HMS Victory build

You could just rig the standing rigging but that in my opinion would be a shame. It is usual even on ships without sails bent to show a fair amount of running rigging - braces, lifts, clues, tacks, etc.

I would suggest you obtain one or both of two books on the subject:-

The Anatomy of Nelson's Ships - C.N. Longridge

The 100 Gun Ship Victory - John MacKay.

Where or what do you use for the ratlines? given that at this scale, I'm looking for a thread thats 0.1mm in Dia!

I know I could use thin wire for this, but I also want to produce lines in the 0.5mm range so need the fine thread for the ropewalk. (the electric shaver ropewalk is working so well, I can't believe it!)

So, 0.1mm thread, anyone?

Just added a thread in the tecniques section for a quick and dirty ropewalk:

http://www.finescale.com/FSM/CS/forums/571328/ShowPost.aspx

jtilley wrote:

Researchers have done a bit of rethinking in recent years about the red paint on British (and other) sailing warships. .....

jtilley wrote:

I don't read Japanese, but the photos are enough to establish that this is a beautiful model.  It's also enormous.  On the basis of the metric dimensions (165 cm long, minus the jibboom and flying jibboom), I figure it must be on 1/32 scale or thereabouts. It contains some really subtle details that elude most modelers of the ship.  This is the only Victory model I've encountered, for instance, that shows the distinction between the rows of windows in the transom.  (The windows in the top two rows have hinges.  Those in the bottom row have sliding sashes.)  The rigging is indeed beautiful.  The modelers notes that he found it easy to make the rope sag realistically, simply because it's so big.  He also says that the sheer overall size of the model is going to keep him from installing the rest of the spars.  That is indeed a shame.

Just found referance to scale, she built to 1/48, that's a big girl!

I don't read Japanese, but the photos are enough to establish that this is a beautiful model.  It's also enormous.  On the basis of the metric dimensions (165 cm long, minus the jibboom and flying jibboom), I figure it must be on 1/32 scale or thereabouts.

It contains some really subtle details that elude most modelers of the ship.  This is the only Victory model I've encountered, for instance, that shows the distinction between the rows of windows in the transom.  (The windows in the top two rows have hinges.  Those in the bottom row have sliding sashes.) 

The rigging is indeed beautiful.  The modelers notes that he found it easy to make the rope sag realistically, simply because it's so big.  He also says that the sheer overall size of the model is going to keep him from installing the rest of the spars.  That is indeed a shame.

This was posted on another site, and is not in English but it does have some great shots, anyone building this ship would do well to have a look over these as the level of detail is mind blowing.

JT in particular, I'd like to hear your comments on this one, the rigging to me looks simply stunning.

http://homepage3.nifty.com/shiphome/victory-page.htm

Just had a look over that site, there are some nice looking models in there, just makes mine look silly actualy

It's getting quite painfull everytime I view another victory as they all seem to be so much better built and painted.

Would be nice if I could view the images in greater size but I'm not sure if the site lets you do that, maybe just my firewall.

Dear Mr Vapochilled and his HMS Victory modelling friends.

Could I please bring to your attention to my website: http://www.hms-victory-build.co.uk which I named before seeing this forum!!

 This is my website forum address: http://www.chumster.co.uk/forum/index.php?mforum=bobbie 
I would love you all to stop by for a visit and a chat..............

My very best regards,
Pete Coleman.
England.

In my opinion, this is a good red (red ochre) :

http://www.ancre.fr/ModHist/ModHist_2.htm

Michel

See now I was not at all happy with the way they turned out the first time, so I stripped and resprayed, still not happy. But what I think happened was by accident, the first attempt stuck between the planks and has given it a better look,lol

All by accident, but still not perfect.

Vapochilled- took a peek at some of your website pics....pretty awesome. I was wondering- how did you make that deck look so  darn good? Did you use any oils, etc?

Danke Sehr! 

Researchers have done a bit of rethinking in recent years about the red paint on British (and other) sailing warships.  Old legend had it that the red paint was intended to camouflage blood stains.  Modern thinking is that the stuff was simply a good, durable color that was used to protect surfaces (accept those that were to be walked on, or painted another color for some other specific reason) from the weather. 

Most of the old contemporary models I've seen use a bright, bang-on-the-back-of-your-eyeballs red.  It's possible, though, that those modelers were using artists' colors rather than the paints that were used on the real ships. 

The Victory' s website uses the term "dull, matt red ochre."  "Dull" in this case may just refer to the finish  ("dull" as opposed to "glossy").  But if the photos on the website are any guide, "dull" is a good way to describe the color as well.  It appears to be a medium, somewhat brownish red - not bright at all.

As I mentioned earlier, there were no official rules about paint colors in those days.  Even if the original paint was pretty bright, red paint fades faster than any other color.  Combine the effects of age, light, rain, and saltwater, and you can justify just about any shade of red you like.  For what little it's worth, I've built several warship models over the past thirty years on which I used bright red for the internal works, but if I were doing one today I'd use a much toned-down, brownish red.  My suggestion is:  if you don't like the red you've got, feel free to change it.

Lufberry - That's one of the more ingenious ideas I've seen in a long time.  Dr. Feldman knows what he's doing; his Lexington practicum will, I hope, strip back a great deal of the nonsense that's been written about that interesting ship over the years.

On the other hand, I have to say that actually rigging 32 gun tackles doesn't really take long - if you do it in one, systematic batch.  My guess is that, once you've got the blocks ready to go, you can do at least that many in one evening.  As usual, the first one will take at least five times as long as the last, but once you get in the groove the job goes pretty fast.

Modelbauer 14 - The real Victory actually has remarkably little gold paint on her.  (When she was built she presumably had a great deal more, but by 1805 - the configuration the Heller kit represents - gold leaf was almost out of fashion.)  Some of the details on the figurehead and the heraldic carvings at the top of the transom are gold.  (If I remember right, that includes the heads of the arrows, the bands around the relief-carved cannon barrels, and maybe some of the details on the Prince of Wales' feathers.  That's about it.)  So are some of the carvings under the canopies of the entry ports, which Heller omitted.  (I'm inclined to think Heller was right - but let's not get into that one again.)  The window frames, pilasters, human figures, and other carvings on the transom and quarter galleries are in fact yellow on a black background. 

Here's a link to the ship's website, which describes the color scheme:

www.hms-victory.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id-41&Itemid=44

If you click on that link you may initially be told you don't have access to the page.  Click on "Model Makers" on the left side of the page, under "Main Menu," and the page for modelers will come up.  Click on "Colour Scheme."

There's some room for interpretation and taste regarding the "dull yellow ochre."  The general consensus seems to be that it was an extremely dull, slightly brownish, medium yellow.  The Tamiya shade probably is, if anything, a bit on the bright side.  But there were no official rules regarding paint in those days.  If you play around with the ship's website a little you'll find lots of photos.  My suggestion is to give them a look as sources of inspiration, and combine that with your own judgment.

In any case, I suspect those little spots of gold won't be much of a distraction on the finished model - regardless of the brand of gold paint.

Hope this helps a little.

I'm having a bit of a dilema regarding the painting of the stern gallery-the tamiya  gold-leaf acrylic which I am using is far from the actual color of this part of the ship in real life. This particular color gives off too much "sparkle". Which manufacturer do you think makes the best paint for the job? Also, would using tamiya flat yellow and black be too dull for the ship's main paint scheme on the sides, or does it really matter?

-Thanks a lot!

jtilley wrote:

It would indeed be unusual for the side tackles to be unrigged.  But lots of models - including contemporary ones - don't include them.  The breeching lines, on the other hand, are almost always present.  They're also considerably easier to rig than train tackles.  My suggestion would be to include the breechings if at all possible; the guns look dangerous in their absence.  As to the train tackles - well, I think that (like everything else) is best left up to the individual modeler.

More footage:

http://www.hmsvictory.ngfl.gov.uk/victory/index.cfm?p=gallery&s=y&type=&kw=Search%20the%20Gallery&start=29

(some are more or less boring)

Here's a link to HMS Victory footage, just in case you're interested.

http://www.hmsvictory.ngfl.gov.uk/victory/index.cfm?p=activity&la=3&id=715

jtilley wrote:

The breeching was a permanent fixture; in its absence the gun was a dangerous thing.  The tackles weren't necessarily kept set up all the time - particularly the ones hooked to the back end of the carriage.

jtilley wrote:

I suspect all Victory builders will discover sooner or later that rigging lines have an amazing ability to get hung up on protruding gun muzzles and, when yanked vigorously, to dismount guns entirely.  It's relatively easy to slide a barrel back through a port and into its place on its carriage, but not so easy to glue a carriage back down onto the lower deck.  Moral:  be sure the carriages of the lower deck gus are firmly - and I mean firmly - stuck to the decks.  They won't be visible on the finished model; epoxy, superglue, bolts and nuts, rivets, or any other fixing devices will be appropriate.  Don't be so determined to fasten the barrels irrevocably to the carriages.  If you do snag one of them on an errant rigging line, better for the barrel to come loose than for it to break.

Too late, too late the fair maiden cried!

I have now stuck, or should I say re-stuck about seven guns! I'll know next time

I can't imagine what Heller was talking about regarding yellow stripes on gun barrels.  I've never heard of such a thing.

I'm not sure about the bow ports, but I think the openings in question may be bridle ports - for handling anchor gear, rather than guns.  It would be a good idea to take a look at a good set of plans for the area of the deck in question.  Heller - quite understandably - didn't include many of the fixtures on the lower decks.  There may or may not have been room behind those ports to handle guns.

On my last warship model, the frigate Hancock, I only put the side tackles on the guns that were visible on the finished model - i.e., those on the quarterdeck, on the forecastle, and in the waist. I omitted all the rear tackles; they'd trip anybody trying to transit the deck, and I thought the model was sufficiently cluttered without them.  For the maindeck guns under the quarterdeck and forecastle I didn't even bother putting wheels on the carriages.  The barrels sit on simplified styrene "carriages" that look fine through the gunports, but otherwise serve just to hold the barrels in the right places.

I suspect all Victory builders will discover sooner or later that rigging lines have an amazing ability to get hung up on protruding gun muzzles and, when yanked vigorously, to dismount guns entirely.  It's relatively easy to slide a barrel back through a port and into its place on its carriage, but not so easy to glue a carriage back down onto the lower deck.  Moral:  be sure the carriages of the lower deck gus are firmly - and I mean firmly - stuck to the decks.  They won't be visible on the finished model; epoxy, superglue, bolts and nuts, rivets, or any other fixing devices will be appropriate.  Don't be so determined to fasten the barrels irrevocably to the carriages.  If you do snag one of them on an errant rigging line, better for the barrel to come loose than for it to break.

Re gun muzzle colors - There's certainly room for a little variety here; I'm sure not all ships painted their guns identically.  But there's plenty of evidence, in the form of contemporary paintings and models, that red muzzles were quite common.  Some old models, in fact, show red paint on the whole barrel back as far as the first molding.  The Victory currently has red muzzles.  The people in charge of her probably had good reason to paint them that way; those folks know what they're doing.  But I'm not aware of any evidence that black muzzles would actually be wrong.

Re gun rigging - the rigging of a typical long gun (the carronade is a little different) falls into two categories.  The breeching line was an extremely heavy rope that ran either around the cascabel (the ball at the breech end of the barrel) or through a heavy iron ring cast on top of the cascabel.  The ends of the breeching were seized to heavy eyebolts in the ship's side.  The purpose of the breeching was to stop the gun from recoiling through the other side of the ship, and more generally to keep it in position.  (Without the breeching the notorious "loose cannon on the gundeck" phenomenon would take place.)

The other category of gun rigging consisted of the block and tackle used to run the gun in and out, and to train it horizontally. Generally there were three such tackles:  one on the right side, one on the left, and one behind the gun.  They ran from eyebolts in the carriage to eyebolts in the bulwarks (for the side tackles) or the deck inboard of the gun.  Each tackle consisted of two blocks (either two singles or a single and a double, depending on the size of the gun).

The breeching was a permanent fixture; in its absence the gun was a dangerous thing.  The tackles weren't necessarily kept set up all the time - particularly the ones hooked to the back end of the carriage.  (They'd be a menace to anybody walking along the length of the deck.)  Lots of modelers omit the tackles; others install the side ones but not the rear ones.  I wouldn't bother with the guns that can only be viewed through the ports, but the ones whose carriages are visible can benefit quite a bit from having at least their breechings rigged.

For a model on this scale those Bluejacket 3/32" blocks would be about right for this job.  The easiest way to install such pieces of gear is to rig them off the model.  Drill the holes for the various eyebolts (any of the reference books we've discussed in this thread will show where they go).  Make the eyebolts out of wire (we've discussed that trick earlier too), and set up a simple jig consisting of headless pins that are the right distance apart, stuck in a piece of wood.  Slip the eyebolts over the pins, and rig the breeching or tackle between them.  Then glue the eyebolts into the holes in the model.  It's kind of time consuming, but makes quite a difference to the finished model's appearance.  And, like so many other aspects of this hobby, the job has a steep but short learning curve.  You'll find that rigging the first set of tackles may take half an hour, but the tenth one will take ten minutes.

