Dave Fellingham

Consider building something quick and simple (the molded-in markings spoil the bottle for viewing an intricate model inside) and gifting it back to your brother-in-law.

I agree with all of these posts. At best, this is a representation (rather than an accurate model) of a barque named Beatrice. The inaccuracies and short-cuts taken by the builder make it difficult or near impossible to determine which Beatrice this is. I suspect that the best way to make a guess at when this was made would be by researching the bottle. The metal screw cap is likely your best hint at the earliest date this could have been made. The backdrop and harbor/shoreline background was more popular among European builders than American but is by no means definitive. Look for a label placed under the sea or a note on the backside of the backdrop. Is there a display stand to go with this SiB? Display stands can easily get separated from a bottle and subsequently lost. It might be worthwhile to visit the museum to follow up on this. Do you have the SiB itself or just the photo to work with?

Frankie: Did some digging and in Eriksen's book he references Brady regarding these "swifters" used as the first shroud on the fore and main mast of USSC. [see earlier posts regarding the works I'm using as principle sources, I have Brady's book as a download in post #12.] Eriksen states: "Let's first define their purpose or function. (From Brady) A. To steady and add additional security to the mast. B. To loosen and hove tight again quickly. C. Useful during hard tacks to avoid chafing and collision between lower spars and foremost shrouds." It appears we're both right. I also found a scale drawing in Eriksen of the shrouds. The fore and main mast shrouds are all connected with a spreader bar just above the deadeyes, excluding the swifter (shroud #1). The futtock stave is similar. None of the catharpins and ratlines attach to the swifter. In the normal sense it's not really a shroud and rather than call it one I'm going to refer to it as a "swifter" using Eriksen's and Brady's terminology. That drawing also shows the clearance between the Bentinck shroud and the bulwark - lots of room, but I am glad to now have graphic confirmation. I'd scan and post the Eriksen drawing but am reluctant to do so because the book is under copyright and in print.

American Civil War vessels hold a fond place in my memory because my very first scratch built model was of the USS Monitor. Made it from a scrap piece of 1 x 4 and a tin can with holes for two pieces of pipe for the turret, ballasted with another piece of pipe so the deck was almost awash. Took it to a pond and "re-enacted" a battle by tossing firecrackers, cherry bombs and M80s at it. It did not survive the bombardment. I was nine or ten.

I also bought some USS Constitution wood from http://store.ussconstitutionmuseum.org/ It appears to be long leaf yellow pine from deck planking rather than oak from the hull. The man who does the cutting of the wood is an avid ship modeler who contributes to MSW. There he said that he could cut pieces to larger sizes than the approximate 2" x 3" x 3/4" (50 mm x 75 mm x 18 mm) sold through the Museum Store for a suitable donation to the Museum. He hates cutting oak - especially the live oak from the hull ribs - because oak is very hard on the saw blades and destroys the chain saw chains when he cuts larger pieces down to a size he can get it into his shop. I plan to use my piece of Constitution for the keel on my Constitution build.

Frankie: Here's a detail from my drawings of USSC of the starboard fore channel with chains and deadeyes. The circled (in green) pair of deadeyes is the one for the Bentink shroud. I don't think a fairlead will be required for the shroud because USSC had very wide channels here and even this far forward the bulwarks still had some tumble home although not much. The tumble home increases going aft at the main mast then transitions closer to vertical at the mizzen channels. The first shroud triple blocks (instead of deadeyes) are circled in blue. The first shroud hinders the yard from rotating around the mast to allow the ship to lie as close to the wind as possible. When the quickly adjustable blocks and lanyard are slacked off on the lee side, that loosened shroud will allow the yard to lie a bit closer to the ship's center line and consequently closer to the wind. I believe this was an American innovation. The three pairs of blocks between the deadeyes are, from the right, the topmast, topgallant mast and royal mast breast backstays You can also see in my drawing the doubled ribs each 11.5 inches / 29.2 cm (23 inches / 58.4 cm total). The doubled ribs are spaced at 25.75 inch / 65.4 cm with a gap between of only 2.75 inches / 7 cm. Constitution's hull framing was 90% solid live oak with white oak planking inside and out for a total of 22 inches thickness at the main wale just below the gun deck ports. No wonder the shot just bounced off. This spacing of the ribs was very unusual for the period, even the venerable 100 gun first rate, HMS Victory, had greater spacing between the ribs than "Old Ironsides".

