Landlubber Mike

I had put up a series of photos of my last ship in bottle build and people said "You should have made a video" so I did just that tonight on my latest Ship in Bottle. The ship is a Brigantine and I am certain this is the first time I have ever modeled a Briantine, a beautiful type of rig and I anticipate building more of this type of rigged ship.  Here is the Youtube link:

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.

I came up with a new method for cannons. I wanted to add more detail so I got a bamboo skewers and put it through a draw plate to get a really small diameter. I used the skewer for the wheels then used a block of wood for the carriage and wire for the cannon. All of the was attached the the wheels. I then cut them off as needed.

I didn't have much time to work on my project today, but I did manage to do so shaping of the hull.  I will probably not shape the hull to much more until I have cut the hull in half.  Then I will continue shaping once I know how far to carve and sand.
 


 
Gwyl

I have started to work on my next SIB.   For some reason I really like the lines of this ship, and I have someone who asked me to build a fairly large model in a bottle for them.  This will be a 1:95 scale of the Scottish Maid.  The hull itself is almost 9.5 inches long. 



 
I cut some nice walnut to see how it will look as the keel.  It is not quite thick enough and it be not as tall once finished but I want to wait and see what the width is once I cut the hull down the middle.
 


 
 
 
 
Next up I will be to refining the shape.  I will post more photos as the shape looks a tad better.
 
Gwyl

Here is the famous tea clipper Taitsing, built to a scale of 32 feet to 1 inch (1:384).    I am very comfortable with this scale as it is neither too big, nor too small.    I built this one quite a few years ago.
Bob
 

Funny this should come up.  I was talking to a miniature builder that recently joined my local club and he shared with me his method.  I just finished experimenting with it and was about to post to my build log.  I think I still will but I'll go more in depth on the deck planking here.  The gentleman that builds miniatures though not in bottles told me about a company called cards of wood.  Here's the website.  http://www.cardsofwood.com/  They sell post cards, greeting cards, business cards and other things all printed on wood.  They also sail sheets of blank wood at thickness's of .015 and .025 inch.  That about .4 millimeters to .6 millimeters.  Not quite as thin as McNarry's method as Howard explained but they are pretty thin.  I was given three sheets as a sample and have tested them out on an old project.  I may start a build log on that as well.  Any way here's my results.  
 

 

 
I used a scribing method for the deck plank lines.  I painted the deck in nail polish then cut lines for the planking and stained the wood.  The result is thin lines are stained but the rest of the wood isn't.  Using the wood I received I was able to do all of this before placing the deck on the model.  My lines are much straighter than my previous attempts in scribing.  Also I noticed my miniature modeling friend made the deck lines very light compared to what I was used to.  I did the same and they are probably a bit to light but in really I think the farther you get away from a ship the more the deck lines blend together so they should appear lighter.  Also a one more quick note.  The ship was planked with the same cards of wood sheet and the bowsprit and channels were done with the wood as well.     

I was always impressed by McNarry's pains in creating planking and I believe Philip Reed still follows some of these techniques.  His books are a wonder resource for any miniature ship modeling, and are all well written.  I also agree with Dave over the frustration about French polish. Happily, the loss of a material or resource in our work is rare.  Although I have no suggestion for a modern alternative to French polish, I suspect something may become available and will renew inquiries.
I maintain miniature deck planking for us need not be this involved.  Here is a deck of a small fishing schooner completed last winter, for a 1 liter bottle.  Yes, these miniature sawn planks are clearly too large, but I believe the impression of a built up hull, instead of a carved one, works here.
 

The width of deck planks in general also depends on historic period, size of the vessel, its intended use, the fabrication materials and even national origin.
 
While researching the Royal Navy's Cruizer-class brig-sloops I came across a very interesting drawing. Bellette was built in 1814 and when she was brought in for a refit in the mid 1820's someone detailed the deck planking as it was on that date onto the original construction deck plan. I've seen several similar deck framing drawings of other Cruizers but none with the decking detailed. This is an exceedingly rare occurrence that I have not seen anywhere else for any vessel. This may be the only contemporary drawing in existence of a Napoleonic era warship that shows as-built deck planking.
 

Original construction drawing of Bellette (and sister Ganette) with decking disposition as recorded in 1824.
 

Same drawing enhanced and with redrawn decking lines.
 
I enhanced the drawing by reversing the colors and tinkering with brightness and contrast and other settings to bring out the lines of the planks. I then traced the planking lines in green and added a centerline and an approximate beam line in red. You may notice that all the butt joints of the planks are shown over a full span deck beam and you will find that the longest planks scale to about 26 feet long.
 