Hope this helps a little.  Good luck.

Ideas anyone for how to create rigging for the ship's cannons?

Thanks

Also see:

http://www.hms-victory.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=41&Itemid=44

Color scheming information- ex: remember to paint gun muzzles red

*note- Victory during 1805

Here's a website which you guys might find to be heplful:

http://www.jotika-ltd.com/Pages/1024768/Victory_06.htm

What I would do for a kit like that.....

what a beast...takes the breath away

*note-1805

Modelbauer 14 - Welcome to the Forum!  I think you'll find it useful and enjoyable - though it's inhabited by some rather odd people.

Modern hobby paints designed for plastic kits are, generally speaking, excellent products.  There's no chemical or mechanical reason to do anything to styrene plastic in order to get paint to stick to it.  Lots of modelers do, however, like to start with a "primer" coat of some neutral color, like grey - especially if the object in question is in several contrasting colors.  (That Heller Victory is molded in several garish colors, like bright yellow, bright red, and black.  A grey primer coat gives a thin finish coat a fighting chance of looking even throughout.  More enlightened manufacturers nowadays mold their kits in grey plastic.)  The primer doesn't have anything to do with making the paint stick; it just provides a uniform base color. 

I haven't used Plastic-Prep, but I believe it's a cleaner.  It's not a bad idea to wash the parts in some solution like that before you start, to remove any mold release that's left over from the manufacturing process.  I confess, though, that in a modeling career of 49 years I've often failed to do it - with no noticeable ill effects.

There are quite a few ways to simulate wood grain on plastic parts.  We had a pretty good discussion of the topic recently in a thread headed "Need advice on painting plastic sailing ship's deck."  I've just moved that thread to page one of the Forum; it should now appear just below this one.

Good luck.  It's a great hobby.

I'm realtively new to constructing ship models, especially the old fashioned ones with sails, riggings, etc. Regarding the HMS Victory,(which is a ship which has always interested me greatly) what are the best  painting precedures? That is, what exactly do you pre-coat it with after you apply the plastic-prep? Also, how do you simulate wood effects with plastic without ruining the model? Just slapping on some deck tan doesn't exactly make the model look convincing. Please educate me!!

Thanks!

jtilley wrote:

Regarding color - there's some room for taste and interpretation.  At the time in question, an act of Parliament dictated that all rope supplied to the Royal Navy be soaked in something called "Stockholm tar."  I've never seen Stockholm tar, but it apparently was a rich, medium brown.  That's what the running rigging ought to look like (not pale beige or white).  The standing rigging generally was coated (after it was in place, in some cases) with an ugly concoction containing tar and lampblack which, if it wasn't pure black in color, must have been pretty close.

All those plastic sails were good for was airbrush practice, I would like to rig her fully sailed, but I think it's more than I can chew right now.

First, model since childhood, yes I must be bloody mad, and start it when the wife was 3 months pregnant! Seemed like a good idea at the time.

Vapo,

Looking great. You are a brave one to tackle that ship at this point in your eh....sailing ship modeling career.

Just one comment. Just curious as to why you went with the bee color scheme and not the pink and green?

Keep it up. Your BOAT, as I know is about ready for the STRINGS and PLASTIC SAILS. Don't forget that these STRINGS normally go vertical, but I think just tying a bunch to different places will make it look busy enough for anyone who doesn't know about these ol' BOATS.

Robert

That it is....

Nice work and great pix...

Hope mine turns out as good.

<Gleason>

Fargo, ND

Ok, posted a couple of new pics up on my site, I know there is some work still to go, but it is definately starting to resemble a big boat

They say the devil is in the details, well I think he brought friends! seems the smaller the job, the longer it takes to do properly!

Vapo,

She looks different eh? So you decided to go with the hot pink and lime green color scheme!

I hope you went ahead and did the masts in polka dot and the yards in checkerboard as per the Heller instructions. Eh, those frenchies! What a sense of humor.

Don't forget to post a pic of the little modeler to be when he arrives.

Robert

Ah JT, who needs a level head at a time like this, I'M BUILDING A BOAT!,lol

I do agree that the smaller ones will not be needed for quite some time, hence my disspleasure at myself for ordering the wrong ones. The "hull" is complete(bar a few touch ups) All the decks are in/on, all the canons are done and in/on(thank god!)

Superstructure is done apart from the toilets, I pre made the boats(along with tiller and other details first and put them to one side ready), all that is left is the "touches" on the upper and poop deck, plus any bits that need touching up around that area. The "planks" (sorry) that the chain plates fix to are on and painted. Soooooooo, I put the trhee lower mast sections in tonight.

Had to write it small, because I know someone will shout at me

So the lower shrouds could well be started before Christmas,

She's realy starting to take shape, and it's getting harder to control the enthusiasm, and urge to rush. Even my wife as she walked past said "wow" tonight. I'm lucky that my job often allows a full day or two to work on her, that of course will change soon.

As far as the sermon goes, preach on dear boy, preach on! I can say without fear, that had it not been for the calming words of this forum that I may have lost my way to square rigged utopia many moons ago,lol.

I'll try and get some pictures up this week, as she does look very different from the burnt offerings last seen.

I hope the following doesn't come across like pontificating, or "I told you so," but I'm a little uncomfortable sitting by watching while people spend lots of unnecessary money.

When it comes to aftermarket parts, my suggestion is:  1.  Come up with a list of the parts you think you're likely to need in the fairly near future.  2.  Study the suppliers' websites and figure out which of their products look like they'll work for that purpose.  (You probably won't be able to tell for sure from the descriptions and pictures.)  3.  Order a dozen of each, and find out which ones actually will work.  4.  Order as many of those fittings you think you'll need over the stretch of a month or two - with a dozen or so extras to compensate for losses and damage.

If you're currently working on the hull of a ship model, you're months - maybe years - away from doing the running rigging.  There's no reason whatever to spend hundreds of dollars on blocks and deadeyes that you won't need till sometime in 2007.  Those companies are used to doing mail order, and give good service; waiting for deliveries won't slow you down significantly.

It's also unnecessary to decide in the early stages of such a project just how much rigging you're going to install.  As we've established earlier, there's plenty of room for personal choice and taste there.  The difference between rigging a model of a full-rigged ship with the basic running rigging and all the sail gear is a difference of hundreds of blocks.  To order all of them when you've just started work on the model doesn't make much sense.

The first steps in the rigging process involve the lower shrouds and stays.  They require the biggest deadeyes and hearts in the ship.  The lower deadeyes, being secured to the channels and the hull by the chainplates, do need to be considered early in the construction process.  Those are the first fittings to buy.  If you work at typical speed, you won't need the corresponding upper deadeyes for several months. 

Throw the Heller rigging instructions away.  The people responsible for them didn't understand rigging, and in any case the instructions are geared toward the fittings that came with the kit - which, as we've established, aren't useable.  The foldout plans in the Longridge book, if I remember correctly, are reproduced at 1/8"=1' scale (1/96).  that's close enough to 1/100 that you can get the correct sizes of the blocks and deadeyes from the drawings.  (If I'm wrong about the scale of the reproductions, you can either have them enlarged on a copy machine or do the arithmetic to get the block sizes.) 

An eighteenth-century ship-of-the-line had many different sizes and types of blocks in its rigging.  A miniature block that's 3/32" long represents, on 1/100 scale, a block that's about 9" long.  That's a good-sized block, though not an enormous one.  You probably won't need anything smaller.  How many 3/32" blocks you'll actually need will depend on how much rigging you install, but you'll probably end up using quite a few of them.

The smaller the block, the harder it is to work with.  One of the few user-friendly features built into a sailing ship model is that, as a general rule, the higher up you get, the smaller the blocks and deadeyes get.  So the first ones you rig are the biggest - and easiest.  Those 3/32" blocks are tiny, all right - but you probably won't need any of them for a long time. 

I find that three tools are necessary for making Bluejacket blocks work:  a pair of tweezers, an appropriately-sized drill bit in a pin vise, and a small, knife-edged file.  (The latter, unfortunately, seems harder to find these days than it used to be.  I've got a little German one that I bought many years ago, and I guard it with my life.  If you can't find a knife-edged file, the smallest triangular one you can find will probably work.)  It also helps, in the case of the smallest blocks, to have a small hand vise, or perhaps a hemostat, to hold the block while you work on it.

The procedure I use is:  1.  Ream out the hole with the drill.  2.  Break off the casting sprue (if any) with the tweezers. 3.  Clean up the groove around the circumference with the file.  4.  Thread the block onto a piece of wire.  5.  When all the blocks you're going to need in this rigging session (plus a few spares) are threaded onto the wire, twist the ends of the wire together.  That will keep you from losing the blocks during the nexts step.  6.  If you want the blocks to be black - dip them in Bluejacket's "Pewter Black."  Lay them on a piece of tissue paper to dry, then shoot them with clear flat spray lacquer.  If you want them to be brown - spray them lightly with Floquil metal primer, then brush-paint them with a thin coat of brown hobby paint.

I lost count of how many Bluejacket blocks went into my model of the Hancock, but it was well over a thousand.  The first few almost drove me crazy, but the learning curve phenomenon works here as in so many other aspects of the hobby.  When I hit my stride I was preparing an average of two blocks every three minutes.  Once your head and your fingers get trained, it's really not so hard - especially if you start with the bigger fittings and work your way down to the smaller ones. 

End of sermon.  Good luck.

Vapo,

I can't wait to hear about your rigging expeiences. Let us know, and with photos if possible what you are doing and what difficulties you are having. Oh yes, and successes. After following this thread and others as to your Victory, I am interested to find out how you are going to tackle this one.

Good sewing,

Robert

Well I just got my blocks delivered from Bluejacket, nice and quick.

Two observations, first, a lot of work to make the blocks look good, a few hours with the file.

Second, I'm an idiot! I ordered 3/32 singles, they are damn small !!! I needed 1/8 at most, I guess there were some smaller blocks on board, So I will find a use for them, if I can thread the damn things.

I dropped one on the carpet.....gone to the carpet monster, at least being cast metal, I'll know when the hoover finds it!

I can see only two possible drawbacks to the fishline Rallynavvie described.  (I assume it's nylon, or some other modern synthetic.)  One - some materials like that are hard to tie into knots, because they're slippery and don't like to assume sharp bends.  But that may not be relevant to this particular material.  Two - as Rallynavvie pointed out, there may be a problem with texture, especially in the larger diameters.  If the stuff looks like it's braided, it doesn't look like rope.

Real rope, in the Victory's time frame, wasn't braided; it was twisted.  As a matter of fact the direction in which it was twisted varied according to the purpose of the particular line.  (We took this up earlier.  Shrouds and stays generally were laid up left-handed; most other lines were right-handed.)  That's why, when ship modelers really start getting into the subject, they start thinking in terms of "rope-making machines."  My little model of the Hancock has more different diameters of line on it than I remember, but they all started out as two sizes of silk thread (plus a few sizes of brass and nickel-chromium wire).  I don't recommend that route for first-timers, though.  My suggestion:  pay some attention to the question of durability (don't use tea or coffee for dye), but concentrate on getting the diameters and colors right.

Regarding color - there's some room for taste and interpretation.  At the time in question, an act of Parliament dictated that all rope supplied to the Royal Navy be soaked in something called "Stockholm tar."  I've never seen Stockholm tar, but it apparently was a rich, medium brown.  That's what the running rigging ought to look like (not pale beige or white).  The standing rigging generally was coated (after it was in place, in some cases) with an ugly concoction containing tar and lampblack which, if it wasn't pure black in color, must have been pretty close. 

For dying rope you might try what I use. I like my running rigging to look a liitle used.I put about 20 drops of India ink in a pill bottle fill up with denatured alcohol.Shake well.Put the rope in for about 15 seconds pull out let dry on paper towel. Than I run it through bees wax seems to work well.I only use Model Expo rope seems to hold up .

Rod

  I haven't used silk for running rigging, but I do use surgical silk for standing rigging. This can be purchased in bulk from Deknatel, online.

   My oldest, surviving ship model is a wood kit "America". built in 1968, I used waxed cotton for the running rigging, and it is still in great shape.

Pete

P.S. I will be using some fly tying silk on a 1:87 friendship sloop.

PJ

The Heller Victory I reviewed for Model Shipwright (longer ago than I care to think about) came with some awful, hairy thread that was dyed a peculiar shade of green.  I have no idea what the firm is supplying with its kits nowadays, but I've never seen any thread packed with a plastic kit that was worthy of anything other than the wastebasket.  Maybe Heller is supplying some decent stuff now, but I'm inclined to doubt it.

