23 - Rigging

Having stepped the main and fore mast, it was time to commence rigging my model. I had some concerns as to how difficult this might be and looked online for info. After seeing the amount of rigging involved in some models, say, a ship-of-the-line, I decided that the Bluenose shouldn't be all that hard after all. The main recommendation seemed to be to start at the front and work aft. And of course, the standing rigging has to be installed before anything else.

With that in mind, therefore, here is Jenson's diagram of the standing rigging on the Bluenose. It is to be noted that standing rigging generally refers to lines, wires, or rods which are more or less fixed in position while the boat is under sail and which support the mast and other spars. Since it was tarred for protection from weather, it was darker or even black in color. Standing rigging also includes the shrouds.

Bluenose standing rigging. 

Bluenose shroud rigging.

The main difference in my approach to the shrouds was that they are already fitted with the ratlines and thus I wouldn't be looping individual shrouds about the mast as depicted here. However, given where they converge between the mast and the top-mast, it will be impossible to detect the difference.

Earlier in the build, I cut the openings in the rail to allow the chainplates to sit flush to the hull. Now it was time to put them to use.

Rail access holes for chainplates.

Chainplates in position.

Chainplates prior to touch-up painting.

  

The chainplates installed with deadeyes and shrouds in place.

There was one detail that to this point had eluded me and that was how to replicate the 'baggy wrinkles' found on the main boom end lift and the middle and forward main boom lifts.I had tried wrapping twine, ordinary yarn and other materials around the lifts but none had the right look. Then I happened across a specialty yarn that appeared to be formed in the shape of a tube. This allowed me to thread the lift lines through strands of this yarn and with a bit of fluffing, a reasonable representation of a baggy wrinkle was achieved.

Baggy wrinkle.

Baggy wrinkles installed on lifts.

With the standing rigging complete, it was on to the running rigging, which is the rigging that is used for raising, lowering and controlling the sails. This obviously was going to be much more time consuming but I fully intended to faithfully replicate the full-scale Bluenose. Again, Jenson afforded excellent guidance in this regard down to the smallest detail. Almost every line was individually documented as to the applicable sail, blocks and belaying point. Here are the two pages of the detail.

Page one of rigging detail - Jenson's.

Page two of rigging detail - Jenson's.

And there were overviews that showed even more detail with regards to sail positioning, etc. Here is an example that provides detail on the jibs, jumbo and fore sail.

Example overview - Jenson's.

Once again, there is little in the way of pictorial documentation of the rigging process but here are a few taken at the very outset.

Rigging early days.

Rigging early days.

Rigging early days.

 After quite a few hours of work, I judged the rigging to be complete. The end was in sight,

One of the last details to take care of were the stacked dories, which were now required in light of the original Bluenose configuration. Will cover that in the next post.