Here we have 14 planks plus a border plank between the deck openings and the bulwark with 8 planks in the band of deck openings. The thickness of bulwark framing appears to be about the same as a deck plank width. Bellette had a beam of 30 ft. 6 in. divided by 40 [2x(14+1+1)+8=40] gives a plank width of 9.15 in. including a tarred seam, perhaps 8.5 in. for the plank itself. This is consistent with my visual impression of deck plank widths from photos of Constitution, Victory and other warships of the period still in existence which appear to have slightly wider planks, perhaps 10 in. which isn't surprising since they are much larger than this 100 ft brig. Deck planks here were 3" to 3.5" thick while on Constitution they were 4" to 4.5" (if memory serves) on the spar deck and even thicker on the gun deck.
 
Deck planking changed considerably on iron and steel hulled vessels since the planking was no longer a structural part of the ship but was retained as a working surface for the sailors laid down over the iron or steel structural deck. Star of India, the first iron framed and hulled commercial vessel, and the much later Balclutha have narrower (and much thinner) deck planking consistent with Alex's observation of 4 or 5 inches. The 20th century Esmeralda also has this narrower planking. The tarred seams got narrower and eventually all but disappeared on steel hulled vessels.
 
This drawing is very interesting in that the upper half shows all the deck beams and also the scarph joints in the waterway. You may also notice that the deck planks taper in width (to about 5 in.) as they run aft and to a lesser extent forward. This strongly suggests that such tapering was standard practice on Royal Navy vessels in this general period and may have been the practice on US Navy ships since American shipbuilding was strongly influenced by British merchant and Royal Navy methods. Spanish, French and Dutch shipbuilders handled some of the finer points of deck and hull planking in different ways from the British. Many early American merchant vessels reflect the norm in the immigrant shipbuilder's home country.
 
Sorry, I know I'm a detail freak and I get off on all these nit-picking little nautical details even if I can never make use of them in my work. If I ever build a large SiB of a Cruizer-class vessel I may try to duplicate the tapered deck planking shown in this drawing but I can't even guess how much longer it would take than straight planking. If I try tapering deck planks I might feel compelled to secure them with treenails. Doing that will take me much further down the road to insanity than I already am - and I'm not sure (yet?) that I want to go there.
 
Dave

Although I've seen plenty of good effects with scoring or marking out deck planks, I have always liked actually laying them with good strips of wood and sanding them down.  It is time consuming but not as time consuming as you might think.  Igor just posted pictures of his lifeboat planking this way.
The size is always a problem.  I once read deck planks are usually 4" to 5" wide and 19th Century photos confirm that.  Rarely can we manage stripwood that fine to good effect, so I accept planking I know is too wide.  Here is my latest Constitution, a large model at 29' = 1', so ideally the plank should have been about 1/64, or .00156", but it was actually .0020", closer to 8" on the model.  Dave will be able to express the arithmetic better than I.  Each strip was given a swipe with a brown magic marker along the side to represent the plank seam.  Hope this will be clear enough
 

Happy Thanksgiving to all our members and their families!
Charlie

I ordered the "Ship Models in Glass" from Hille and Young via the link that Alan provided.  Wow, it's an amazing book!  I've only had a few minutes to flip through it, but it seems incredibly comprehensive.  I have probably half a dozen other SIB books, but this one looks like it could be the bible of them all. 
 
There's about 150 pages of in-depth, how-to instructions - here are the chapters:
 
1.  Techniques
2.  Tools of the Trade
3.  Materials
4.  Bottles, Stands, & Embellishments
5.  The Sea
6.  Seascapes & Dioramas
7.  Hulls
8.  Fitting out the Deck
9.  Masts & Spars
10.  Rigging the Model
11.  Sails, Flags & Flag Lore
12.  Books, Plans & Nautical Terms
 
There are also four projects in the book, so fewer than maybe some of the other books out there, but very detailed instructions.  Finally, there are a few appendices on suppliers, pattern sheets (sails, flags and detailing), and a bibliography.

Picked up this Ferragamo tie on eBay - a bit whimsy, but hey, it's a tie.  

Another thing I did different was I didn't make any kind of jig or base to hold the ship down while I worked on it. Just wanted to try it to see easy or hard it would be this way. I was able to do it but I highly recommend not doing it this way It was much more irritating- especially doing the rigging.  After gluing the sea baser in. The !st bulb out of the pack of 4 bought this year was found broken open one morning much like the picture before showed. That was now 5 bulbs broken. Got the 6th one out & for the 6th time started it all over again. Began to wonder if this would be possible at all, Repeated all these steps again & was now needing to figure out what I would do for the sea. After test fitting the ship in the neck - you guessed it- another break. This time it was just the neck itself. Very frustrated I was about to give up. Then I looked at the thin metal decorative cap that goes over the neck that holds the wire for hanging the ornament. When this piece is on it would completely hide this break. I decided I would finish this build & epoxy the neck back on & hide it all with the cap afterwards. The opening was still the same except it had a sharp edge I would need to be very careful with. I went with it......
 

