sails on revel kit 0398 U.S.S. Constitution

Very much like GMorrison I, believe no sails makes a ship look better than full sail, though I prefer the compromise of furled ones. The 1/96 Connie allows for setting the yards in their lowered position without extra effort, which is nice. I wish the smaller scale models would be made the same way...

Anyways, I've stumbled upon some 1/96 Constitutions which were made in full sail, even with the studding sails set, which looked quite nice. Some of them even used the vac-formed sails. I guess experienced hands can make anything look good!

It looks like I goofed in assuming that Thadkres (this phone tried to make him "to adores") was working on the little 1/192 kit. My bad; I didn't look up the number.

Now that I look a bit more carefully at that diagram (on my big monitor), I do see some lines in it that apparently are intended to represent a jackstay. I think GM's right: it's a generic diagram that Revell has recycled for several kits. (Revell does that sort of thing a lot these days.)

The bottom line remains unchanged: the 1/96 kit doesn't have jackstays, and it's probably right on that point.

I'm pretty certain that the Constitution's jackstays were always on top of the yards. (I'm not sure whether she has them now.) It's dangerous to be dogmatic about such things, but I can't recall having bumped into a ship with single jackstays on the forward sides of the yards. I think that arrangement was only to be seen on latter-day sailing ships with double jackstays.

The instability of this site can be tiresome. I just finished a long post that was sent to Pluto, I guess.

In any case- the high (or lowlights):

It's clear the OP is building the 1/96 kit since he listed the kit # as such.

The diagram that Rdiaz posted is from the latest release of that same kit. But it's part of a rather lengthy generic intro to rigging showing a lot of non-kit specific and basic information about how to tie blocks to spars, seize shrouds etc. I rather expect that the instructions creator pasted in a "boilerplate" diagram that was on hand.

I still think it shows a jack stay, however that's obviously of no matter here as the actual ship probably didn't at the time, it doesn't affect the suggested detail, and there'll still be the matter of how to avoid the studding sail booms, which probably would best be added last.

So my apologies if the response I gave seemed to imply that the 1/96 kit would best be served removing cast on jack stays ( which don't exist) and replacing them with scratch built ones ( which is a fair amount of work and probably ahead of its time) or that these erroneous jack stays should be on the forward upper quarter of the yard.  Did Constitution get them? At some point it would seem. We're they single? Most probably. We're they on top or forward? I have no ideas but the camera was probably in use by then so the info is out there.

I agree that tying the robands  around the yard would be the right detail.

How many I couldn't say and a rabbit hole about whether the cast on seams on the sails are accurate or not scares me.

IMO sails on ships are best left off. Besides the fact that it really takes a lot more skill than I have to get them right and the vac formed ones are just nasty; I think they totally conceal the grace and beauty of a ships structure. Plus to be even reasonably accurate to the level of detail being ruminated here, you need sailors and water added to the display. It's obviously done and done well, but I like full hull builds.

Right! It doesn't show jackstays, which (correctly, in my opinion) the 1/96 kit doesn't have. I think everybody's on the same as page here.

But the diagram I posted is actually from the 1/96 kit rigging instructions...

I question that 1815 date too, but I won't reject it out of hand. When I was digging around for tidbits of rigging information about frigates of the American Revolution, I bumped into several crumbs suggesting that American riggers were slightly ahead of British ones in some respects but not others. An inventory of  the frigate Raleigh, for instance, suggests that her topsail lifts and topgallant sheets were separate lines. (In the Royal Navy at the time, according to James Lees, the same rope performed both functions.) On  the other hand, the Hancock's plans suggest pretty clearly that her fore tacks ran through holes in the knee of the head, rather than to boomkins (this phone practically grossed out over that one) like those that were in common use in British ships by 1776.

The dates in texts about rigging always need to be taken with a grain of salt. In this particular case, though, the bottom line is that they all seem to confirm that Revell got it right: jackstays (no, phone, not "backstage;" I hate you) on the little, 1830s version of the Constitution, none on the big 1814 version.

thanks for all the great info......finally was able to download the complete directions which included the info about the sails......would not download on my desktop computer but tried doing it on my tablet and it actually came in all complete.....unbelievable

In the Bluejacket kit manual, Larry Arnot (and Commander Tyrone Martin) calls for jackstays on the Constitution beginning in 1815.  Olof Eriksen utilizes jackstays as well in his version of the 1815 Charles Stewart Connie.  Eriksen was also heavily influenced by Martin and claims that the US Navy had references to jackstays as early as 1805 by Josiah Fox.  It may be, however, that the reference was for something else entirely that was used for bending staysails...