I'm a little surprised (though I guess I shouldn't be) that Heller is advising people to dye thread with coffee.  Serious ship modelers found out a long, long time ago that coffee and tea (both of which used to be popular for dying purposes) contain acids that literally eat thread. 

A few years ago I had the unpleasant job of restoring a nineteenth-century ship model whose linen sails (at least I think they were linen) had been died with tea or coffee (probably the former, though I'm not sure).  The sails were literally falling to pieces.  In search of advice I phone a friend who was in charge of fabric conservation at Colonial Williamsburg.  He explained to me that what I was looking at was the phenomenon of "fabric breakage" (as opposed to tearing).  The tea (or whatever) had actually caused the individual fibers in the fabric to rupture.  It had also turned the sails an extremely dark, reddish brown - presumably nothing like what the modeler had intended.  

I normally don't like to condemn materials or techniques; my usual attitude is "to each his own."  But I make three exceptions:  lead fittings, and coffee and tea for dying thread or sailcloth.  (Actually there's a fourth one on my personal list of banned substances:  balsa wood, for any purpose.  But some people seem to be emotionally attached to it.)

Plenty of better substances for changing the color of thread are available.  (I have no idea what inkjet ink does to fiber.  Presumably it's quite durable, but whether it eventually has some unpleasant reaction to the fiber itself I don't know.)  I've had pretty good success with fabric dyes from the arts and crafts store - including the kind that comes in fiber-tipped pens.  But the best solution, in my opinion, is to buy thread that's the right color to begin with.

Ship modelers argue endlessly about the best material for rigging line.  Everybody agrees that, in terms of durability, linen is good.  Unfortunately it's also hard to come by - especially in good colors - and nowadays most of it has "slubs" (nasty little lumps) in it.  Bluejacket sells some pretty good linen line, but only in white - and the smallest diameter is .01".  (Actually that's probably small enough for most lines on a 1/100 Victory.)  

My personal favorite is silk.  Some modelers claim it isn't durable enough, but I've got two silk-rigged models that are more than twenty years old and look good as new.  When I was working at the museum I had the chance to work on quite a few old models that were rigged with a variety of materials.  I wasn't able to see any consistent pattern of deterioration.  We had some silk-rigged models from the 1930s that looked fine, and some linen-rigged ones from the '40s that were starting to deteriorate.  Not being among those who expect their models to last a thousand years, I'm satisfied with silk.  Unfortunately, though it used to be commonly available in a wide variety of colors, it's hard to find nowadays.  (I found some places on the web that sell it, but I haven't tried any of them.)

There is, of course, some inevitable debate about modern synthetic threads in ship modeling.  Harold Hahn, one of the best, uses nylon exclusively in his models and they look great.  Some people worry that nylon will fall apart eventually due to atmospheric polution, but I've never heard of it actually happening.  I have a bigger problem with most of the nylon I've seen, though:  it's slippery, it's hard to tie in a knot, and it just doesn't behave like miniature rope.

Model Shipways (via Model Expo:  www.modelexpoonline.com ) sells some stuff it calls "cotton-poly mix" that (so far) I really like.  It comes in the requisite colors and a wide variety of diameters, seems to handle well, and has a nice lay that actually looks like rope.  If I were doing a project like this I'd lean in that direction.  I rigged my little model of the pilot boat Phantom with this stuff and I'm happy with the results.

Two golden rules in ship model rigging:  1.  If in doubt as to diameter, err on the small side.  2.  If in doubt as to color, err on the dark side. 

As for my building a Heller Victory - no way.  I actually have a very high opinion of the kit; in my opinion (caveat:  I haven't seen all the competition by any means) it's one of the three best renditions of the ship in kit form.  (The other two are the 1/72-scale wood one from Caldercraft, which costs over $1,000, and the cast metal 1/700 one from Skytrex.  Both are British firms.  The Italian and Spanish wood kits I've seen don't meet most reasonable definitions of the term "scale model.")  If I were looking for a major plastic ship modeling project, this is probably the kit I'd pick.  But I built my first model of the Victory when I was about twelve years old (from the old Revell kit - a very good one for its size and age), and by the time I got out of college I'd built at least eight.  By the standards of this forum they undoubtedly were pretty laughable efforts, but no more Victories for me in this lifetime.  Besides, if I did build a 1/100 ship-of-the-line I don't know where I'd put it.  My wife and I (with ridiculous optimism) have picked out a place for my current big project, but I can't think of another place in the house for a three-foot-plus model.

Hey Rallynavvie, what you would not give to have JT live next door

Actually, as good as that book is, most of the info I needed and lots of info I did not know I needed, has come from these forums.

Oh Jtilley, you keep knocking the old girl "heller victory"  why not come down of that pearch and build one,lol, don't worry about the difficult parts, we're all here to help you

Bluejacket casts fittings in a material called britannia metal, which is a mixture of tin, copper, and antimony.  It's a light silver color, almost exactly like the old lead alloy that model companies used to use. Britannia, however, is far more durable.  Whether it will last forever is hard to say, but it won't flower and disintegrate like lead does.  (It also costs about ten times as much as lead. That's one big reason why Bluejacket fittings are on the expensive side.)

As I understand it, lead has just about disappeared from the hobby world these days.  Model Shipways uses britannia too, and I think most military miniatures are cast from something similar.

I can't figure out how many blocks it will take to rig a model of the Victory, because the number depends on how much rigging you put on it.  The real ship, with sails ready to set, had well over a thousand blocks in her rigging.  I don't recommend, though, that anybody breaking into the hobby start out determined to include every single line in the rigging of a ship-of-the-line.  My normal suggestion is to figure on including all the standing rigging and those portions of the running rigging that hold the yards in position and make them move.  That means the halyards, jeers, lifts, and braces, plus the basic gear for the spanker (topping lifts, peak and throat halyards, boom sheets, and vangs) and perhaps the basic gear for the jibs and staysails (halyards, downhaulers, and jib outhaulers).  Most people find that's plenty.  When you've reached that point, sit back, take a good look at the model, imbibe liberally of the liquid refreshment of your choice, and ask yourself whether you really want to spend an additional year or so on this particular model or go onto other things. 

There's no need to order a complete outfit of blocks at once.  My normal practice is to order what I figure will last me for a month or so, and when the stock starts looking depleted order some more. 

The number of deadeyes is fairly easy to count accurately.  The numbers on your list sound reasonable.  Again, though, it isn't necessary to buy all of them at once.  If you work at the speed I do, it will take you a month or two to set up the rigging (shrouds, stays, and ratlines) of the lower masts.  (If you've never rigged deadeyes before, be aware that there's a steep but fairly short learning curve.  The first pair is likely to drive you crazy.  By the time you get done with the foremast, you and your fingers will wonder what the fuss was about.) 

If I were building that kit (heaven forbid), one of the big problems I'd have to figure out would be how to represent the chainplates.  I don't remember much about the kit, but if I recall correctly Heller tells you to make the chainplates out of loops of thread.  (I think those loops of thread hanging out of the hull may be the lower links of the chainplates.)  I'm inclined to regard that as marginally acceptable on that scale.  Making them out of wire links would be quite a project - since every chainplate (on one side of the ship) is a different length.  I honestly don't know how I'd do it.  In any case, you need to decide how you're going to represent the chainplates before you order the deadeyes.  I'm not sure the style with the strops cast integrally would work.  The strops may not be long enough to project below the channels. 

You might want to order a dozen of each fitting and take a good look at them, before you lay out the cash for the whole outfit.

Bluejacket's "rope-stropped" blocks have grooves around them (which, in practice, need to be cleaned out with a file before they'll work).  The "iron-stropped" blocks represent fittings from a later period.  They have the strops cast integrally with them.  Generally speaking, they aren't appropriate for 1805.

The new Bluejacket catalog shows only one size of turned brass gun:  1 1/2" long, at $2.75 apiece.  There are seven different sizes of Britannia metal long guns, ranging in length from 1/2" to 1 7/8" and in price from $1.35 to $2.80 apiece.  I've never actually used any Bluejacket guns, but on the basis of the catalog pictures I don't think they're nearly as well detailed or proportioned as the Heller ones.  And I don't think the Bluejacket ones are available in all the necessary sizes.  And the muzzles would have to be drilled out. 

I'm about 99 percent sure that all the Victory's guns were iron.  (The British navy had virtually abandoned the bronze/brass gun by the end of the American Revolution.)  So the barrels would be black.  My recommendation would be to clean up the joints on the Heller guns and paint them black.

You're right:  the Longridge book (or one of the McKay ones) is just about essential for this project.

Hope this helps a little.  Good luck.

I don't have any postable photos of the Victory's boats.  You might try the ship's website, which is listed somewhere or other earlier in this thread.  I'm not sure whether she currently has a full boat complement stowed on board, but there might be something useful on that site.

I can't emphasize enough the importance of getting some good books in a project like this - especially in view of how awful the Heller instructions are.  The Victory, fortunately, has been the subject of several - and has inspired several sets of excellent drawings.  In addition to the Longridge and McKay books mentioned above, an extremely valuable one is H.M.S. Victory:  Construction, Career and Restoration, by Alan McGowen and John McKay.  That one is a big, oversized "coffee table book," full of photos of the real ship and paintings of her from many periods.  Mr. McKay recycled some of his drawings from his Anatomy of the Ship book for this one, and added some new ones.  (The McGown/McKay book actually has more drawings than the Anatomy one.  The biggest difference is in the coverage of the rigging.)  Any of those three books should provide enough information about the boats to build nice models of them.  Unfortunately all three are pretty expensive, but I suspect used copies of all of them can be found  on the web.

For anybody confronting the job of rigging a model of the ship, though, I think the book I'd recommend starting with is Longridge's Anatomy of Nelson's Ships.  The drawings in it, by George Campbell, are perhaps not quite as comprehensive as Mr. McKay's, but they're beautiful pieces of the drafting art in their own right.  And Longridge's text is geared specifically toward model builders.  The McKay drawings of the rigging include just about all the information imaginable, but they can be pretty intimidating.  (The isometric drawings of the individual masts, for instance, are mind-blowing in terms of the artistry and geometry that went into them, but rarely do both ends of a line get shown in the same drawing.)  Campbell provides a big, fold-out drawing of all the rigging on one sheet, and Longridge's text describes the lead of each line verbally.  You can literally follow his written instructions as you rig each line.

Just ordered about twenty packs of the Bluejacket blocks, should be enough to get me going,lol

I'm guessing that the plastic ones in the kit, are somewhat over sized in order to make then feasable, so I've reduced the size a little for the ones I ordered. Smallest being 3/32 singles.

Looking at the Heller ones, I can't see how they were going to be used anyway? they just would not look right at all.

With rare exceptions, blocks of the Victory's period were rope-stropped, so the "rope stropped" blocks from Bluejacket are the ones to buy.  I put the term in quotes because they don't have strops at all.  The modeler has to provide the rope.

On 1/100 scale most modelers don't try to fit blocks with individual rope strops.  They just seize (or otherwise attach) the rigging lines around the blocks.  If I were doing it I'd take a crack at putting genuine rope strops on the biggest blocks (the fore and main jeer blocks, for instance), but I wouldn't try to put separate strops on a block smaller than about 3/16". 

I'm having trouble figuring out the reference to a line coming out of the hull near the quarter gallery.  I imagine it's one end of either the main sheet or the main brace.  There are two possibilities.  If the part coming out of the hull is the standing end, what really ought to be happening is that there should be an eyebolt in the hull and the line should be secured to the eyebolt.  If the part of the line coming out of the hole is the hauling end, the hole must represent a sheave built into the hull.  The line, in real life, would lead through the sheave to a belaying point of some sort (probably a cleat or kevel) inside the bulwark.

My strong inclination in either case is to leave the line off for the time being.  I don't like stray pieces of thread dangling around in the relatively early stages of a project.  One way or another, I'd figure out how to rig those lines much later in the process.

The ship's boats don't need to be especially intimidating.  I haven't seen that kit in the flesh for many years, but my recollection is that the basic shapes of the boats' hulls were pretty good.  If I remember right, there are good, detailed drawings of the real things in the Longridge book and even better, more detailed ones in John McKay's Anatomy of the Ship:  The 100-Gun Ship Victory.  The missing interior details can be added made convincingly, and pretty simply, with plastic strip and sheet.  Give some thought to how the boats are stowed.  (If one of them has another sitting inside it, there's no point in putting lots of detail in the one on the bottom.)  Also, each boat probably would have its basic equipment (one or two masts with sails furled to them, a set of oars, a rudder, and a boat hook, at the minimum) lying on top of the thwarts - and blocking the observer's view of the interior.  The aftermarket companies sell oars.  (You can also make them yourself.  Get a piece of brass wire the diameter of the oar shaft.  Heat the wire over a candle to soften it, and mash one end of it in a vise.  Snip off both ends at the appropriate points.  The flattened part is the oar blade.  I can testify that this trick works quite well on 1/128 scale; I suspect you could just about get away with it on 1/100.) 