I have been asked in a private message about the size of the hull so I thought I'd share it here. It is approx. 2 1/8 inches (5 1/2 cm) long (without bowsprit), 9/16 inch (14mm) wide, & 4/16 inch (6mm) thick.
 
Using the 3rd glass ornament after 1st two broke.
 
A year ago I asked Daniel for some advice on this build. The sea surface will be over an inch higher than the bottom of the ornament. Filling it up with putty or resins would be much too heavy to hang on a Christmas Tree limb so I was stumped on how to pull this off. Daniel told me about another bottle builder who used a method painting the space below the sea level to hide the empty space & make a thin solid "floor" that would rest higher up that would be the sea surface. I cant remember where he referred me to but I knew it was the answer to my problem. Now how to make it. I used the same way I did the disk for the bottom label, make a folding disk using paper as hinges . I measured the inside of the globe by inserting a round paper cut out trimming it until it fit right. Then made the wood base out of tongue depressor sticks.

I've been doing some experimenting with planking before I do the same on the scavenger.  Here's a couple pirate ships I'm using wood planking on.  
 

 

 
I'll post more as the planking for the first one continues.  I'm liking the results but I'm thinking a lighter stain would be better for the Scavenger.  

Scratchbuilt 32 feet to 1 inch.
Bob

The "mighty" Wyoming, 32'=1".   Scratchbuilt.     Built from plans found in book A Shipyard in Maine.
Bob
 

Nothing has happened regarding modelling however going hard on the SS Nova. The front end is backtogether, just working on installing the; grill, headlights, bumper etc. The interior will be last however dash and steering column are in. We are now on to the last major task and grunt work:
Pull the differential/axle complete with leaf springs out Finish de-rusting the underside of the rear body section and paint (front half is completred) Pull apart the axle and check the gears, bearings, rear brakes, drums, seals... etc. Paint everything up We have a brand new fuel tank to install Fix up some wiring harnesses at the back Fix some rust spots (trunk pan) Sorry Bob... nothing got done on the Preussen this weekend    ... Jeff
 

 

 

Scratchbuilt from plans found in Around Cape Horn by Charles G. Davis.
Bob

Tool for Measuring the Diameter of Line
An old idea, but it works.
 
This is a tool that will give measurements directly in either metric or imperial units.
It works by winding a number of turns round a defined space on the tool, counting the turns, and then performing a simple division to give the diameter.
Carefully measure and mark two segments on a dowel about 6 inches long, 1 inch at one end, and 2 centimetres at the other end. Don’t use the ends of the dowel as the ends of the measured segments - start about ½ an inch in from end of the dowel as illustrated below.
 

 
 
Line Diameter Measuring Tool
Decide whether you want to know line diameter in inches or millimetres. Wrap line around the appropriate area until it’s filled. Keep the line snug on the dowel and against itself as you wind it.
Count the number of passes of line between the marks defining the segment.
For line diameter in INCHES
Divide 1 by the number of turns counted on the 1 inch segment marked the dowel; e.g. if you count 31 turns, divide 1 by 31 to get 0.03225 - the diameter of the line is 0.03225 inches.
For line diameter in MILLIMETERS
Divide 20 (the number of millimetres in 2 centimetres) by the number of turns counted on the 2 centimetre segment; e.g. if you count 40 turns, divide 20 by 40 to get 0.5 - the diameter of the line is 0.5 millimetres.
For best results, repeat two or three times and use the average.
If the line is treated with beeswax, stain, or other substances, then measure the line AFTER it has been treated.

Gwyl - Ammonia fuming is not hard at all especially at the scale we work in.  I just get a small cup of ammonia that's smaller than the block of wood I'm fuming.  Place the cup into a much bigger Tupperware bowl that has a lid.  Place the block of wood on top of the cup and place the lid on the Tupperware.  Leave it in a closet for 24 hours and the wood will be nice and dark.  The deck on my latest cutter in my build log is a result of ammonia fuming cherry.  

One of my crazy creations

PS. Wow, this site is the best for posting pics - soooooo simple.
Herewith, "Cutty Sark", "Marie Sophie", and a gypsy caravan, with "trick" cork.

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