judging rigging knots on sailing ships

thank you for the head up on  the knots

                                 Ronald

I've both entered and judged sailing ships in IPMS meets and as long as the knots are within a reasonable size, meaning they don't stand out as "odd" to the overall scale of the ship and are seized with a lump of glue, which we have seen, then you are fine.  The Square Knot is the most common, and easiest to use for securing and the Clove Hitch for holding fast to other lines and pins.  It is acceptable that running lines have slack to them if the ship is projected to not be under a wind load.  Beeswax helps to keep the form and makes the thread easier to handle.  Enter and have fun, I know from experience that a fully rigged ship always gets a lot of respect and attention at a contest, even if it didn't win, modelers seem to give you a lot of praise for just trying.

Don's suggestions in the last post appear to make most sense. If you are looking to enter models into competition then it's best to gauge the level of judging expertise at the shows entered. Going back a few posts I note that the model being built is the Academy Cutty Sark kit. I don't know how good a kit this is or not as I have the Airfix one to build. The Airfix kit is 1/130th scale so it is not too far off the scale of the Academy one.   So you might find a book specifically about building the Airfix Cutty Sark that was written by Noel Hackney back in the 70's very helpful to build your Academy kit. This book was published in the UK by Patrick Stephens Ltd at the time.  It is long out of print so maybe scouring Ebay might bring bring some luck, or putting a want ad in the UK and USA IPMS forums might yield a copy. There is also a book about modelling the Cutty Sark by C.Nepean Longridge that was published by Model and Allied Publications that is about the model in the London Science Museum.   Again Ebay or want ads required.   There is a really good set of drawings of the Cutty Sark that are ideal for model makers by G.F.Campbell. I bought mine some time ago whilst visiting the ship itself. You may well be able to obtain a set by contacting the Cutty Sark Society as I think that they may still be currently on sale for modellers.

sumter III

May I suggest checking out the IPMS website forum and ask what level the judges are looking for.  Remember the local meets may or may not have a judge that knows all the details about your ship, but you can bet your bottom dollar if you go to a National you better know you stuff. 

There are many ship contests which are not IPMS.  Ship modeling is a genre that sort of lives on its own.  Many model ship groups are anti-plastic, and quite conservative.  In general, I find non-IPMS contests to be a bit harder on judging than IPMS.  Since the meets are ships-only, and the judges are ship enthusiasts, they will know more about ships than the judges roped into the task at many IPMS meets.

If you restrict yourself to IPMS meets, then IPMS standards are fine. If you go to other than IPMS meets, like the Manitowac show or those on the east coast, you are likely to find rougher judging.  Also, the knots themselves are not as much of an issue as where and how the lines are tied off, what is done with excess line, etc.  Judges at these shows will expect standing rigging terminations to be served/seized, etc.

May I suggest checking out the IPMS website forum and ask what level the judges are looking for.  Remember the local meets may or may not have a judge that knows all the details about your ship, but you can bet your bottom dollar if you go to a National you better know you stuff. 

thank you for  the informantion

thanks again Don

   for your  help  if it's with you can I contact you again if I have any question

                                    Ronald

If there are any universally-accepted standards for judging ship model rigging in contests, I'm not aware of them.

If you do want to rig a model with the "right" knots (i.e., knots that are like the ones on the prototype), you probably need to learn only two:  the reef knot and the clove hitch.  The reef knot, known to Boy Scouts as the square knot, is the one just about everybody learns to tie, and it will work quite well for most rigging situations.  The clove hitch is used for one common purpose in ship rigging:  securing ratlines to shrouds.  In my opinion the clove hitch is, if anything, even easier to tie than the reef knot.  Once you learn it you can tie it in a few seconds. 

ronald305

Thank you Don   

   I appreciate your  help  the model ship Im  working on now is a 1/150 scale Cutty Sark from Academy  how would you approch this kit  as far as rigging

                      Ronald

For a fairly large sailing ship like the CS, you are about at the borderline.  It is at a sufficient scale that hand made ratlines on the shrouds would improve the model, but I'd use an overhand knot- don't bother with the scale knots, you'll be painting shrouds and ratlines with black paint anyway.  I'd do a composite on the ends of stays and such.  A small overhand knot, leave an eighth or 3/16 end, and wrap a few ties around it to simulate seizing, then paint the area.  On belayed lines I'd make the loops and belay properly.  Coil ends of belayed lines- at least some of them. If the pin rails get too crowded eliminate some ends but have others there.

ok thanks

Thank you Don   

   I appreciate your  help  the model ship Im  working on now is a 1/150 scale Cutty Sark from Academy  how would you approch this kit  as far as rigging

                      Ronald

I'd say you need to decide whose format your building for.  If you're building for you, it's up to you.  If you're building for IPMS, then you'd probably be okay with winging it on the knots and concentrating on the overall quality of the build itself (at the show we had in Fort Worth, there was a beautiful 1/35 fishing trawler, however there were several loose lines and sheets and he still won best of show over a much better, well constructed race car).  If you're building it for a wooden ship contest, find out how they judge and build to those standards.  Have you tried googling or yahooing books on rigging model ships?

Actually, much of the line termination on sailing ships did not use knots. Knots were used in the running rigging only, for the most part, for lines that had to be tied, untied and adjusted a lot.  For standing rigging the lines were looped to make an eye, then served or seized- wrapped with a smaller line, then tarred.  Sometimes the lines were looped around an eyelet or thimble or something, other times the line end itself made the eyelet.

As far as true knots, I feel scale determines a lot what kind of knot to use.  In smaller scales the knots are so small I defy anyone to tell what kind of knot it is even with a magnifying glass.  Larger than 1:100, maybe you can see what type of knot, but in the smaller scales I don't believe you can.  Personally in smaller scales I use overhand knots a lot, even though that would not have been used on full-scale.

see that is what I  have been trying to find out  what exactly is the historical accurate knot  for sailing ships so I can use them

Now that part I can't really say.  If you can make the historically accurate knots I would suggest doing that.

so you saying I can  just about use any kind of knots  such as over hand, clover hitch etc

                                     Ronald

It varies from contest to contest.  It varies even between judges within the same contest.

I'm sorry I don't have a better answer for you than that.