Medium is essentially a paint base without pigment and dries transparent. If placed thick (over about 1/8 inch / 3 mm) it won't dry clear but will remain milky. Medium is useful for water surface treatments (wave caps, bow waves, etc.) but will be a problem with deep water as you describe. Casting resin or epoxy might be a better choice but will still need to be placed in layers so the generated heat won't break the glass.

Did a bit of more research plasticine and plastaline - they're essentially the same. In one place I read a review in which the sculptor wrote about warming plastalina in a double boiler when mixing colors and softening it for first use. The double boiler is much like the water bath idea. The bath would allow more precise temp control to prevent separation. Dave

Plasticine is petroleum jelly based so it seems likely that too much heat or too long caused some separation. Dave

That depends on the type clay you're using. Daniel talked about Plasticine clays; I assume the temperatures he listed are Fahrenheit rather than Centigrade. The polymer clays (Fimo, Sculpey, etc.) will bake and harden at 130F. All consumer bottles have to withstand near boiling temperatures since they are washed and rinsed with very hot water (or steam) prior to being filled with some liquid and sold. These bottles should withstand an oven set to its lowest possible temperature to soften Plasticine or bake polymer clays. It just occurred to me that bottles with Plasticine or polymer clays can be set up in a water bath using running hot water from the tap. Your hot water should be over 150F (too hot to put your hand in for more than a second). Just turn off the water running into the bath and don't touch the bottle until it has cooled. Daniel mentioned that rapid heating and cooling can cause bottles to crack and break. Glass with very thick bottoms or generally un-uniform in thickness (which shows up as "wavy") are more prone to breakage from rapid heating or cooling because the different thicknesses don't heat or cool - and consequently don't expand or contract - at the same rate which can cause the glass to crack or break. We often see where a builder has used acrylic or epoxy resin for a sea material and cracked the bottle from the heat generated by the resin as it cured which caused uneven heating and cooling. Borosilicate glass (Corning/Pyrex is one brand), used in laboratory glass, is much more resistant to heat. It is also much more uniform in thickness than consumer glass which aids its heat tolerance. This uniformity in thickness, which results in minimal distortion of the model inside, is the reason many builders favor these bottles and flasks for SiBs over most consumer glass.

I have found that sizes are not standardized for fly tie thread, they are relative only for the thread from individual manufacturers. I've been using Veevus which has the widest range of sizes I've seen from 6/0 through 16/0 (finest) by even numbers. Measuring the diameter of fine thread is difficult because it flattens under pressure. I hold the thread lengthwise to the caliper jaws and close them until I feel the slightest resistance and measure several times until I get a consistent reading. This only works with my best calipers, I can't feel the beginning of the "crush" with my cheap one. I come up with .002 in./ 0.05 mm (finer than my blonde hair) for Veevus 16/0. Others will likely get a different result because of differences in how individuals will detect this "crush." Micrometers are useless for measuring thread because the anvils twist relative to each other as the mike closes. I don't see wire as an option on SiBs except possibly as foot ropes on yards and a few other locations were they won't get bent during the launch down the bottle neck. I'm sure wire would be disastrous for lower shrouds, but might work for topmast and topgallant mast shrouds. I don't see myself experimenting with wire except as foot ropes. Straightening bent wires inside a bottle seems to me an exercise in futility. I have some copper wire as fine as 45 gauge (.002 in./ 0.05 mm). Copper wire finer than that is measured by its electrical resistance and not by a number related to its diameter.

I agree with Dan. I proof my posts before posting them but always seem to miss something. I usually get timed out before I find the typos and correct them. There have also been times when I wanted to correct myself on posted information I later learned was incorrect.