I'm a bit skeptical - neither of these cites any specific sources for the 1815 jackstays and they really don't seem to show up on rigging plans and contemporary ship models until the 1820s or so - as noted by J Tilley.

If true, then the US Navy preceded the Royal Navy by at least a decade in their use.

Evan

The Jackstay began to appear in good-sized sailing ships in about the 1820s. I gather the kit in question is the one on 1/192 scale, which represents the ship pretty much as she appeared in the 1830s. So the jackstays may well be right.

Their locations on the tops of the yards are also correct. Toward the very end of the nineteenth century, big ships with iron or steel yards started to be fitted with "double jackstays" - one on top of the yard, the other 45 degrees forward of it. The one on the front was used to secure the robands; the upper Jackstay had various pieces of running rigging attached to it - and formed a handle for men to hang onto.

Jackstays on that tiny scale are VERY difficult to represent to scale. Revell probably did about as good a job on them as could be expected. Tying the robands (this infernal phone tried to change them to "Robards") to the jackstays obviously isn't practicable (certainly not on a first model project). My suggestion would be the "double loop" method.

Another possible approach: leave the sails off. Lots of modelers (including me) don't like plastic sails. But that, of course, is up to the individual modeler.

It may be worth noting that Revell's big, 1/96 Constitution doesn't have jackstays. It represents the ship as she appeared in about 1814, so that's almost certainly correct.

Hope that helps a little. Good luck.

Great reference! Thanks for posting that jgonzales.

Hi all,

Here is some info on how sails are bent onto the yard, either with or without a jackstay:

books.google.com/books

I wouldn't suggest duplicating the real thing, but I chose to wrap the robands around the yard twice before tying a square knot, to match the doubling around the yard.

Cheers!

Jose

I am wondering if anyone has a picture that shows the actual U.S. Constitution Revel kit 0398 completed with the sails that are supplied in the kit pictured?  All pictures online are not the correct kit or only show without the sails.......when I go to revell to try to download the complete instructions, it will only give me about four pages so I do not know if the directions actually exist that explain the mounting of the sails according to the numbers on the molds.  There are so many sails with different sizes, that with no directions, it is worse than a maze or 1000 piece puzzle trying to figure out which and where each sail goes.  I am guessing that the sails are attached after all the rigging is put on, or am I wrong about that too?  I am on the second step of the running rigging right now and I have the sails partially painted.

Thadkres- looking at that little diagram from the instructions, there's a kind of bar molded along the top of the yard. That's probably supposed to represent something called a jackstay. In reality, that would be on the front upper face of the yard, just about where Arnie glues his sail, or just above that. It is like a towel bar in the bath room; a rod that passes along through a series of eyes. The sail head (top edge) got bent (tied ) to that with robands (short little lengths of rope), and hung down on the front of the yard. Obviously the one on the model can't be used, and removing it and adding a better one is a job. Far from impossible, but takes some practice.

So on a big ship with jackstays, there would not be ropes wrapped around the yards holding the sails when they are set. But thats a detail, individual ties like Arnie described are a good compromise. They ought to be the color of the yard, or close to it.

Here's a good diagram, looking aft at the face of a sail. You can see there's two jackstays. The one on top is to hold onto. But that's a modern ship.

it does make a lot of sense.....thanks

thank you....that certainly looks workable......have used CA a lot for other types of work.

I have done the following in the past and had it work very well for me.

Pierce the number of holes you need in your sails. Run a very thin bead of CA across the top and back edge of the sail and attach it to the underside of the yard. It should actually be just a little bit forward of directly underneath the yard (see below). This is a bit tricky, so I recommend that you practice w/ some scraps from cutting out your sails on a piece of dowel. Once the sail is attached it is pretty quick and easy to run the ties.  To the best of my knowledge, sails were not attached to the yards w/ a single line run in a spiral, but w/ individual ties. If you are working in a larger scale such as 1/96, you really should use single ties. For scales like 1/250, the spiral should be fine as it will not be so apparent that you did it that way. Hope this helps.

That diagram is the right way to go. Its a little more work that one running stitch, but it will look a lot better, and is closer to the actual solution. Use tan or white thread.

I really appreciate the help and in looking thru my kit and online, it seems like the sail directions that you show are not a part of the kit anymore for some reason.  Is there a way that I can get a copy of that sheet from you?  I am assuming it identifies the numbers on the plastic molds with where each sail should go.

Thank you.

thank you......also just received an email stating that those instructions were supposed to be in my kit, but they were not.

A lot of models I've seen use one continuous length of thread through the sail and around thd yard, in spiral. In the Revell kit, instructions say to pierce holes 1/8" from the edge of the sail, then attach the sails to the yards with loops of thread: