Revell Viking Ship WIP- FINISHED!!

Yeah, that's another one Revell got right. The instructions do specify which oars (by part number) go where. I remember now that by the time I got to that point on mine, I'd lost the instructions. Fortunately they're available on the Revell Germany website.

i gave my model shrouds, secured to the shield rails as I described earlier. There's room for argument there, but I don't think many of the sailing replicas had been built when that book was published. Every sailing replica Viking ship I've heard of has had shrouds. 

I'm currently about halfway through Brøgger and Shetelig's The Viking Ships, published in 1951.

Several items of interest, according to the book. The Gokstad ships oars were varied in length, and that's well captured by Revell.

This is not the result of any sort of Medeival casualness. Of course not; these ships are pretty much perfect in detail.

The reason given is that the oar holes at bow and stern rise slightly higher than those in the middle, and the oar length was very carefully calculated to have them all meet the water in a straight line fore/ aft.

Whether or not Revell called that to the modelers attention I don't recall, but if you are adding the oars, pay attention!

Another is that the authors seem to feel that the Gokstad ship did not have shrouds, as no evidence exists of where they would have been secured to the hull. That the mast was such a fine specimen, a 40 foot long pine pole, and that a flexible ship is a better sailer; it would have been faster and more maneuverable without them.

I don't know. Many rock carvings and drawings seem to show them, the replicas have them.

And the halyard is claimed to have run back to the stern and formed a back stay. That I could see. I had added a cleat at the base of the mast for the halyard, but I'm going to remove it, or at least not use it and decide later.

Excellent build, Bill! I'm going to use this thread as a reference for building mine. Thanks!

very nice clean work , getting more into this build

Base coat for the red color.

The wash with black oil paint dissolved in Turpeoid.

A good read on the sails and the use of beef tallow to improve impermeability.

Which got me to thinking along another line and that is that you didn't need a sail and a tent cloth on the ship.  All you had to do was use the sail as a tent draped over the yard.  Wonder if that would work?

Gary

Most interesting information on the sail.

One of the many things I like about that kit is the amount of individual interpretation and individuality that can legitimately be applied to it. GM's model is going to look a lot different from mine - and I think that's great! The more careful interpretations the better!

This is where sailing ship modelers can have more fun than...well, never mind.

Lookung good!The planks look like thay have been exposed to the weather.

Sure, you all seem to be interested.

I worked up the sail this evening. Mine will be the vertical stripes. Woolen pieces each about 1 meter wide. Sewn together on the backside with a big round running stitch.

Starting with a piece of paper with a weave that I set on horizontal, I used 0.1 mm thread for the stitches and 0.5 mm for the leech and bunt lines.

The red color most often used for dyeing wool in the Viking Middle Ages was madder root.

 And the boat herself. I have tried to make the pine deck boards look a little different than the oak hull.

Great article Bill, thanks for posting it. I really love the first photograph, the color of the closest ship's sail is just beautiful.

Steve

http://www.reikfelag.ca/files/Viking_woolen_sails.pdf

worth a read.

Yep, working on the sail.

Really liking this thread...very informative, very fun.  And a quality kit.

Cheers!

Dave

There is something about the sight of paint bottles that brings out the kid in me.  Time to go and play. 

Good luck with this next step. Can't wait to see it! 

Three more images, in no small part so that I don't lose them.

The shroud assembly on a replica. Maybe way too much lanyards, or at least ones set up for more modern sailing trim.

The fore stay attachment to the stem.

The tiller assembly.

I spent a good solid hour getting the airbrush out and cleaning it. Ahem, whoever put it away last didn't exactly clean it.

Yeah, you.

Dug around the paints and brought in the usual subjects.

And a couple of fine old vintages. I use these for dry brushing.

That's the gadget, all right. Simple but ingenious - like everything else in that ship.

Dr. Tilley said:

"Somewhere (I don't remember where) I found a drawing that showed a Norse method for securing shrouds in such a way that they can be cast off in a hurry. A loop of rope, maybe two or three feet long, is secured to the gunwale. The shroud terminates in a simple piece of wood shaped like a toggle, which is hooked through the loop and secured with a temporary seizing. Flip the toggle and the shroud comes loose. Sort of like a modern "come-along."

Yes! I now know what you mean, good description. Like this:

I added a couple-three cleats to the mast. I also agree about the fore stay. Except as I noted before, the boat could sail with the wind over the bow, and that would put stress on the fore stay, but not much as she would be tacking at a pretty considerable angle to upwind.