I responded to a reader's question regarding "How do I read hull drawings?" on another site and thought the primer I put together for him might be useful here as well. It's pretty basic using a simpler drawing (the yacht America) and also describes how the basic information in the drawing can be used to easily build an accurate hull. Most useful for someone who is building from scratch with nothing but plans for the first time. Reading Three View Hull Drawings.pdf

Glad I could help. I saw someone's sketches for the mini eye splices several years ago but don't remember where or who, perhaps in an old book on conventional ship modeling. It kind of rattled around in my skull for a while until I saw how to do it at SiB size and did some experiments. I follow the discussion on the clamps but don't really have much to add - I make a new stand or modify an old one to meet the needs of a planned build. It's just a tool I clamp in my Pana-Vise to hold the model while I work on it. They are often just a piece of square or rectangular cross-section molding picked up at a home improvement store for a buck or so. I don't even bother with fitting a cross bar as seen on many. Dave

Sorry, I don't have any in-progress photos of a needle eye splice but did make a crude sketch. I use a needle to pass the thread back through itself to simulate an eye splice, glue it, then pass the needle through the thread a second time about a thread diameter or more away from the first and glue that. That second pass through cannot, in effect, just go back though the first "hole". When the glue is set, trim the loose end at an angle and glue it against the thread. It helps to know what a real eye splice looks like. The way shrouds are secured to dead eyes is different from an eye splice and involves three seizings which would be near impossible at anything even close to SiB scales but looks similar enough to an eye splice to get by. In fact, these dead eyes I've shown can only be used on large or large scale SiBs and still be to scale. These dead eyes require a different approach than usual when rigging the shrouds. A sketch to show how the needle passes through the standing part of the thread twice. The distance between the two passes through is exaggerated here for clarity. Rather than drawing a needle I "kinked" the line where the needle would be. I couldn't find a good photo of a finished eye splice on a dead eye but did find this photo of a heart secured with the same eye splice. This is on the mainmast stay with larger thread than was used on the dead eyes. The drill bit is a stand-in for the fore mast and is 1/16th inch / 1.5 mm in diameter. There are two basic kinds of needles available at the big box stores - sharps and embroidery needles - use sharps, embroidery needles have a more rounded point that allows the point to pass around thread fibers while sharps are, well, sharp, so that the needle will more easily go through the groups of fibers that are twisted together to make most thread. The needle needs to pass through at least one of those fiber groups rather than just between those groups, and it needs to do it both times through. In my description you quoted, I mentioned gluing with diluted pva; however, since writing that I have switched to lightly diluted acrylic matte varnish for most of the gluing of rigging for three reasons. First, the varnish wicks into the thread fibers better than pva which sometimes just beads up on the surface even when diluted and using the soap trick. Second, pva doesn't adhere well to itself such as in re-applications to reinforce the glue joint. Third, pva sometimes dries milky rather than transparent spoiling the appearance, while the varnish never dries anything but clear. I use an Opti-Visor with 2.75X magnification when doing these and other variations of splices using a needle. Passing a needle through a thread is somewhat more challenging than threading a needle and requires some practice - and magnification. I use needle eye splices in many places where I used to use knots because the eye splice is smaller, but I always test them the next day to make sure they won't slip under load.

Thanks, Gwyl. I bought the kit primarily to make nameplates for my work without the limitations imposed by the makers of nameplates (fonts, lay-outs, sizes, etc.) and to experiment with the process for making small parts. I also was pleased with my results once I got over the initial hump in the learning curve. BTW, in the article I mentioned a plan to fill the etched areas will black paint. It didn't work very well and I used a blackening agent for copper and brass then sanded the high spots back to bright brass and finishing with light coats of spray clear lacquer.

Micro-Mark sells a photo etch kit with everything needed to make your own PE parts using your computer and printer. http://www.micromark.com/micro-mark-pro-etch-photo-etch-system,8346.html I wrote an article about my first attempts at using the kit. In it I went over some points in the kit's instructions that may be confusing and areas where I had problems (with my solutions). The intent of the article is to help others get through the steep learning curve by learning from my mistakes. It is not a substitute for the excellent instructions in the kit, just some additional information. First Attempts at Photo Etch.pdf

Real ratlines were tied to the shrouds with clove hitches except at the ends which had eye splices that were seized to the shrouds. They were spaced at about 15 inches / 38 cm and were aligned parallel to the ship's waterline. Clearly too complicated and fiddly to duplicate the tying - especially the eye splices and seizing - so I just glue them as you suspect. I use lightly diluted artist's acrylic matte varnish, about 2 to 3 parts with 1 part water, to glue them. Being acrylic it remains somewhat flexible, unlike ca, and diluting the varnish allows it to wick into the fibers. I always use my finest fly tie thread no matter what scale the ship is because the ratlines will be over scale unless the model is larger than about 1/300 scale. This is a frame I make to pre-space the ratlines and pin it into place to align the ratlines parallel to the waterline. Then I use a small pointed brush to varnish all the intersections and repeat on the opposite side making sure both sides match. I then cut the frames loose and do the same to the other mast(s). I do the same with the topmast and topgallant mast ratlines. I trim the ends with nail clippers all at the same time so I can clean up the cuttings just once instead of two or three times. Completed ratlines. Hope this helps.

That is definitely from the Philippine company that makes most of the tourist shop junk SiBs. The real Flying Cloud was a black three masted ship while this piece of junk is clearly a white four-masted barque. The three part spanker is in the German style from the early 20th century. You can see the same feature on the Gorch Fock family such as the USCGC Eagle. This company offers a lot of the famous clippers with a choice of matching hull and spar colors of red, blue or green. Their claim of "museum quality" is nothing but advertising hyperbole, which is a nice way of saying a blatant lie. The real Flying Cloud from Currier and Ives, 1852

In regard to the direction this topic has turned, right now we are doing the best thing we can by openly sharing our techniques and methods in order to shorten the learning curve for beginners and novices. Just seeing what can be done will inspire them to try it. This sharing can also inspire some of us old salts to attempt things we previously thought impossible and to learn from those same beginners and novices. For example, it took a talented novice to teach me that nothing is impossible just because it hasn't been done yet. This change in my own thinking has allowed me to attempt things I had previously thought too difficult or even impossible. He also taught me to not fear failure. Failure can be educational (even if it is a harsh teacher) that can lead us to some very inspired solutions. I think the only way to improve the perception of ship bottling is to continue the way we are through our own personal commitments to making each project the best we are able and by helping those who show an interest in learning how to do it. Getting back to the original subject of this thread, I think Gwyl hit the nail on the head with the link he posted. That company uses the same cork, twine and wax seal used on the example. Production methods in which one individual makes the hull, another makes the spars, another paints them and the hulls, a fourth installs deck details, etc. to completion would account for the apparent variation in skill level throughout the model. A rigging arrangement designed for ease of multiple reproduction also fits into such a production plan. I think Gwyl solved the question and this is an example of a model in their line that didn't sell well and is now discontinued. Dave

Daniel, I thought the possibility the bottle was an early Bardet was so remote that I couldn't even say it out loud, but only presented the trail of a fact or two and a lot of conjecture that led me to the thought and let you draw your own inference. Now that I know the masts were hinged (which shoots down one of my conjectures) the possibility seems much more remote, perhaps even ludicrous. Put it down as a failed attempt at humor if you wish - I'll feel less foolish if you do. For the most part I agree with Bob, but I also saw a couple things that show promise like the red stripe on the hull that appears straight, uniform and parallel to the sheer, at least as far as I can tell through the poor glass. Much of the rigging appears reasonably accurate given the limitations and compromises frequently forced on a novice SiB builder - and poor glass. Although I personally don't care for drawn-in seams in cloths of a sail, the ones here are very uniform through-out and not too over done. However, the spacing is way out of scale. Even the mis-located deck details Daniel mentioned could reasonably be attributed, at least in part, to poor glass and the builder being unable to see what he was doing through it. I'll at least give the builder some benefit of the doubt in that regard because I've done something similar myself because of poor glass. All in all it's a fairly typical novice attempt.