Here's a picture that should give an idea of what I'm talking about:  http://gallery.drydockmodels.com/album194/hancock_3

If I remember correctly, each of those boats took two or three days to build (from scratch).  Considering how prominent they are on the finished model, that doesn't seem like a lot of time.

Perhaps it's worth noting that C. Nepean Longridge, in his classic, scratchbuilt model on 1/48 scale (the one that's the subject of his book, The Anatomy of Nelson's Ships), omitted the boats altogether.  (That, at least, is my recollection.)  Some people argue - quite reasonably - that the boats detract attention from the ship.  Others (including me) find a well-detailed set of boats to be a highlight of a ship model.  One virtue they possess:  they can be done at any time in the model's construction.  When I was working on my little Hancock model I used the construction of its two boats as a sort of relief from working on the rigging.  It was refreshing, after a year or so of working with nothing but spars, sails, and thread, to spend some time on a completely different activity.

Regarding hammock nettings - the "jig" with which Heller tells you to make your own netting strikes me as pretty silly.  You might want to check out a fabric store.  See what it has to offer in the way of nylon netting.  Most of that stuff has a hexagonal mesh, which looks nothing like hammock netting.  If you look hard enough, though, you probably can find some with square mesh.  Also, take a look at some photos of the actual ship.  On more than one occasion I've made the mistake of making hammock nettings out of mesh that's too fine.  The real stuff was quite coarse.

You might also want to think seriously about replacing the plastic hammock netting stanchions with brass or steel wire.  Plastic is great stuff, but for some purposes it isn't the most suitable material.  Those hammock netting stanchions will be up for a long time, during which you're doing all sorts of other things to the model.  It would be nice if they didn't break every few minutes - as the plastic ones are likely to do.

For similar reasons, I'd recommend discarding all the plastic eyebolts that come with the kit.  They break if the lines secured to them are yanked with any enthusiasm.  But don't spend good money for pre-formed ones.  It's ludicrously easy to make your own eyebolts. 

A set of #60 to #80 drill bits makes a good set of mandrels.  Pick a bit based on the inside diameter of the eyebolt you want to make.  Get hold of some brass or copper wire of an appropriate (i.e., pretty fine) diameter (the larger the eye, the thicker the wire).  If it's brass wire, start by heating it for a minute over a candle to soften it.  Then loop it around the drill bit and twist the ends into a "pigtail."  Snip off the ends and glue the eyebolt into the deck (or whatever) with superglue.  You can produce a hundred eyebolts in half an hour - for $2.00 or $3.00.

The Heller kit is basically an excellent one, but it does have its weaknesses - one of which certainly is the lack of detail inside the boats.  They ought to have keelsons, floorboards, frames, knees, sternposts, etc. - to say nothing of the masts, sails, oars, rudders, and other equipment that normally would be stowed in them.  Extra work on those boats will pay off; they become focal points of the finished model.  It really seems like Heller could have done better in that department.

I'm a big fan of Bluejacket blocks, deadeyes, and other rigging fittings.  The ones supplied in the Heller kit are almost hopeless.  We shouldn't blame Heller too harshly for that.  Plastic isn't a good material for making blocks and deadeyes, because the injection-molding process requires a rigid mold - and a rigid mold, by definition, can't produce a casting with holes in it and a groove around it.  I suppose it would be possible to make the Heller parts work, by filing a groove around each and every one of them, but yikes what a job.  So little time is allotted us on the orb.  And the results wouldn't be as good as the Bluejacket products.  The cast metal fittings do require some cleaning up - especially the smaller ones.  (Cleaning up the grooves on the hundreds of 3/32" blocks on my little model of the frigate Hancock seemed initially like an awful challenge.  But, as usual, my fingers and my little file found the learning curve was steep but short.  By the time I was done I was working at the rate of about three blocks every two minutes.)

The bad news is that Bluejacket raised all its prices a couple of weeks ago.  (They'd been steady for several years; I'm sure the increase was appropriate - and made reluctantly.)  I imagine a full outfit of Bluejacket blocks and deadeyes for a 1/100 Victory would cost several hundred dollars.  But it wouldn't be necessary to buy all of them at once.  If I were doing it (heaven forbid) I'd order enough deadeyes for the lower masts, and get them in place before buying anything else.  Bluejacket gives good service; waiting for delivery won't slow you down much. 

http://www.amazon.com/gp/product/0870210777/103-3052226-6311815?v=glance&n=283155&v=glance

You won't go far wrong with this book for the rigging, Jtilley suggested it way back, and I am not dissappointed at all.

You mentioned the canons and the flash lines, if I may say one thing that stuck out to me? was the life boats/dingys, the join line in the bottom. I'm in no way a master moddeler,lol, so take it with a pinch of salt if you will, but it did kinda stick out.

As for the fit, I have so far found it to be horrible on my kit. I have used almost a full tube of filler so far, some items I have had to create totaly from filler,lol as they plastic was so badly warped. I put it down to the fact that it's such an old kit that I got hold of.

As for the pics,

http://pclincs.com/coppermine/thumbnails.php?album=7   it contains all the pics so far, even ones that are no longer as they appear,lol, there has been several dry dock refits shall we say <sigh>.

I'm looking around at the moment for gears to start building a ropewalk, if enough people are interested, perhapit could be made as a joint effort and then shared, as I have no need for a ropewalk in general,lol and the bought rigging line is too expensive, I priced it up and it will be close to $120.00 for the line alone, then you have blocks etc on top of that. With the little one on the way, there is no way I'll be doing that.

Thanks for post rallynavvie, looking at your pics, I see you've done the stern, how was it? which way did you go with it? looks very good.

4 weeks to go before the baby arrives, so time on the kit is limited. But I have been cracking on, I desperately need to get some pics up on my site and link to them to show the progress. I have started on the stern gallery build, the wood paneling is taking some time to paint, and I had a few issues with installing the top deck, it took lumps out of the hull sides and my fingers trying to get it into place.

Maybe just my kit, but the mast holes would also have been an issue, had I not checked them before installing the top deck, nothing a 1/2" twist bit did not fix, but something to check for.

What made you do the hull in halves? I'd be worried about damaging the finish when trying to put it together.

QUOTE: Originally posted by vapochilled Well here's a pic of the rear stern port side. Some touch up to do but no where near as bad as the Stb side. looks like I may have a finished hull before the daughter is born

