Soleil Royal

I am not sure if they are different than yours are or not.  They are already copied so just let me know.  I have RC Andersons book and though detailed, I wish there was a book that had diagrams of the entire rigging schemes, section by section, of ships during this period. 

Wayne

Wayne:

I appreciate the offer but unless your instructions are different than mine, I already have them. As Professor Tilley commented the English translation is horrible. Sorry I haven't gotten around to posting pictures of my build but I promise I will. I think I may just use the rigging instructions from a book on sailing ships of that time period. Does anyone have any suggestions as to which one would be a good choice? I have a copy of Underhill's Masting and Rigging of the Clipper Ship and Ocean Going Vessels which while an excellent book is for a later time period. I guess I could use it as the overall principles regarding the running rigging/standing rigging are the same as long as I remember that the Soleil Royale did not have things such as footropes on the yards.

Sincerely

Michael Lacey

The big problem with the English "translation" of those instructions is that they're virtually useless - whether incomplete or otherwise.  Big caveat:  I'm talking about the instructions that were included when I bought and built the kit - a long time ago.  Maybe the company has produced a new translation since then; I certainly hope so.  But I've heard complaints from lots of folks to the effect that the same old garbage has been packaged with the kit in more recent years - and, presumably, in lots of the old kits that are being sold on E-bay and elsewhere.

It quickly became obvious that the person who wrote the "translation" in the kit I bought neither (a) had attempted to build the model, nor (b) understood the French language. 

There's an easy way to tell whether your kit has the same set of "English instructions."  Check the parts list, and compare it with the drawings in the French instructions.  The person who wrote the set in my kit thought "le mat de misaine" was the mizzenmast.  It isn't.  "Le mat de misaine" is the foremast; the mizzenmast is "le mat d'artimon."  (Any French-speaking ship modeler would know that.) 

Initially I thought the "translation" in my kit had been thrown into the box by the American distributor.  But sometime later I got a look at a kit that a British friend of mine had bought - in England.  The same document was in it.

I complained to the American distributor, and commented on the problem in the review of the kit that I wrote for the British magazine Scale Models.  I never got any response. 

It's possible, I suppose, that somewhere along the line Heller (or Airfix, in the period when it sold the model - if it ever did) commissioned a new, genuine translation of the instructions into English.  But anybody who has the same "translation" that I got might as well throw it out.  The person who wrote it apparently did so by looking at the parts of an unassembled kit and the pictures in the French instruction book - in other words, he/she didn't know any more about how to build the model than you do. 

When I was building my model I lucked out:  I found an old French-English/English-French dictionarly lying around the house that contained almost all of the maritime terms I needed to read the French parts list.  (Beyond the parts list the instructions really aren't so hard to follow.  One mostly-forgotten year of college French was more than enough.)  But I personally don't think a modeler who spends such an amount of money on a kit should have to do that.  In my opinion those instructions are a scandal.  And those of the Heller Victory aren't much better.

Michael,

I have made a full copy of the Soleil Royal insructions.....it is all English.  Let me know if you would like a set.

Wayne

Michael,

If you decide to continue with the build, I will see if I can copy my instructions for you.  Just let me know.  It was this forum and these threads that got me interested in picking up my Soleil Royal build after almost 30 years.  I am looking ahead to the Heller Victory after this one.  They will look good in glass in my living room.  Lots of work and frustration, I am sure, before that day is realized.

Wayne

Wayne:

I have a few pictures of mine somewhere. I'll take some new ones and post them. Actually your thread has started to spark an interest to finish this kit. I'll have to think about it some more as it is a massive undetaking compounded by the kits instructions in French with a few pages of an English translation!

Sincerely

Michael Lacey 

Thanks Michael. 

I will study your description and give it a try.  I plan on using John Tilley's suggestions from before about hand stringing the ratlines using the clove hitch method.

Do you have any images of your build so far that we could see?  I will be posting some of mine soon.  Like I said, I have disassembled the decks and repainting and rebuilding them.  I hope to start assembling the decks soon.  I also plan on attaching lines to the cannons through eyebolts in the bulwark for cannons on the lower decks....not too fancy but it will keep one from losing them if they come unglued.  I learned that a loose cannon below decks is virtualy impossible to find and reglue.  I will fully outfit the top deck cannons with blocks and lines.