I think you are correct about a continuous line being used to rig at least the fore mast and jib stays, perhaps in a pattern similar to this. Rigged similar to this means that none of those stays are control lines and that the bases of the masts were not fixed to the deck with hinges, leaving one of the two variations of the "divot" method for erecting the masts - with or without a control line from the base of each mast through the deck. There doesn't appear to be obstructions around the mast locations to prevent either variation from being a possibility. I think it's safe to conclude that the builder was influenced by exposure to the work of Michel Bardet who favors the divot method with control lines from the bases of the masts. The only other lines I see that were control lines are the ones from the aft ends of the booms. There may have been four or eight control lines depending on whether or not the bases of the masts were controlled. The lettering for Sigrid is excellent, but could be home made decals and not hand painted. Sigrid is a female name. Did the builder have a Danish girlfriend (or wife or other female family member) named Sigrid? Was he himself a Dane? The twine and wax seal is more often seen on European SiBs than on American, but it is also a characteristic of the Philippine company that makes the cheap, tourist shop SiBs, however, the workmanship on the schooner is better than those so it does not seem likely that it is a product of that company. Is there anything to be learned from the red bordered swallow-tailed flag with the letter S? It's displayed at the usual location for a company flag. Or does the "S" just a refer to Sigrid? I Googled "four masted schooner" and looked at dozens of different images of them. The masts on all of them were equally spaced and the mast heights above the deck were consistently in the range of about 60% to 75% of the waterline length of the hull. The model has unequally spaced masts and they are less than half the hull length. This suggests that the hull was carved first to a length that appealed to the builder then the masts were cut to a length to fit the bottle (poor planning?). The unequal spacing may reflect difficulty erecting one of them (#2) or just another example of poor planning. These details are somewhat contradictory to the general quality of the rigging and the more sophisticated method of mast erection than hinges. I have no idea what the thread on the forward side of the masts might be. It appears that the bottle markings include the volume (0,7L) and possibly a code for the date of manufacture of the mold (715 - May 1971? or July 15?). The triangle may be the bottle manufacturer's identification mark. An interesting thought came to mind. The tentative date for this piece is early 70's - about the same time that Bardet started building SiBs. Now, put that fact with the very likely probability that the masts were erected by his favorite method. What does that suggest to you?

If we stick to the Royal Navy rating system of the period, this is technically a fifth rate build, but I know what you mean. Thank you, I hope so. I chose the scale so I could detail it right down to the belaying pins. I will be pushing my abilities to their limits here and may be as likely to fall flat on my face as successfully completing this project to my satisfaction. We shall see. There's an interesting little Old Ironsides story that comes to mind. When it was decided to take USSC from Annapolis to dry dock to be refit to participate in the 1876 Centennial celebrations, a steam tug was assigned to tow her to the ship yard contracted for the work. USSC set a sail or two to ease the strain on the tug during the trip. The captain and skeleton crew on board her soon threw off the tow line, set more sail and very quickly left the tug behind. After Constitution arrived at her destination she had to wait for 10 hours for the tug to arrive to move her into the temporary berth for the preparations to dry dock her.