Originally posted by jtilley Trowlfazz - You may be right. I can't recall having encountered that term "chinking" in a nautical context, but the American Heritage Dictionary (which happens to be beside my computer) defines the verb "chink" as "to fill small openings in." I wonder if it may be a carpenter's term. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, September 21, 2005 7:22 PM I got the boat before I got the forum,lol. So I'm kinda stuck with her for the next, oh, 2 years! Reply Edit jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Wednesday, September 21, 2005 5:18 PM Trowlfazz - You may be right. I can't recall having encountered that term "chinking" in a nautical context, but the American Heritage Dictionary (which happens to be beside my computer) defines the verb "chink" as "to fill small openings in." I wonder if it may be a carpenter's term. I agree completely with your other point: somewhere one has to draw the line. I certainly don't suggest that every technique ever conceived by every ship modeler be applied on anybody's first effort. Incidentally, this discussion illustrates one of the big reasons why, when newcomers ask me for recommendations on how to get into ship modeling, I always suggest starting with a small ship on a large scale. Such a kit can produce a beautiful finished product in a few weeks, leaving the modeler with an arsenal of skills and knowledge ready to be applied to something more advanced. Unfortunately that advice doesn't work well at the moment - at least in the realm of plastic sailing ships. So few kits are in production that it's almost impossible to find a small ship in a large scale. That's one reason why the announcement of the Zvezda medieval cog kit interests me. The price is high, but if the kit is any good it will be a fine one for introducing people to the hobby. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, September 21, 2005 5:01 PM JT-was that called 'chinking' as well? Also, guys, remember the line has to be drawn somewhere-there's modeling and then there's self-abuse. Reply Edit jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Wednesday, September 21, 2005 4:41 PM One more point about all this. In a well-constructed wooden vessel of the eighteenth or nineteenth century (I have no idea about the Santa Maria) there actually would be gaps between the deck and hull planks - sort of. Shipwrights and naval architects discovered fairly early that it was almost impossible to fit the planks of a big ship together in such a way that they didn't leak - especially when the ship was working in a seaway. The bending and twisting forces in such circumstances are tremendous, and even the most careful shaping of the boards can't compensate for them entirely. Hence the development of caulking. In typical, high-quality work the shipwright would plane off the outside (or, in the case of deck planking top) corners of each plank, either at a slight angle or with a rabbet plane. The result was that a gap, probably somewhere between half and inch and an inch wide, was left on the surface when the planks were spiked into place. The caulker (a member of a separate, specialist trade) then did his thing. He pounded strands of caulking (usually old rope soaked in hot tar or pitch) tightly into the gap using his caulking irons. (While he was at it, he also stuffed caulk into the counterbored holes over the spikes or treenails that held the planks in place. The counterbores were then filled with wood plugs, which were cut out of the face grain of a board of the same species of wood as the plank.) The caulking expanded and contracted with changes in the weather; on a hot day it would project a little above the plank, and in cool, dry weather it would be, in plastic modeling terms, countersunk. I haven't been on board the Victory in quite a few years, but I know she's been replanked several times since 1805. (As I recall, only a few of her original components are left.) I suspect that, in view of the price of labor and the fact that she's never going to go to sea, the modern restorers took some short cuts regarding the planking. (They made plenty of compromises elsewhere. Most of her current spars are made of steel, and her masts are no longer stepped on her keel. They're steel tubes, and steel rods welded alongside them poke through the bottom of the hull to be embedded in the concrete of the drydock.) On many models the gaps between the planks are out of scale. One trick that I like, when building a deck from individual wood planks on small scales, is to run a soft pencil around each plank before I install it. The pencil line (which runs all the way through the deck, and will survive any sanding or other brutalization) looks pretty convincingly like a caulked seam. Again, I'd have to take a good look at that Heller kit before forming an opinion on how best to deal with that particular problem. I'm inclined to think, though, that filling the gaps almost - but not quite- flush with some substance might give just about the right effect. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, September 21, 2005 2:24 PM It's certainly a note worthy point, but given the painfully slow progress I need to either srap this or just go with what there is. The amount of research I've allready done is mind numbing, for what was supposed to be "something to do of an evening!) Don't get me wrong, having all this info is of great value, because I don't think this will be my last Victory, but I need to start making some headway into this kit and the hobby in general. This is the first model since childhood(yes,yes I know<sigh>). It's my first time out with an airbrush, first time with rigging, and on and on and on! The knowledge you guys are giving is fantastic, and it will serve to make this a far better model that it would have been had I not joined these forums. I must admit, I'd not even thought about gap plank scale, never crossed my mind. Reply Edit scottrc Member since December 2003 From: 37deg 40.13' N 95deg 29.10'W Posted by scottrc on Wednesday, September 21, 2005 12:01 PM That is another issue about Heller, that the molded in planks are out of scale in some places. On my Heller Santa Maria, the gaps in the deck and sidewall planks are wide enough to swallow a small dog so I ended up putting a layer of thinned Spot Glaze filler over the deck and rescribing the seams. Scott Reply jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Wednesday, September 21, 2005 11:56 AM There's no doubt whatever that the gaps between the planks on the Heller kit are too deep - and too wide. If that much space existed between the planks of a real ship, said ship would leak so badly that it would sink. What this amounts to is what the aircraft modelers call "surface detail." It's customary these days for high-quality aircraft kits to have countersunk lines (i.e., grooves) delineating the panels of the fuselage, wings, and other components. Everybody knows that there are no grooves between the panels of a real airplane; the panels butt up against each other. Countersunk detailing is a modeling convention, designed to create an illusion that the model is actually made up of individual components like the real thing. Countersunk detailing is a relatively recent innovation in plastic modeling. (Actually it's been around since the fifties, but it only became fairly common in the late seventies or thereabouts.) For a long time plastic airplane kits represented the joints between panels with raised lines, and rivets with raised dots the size of scale watermelons. The typical 21st-century airplane kit, with its barely-visible countersunk panel lines, is far better than that. Ship kit designers have wrestled with the same problem, with varying degrees of success. To my eye the Heller Victory is one of the better examples. (For one of the worst, take a look at the Heller French ship-of-the-line Superbe. Its hull has "wood grain" engraved it it - but no planking seams. Apparently we're supposed to believe that the entire hull of the ship was hacked from a single, Brobdingnagian log.) Heller researched the complex layout and shapes of the planking pretty thoroughly. The "anchor stock" pattern of the wales is especially noteworthy. None of those hideously expensive continental European wood kits bothers with it. If (gawd forbid) I were building the Heller kit I'm not sure what I'd do about the surface detail. I think my inclination would be to sand down the "wood grain" texture a bit; it's really too prominent. As for the "seams" between the planks, I wouldn't want to offer a suggestion without doing some experimenting. I don't think I'd want to fill them and sand them till they disappeared, but I might try filling them partially in order to make them less prominent. This is yet another instance where personal taste has a role to play in this kind of modeling. I want my models to look like they're made of individual planks - but I don't especially want them to look like they leak. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, September 21, 2005 10:34 AM Re paint seepage.... I was looking at pictures of the Victory. It seems that the Heller's molded on wood effect is too deep for a model of this scale - especially, the gaps between planks. When you look at the Victory as she is now, the sides of the ship look almost smooth with faint lines denoting planks. I think that the ship should have the wood effect detail sanded off and the gaps filled. I'm doing it on mine and it should cut down on the paint flowing under the mask. Here's an example of the smooth effect on the actual ship: http://gallery.drydockmodels.com/album217/IMG_0454_c I know you could argue that coats of paint could have hidden the effect but I really think that the models details are too deep. Steve Reply Edit Chuck Fan Member since April 2004 Posted by Chuck Fan on Monday, September 19, 2005 11:21 PM Victory is not that big. Her displacement is only about 3500 tons. All her guns on one side would weigh over 100 tons. Moving 100 tons around inside a 3,500 ton ship would noticeably effect the trim. (note: her often quoted tonnage of around 2200 tons is derived for a formularused at the time to measure a ship's relative carrying capacity, it does not bear any relationship to the ship's actual weight or displacement) Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 19, 2005 5:32 PM QUOTE: Originally posted by Chuck Fan Actually, running out all guns on weather side of the ship while leaving all guns on the lee side inboard is a common practice when sailing on a boradreach. It improves the ship's stiffness, reduce the ship's heel and increases the ship's speed. Zeolous captains even insist that all members of watches not currently on duty to stand by the weatherside rails to make the ship stiffer still. On a ship the size of victory, would it make "that much" differance? it's a Q not saying your wrong, just seems that she's so big, Reply Edit Chuck Fan Member since April 2004 Posted by Chuck Fan on Monday, September 19, 2005 10:59 AM Actually, running out all guns on weather side of the ship while leaving all guns on the lee side inboard is a common practice when sailing on a boradreach. It improves the ship's stiffness, reduce the ship's heel and increases the ship's speed. Zeolous captains even insist that all members of watches not currently on duty to stand by the weatherside rails to make the ship stiffer still. Reply jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Saturday, September 17, 2005 8:36 PM We had a good discussion about the color of hull sheathing a few days ago, in the thread headed "Copper leafing instead of paint for plates on hull." I've moved that thread to page 1; it should appear just below this one. For what it's worth, I firmly believe that the question "whether to weather" has no right or wrong answer. The old "Board Room style" models are pristine (or were when they were built), and I can't imagine that a ship model could be more impressive. I'm also blown away by good, skillful application of weathering techniques; done carefully and knowlegeably, they can convey the character of the real ship like nothing else can. I know one prestigious European ship modeling organization bans weathering in its competitions. I have no interest in any group that operates like that. In my opinion such matters should be left to the judgment and taste of the modeler. As to open and closed gunports - there's another good application for personal taste. The normal drill would be for the ports to be opened more-or-less simultaneously during an engagement, or during gunnery practice - or when the weather was hot. But there would be plenty of scenarious in which some ports would be open and others shut. The appearance of a model ship-of-the-line changes to a surprising extent if the ports are closed. I'd suggest giving the matter some thought, and handling it however you think looks best. For that matter, there's no rule that says both sides of the model have to be identical in that respect. (Running out all the guns on only one side of the real ship would be risky, but since only one side of the model is normally visible - who'd know?) Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, September 17, 2005 2:17 PM Originally posted by Mr_Gardner aha! I certainly like the idea of a nice coppery bottom! Well-some tanning would help! ;-) Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, September 17, 2005 2:04 PM aha! I hadn't thought of that! I'm going to go do some surfing to see if I can find out! I certainly like the idea of a nice coppery bottom! Cheers, Steve Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, September 17, 2005 1:54 PM Steve-I wonder how copper weathers in sea water as opposed to air. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, September 17, 2005 1:39 PM Well, I for one intend to weather my Victory - which leads me to this question; Would the copper be copper coloured or should it be greeny coloured like the statue of liberty? Also, I have a feeling that the top of the copper plating should be some other colour like grey - anyone have any thoughts on this as I may be thinking of the Constitution rather than Victory. This is my 1st sailed ship so maybe all sailing ship models have such horrible instructions but I have to say, I've never come across instructions that cause instant eye strain when looking over them! And the paint guide leaves a lot to be desired! One last thing, would a ship like this have all the hatches that cover the cannons open at the same time, or could some be open and some be closed? Cheers, Steve Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 12, 2005 11:01 PM Ships seem to be rarely built and finished with the same degree of weathering that armour and aircraft get, I can understand why. To me, ship models are more snapshots rather than recreations, not sure if that makes sense? It seems more appropriate that a model aircraft should be weathered, it just looks wrong on a ship to me at least. Dan! never, I won't quit on it, I may ignite it, but I won't quit till the flames die out! I guess it is my first model since....well, a while And I had never used an airbrush before at all, in fact the last model I did, possibly got painted with a finger,lol But still, I know what I am aiming for, but it just eludes me atm, we'll see how the other side goes. Like I said, she can allways sit with her starboard side against the wall Reply Edit Chuck Fan Member since April 2004 Posted by Chuck Fan on Monday, September 12, 2005 8:20 PM Keep in mind that the real Victory of Napoleonic war would have been at sea 11 month out of each year she was in commission, being battered by sea and weather. Her paint would have been constantly touched up by a hodge podge of yellow and black paints from large number of different and disreputable sources, dilluted to different degrees based how much paint there is left, how large of an area needs to be painted, and how much turpentine remains in the ship's stores. The edge of the stripes would have been eyeballed by sailors sitting on planks hanging over the gunwales. Yes, a slickly painted Victory looks more impressive to the casual observer. But a indifferent paint job where areas of the same color really consists of patch work of slightly different tints and shade is far more realistic. Reply scottrc Member since December 2003 From: 37deg 40.13' N 95deg 29.10'W Posted by scottrc on Monday, September 12, 2005 7:56 PM I'm having that battle with a 1/350 Bismark. I would think after 20 years of building sailing ships that this would be a walk in the park, a two month build. WRONG! I'm now into my 6th month and it almost went into my "wall of shame". I mean, how hard can a few black and white stripes be? And painting the dark grey on the tops of the turrents, ARRGH! And after two hours getting the PE just right on one of the float planes, yup, all the little struts and cubanes, I go and drop a paint bottle on it while putting it away. Oh well, I still have two more. I build in a basement with a 8x10 concrete wall that remains clear for those "late night therapy sessions". But still, I am liking the looks of it, although it is not close to being a good as other builds, I'm still having fun tinkering with it. I have put it away a few times but it lies there, on the shelf, taunting me, so I take it off the shelf and put it back on the table just to be able to knock off one of the PE radars while grabbing a pair of tweezers. This is the same model that survived my basement flooding in June with minimal damage. Yup, building these can be quite rewarding eh? Scott Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 12, 2005 7:52 PM Vapo-make your own tape and remember that overspray is like atmosphere-it gets everywhere-so be careful. Someone mentioned in this thread that there are more ships to build: "If thine eye troubles thee-pluck it out!". Don't turn this hobby into a herculean labour. If this kit is a pain remember that no medals are handed out to those dying with their brushes in their hands, Not that i advocate giving up but I have done it to save my sanity (oops-too late), Edit: perhaps I mean just putting it aside for a bit. