13 - Bowsprit

Today I'll cover the fabrication of the bowsprit. This can pretty much be fully assembled and installed without relying on any other yet-to-be-fabricated elements of the boat, which makes it suitable for this juncture of the build.

As usual, Jenson's book provides excellent detail of the various fittings that make up the business end of the bowsprit.

Bowsprit detail from Jenson's book.

I started with the metal fittings used as attachment points for the bowsprit shrouds and upper and lower bobstays. (These also provide the attachment points for the jib and jib topsail stays, so they have a fair number of attaching options.) As with other metal fittings of this type, I fabricated them from metal strips of copper plate, with attaching points soldered on as necessary. Unfortunately, I neglected to take any shots of the fabrication steps but here are the two end fittings after installation.

Main bowsprit fittings.

Next I fabricated two turnbuckles used in conjunction with the bobstays. Needless to say, they are non-functioning but from a distance, they serve the purpose.

Bobstay turnbuckles.

The other metal fittings were a few more hoops for the bowsprit itself and the small chainstays for the bowsprit back ropes.

Bobstay chainplates and attached back ropes.

After that, I decided to pre-fabricate the safety-net (correct term?) that is slung below the bowsprit. In hindsight, should have waited until I had twine of the appropriate size but instead went with what I had on-hand. The finished rope appears to be a bit on the large size and stiffer than the full-scale item, but again, think I can live with the result. To make the net, traced out the shape on paper and then wrapped the template around a cardboard tube formed into a cone shape. I  then laid out the lines and applied white glue at the intersection points.

Bowsprit safety net formed over template.

As can be seen, the end result is fairly rigid! (As an aside, I have not been looking forward to tying the ratlines on the mast shrouds, but this approach seems to yield an acceptable result so it may not be as much of a chore as I anticipated - just have to make sure the lines are the right scale!)

Bowsprit safety net ready for installation.

Now it was merely a matter of assembling all the bits and pieces to make up the bowsprit, including the back rope and the foot rope.

Model bowsprit fitted out.

A couple of notes on the bowsprit before I sign off.

First, according to Jenson, the two bobstays are different n size and both are quite large; the upper is 3-1/2" diameter steel bar and the lower is 4-1/2" steel bar. However, when I mocked up a section of steel wire at the scale size, it didn't look right so I opted to go with a smaller gauge wire, equivalent to roughly 2" diameter for both bobstays.

Secondly, Jenson specifies the four full-scale bobstay shrouds as steel wire rope, 2-1/2" diameter. (The same goes for the two foot-ropes.) While I had access to some small-scale wire rope, I didn't relish the thought of trying to splice the cable to form the loop at each end; in fact, doubt that I could do it in any event. As an alternative, used a suitably sized section of line.

I still doubt that the bobstays were the diameter that Jenson specified. In another diagram, he details the diameter of the end of the bowsprit as eight inches. Here is a shot of the full-scale ship and the bobstays don't look to be twice the size of the shrouds and they certainly don't look to be half the size of the bowsprit! 

Full-scale bowsprit - size comparison.

Here is a comparison of the full-scale bowsprit and my representation. Once the rest of the upper rigging is installed, think it will look just fine! If I really get keen, may try my hand at weaving a loop in my small scale wire rope. It it turns out, I may consider a retro-fit....

Comparison of full-size and model bowsprit fittings.

Now to figure out what to tackle next.... maybe some deck furniture for a change of pace!

Cheers.

12 - Chainstays

12 - Chainstays

Well, here we are at the end of the summer and I have failed to post anything since March! As usual, no excuses; just idleness on my part, although I have been doing a bit of work on the model in the interim.

Before we get on to that, though, we did get in our annual trip to Florida. Split our time between the Orlando and Fort Lauderdale areas this year. Pretty much standard fare in the Orlando area but the Fort Lauderdale harbour proved interesting. Also stopped over in Daytona Beach on the way home to check out driving on the beach. Not many places left that you can do that - and even at Daytona, you are restricted to certain stretches of the beach. However, with segments four or five miles in length, this is enough to give you a feel for the experience. Here are a few shots:

Mansions in Fort Lauderdale harbour:

And their toys:

Hollywood Beach:

Miami Beach:

And early morning on Daytona Beach before the crowds get there: 

And now to the real subject of today's post - the chainstays. The chainstays are the metal straps affixed to the hull which secure the mast shrouds. In the picture below, their location on the hull can be seen in this shot of the Bluenose II, currently undergoing a major rebuild in Lunenburg, NS.

The shrouds are secured to the chainstays by pairs of dead-eyes and landyards that permit adjusting the tension of the shrouds.

 I had made the dead-eyes to be used with the chainstays at the same time as I produced the blocks, the only difference being that I used hardwood for the dead-eyes rather than boxwood, The reason for this is that I felt there might be more of a need to put stress on the dead-eyes and if so, the boxwood would not likely stand up to the demands placed on it.

I made the chainstays themselves out of strips of copper sheet. To permit affixing the dead-eyes, I merely curled one end over. With a few drilled holes for the securing bolts, the chainstays themselves were basically complete.

Curled-over end:

Pre-drilled for attaching hardware: (Should have drilled the holes before painting!)

Next it was time to assemble the dead-eyes. Fortunately, Jenson has included a detailed description of the deadeyes in his book, including a 'lacing' diagram for the lanyards: 

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In some of my research, there was a suggestion to rig the dead-eyes using a template but it was not clear how this was to be done. I decided I would pre-assemble the dead-eyes and then adjust the lanyards individually after installation of the chainstays on the hull and rigging the shrouds. 

The first item of business was to fasten a dead-eye to each of the chainstays. I initially tried using thread but this wasn't stable enough; plus it probably didn't replicate the full-size version in any event. Instead, I threaded wire through the chainstay and then used the resulting loop to insert the dead-eye. 

Pulling on opposite ends of the wire tightened the dead-eye to the chainstay: 

A few twists to fully tighten the wire around the dead-eye and a snip close to the chainstay and we're ready to start threading the upper dead-eyes.

Threading the dead-eyes was fairly straightforward - once I got the first two or three under my belt; easy to get it wrong if you don't pay attention. The only tool I devised was to use a piece of small wire to aid in getting the "lanyard" through the holes in the dead-eyes.

The first step was to knot one end of the lanyard. (In the full-scale version, there is a stopper as well, but that was a level of detail I felt I could do without,)

The 22 upper dead-eyes ready to be threaded to the corresponding dead-eye fastened to the chaistay.

Then is was merely a simple matter of following Jenson's diagram to reeve (thread) the lanyard through each pair of dead-eyes.

Repeat 21 more times and you're done!

Next post, I'll describe rigging the bowsprit.  Cheers!