I have definitely decided on the 50 L boiling flask by Corning/Pyrex. 18 inches / 46 cm dia., 3 inch / 76 mm neck ID, 5.6 inch / 140 mm neck length. The supplier wants US$300 to shorten the neck so I'll leave it as is. This will work well inverted similar to the Biondo SiB in the photo posted earlier. Scale will be 1:240 (20' to the inch). Length on deck, a bit less than 9 inches / 23 cm; overall length, about 15.5 inches / 39 cm. In order to resolve the issue of the stern decorations and number of windows I found photos of USSC taken during the 1873-77 reconstruction during which all the planking above the waterline was removed and replaced. Bow view showing the very closely spaced ribs. Notice the very pronounced flair around the bow above the spar deck which was most likely added during a re-fit in the early 1820's. The narrow opening at the shear line was for the cat head; the opening inboard of that was not a gun port, it was for crew access to the head. Stern view also showing the closely spaced ribs. The stern openings at spar deck level were not gun ports, they were windows into a structure added to the aft end of the deck for USSC's tenure as the sail training ship at the Naval Academy. It's difficult to see the framing of the transom and counter. I attempted to enhance the contrast in this cropped version in order to see the frame members, without much success, just enough to see that the frames are almost side by side. The gun deck level openings are an artifact of an earlier re-fit but documentation does not clearly pin down when these were done. I came across photos of a model of USSC depicting her as she appeared at her commissioning or shortly after. The model was made by Mark Antczak at 1:48 scale. For more of this model see: http://www.shipmodel.com/models/constitution-old-ironsid A port quarter view of the stern. Here can be seen that the arches portion of the detail is built out significantly from the base transom. The detailing is very consistent with Joshua Humphrey's written description in his notebooks. The biggest difference between this and the Hull model is the planked over aft-facing quarter gallery windows in the latter. Another view of the stern. On the underside of the center of the built out arch can be seen what looks like may be an eagle with spread wings and six stars viewed almost edge on. Notice the similarities with the stern details depicted on the Hull model stern photo in one of my earlier posts. Notice also that the space between the taffrail and the top of the transom is not planked. There are log entries mentioning repairs to the stern decorations and quarter galleries by an outside contractor, and bills and payment vouchers in the record for the same, dated at about the end of the First Barbary War. Unfortunately, none of these detail the extent of the repairs, but it's easy to imagine the craftsman discarding elements too weathered or damaged to re-use and repairing and slightly re-arranging the rest. He could have also simplified the repairs by removing entirely the thick arches. We may never know - I'm at a point where all I can do is make my best guess. I spent hours studying the Hull model stern photo and having a very strong feeling that I had seen it somewhere before. I realized that the detail was very similar to the Revell USSC model I had built 50 years ago. A Revell USSC transom and counter. Clearly the Revell researcher(s) studied the Hull model. The colors are the model builder's interpretation for a natural wood coloring. This photo is very crisp and will help me reproduce the details better than I could from the Hull model alone. I mentioned earlier that I intended to draw studies of the structure required for five windows and for six to help make my best informed guess for them considering the conflicting information. First was to sketch a profile of one of the major vertical structural members and then project the three angled surfaces at near true size onto a single plane. Profile of one of the transom and counter frames. The following studies show the three surfaces of the aft line (at left) as if that line was straightened out vertically. Six window study. Here I have the likely framing, consistent with the frame spacing shown in the 1873-77 photo and usual practice as illustrated in The Construction and Fitting of the English Man of War 1650-1850 by Peter Goodwin. At the right are an approximation of the starboard quarter gallery and aft facing gallery window as seen in the photos above of the Antczak model. I left out many of the sub-frames on the port side as being unnecessary for this study. The pinkish frames are the major structural members. Five window study. This shows that after planking over the gallery windows it would be a major reconstruction job to rearrange the framing for the remaining six windows into five. I could find no mention of such major work in my research and little opportunity for it. I readily admit my conclusion doesn't mean that it wasn't done. With these studies and the Hull model I find that it is most likely to me that USSC had six windows across the stern at the beginning of the War of 1812 and not five as depicted in the Corne and Ropes series of paintings. I had wavered back and forth between the Hull model depiction and the paintings and drew the studies to resolve it. I came across the earliest photo of Constitution taken during the 1857-58 re-fit in preparation for use as the Naval Academy's sail training vessel. The major work done was to strip the copper and tarred felt, examine and repair the underlying planking and replace the copper. Notice the completely closed in head and the gun stripe that continues around the cut-water. Also note the Andrew Jackson figurehead.

My age induced inability to focus on small objects forced me to buy an Opti-Visor with a #3 lens (1.75X magnification) a few years ago. Last year I bought another with a #5 (2.75X) lens. I find the #3, which has a focal distance of about 12 inches / 30 cm, optimal for most bench work and the #5, about 6 inches / 15 cm focal distance, excellent for fine detail work.