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 12, 2005 7:24 PM I'm using the Tamiya stuff, and in fairness it is good tape, it's just the hull detail stops it from making that "perfect" edge. I'm about to start masking up the other side, so I will try a few different things, some have worked on the sails(scrap) that came with the kit, they have some surface detail, so allow me to see whats what. It just really gets my goat, most things I do, I do with a very high degree of precision, it's my job, so when faced with something as "simple" as painting a straight bloody line! it pains me when it goes a bit adrift,lol. To top it all, after I'd finished yesterday, I was cleaning up and spilt black enammel over the stern part of the kit which WAS a nice flat yellow It was at that point that I dropped brushes into the jar and just walked away! So that now needs to be stripped and resprayed. It just seems to be never ending,lol, I was warned that tuhis kit was not for the faint of heart, but my god is it a battle of wills atm. Reply Edit scottrc Member since December 2003 From: 37deg 40.13' N 95deg 29.10'W Posted by scottrc on Monday, September 12, 2005 6:11 PM Hi David, I hope you don't get to frustrated, there will always be more ships to build and this is just a learning curve, so don't be to hard on yourself, your ship is looking very very good. To finish these plastic sailing ships, you need to look outside the traditional hobby suppliers and at automotive finish and art suppliers for good masking materials, paint finishers, and most important, brushes. About your masking tape, what kind did you use? The best kinds are high quality drafting / commercial artist tapes and automotive pin stripe tape. Tamiya tape is good too but I cannot get it to fit the fine contours that Heller sailing ship hulls have. Also, get a few sheets of Frisket paper. This is a masking paper that is also very thin, yet can be cut and fitted into contours quit easily and won't harm finished surfaces. My experience with liquid mask has not been very good either. IT does not create a good demarcation, nor is it very easy to remove from painted surfaces. I just tried it on a 1/350 Trumpter Arizona with horrible results. A good tape, a lighted magnifier, some patience, and a very sharp edge is the best thing. Also, feel free to mask off the area's that need touch up, and get a very high quality sable brush, thin you paint, and do light coats on your touch up areas, after this and a clear coat, you will never know that it was touched up. For clear finishes, many of us use Future, and for an enamel finish, I like Floquile's dull coat. It can be thinned with Floquile Thinner for really light coats. I also use Graumbacher or Liquitex acrylic satincoat as well, again, it sprays on and is easy to reduce and looks very good. It also will not colect dust or hair which why artists use it on paintings as a protectant. Hope to see more of your progress. Scott Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 12, 2005 4:46 PM Yes Testors Dullcoat works welll-just use light coats after much agitation (not you-the can) as you work and don't use after rigging (creates a dust magnet). Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 12, 2005 3:50 PM what is it? a spray can? I was/a, using dull coat as a protective barrier for the copper paint. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 12, 2005 3:13 PM Believe me, David, clear coat is a good thing! PS-or don't believe me-post a question-it's true!! Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 12, 2005 1:48 PM QUOTE: Originally posted by trowlfazz David-Realize that a little brush touch-up and a little inadvertant glue all disappear in the final clear coat. Had never planed on using anything over the top? Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 12, 2005 1:07 PM David-Realize that a little brush touch-up and a little inadvertant glue all disappear in the final clear coat. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 12, 2005 12:39 PM QUOTE: Originally posted by Lufbery David, Take it easy on yourself, man! I think it looks pretty good. Sure there's a little bit of touch-up needed, but nothing really bad. Moreover, I like the colors. Please keep us posted. Regards, Thanks Lufbury, new day fresh eyes, I'm still upset at the finish (i'll get some better pics today) but yes, it is workable. I'll just have this side facing the wall The biggest problem is with the liquid mask, it really is crap on this kinda surface, it lifted the yellow off in places and just stuck like glue in others. I have some other "stuff" that I'll give a try too, it worked ok on scrap, though it was never intended for this use. I'll have the other side done this week sometime. I have to get a move on, the idea is to have the main part of the hull/superstructure done before the little one arrives in Dec Reply Edit Lufbery Member since December 2002 From: Harrisburg, PA Posted by Lufbery on Monday, September 12, 2005 8:44 AM David, Take it easy on yourself, man! I think it looks pretty good. Sure there's a little bit of touch-up needed, but nothing really bad. Moreover, I like the colors. Please keep us posted. Regards, -Drew Build what you like; like what you build. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Monday, September 12, 2005 6:31 AM Man-you guys post at some length! David-liquid mask is crap-plus it ruins brushes. A high quality brush is better for touch-up. Plus masking tape is best trimmed to produce a sharp edge-the factory edge gets bashed about and wasn't too sharp to begin with. I use a straight-edge and X-acto to get a nice clean edge. It's laborious but worth it. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Sunday, September 11, 2005 10:26 PM mere details,lol Given the effort that is going into just getting the damm thing to not look like it fell into the paint, I may just not bother with "scale" extras, at this point in time I may just not bother at all! Reply Edit Chuck Fan Member since April 2004 Posted by Chuck Fan on Sunday, September 11, 2005 9:37 PM Just a couple of points about the copper sheath. 1. The very stem of the ship, the cutwater, is actually plated with much larger lead sheets in a vertical roll. Heller did not represent this. I cut a strip of aluminum foil to represent this. 2. The very top of the copper sheath is battened down with a roll of wood strips about 5-6 inches high and 2 inch thick. This roll runs the length of the ship from rudder post to the stem. Heller also missed this. I used 1mm X 0.5mm evergreen styrene strip to reproduce this. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Sunday, September 11, 2005 9:24 PM Well, the starboard side is sprayed At this point in time, I'm not sure what my next move is, the liquid mask is crap! anything with a texture and it sticks better than CA! It's left me with quite alot of clean up to do, and some touch up of the flat yellow, which will look sh!t brushed over the sprayed finish! Overall finish is alot better than before I think, but there is still not that razor sharp line I was looking for, there is so much surface detail on this son of B!#$@ that the paint still creeps a little in places. It's worst up around the bow area, and will need much "fettling" I'll leave it a few days to calm down, but if I don't feel any different, I may just sling it. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Sunday, September 11, 2005 12:15 AM Thanks JT, I actually had figured that one out the first time round, that's what caused the paint cock up in the first place, because of the line that it takes, it crosses some of the most horrible areas to try and mask! my intention this time is to use the tape but then use liquid mask at the worst places, like the ornamental areas above the gun ports(I guess they were rain gaurds?) The other issue is that this kit has wood grain nicely molded into it, masks getting a nice line harder, again, my tactic this time is to a use a slightly thicker paint mix and spray at no less then about 100o to the tape, so I don't spray paint under the edge. We'll know by next weekend if it works, or if this kit will have a sacrificial burning! Reply Edit jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Saturday, September 10, 2005 10:53 PM Before you start working on the black paint, take a careful look at some photos of the ship - and a really careful look at the hull moldings. The stripes on the Victory's hull sides are subtle things. The tops and bottoms of them follow their own graceful, independent curves. The stripes taper in width slightly but noticeably toward the bow and stern. They don't run parallel to the gunports, or to the decks. All this is discussed on the ship's website ( www.hms-victory.com/index.php?option=content&task=view&id=41&Itemid=44 ). I don't know just how the people responsible for the real ship determined where to paint those stripes - but I think I know why. It was to compensate for an optical illusion that would take place if the stripes were of constant width. Fortunately, the Heller designers understood this. (In some ways those folks didn't quite understand prototype shipbuilding, but they sure understood aesthetics.) One of the things I noticed on the review sample of the Heller Victory that I was sent years ago was that the boundaries of the stripes were indicated - quite accurately, I think - by extremely fine raised lines on the hull halves. Follow those raised lines and everything should work out great. Unfortunately those wretched English-language "instructions" don't clarify this point. Just about every finished Heller Victory I've ever encountered has the stripes in the wrong places. Most modelers seem to assume the stripes run parallel to the tops and bottoms of the gunports. The discrepancy is small - probably no more than 3/16" or so - but once you get sensitized to it, it's pretty obvious. Hope this helps. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, September 10, 2005 5:42 PM Well I've got the hull copper and yellow laid down again! The flash makes the yellow look a bit brighter than it actually is. Much happier with the result, though I still have to lay the flat black down which is where it went wrong last time, I have a better plan so hopefully I won't be stripping it down again Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, September 8, 2005 6:20 PM JT, my copy of "C. Nepean Longridge, The Anatomy of Nelson's Ships" Oh my! this is more of a barrel than a can of worms! I need to draw a line in the sand, the more info I get, the further away from completion I get. What a stunning book for details, especially the rigging! thanks for a first rate recommendation Reply Edit jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Tuesday, September 6, 2005 11:48 AM Interesting. I'm an utter ignoramus when it comes to art, but I've always had reservations about that painting. Deliberately or otherwise, Turner made the old ship-of-the-line's masts and yards way too short - far out of proportion to the hull. It seems to me that the distortion has the effect of downplaying what I took to be the basic message of the picture. But I'm no art critic. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply lolok Member since March 2003 From: On the way to AC+793888 Posted by lolok on Tuesday, September 6, 2005 6:27 AM As an aside. Turners " The fighting Temeraire" has just been voted the greatest painting in Britains galleries in a survey. Jim Ryan Ex-Pat Limey in warsaw.Poland. " MENE,MENE,TEKEL U PHARSIN" Reply jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Friday, September 2, 2005 9:44 PM Chuck Fan - None of the drawings I've seen shows a bulwark around the poop deck. That does not, however, necessarily mean there was none. My recollection (which is pretty unreliable) is that the 1802 model in the NMM showed a simple, rather heavy rail on each side of the poop. I don't think that model has guns. None of the drawings or paintings I've seen shows guns on the poop - except those swivels in Turner's watercolor sketch. Again, none of this is decisive evidence. It may be, though, that the poop simply wasn't big enough, or its beams sturdyy enough, to support carriage guns or carronades. People who visit the Victory (including me) are often surprised at how small she seems. Four carronades, with all the associated gear, would leave little room on that poop deck for anything else. If (heaven forbid) I were building a model of the Victory in her 1805 configuration - and for some reason had to finish it in a hurry - I probably would start with the Heller kit, raise the forecastle bulwarks, and add the swivels on the poop rail. I'd leave the steps on the sides as they are. But I'd be far more comfortable if I could wait until Peter Goodwin and his associates publish all the results of their research project. I suspect it will reveal some surprising and interesting details. Incidentally, the most accurate depiction of the Victory in her 1805 configuration may well be a kit that doesn't get much attention: the 1/700 cast white metal one from Skytrex. It is, to my knowledge, the only one that has the raised forecastle bulwarks. It's in my "to be built" stack. The hull is a really remarkable casting, but painting it will be quite a challenge - to say nothing of the rigging. Just watched the History Channel show about the Victory. In general I thought it was reasonably good, but I was disappointed that it only included a couple of minutes' worth of footage of the actual ship. Most of the program consisted of computer graphics (decent, with a few glitches) and stock footage of those awful models from the "Horatio Hornblower" series. I probably shouldn't complain though. TV documentaries on historical subjects are a great deal better these days than they used to be. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply Chuck Fan Member since April 2004 Posted by Chuck Fan on Friday, September 2, 2005 4:27 PM Mr. Tilley: Is there any consensus regarding whether the Victory had bulwurks around her poop deck? I read that she shipped 32 pdr carranades on her poop after the 1802 refit, and those were removed in the middle of 1805. Surely if she had carranades there, there would have been some kind of bulwark to protect the crew? Regards Reply Lufbery Member since December 2002 From: Harrisburg, PA Posted by Lufbery on Friday, September 2, 2005 2:19 PM Mr. Tilley said: QUOTE: The omission of the royal yards isn't exactly an error. In 1805 the royal was in the process of being established as a permanent element of the sail plan. Rigging practices varied from ship to ship, but at that time the sail was often referred to as a "topgallant royal" and was "set flying." The sail and its yard were lowered and stowed (often by being lashed inside the topmast shrouds) whenever they weren't set. Setting the topgallant royal entailed rigging the halyard, braces, and sheets and hauling the yard up to the topgallant masthead. In a ship the size of the Victory that would be quite a job - which probably is why, within a few years, warships in general adopted the practice of mounting their royal yards permanently. Yay! I've been wondering why most depictions of the Victory show only three sails per mast, yet stories (both real and fictional) have captains setting "royals and courses" all the time. Thanks for solving that little mystery. Regards, -Drew Build what you like; like what you build. Reply jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Friday, September 2, 2005 2:05 PM We've taken up the question of the Victory's entry ports a couple of times before. The bottom line is that, though the evidence so far is inconclusive, Heller may well have been right to leave them off. Quite a few paintings of the Victory date from the Trafalgar period. (We have to be careful when consulting paintings of her; she had a long career and got modified many times.) The recent book by Allan McGowen and John McKay, H.M.S. Victory: Construction, Restoration and Repair (I may have garbled the title a little) contains several excellent reproductions of such pictures. Not one of them shows the entry ports. The most persuasive piece of evidence may be the enormous oil painting, "The Battle of Trafalgar," by J.M.W. Turner. It was commissioned not long after the battle by the Prince Regent (the future George IV), and now hangs in the National Maritime Museum at Greenwich. The Victory is the centerpiece of the picture; if I remember right, she stands at least six feet tall in it. Turner is known to have gone on board the ship shortly after the battle to make sketches for the painting. (One of those sketches is in the McGowen-McKay book.) He shows the steps on the side of the hull exactly the way Heller does. The Turner painting is pretty convincing, but not absolutely decisive. Turner was a great artist, but his knowledge of ship construction was sometimes a little hazy. He apparently worked on that painting for a long time; if I remember correctly he didn't finish it till sometime in the 1820s. It's entirely possible that he unwittingly included some features of her that weren't there at the time of the battle. The National Maritime Museum has two contemporary models of the Victory. One of them represents her "as built," 1765 configuration. It does have entry ports - but in many other ways doesn't look anything like the ship looks now. The other model seems to have been intended to show what she looked like after her 1802 refit (i.e., just about how she looked at Trafalgar). That model doesn't have entry ports - and is enough to make a ship modeler throw up his hands and give up. All sorts of features of that model differ from the real ship (and every published set of plans, and every commercial kit - including the Heller one). The structure of the bow is different, the decorations on the transom are different, much of the deck furniture is different (there's no belfry, if I remember right), and the stripes on the sides are white instead of yellow. The number of gunports in the quarterdeck bulwarks is also different - and, just to provide food for thought, agrees beautifully with the