the balsa template a bit more robust I painted it with the PVA glue that I had used to fix the individual profiles to the base board and to each other. As I was fitting the ribs to the template this caused some difficulty as the CA that I was using wouldn't fix to the PVA. I ended up stretching an elastic band around the template and tucking the rib ends underneath it. This worked OK. The unseen advantage of this was that when I came to lift the hull off the template once I had fixed enough planks to make it stable this process was comparatively easy as the CA used to fix the ribs to the keel and the planks to the ribs didn't stick to the template.

 

As I didn't feel confident doing the clinker planking from the keel up so as to achieve the overlap another method was needed to let me plank from the gunwale down. I decided to try thickening the individual planks at the bottom edge so I could butt joint them and still get the clinker look. Gluing a 0.5mm square timber strip to the inside bottom edge of each plank was a bit fiddly but i think it worked OK. 

 

Now for the internal fitout of the hull.

 

Cheers,

 

David.

 

 

 

[Navis Factorem]

25' Cutters

 

The "Blue" cutter has been completed and the hull for the "Red" cutter built. I was quite pleased to have been able to preserve the blank from the first cutter so I have a reasonable chance of ending up with 2 boats which should look reasonably similar.

 

Cheers,

 

David.

 

[albert]

Very nice boats.

[Navis Factorem]

25' Cutters

 

The red cutter is now complete. It is reasonably similar to the blue cutter but I am glad that they will be hanging on different sides of the stern and not viewed close together.

 

Being able to re-use the template from the blue cutter for the red one was a great help but I find that working at this scale it is easy for inaccuracies to creep in. I won't say where I went a bit wrong, consider it one of those "spot the differences" puzzles.

 

4 boats done 1 to go.

 

Now for the jolly boat and a short stumpy little item this is, at 18' only 3/4 the length of the cutters.

 

Cheers,

 

David.

 

 

 

[Navis Factorem]

18' Jolly boat

 

I am using the same method to build the jolly boat, hull profiles scanned then printed and pasted to balsa to create the template. Getting the template right for this boat took a bit more time than the others, probably because of the relative shortness and the fairly bluff bow and the narrow tuck stern. The transom is tiny.

 

All the ribs are heat shaped to fit before threading through the keel and gluing to the template outside of the hull line. To get the 18 ribs done took about 25 lengths. At 0.5mm x 1.0mm they snap very easily.

 

Now for the planking. Again this is a clinker hull so the planks will be 2 piece, the basic 2mm wide visible plank and a 0.5mm square strip glued to the bottom edge to create the clinker "stepped" look.

 

Cheers,

 

David.

 

 

[popeye the sailor]

awesome looking boat David  

[Navis Factorem]

18' Jolly boat

 

I have finished this build and I am glad I left this until last. The shortness, relatively bluff bow and tight narrow stern meant that this was certainly the most difficult and fiddly to build. I think the final product looks OK so now all 5 ship's boats have been completed.

 

Like all these things the process changed as I went along, learning from each build, I think I am relatively proficient now. Pity I've finished, I will probably forget by the time comes to build boats for the next project, whenever that is!  

 

 

 

[Navis Factorem]

Ship's boats complete.

 

The 5 boats have now been completed. Up to this point I hadn't really appreciated just how different the boats are, from the heavy duty 28' launch to the sleek fast pinnace and the short jolly boat.

 

So after about a 4 month break from the main build I will now get back to work on the hull.

 

Cheers,

 

David.

 

[Louie da fly]

Beautiful work, David

[mtaylor]

That is a sweet looking fleet of ship's boats, David.  Well done.

 

[usedtosail]

Beautiful ships boats, David.

[marktime]

Those are the most beautiful boats that I have ever seen. Finish is perfect. Thank you for sharing.

[albert]

Very nice boats David.

[Navis Factorem]

Having finishing building the ship's boats I thought it would be good to see how 2 of them mounted on the hull.

 

For final fit the rudders will be removed and stored in the boats.

 

These 2 boats substantially cover the waist making it hard to see down to the upper deck so I am thinking of showing the launch hoisted above the deck. I am not sure how this was done, I assume lifting tackle was connected to the burton pendants for the fore and main masts with other tackle on the main and fore yard to enable sideways movement. Advice on how this was handled would be appreciated.

 

Cheers, David.

[albert]

Very nice work.

[mtaylor]

David,

Have a look here and follow the links on some of the posts:  

  

[Navis Factorem]

Hi and thanks,

 

I looked up the link, exactly the information I was after.

 

Cheers,

 

David.

[Navis Factorem]

Gun tackle.

 

I have started installing the gun tackle for the main deck 32 pd carronades. So far guns 1 and 2 on the starboard side have been completed. If I had realised how much tackle is attached to each carronade I think I may have built a different version of the Surprise with long guns only!

 

Each gun has 5 block and tackle units, 2 for the slide outhaul, 2 for the carriage traverse and a slide inhaul, along with the breech rope. Each block and tackle has 2 blocks and 2 hooks, and where they attach to the gun and the hull there are another 2 ring bolts each. And the breech rope has 2 ring bolts on the slide along with another 2 rings. That adds up to a lot of copper wire shaping.

 

36 to go.

 

Cheers,

 

David.

[Navis Factorem]

Starboard gun tackle complete. I might do something else for a while, perhaps start on some spars, there's only so much time I can spend on making tiny blocks and hooks and tying tiny knots before I need a rest.

 

Cheers, David.