Here's where I got during a break in the rain this morning. I personally like to prime way off of the finish colors, as it helps me later gauge coverage of the finish paint.

Some nasty sink marks on the hull, but there's no way to fix them. I hope the dark wood color minimizes them.

Somewhere (I don't remember where) I found a drawing that showed a Norse method for securing shrouds in such a way that they can be cast off in a hurry. A loop of rope, maybe two or three feet long, is secured to the gunwale. The shroud terminates in a simple piece of wood shaped like a toggle, which is hooked through the loop and secured with a temporary seizing. Flip the toggle and the shroud comes loose. Sort of like a modern "come-along."

The big challenge in rigging that Revell kit is to do it without adding anything that isn't on the real ship (with the exception of stuff that could conceivably have rotted away in the higher, more acidic layer of dirt). There are no obvious belaying points other than those four cleats near the stern (which Revell reproduced very nicely). Adding cleats, eyebolts, etc. to the deck or hull is a no-no.

I figured the foremost deck beam would be strong enough to take the pull of the forestay. The stay doesn't actually have much stress on it - except when it's being heaved on to raise the mast. And that beam is quite short and sturdy.

For the rest of the belaying points, as I mentioned in that other thread, I decided to use the "shield rail" inside the gunwale. Scholars think its primary purpose was to provide a means of securing the sailors' shields, but it looks like a pretty good place to belay lines as well. It has the advantage of being adaptable; you can secure a line to it anywhere along its length. The problem is that Revell - just about unavoidably - molded it integrally with the hull halves. My solution was to drill holes through the cutouts in the shield rail all the way through the gunwale - two for each line - and pass the rigging lines out through one hole and in through the other. The little piece of thread on the exterior is hidden by the shields.

I don't know whether that scheme is right or not - but it seems to work.

Fascinating stuff. One thing we can be sure of: when it came to sailing, those old boys knew exactly what they were doing.

I'm making the blocks. Basically there are singles and doubles. maybe. None of the above have sheaves, axles etc.

Six double blocks, one each,  for the side stay/ shrouds. I'm saying six total singles for the mid leech left, left clew, bottom mid foot ( a pair) right clew and mid leech right for sail handling.

A pair of the big "virgin" rigging cramps/ flying cleats whatever for the forestay, that came with the kit.

I read through a series of sailing articles about the upwind capabilities of these ships. more about that later, in more detail.

Teaser: when you back a square sail all the way around to be behind the mast, putting slack on that fore stay virgin system to allow the sail to go around past the midline, and dip the fore end to the deck, what do you get?

Here's typical detail of a "Rakki" or parrel. This one on a reconstruction of a slightly smaller 11C ship in Roskilde.

For our purposes, more U shaped, with two downhauls.

Some great reading and speculation. This thread gets more interesting with every post.

Well put. And imaginitive, and fun. It's always nice to be innoculated from rivet counting.

Next puzzlement for me. What to attach the fore stay, and the rear one for that matter, to. I don't think the cross beams are up to the job. They aren't particularly robust. The stem and stern pieces aren't really exposed inside the hull, because the strakes were inset into them and pretty much touched each other side to side.

For the side stays/ shrouds I found a detail on a rconstruction that made sense to me and followed some drawings of other ships. Each shroud has a block attached to it's end, several feet above the deck. Theres a pretty good sized hole bored sideways through the knee where the cross beams meet the hull ribs. The lanyard does a double turn through the block and the hole and is double hitched to itself top and bottom.

Well, GAF may be right.

One thing that makes the study of these ships so interesting is that, despite the amount of research that's been done on them, some big questions have never been answered. Just what are those T-shaped things for? Why are there three of them - including one almost bumping against the mast? There's plenty of evidence that the Norse set up tents on board their ships - but just how did those tents work? Is that deteriorated mass of wool cloth in the Gokstad burial site a sail, or a tent?

Just how did the bietass work? It's widely assumed that their feet sat in those two blocks with round, shallow depressions in them. If so, how come their are two depressions in each block? I remember reading, quite a long time ago, an article whose author suggested that those blocks were in fact sockets for an a-frame mechanism that was used for raising and lowering the mast.

One possibility: the three T-shaped posts were intended primarily as supports for the yard when it was lowered. Maybe the yard served as a ridge pole for the tent.

And where on earth were the oars stowed? I haven't checked out the geometry, but I wonder if it would be physically possible to slide them under the deck boards? (Those boards are easily removed; they sit loosely in rabbets formed in the deck beams.) I don't see how all of them could have been piled up on the T-shaped thingies.

The answer to all these questions is the same: we just don't know.