Turner sketch. (That sketch is itself rather disquieting. It shows a different form of railing at the break of the poop deck - and the railing has a couple of swivel guns mounted on it.) One other conspicuous feature of that newer model: the bulwarks around the forecastle deck are shoulder-high (rather than knee-high, as the real ship's - and the Heller kit's - are today). There's room for argument about that one too, but I'm inclined to think the NMM model is right. Back in the 1920s, when the ship was undergoing one of her first historical restorations, a fine scholar named R.W. Bugler did a thorough search of the records and concluded that the forecastle bulwarks had been raised during the 1802 refit. Unfortunately, by the time his book came out the carpenters had torn the bulwarks down and rebuilt them in their present configuration. Dr. R.C. Anderson, who was in charge of the work, acknowledged the mistake; he was (understandably) reluctant to tear apart the skilled work that the carpenters had just completed. I think Chuck Fan is right about the armament - but that's a matter of some question too. Some sources give her 104 guns at the time of Trafalgar; some give her 102. Some put a couple of long guns on the forecastle deck beside the carronades, firing through ports in the tall bulwarks. And, of course, if the entry ports are omitted there are two additional gunports on the middle gundeck. The omission of the royal yards isn't exactly an error. In 1805 the royal was in the process of being established as a permanent element of the sail plan. Rigging practices varied from ship to ship, but at that time the sail was often referred to as a "topgallant royal" and was "set flying." The sail and its yard were lowered and stowed (often by being lashed inside the topmast shrouds) whenever they weren't set. Setting the topgallant royal entailed rigging the halyard, braces, and sheets and hauling the yard up to the topgallant masthead. In a ship the size of the Victory that would be quite a job - which probably is why, within a few years, warships in general adopted the practice of mounting their royal yards permanently. To my mind the most bewildering thing about the Heller Victory kit has always been the absence of any means of fastening the other yards to the masts. There are no parrels for the topsail or topgallant yards, and the rigging diagrams show no trusses for the lower yards. Apparently the yards are just supposed to hang there. That's utterly ridiculous. It would have been perfectly practicable to make a set of parrels out of plastic - and that would have been a much better use of plastic and ingenuity than those idiotic "looms" for making ratlines and hammock nettings. Sorry; getting up on the soapbox again. As I understand it, the people in charge of the real Victory are in the midst of an extremely high-powered research project, the objective of which is to determine once and for all what she looked like on October 21, 1805. My hunch is that their ultimate answer to that question will be, "well...we really aren't sure." They've come to some interesting conclusions already, though. They've established fairly firmly, for instance, that Nelson didn't die on the spot where the "here Nelson died" marker is - and they seem to be leaning toward the conclusion that the forecastle bulwarks were indeed shoulder-high. But to my knowledge they haven't said anything about the entry ports. I'll be watching the press with great interest to see what the final conclusions of that research project are. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply Chuck Fan Member since April 2004 Posted by Chuck Fan on Friday, September 2, 2005 1:50 AM BTW, Heller kit has two significant errors in the hull: 1. It omitted the very conspicuous middle deck entry ports. It's hard to understand why Heller made this mistake. 2. On the real Victory, the entire upper deck is armed with long 12 pdrs, only the quarter deck is armed with short 12 pdrs. There is also a pair of intermediate length 12 pdrs on the forc'stle. Heller had the rear thrid of the upper deck armed with short 12 pdrs, and omitted the forc'stle 12 pdrs altogether. Some minor errors in the rigging: 1. Dolphin striker (The thing projecting down below the bowsprit cap) on the real Victory is made from a wooden pole with round cross section. The model seem to imply it was made from a flat piece of iron. 2. fore and main top gallant masts on the real victory has a second roll of slots for royal yards. Heller's model omits there. So in the configuration depicted by Heller, Victory would not be able to cross royal yards and spread Royal sails. Reply Chuck Fan Member since April 2004 Posted by Chuck Fan on Friday, September 2, 2005 1:44 AM I've had good luck paiinting the whole stern piece black first, then dry brushing yellow to bring out the balisters and window frames. I understand that RN had no standard yellow color at the time of trafalgar. It's dockyards would have used cheap yellow paints of a variety of tints and dullness. Rich captains and Admirals improve the apperence of their ships with privately purchased high quality bright yellow paint. But neither Captain Hardy, Victory's skipper at the time of trafalgar, nor Nelson, was rich. So victory probably would have been painted with a mixture of dull, cheap yellow paints. I thought a 3:1 mixture of flat yellow and yellow-green produced a result that looks like a surface freshly painted with cheap yellow paint. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, August 31, 2005 2:18 PM Thanks powder monkey, I have just sprayed the primer and am waiting to see how that "tacks" onto the hull. If it looks ok, I could well be putting some colour down on it by the weekend. Reply Edit Powder Monkey Member since June 2005 From: Walworth, NY Posted by Powder Monkey on Wednesday, August 31, 2005 1:58 PM QUOTE: Originally posted by vapochilled Looking over the hull, I see that all the filler has gone, and that the oven cleaner has not eaten all the primer, it's left a slight deposit, is there anything I should do to "kill" the oven cleaner? Don't want to paint over and find the paint won't stick. I've allready soap and watered it all. Soap and water should do it. If you want to be sure you have neutralized the oven cleaner, use vinegar. Oven cleaner is sodium hydroxide. A mild acid like vinegar will neutralize it no problem. The oven cleaner is soluable in water, so there is probably nothing there anyway. Reply flashcul Member since March 2004 Posted by flashcul on Wednesday, August 31, 2005 1:19 PM I see most if not all are building plastic. I took a different tack and am building plank on plank.All wood masts and yards shaped with file & sand paper. I surprised myself they turned out pretty good. The ship is 44" long , 30" high and I'm slowly trying to do the rigging, the ratlines being the hardest. The deck s & cannon,lifeboats all deck furnishing are done.My ship sits atop the spareroom t.v. between work sessions. Hope to have pictures soon Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Sunday, August 28, 2005 1:10 AM Could'nt sleep. Looking over the hull, I see that all the filler has gone, and that the oven cleaner has not eaten all the primer, it's left a slight deposit, is there anything I should do to "kill" the oven cleaner? Don't want to paint over and find the paint won't stick. I've allready soap and watered it all. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, August 27, 2005 5:01 PM Well it's done I'm sitting here with a glass of 18 year old water while I survey the task ahead! It had to be done, there was no way I could make it look good, that's the thing with paint, more paint never covers up a problem,lol So, I'll do no more to it tonight, I need to wash the oven cleaner off and then dry the hull before I can start the proccess again. Only downside to the oven cleaner is it seems to remove the filler as well, so I have some serious work ahead. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Friday, August 26, 2005 9:53 PM well, after over 40 hours spent on the hull, I'm getting ready to strip all the paint of in the morning I figure if it's worth doing, it's worth doing as well as I can do it! And this is not as good as I can do it. The copper went on great, the yellow,mmm not so happy with the black looked great. So I tried to re mask and brush the yellow, that's where it all went wrong. The area around the steps just looks terrible, there is no way I sit the model on the sideboard and be proud, knowing that I can do better, so I've just setup a bin bag with the hull in it outside, and I'm about to unleash the fury of the oven cleaner into it Not sure what to expect once all the paint comes off, I would imagine many hours will need to be spent, preping the hull again and laying down the primer. Just a little upset and angry right now, as there is a great deal of time invested into it so far. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, August 25, 2005 10:59 PM Just came across this site while searching to find out the purpose of a "fish" (please don't state the obvious,lol http://www.all-model.com/wolfram/PAGE26.html Has loads of info in their, very usefull for the sailing ship fans I've allways been amazed at how these ships were manned, but the more I read, the more I'm not only impressed at the mechanics of these things, but also the skill required to sail one, not just as a proccess to move, but also to move as a ship of war! Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, August 25, 2005 12:10 AM that would certainly do it Just ordered the longridge book, I have one book allready, but this kit was never meant to be the start of a hobby, it was just to get some "quality" time with my now very pregnant wife(it's going to be a girl btw, found out today) However as time goes on, I'm being drawn more and more into it, instead of this being my one and only kit, I see it being used as a tooth cutting excercise! Also, comming from a background of always aiming for perfection in pretty much everything I do, I keep, re-doing bits on it as I'm unhappy with it. Don't get me wrong, this won't be a patch on any of the fine examples I've seen of your work or many other guys here, but it will be a steep learning curve in terms of techniques, airbrushing being just one example. ropewalking being another. Reply Edit jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Wednesday, August 24, 2005 11:25 PM Well...forty-nine years of reading, forty-nine years of model building (starting at age five), thirty-five years of travel to maritime museums and restored ships in the U.S., Britain, and Holland, four years as an undergraduate student (in history and music), seven years as a grad student (in military and naval history), three years as a curator in a maritime museum, and twenty-two years as a college professor. (Teaching is one of the best ways to learn things. If you want to stay ahead of your students you have to keep learning - and if you don't stay ahead of them, they'll know it sooner than you do.) That sort of resume is not, however, necessary to understand the basics of square rig. I strongly recommend that anybody with a serious interest in building models of sailing ships start acquiring a library of books. The number of good ones on the market has increased dramatically during the past twenty years or so. Some particularly good starters for anybody interested in H.M.S. Victory: C. Nepean Longridge, The Anatomy of Nelson's Ships John McKay, Anatomy of the Ship: The 100-Gun Ship Victory John McKay and Alan McGowen, H.M.S. Victory: Construction, Restoration, and Repair George M. Campbell, The Neophyte Shipmodeler's Jackstay John Harland, Seamanship In the Age of Sail James Lees, The Masting and Rigging of English Ships of War Darcy Lever, The Young Officer's Sheet Anchor David Steel, Elements of Mastmaking, Sailmaking, and Rigging If I had to recommend two for starters, they'd probably be Longridge and Campbell. Longridge built an outstanding model of the Victory that's now in the Science Museum, London. The book (the title not withstanding) is a detailed account of how he did it - with beautiful drawings as well as photos. The book would serve admirably as a replacement for those awful Heller instructions. The Campbell book is a moderately-priced paperback, originally intended as a guide for people working on solid-hull wood kits. But it contains an amazing amount of sound, basic information on how the structure and rigging of a sailing ship work. Anybody who learned everything in that book would know a good deal about ships. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, August 24, 2005 10:48 PM the one I have uses Black,White,bright red!, Tan and that awful brown, which is so brittle! I think the average modeller would be horrified at the amount of filler this boat is using! One of the anchors had such bad sink marks, that actually ended up building up one half of it it from filler. Damm things a work of art in itself,lol. Barring the fact that your 200 years old JT, where did you pick up all this knowledge on square rigs? just years of doing them? Reply Edit jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Wednesday, August 24, 2005 10:16 PM Ouch, what an awful - and irrationally chosen - color. As I remember, the kit I reviewed (quite a few years ago) didn't have it. I remember yellow, black, and bright red. But maybe that's my senile memory talking. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, August 24, 2005 7:43 PM Actually, the mastheads are that colour out of the box, it's the nastiest plastic I've ever worked with. Very brittle. The two halves did not go well together, so the grey you see, is me starting to build up the join lines, ready to spend happy hours sanding! Reply Edit jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Wednesday, August 24, 2005 12:11 PM There are no "rules" about how to rig a ship model. In the case of the real thing, the near-invariable practice was to step the lower masts, rig them, use them as the mechanism for hoisting the topmasts, rig the topmasts, use them to hoist the topgallant masts, etc. That was about the only way to do it without inviting the masts to fall over. Lots of modelers do it the same way - not because of strength considerations, but simply because setting things up in that order keeps things from being in the way. It's easier to rig the shrouds of the lower mast before the topmast is in position. That sequence also makes it less likely that anything will get broken. It's entirely practicable to rig the model in stages like that. The whole network of spars and rigging is, in fact, designed for that purpose. If you set up the rigging of the lower mast and find that you can't fit the topmast into position, you've done something seriously wrong. On the prototype ship, it has to be possible to unship the topmast without disturbing the lower mast. Many modelers set up the lower masts, then the topmasts, then the topgallant masts, and then move on to the yards. I like to rig the fore lower mast, then the fore yard, then the main lower mast, then the main yard, then the mizzen lower mast, then the crojack yard, then the fore topmast, then the fore topsail yard - etc. That system adds some variety to the job. It's all up to the individual modeler. The object in your photo is indeed one of the lower mastheads. I imagine the brown paint on it is either a primer or a trick of lighting in the photo; the masthead, along with the top, the trestletrees, the cap, and the hounds, should of course be black. Scottrc's comments about plastic spars probably are more applicable to smaller kits. As I said in my last post, the larger spars in the Heller kit probably are strong enough - though the smallest ones might benefit from replacement. I agree completely with scottrc's comments on the kit-supplied blocks and deadeyes. Heller made a gallant attempt at them, but was thwarted by the inherent characteristics of the injection molding process. One-piece injection-molded blocks and deadeyes, by definition, just don't work. A two-piece rigid mold physically cannot produce an object with a hole in it and a groove around it. Wood replacement blocks and deadeyes are available from a variety of sources. My own personal preference, though, is the line of Britannia metal fittings from Bluejacket Shipcrafters ( www.bluejacketinc.com ). They aren't cheap (a full outfit of blocks and deadeyes for a 1/96 Victory might well cost more than the Heller kit did), but to my eye they're the most authentic-looking fittings available. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply scottrc Member since December 2003 From: 37deg 40.13' N 95deg 29.10'W Posted by scottrc on Wednesday, August 24, 2005 8:49 AM I am enjoying your thread You seem to realize what a lot of scale modelers find out when tackling a plastic sailing ship, that in order to satisfy the requirements of looking as authentic as possible, the kit becomes a multi-media project. In regards to paints for instance, I use all types of medias; enamels, acrylics, tempura, and oils to get the best results. Don't rule out any medium, because they all have their purpose. Also, as you found out, we apply these medias with different techniques. I for one use the technical pen a lot. I also use India Ink for deck and side washes. I like oils for painting gilding and also as a wash, since oil seems to give depth and a patina that real wood represents. Pastels also are a must for shading and blending and light weathering. You find yourself more of an artist painting a 3 dimensional picture than a plastic model builder. In regards to the masts and spars. I have built several Heller sailing ships, and have learned that the some of the kit masts, yards, and spars are only good for stirring paint and to use as patterns to make better ones out of wood, round styrene, and brass tube. Same goes with any hardware Heller provides such as blocks and tackles. Most are too big, or are molded poorly that inhibit them to function properly. RTV and resin has become my best friend in being able to make a pattern, then a mold, and make a couple dozen resin fittings. Building the masts in stages is the more sane approach. I tried eating the whole elephant by building the entire foremast and ended up in pure frustration when trying to install the stays, braces, footropes, futtocks, and reefers. The best solution is to build and rig each step before installing it on the model, with exception to the lower mains which are installed in the base of the hull, that way you have room to test and re-rig if possible each line in the segment and iron our any issues before finding them when the masts are secured on the model. I hope you enjoy your build, I think it's looking fantastic so far, don't let it get to complicated though, for there are always more models to build in the future. Scott Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, August 23, 2005 11:57 PM JT, excuse my ignorance, but is this the masthead? If so, then I'm not happy with it either! they will require a great deal of work to get them looking good, let alone any problems with rigging. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, August 23, 2005 11:51 PM The wife is now officialy starting to get worried! She's just seen me putting the masts together to check how they fit etc. Her response was "where on earth do you intend putting it once it's done?" That's a 12" rule being dwarfed by the lower section of the mast Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, August 23, 2005 11:29 PM Hi JT, yes , I was thinking that the rigging on this thing will be far from a model, it will be functional! I had a look at modelexpo, the ones they have will require a great deal of work to get right. I've glued brass tube into the two lower mast sections, and can do something similar with the yards. You know, while I greatly appreciate your answers JT, your knowledge is great, I sometimes wish you would'nt answer,lol, You see every time you answer, I find out my question is only half the story. Your answer normally opens a whole other can of worms for me. Far from making the job easy, you force me to learn yet more and more with each answer I fear my brain is going to explode before the end of this kit You've built several of these beasts, and from your answer, am I to understand that I can't assemble the masts, fit them , then do the rigging? that was my plan, as it would make the job of putting them in easier(I thought), your asnwer suggests that I must install each mast section in stages as per the real thing, doing the rigging as I work up the mast? Reply Edit jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Tuesday, August 23, 2005 10:24 PM Ship model fitting companies don't make replacement yards with all the fittings attached. They do offer tapered birch dowels in various lengths and diameters; you might be lucky enough to find some in sizes that match. But the final shaping and the addition of the fittings would be up to you. It probably would be virtually as easy to start from scratch. A yard on an eighteenth-century warship is more complicated than it looks. (Incidentally, the word yardarm refers to the outermost section of the yard - the part from the shoulder to the tip. The shoulder is the "step" near the end of the yard, where the earring of the sail is attached. Each yard has two yardarms - one at each end.) The center section of the yard is octagonal; the taper from that section to the ends is governed by rules. That sort of thing sounds pedantic, but nothing wrecks the appearance of this kind of model like a set of badly-proportioned spars. A yard also has a number of fittings attached to it (though not as many, or as complex, as a late-nineteenth-century yard). As I remember (I don't have the kit in front of me), Heller got almost all that stuff right. The only criticism of the yards that I can recall making when I reviewed the kit (that was a long time ago; beware my senile memory) was that the representations of the studdingsail boom irons were sort of crude. If I were building the kit, my inclination would be to keep the plastic spars (with the possible exceptions of the very skinniest ones) and make new studdingsail boom irons from pieces of wire and brass tubing, soldered together. I wasn't impressed with the design of the lower mastheads - the pieces that plug into the lower masts, supposedly after they (the mastheads) have had the shrouds rigged around them. That's part of Heller's ridiculous solution to the Great Ratline Problem. Each lower mast ought to be one solid unit. I can't imagine that the plastic tops would give any trouble; they're plenty thick enough, and a lot of rigging supports them. Ditto for the lower masts and yards. I suspect the topmasts and topsail yards are hefty enough to handle the strain too. For the topgallant yards and topgallant masts, your options really are to use the kit parts or build replacements from scratch. If I remember correctly, the lower masts and yards are hollow. (Maybe the topmasts and topsail yards are too; I don't remember for sure.) You might try gluing pieces of wood or piano wire inside to provide some stiffening, but I don't really think it's necessary. This is a large-scale model., and those plastic parts are pretty stiff. Most species of wood, turned down to the diameters of those topgallant masts and yards, would be either just as springy as the plastic or (worse) prone to break at the worst moments. There's no way to avoid the fact that, even on a big model like this, it takes a good deal care and some practice to keep the rigging from pulling the thinner spars out of alignment. If the model is rigged to scale, though, the problem won't be nearly as severe as it may seem at first glance. Rigging isn't an arbitrary collection of ropes; it's a system, carefully designed to resist far greater forces than any that a model will ever encounter. Those old boys knew what they were doing. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Tuesday, August 23, 2005 6:11 PM Well I have now stripped the stern end twice, as I was unhappy with the results, going to be looking at that again this weekend. I had the bright idea of looking at the mast assemblies today, boy what a lesson in frustration they are! So much filler and sanding to be done. Can I get 1/100th scale yard arms? the plastic ones, well even the mast tops are so flimsy that I can see a real "pita" brewing once I start rigging? Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, July 30, 2005 2:24 PM Vapo-I occasionally have ideas-but only occasionally. Get that shoulder shake going! Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Friday, July 29, 2005 12:21 AM Trowlfaz, the rotring pen idea seems to have some merit! After the enamal yellow had dried, I loaded up the pen with diluted Tamiya acrylic, and started playing. While I', not thrilled with the flat/no flat acrylic!! it does seem to be working, Once it's all cured for a week or so, I'll build up 2 or 3 thin layers of dullcoat and see how it looks. Quite a lot of work to do, but you can see the basic idea of the pen is actually working, nice idea trowlfaz Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, July 23, 2005 11:36 AM Well, I was up until 4am trying to figure out this rope business. I tryed my first one. 3 lots of 3 strands, each yarn wound right then the the 3 yarns wound together left. Not as pretty as using a ropewalk,(I could have done with about 4 extra hands,lol) But not too bad for a first attempt. Oh and thanks for the water tip! worked a treat JT Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Saturday, July 23, 2005 12:35 AM You have a habit of making it all sound so easy,lol After I posted, I was looking more at the ship references I have and the model, given it's size and the fact that I am looking at possibly over a years build anyway, the added benefit of having correct rigging outways the cost in time(which of course in a hobby is free!) The reason I need the anchor done sone(ish) is that as you know it runs between decks, so once I've got the hull painted and the second deck goes in, I won't be able to thread this rope. I did find some reference sites on rope making. and indeed I do understand the difference you are talking of, but I suspect that very...VERY few people in this world could look at a model ship line and say"hang on a minute, that's laying the wrong way!" Just as very few people know which way to coil a rope! I'm starting to be of the opinion that the plastic parts are just there to hang the rigging from! which is the actual challenge? I think we know the answer to this one. Yes it's some way off before the lines go on, but rather than panic at that time, if I try to get prepared now, it may just not come as such an overwhelming experiance? Reply Edit jtilley Member since May 2003 From: Greenville, NC Posted by jtilley on Saturday, July 23, 2005 12:15 AM Vapochilled - Braiding (if the word is to be taken literally) the anchor hawsers or any other piece of ship model rigging would be utterly ridiculous. With the exceptions of ornamental ropework, I can't think of a single instance of real eighteenth-century line being braided. It was twisted. Somewhere along the line every builder of a big sailing ship model has to decide how interested he or she is in accuracy when it comes to rigging. In the case of a ship like the Victory, just about the only way to reproduce the rigging line with real accuracy is to make at least some of it yourself. There are two reasons for that. One - the rope on board the real ship is in a huge variety of sizes - considerably more than any manufacturer offers. Two - most of the standing rigging of an eighteenth-century British warship was cable-laid, whereas virtually all commercially available thread is hawser-laid. The difference is obvious in a picture, but a little tricky to explain verbally. Imagine a drawing of a piece of rope, running vertically. The individual strands of the rope show up as diagonal lines. If those lines run upward to the right, the rope is hawser-laid. If they run upward to the left, it's cable-laid. (There's a third possibility: the lower shrouds generally were shroud-laid. Shroud-laid rope looks like cable-laid rope, but has four strands instead of three. That distinction isn't terribly relevant to model builders.) Building a "rope-making machine" isn't as hard as it may sound; it can be done in an evening using gears, shafts, and bearings from a Lego set. But the act of making the rope does add a good deal to the time it takes to build the model - especially a model like this one. (The individual strands making up the main topgallant backstays probably would have to be about fifteen feet long, twisted into lengths of four or five feet.) I don't blame anybody who thinks making his or her own rope is, as you put it, a little extreme - especially on your first attempt at a sailing ship model. If you use commercially-available thread, few people are likely to notice the difference. To those who are in the early stages of their models, I'd suggest putting off the decision till quite a bit later. In the mean time, if your immediate concern is the anchor hawsers - they really don't pose much of a problem because they're so short. (I imagine six inches would be plenty.) You probably can make good-looking rope for them simply by twisting three strands of thinner thread together and putting a drop of white glue on each end. The strands will try to untwist (that's the inherent complication of rope-making), but if you soak them in water overnight and clamp each end while they dry I suspect they'll hold their shape. Youth, talent, hard work, and enthusiasm are no match for old age and treachery. Reply gleason Member since October 2004 Posted by gleason on Friday, July 22, 2005 11:28 PM I am looking tusing Jewelry Cord that you can find in the bead making section of HobbyLobby. It is 1.4mm and with two strands, it should make for a nice anchor rope. <Gleason> Originally posted by vapochilled Jtilley, thanks so much for the info and links on the rigging, I'll be ordering from there for sure. However I need to make up an anchor line 2mm Dia, the kit suggests braiding 0.03 line into a rope, I looked at the hand winding contraptions, but it seems a little extreme to me,lol Reply Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Friday, July 22, 2005 5:47 PM Ah hang on, http://www.modelexpo-online.com/cgi-bin/sgin0101.exe I could dye this stuff? Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Friday, July 22, 2005 5:45 PM Jtilley, thanks so much for the info and links on the rigging, I'll be ordering from there for sure. However I need to make up an anchor line 2mm Dia, the kit suggests braiding 0.03 line into a rope, I looked at the hand winding contraptions, but it seems a little extreme to me,lol I've never done braidin(obviously) and have no idea how to do it, it won't matter if I use cotton as any "sag" won't be seen, I only need about 300mm of the stuff, any ideas on what to use? Being 2mm it will and should look like the braid on braid used in the real thing. Short of actually learning admiralty rope making, I can't for the life of me think what to use? Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, July 21, 2005 5:18 PM Vapo-have you used 600 grit wet? You couldn't feel it on your eyeball. Just thinking out loud here, son. Give it a try-on scrap of course-always experiment and not just with mind-altering drugs. But, as always, these are suggestions only. Please do as you will, buddy. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, July 21, 2005 4:00 PM QUOTE: Originally posted by trowlfazz Naw-we didn't have birds back then. Here's a theory: paint the stern yellow then clear coat it-let dry-paint it black (per the 'Stones) and do a knock off rub with wet 600 grit. That'll take the yellow of as well won't it? Right now I'm leaning towards the do it yellow, then use the rotring with water based paint to do the gaps in the posts, the rest can be brushes with the same paint Just concerned that the brushed on, will look widly different to the AB black on the hull. Right now I'm just getting the filler done on the hull, man! I've repaired holes in cars that did not need this much filler, Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, July 21, 2005 3:12 PM Naw-we didn't have birds back then. Here's a theory: paint the stern yellow then clear coat it-let dry-paint it black (per the 'Stones) and do a knock off rub with wet 600 grit. Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, July 21, 2005 3:04 PM Showing your age, you sure you wern't using a feather? lol Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, July 21, 2005 2:48 PM Vapo-Kohninor (SP?) used to make humidors for their pens-but since they were stored vertically-the heavy carbon in the ink settled to the bottom-so all you got was a watery mess. The good ole days! Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, July 21, 2005 1:34 PM So I could mix up, some water based paint, and run it through the pen? then just OOO brush where it pooled a little? Sounds like a plan. As for a model for the ages, you damm straight I am, this thing better not need re-doing before my demise!! Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, July 21, 2005 1:32 PM Trust me, I too know of the "shake,shake, expletive" pens! Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, July 21, 2005 1:00 PM Vapo-it does darken after dullcoat-the rotring pens are another option; they are water based but expensive and hard to keep flowing. I should know-i spent many years shaking the bastards. But once water based pigments are encased in dullcoat they're safe. You're not building a model for the ages are you? ;-) Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, July 21, 2005 12:33 PM Jose, sry, my bad, I should search harder, I did try and look but could not see anything. That's not a bad way of doing it, just means using waters based black for the entire hull, which I wanted to avoid as I don't think it's as durable, correct me if I'm wrong please. Also, having never used gloss or flat coat before. As for you Trowlfazz,lol sarcastic swine, I did actually think of the permant makers, but even the black, seems to have a deep blue tinge to it Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, July 21, 2005 11:28 AM Hello all! Just brought up a thread from the archives regarding painting the Victory stern - I'm still working on my Revell 1/96 Constitution. That stern is a bit easier. Jose Gonzales Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Thursday, July 21, 2005 7:57 AM Yes you can Mr. Steady Hands. Also you can "puddle" in dilute black and build up the colour. Also think about permanent magic markers-a lot of people use those. The colour looks a little funny until you hit it will Dullcoat (make sure they're permanent). Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, July 20, 2005 10:17 PM all the versions I've seen, inc the real thing(though she's weathered a bit now) call for a sunflower yellow, so it won't be an in your face kinda paint scheme(well I hope not). problem is that cutting in the black between the posts is going to be nigh on impossible, the gap is approx half a mm! steady hand or not, you can't do that without it looking cr@p Reply Edit Anonymous Member since November 2005 Posted by Anonymous on Wednesday, July 20, 2005 9:52 PM Yellow doesn't cover black well-you need tons of coats-best to paint yellow first and 'cut in' with black. Besides, use maize or muddy your yellow--you don't want it to look like a NO whorehouse. Reply Edit 123456 JOIN OUR COMMUNITY! Our community is FREE to join. To participate you must either login or register for an account. Login Register SEARCH FORUMS FREE NEWSLETTER SIGN UP By signing up you may also receive reader surveys and occasional special offers. We do not sell, rent or trade our email lists. View our Privacy Policy. FORUMS PRODUCT REVIEWS READER GALLERY HOW TO VIDEOS SHOP ABOUT US FREE MONTHLY NEWSLETTER SIGN UP By signing up you may also receive reader surveys and occasional special offers. We do not sell, rent or trade our email lists. View our Privacy Policy. More great sites from Kalmbach Media Terms Of Use | Privacy Policy | Copyright Policy