Wayne

Greetings:

One thing I would recommend is not using that shroud rigging tool that comes with the kit. I never could figure out how that was supposed to work. I did my shrouds by hand using a little tool I made to set the distance between the deadeyes. Basically it is a rectangular piece of plastic with 2 metal pins correctly spaced set in the top and bottom of it. The distance between these 2 sets of pins sets the correct distance between the lower deadeye and the upper one. What I would do is setup the lower deadeye, place the bottom set of pins into it, place the upper deadeye on the top set of pins and then fix my line for the shroud on the upper deadline and run it up and over the mast top. I would then pull it taught and put a drop of super glue on the backside to hold it in place. I would then remove my tool and set it up in the next pair of deadeyes and then fix the end of the previous line to the top deadeye of this pair. Next I would remove the tool and run the lines between the deadeyes. When this was completed I would then wind thread around the shroud lines where it went over the mast top. This tool helped greatly in setting the correct spacing between the sets of deadeyes (I believe the distance should be 3 times the diameter of the deadeye). I hope this helps. My build is about 60% complete and I haven't worked on it in a couple of years. It is a daunting task especially trying to decipher the horrible instructions.

Michael Lacey  

Thank you John. I really appreciate your input.  I have read all your posts regarding the Soleil Royal and I have tremendous respect for your knowledge on the subject.

I have the RC Anderson book on rigging, thr Neophyte Shipmodelers Jackstay, and a couple more on building these ships as recommended by you and they are a great source of knowledge....I am learning so much.

My eyes are wide open for sure regarding this kit.  Like I said, I want to improve on the kit wherever I practically can.

Thanks again.

Wayne

I don't want to get into another lengthy discussion about this kit; I've said what I have to say about it, and I can't imagine that anybody wants to hear any more from me about why I don't like it.  I have, however, always emphasized that I don't intend my low opinion of it to stop anybody else from building it.  This is, for most of us, a hobby; what matters is the individual modeler is attracted to the subject.  I do think the modeler is entitled to go into a project with eyes open; if I'd known, back in 1974 (or whenever it was that I bought the thing), how inaccurate it was, I wouldn't have bought it.  But the modeler who, having read all the comments about it on other threads, wants to build it certainly has my best wishes.

Regarding waynec9436's specific questions - the matter of belaying pins (and belaying points in general) is a little complicated.  The belaying pin certainly was in use by the Soleil Royal's day, but apparently not nearly as common as a hundred years or so later.  On one of the other threads it was noted that the deck furniture of the Heller kit probably is pretty inaccurate; there almost certainly ought to be more bitts, cleats, pinrails, etc. than there are.  And it seems likely that some of the bitts and rails would have had belaying pins in them.  In any case, replacing plastic pins with brass ones is always a good idea.  (And belaying pins do not have sharp points.)

I've seen quite a few different ways of rigging portlid tackles.  Sometimes there's one line running from the middle of the bottom edge of the lid.  Sometimes there are two, running through two holes in the hull.  Sometimes there are two eyebolts in the lid, with a Y-shaped tackle between them and its "stem" running through a single hole in the hull.  There usually were two eyebolts (or ringbolts) in the bottom/inside of the portlid, for the purpose waynec9436 mentioned.

One thing I've been curious about for a long time is just how the portlids were kept closed.  Presumably there was some sort of tackle rigged to those eyebolts, but I can't recall having seen a picture of it.  I have seen, somewhere or other, a drawing of a simple latch mechanism -similar to the modern sliding door bolt - but that was (I think) on a nineteenth-century ship.  John Harland's wonderful book, Seamanship in the Age of Sail, shows a gadget that, he says, was used to secure a gunport lid during a storm.  It consists of a wide board with two elongated slots in it.  The slots are slipped over the eyebolts in the portlid, and an iron rod is shoved through the eyebolts.

That's the best I can do with those.  Good luck.   

I will post images as I go along.  This is a learning process for me and I will make mistakes.  Helpful hints will be appreciated. I hope you start yours soon.

Maybe we can get this thread going again with good modeling information and hints about constructing this kit.....a place where we can learn from one another.....a place where people do not need to be afraid to post images and thoughts.  A free flow of information would be good and I know that there are many people that peruse these threads that are much more knowledgeable on ship modelling and modelling in general than I am.

Wayne

Wayne hope to see some pics of your construction......it might inspire me to start work on mine

Thanks