The photos on my thread show my way around the problem: I glued the oars in the oar ports. (That wasn't easy - and no, I wasn't able to get them all lined up absolutely symetrically.) The configuration of my model obviously isn't realistic. (Impaled on a pair of brass posts, oars out, sail up, no chests for the oarsmen to sit on - and no people.) But viewers don't seem to be bothered by that. (After all, the great British Navy Board models aren't realistic either: they don't have planking on their bottoms.)

Building a model of a Viking ship automatically forces the builder to make some pretty big choices. Who's to say whether one approach is better than another? This is a subject that, no matter how much you read up on it, inevitably leaves lots of room for personal judgment and taste.

GAF

But second, and this is the part that will probably get me laughed at, is the stowing of the oars.  I've looked at the T-racks in the pictures of the Oseberg ship and they don't really look like they were designed to store things on. 

Thanks for not laughing (at least out loud).     I did type Oseberg when I should have typed Gokstad.  I can only claim old age and clogged arteries to my brain.

These are what I meant, of course.

Gary

PS>  After looking at these again, perhaps the oars were not placed on top at all.  Perhaps there were loops of rope suspended from the arms into which the oars were slid / placed.  Then the oars could be cinched together and the bundles secured with ties (to keep them from swinging) to the uprights.  Then, when needed, all you had to do was unfasten the ties and lower the bundles to the deck and every man grab an oar.  Could those arms have supported such a weight?

GAF thanks for looking in.

Your first photo is indeed the Oseberg ship.  I'd consider adding them, but they were from a ship 100 years older, there's no evidence the Gokstad ship had them AFAIK, and, umm, I just don't much care for them. Their absense I guess is more defensible than their inclusion. Thank you though.

That second image is pretty cool. In a way there's much about it that's right. Certain details of the rig such as the block and tackle attached to the foot of the sail in the middle indicate the painter knew something about their subject. You can see in the painting that the tent is held up by scissored gable boards, which were connected by a ridge pole. I'm in doubt of the size and complexity of that tent, in particular the inclusion of a mast hole, but it's in many ways right. Rather imagine a tent aft of the mast, enough for everyone to crowd under, or not depending on the temper of the captain. (that last is my imagination).

GM,

First, you're doing some great work on the Revell "Viking Ship".  It makes me want to add one to the stash! 

But second, and this is the part that will probably get me laughed at, is the stowing of the oars.  I've looked at the T-racks in the pictures of the Oseberg ship and they don't really look like they were designed to store things on.  They really have a curve up in the middle and not downwards like you would see if you wanted something to stay inside.  It looks very insecure and I would be afraid of these oars crashing down on my head when the sea got rough.  Securing them firmly would be a task, and getting them down would be quite a task.  I think this would be closer to what I think stanchions for oar storage should look like:

http://farm4.staticflickr.com/3540/3815187387_633a627e43_z.jpg?zz=1

I see the oars secured horizontally, but sliding out aft or forward?  Seems like it would take too many ropes.  This worries me.

On the other hand, I've always thought these had another purpose, if not for oar storage.

A good upright for shelter would be welcome, though it might get in the way of working the sail, as shown in this rather fanciful image.

http://1.bp.blogspot.com/-Fq5GCMT0Bl0/UPBA-tPAUDI/AAAAAAAAOe4/fn-gvS9Yrn4/s1600/Vikings_arriving_in_Pegwell_Bay.JPG

Anyway, those are my thoughts (silly as they may be).

Gary

Dr. Tilley, a question.

As you've got more research materials than I, and much more knowledge, would it seem likely to you that the oars were stored in the T shaped racks? They scale about 2500 mm above the deck, which is reachable but high. They'd need two tall guys, and it would get difficult after the first layer. Now, difficult for a Viking is a different thing than difficult for me. Certainly it's really annoying to climb over gear on the deck of a sailboat, they must have been stored somewhere. And the distance between the admidships frame and the rear one is a lot longer than the oars, but right for the leech poles as I see you stored in your model. So getting all or most of the 32 oars on the forward set is a task, as I've found out. The Oseberg ship had a pair of forked racks above the bulwarks on either side of the ship, as you know. Seems a more sensible set up.

Further to the admiration for Revell- the anchor scales exactly to the dimensions of the nice drawing above, if a little thick.

The other questions then are, what was the chain attached to? The Ladby ship had the remains of a hawser, Gokstad doesn't even seem to have bitts.

The drawing in Landstrom, behind the anchor is of a knorr, and it clearly shows how the leech pole was set up.

Verrry interesting. There's certainly justification there for an anchor chain.