Bermuda Sloop by DSiemens - Aprox: 1:300 - BOTTLE

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Posted May 27, 2019

An example of the frame method.

This was used on this ship. This was a old build from a long time ago unfortunately it wrecked going into the bottle and was not rebuilt. It's an occupational hazzard.

Time to get into yards arms and running rigging. This is a little tricky since parts of the running rigging works off of other parts but little by little it comes together. First lets start with the gaff. When it some to yard arms I prefer to tie them on instead of drilling holes. This keeps the overall strength of the model while enabling the use of parts that are more to scale. One of the primary knots I use for this is the cow hitch.

This is particularly useful for square rigged sails. You can tie a cow hitch on the yard arm and then use the ends to tie the yard arm onto the mast. I used this same method for the gaff. Tie a cow hitch on the gaff and use the ends to tie it to the mast. I find it easier to tie the knot around the base of the mast then slide it up into place and glue the string to the mast. The gaff should be able to raise up and down and move side to side on the knot.

For the halyard on the gaff tie a thread block on the end end of the gaff. Then tie a string to the mast just above the cross trees. Run it through the thread block the tie it to the mast at the spot you started. Cut off the excess. If you want it to be slightly more realistic you can run it down to the bulwarks where it would be tied off. This is a bit over kill so I just cut it off. The important part here is the length of the gaff halyard. You want the halyard to be tight with the gaff at the angle it is on the plans.

Now we move on to the boom. Remember the hole we drilled in the mast while putting it together? This is where its used. You could use a thread block for this as well but since nearthe base of the mast, where it is thickest,I determined a hole would be fine.

Tie a line to the end of the boom that will be next to the mast. That line will go through the hole in the mast and out of the bottle. The idea is the boom will be able to separate from the ship and allow the sail to roll up. Since I'm planning paper sails this is important to the sails don't crumple up.

From here I tied a couple thread blocks on the other end of the boom. As I simplified the rigging I found you only need one. This is where the rigging on the plans can differ from the rigging on a ship in bottle. With some effort you can copy the rigging in the plans exactly. This is supposed to be a simple model though so I'm going use a mixture of planned rigging and simplified ship in bottle rigging.

According to the plans there is some blocks on the transom that help control the boom. I made a small eye bolt for this block and glued it in a hole drilledinto the transom.

PostedMarch 3

According to the plans there is some blocks on the transom that help control the boom. I made a small eye bolt for this block and glued it in a hole drilledinto the transom.

I did two on either side of the Windows. You can do one in the middle as well. I suspect the actual ships would have two so they can quickly adjust the boom while tacking. I decided to use two for mine but one central eyebolt would work.

Here's another place I differ from the plans. It appears on the plan that the line runs from the block at the transom to the block at the end of the boom, back to the transom block, then back to the boom block then it runs to the bulwark. I initially tried this but I couldn't pull the lines tight very easily. The added lines add a lot of strength on the real ship at a point that holds a lot of pressure. This isn't needed on a ship in bottle so I reduced the number of lines running back and forth. I tied the first line to the thread block on the boom, ran it through the transom block, back to the boom block then to the hole drilled in the bulwark. With one less line it pulls tight more smoothly. The line going in the bulwarks then runs out of the bottle. It will be tightened and glued down after the ship is in the bottle. If you only have one block in the transom you only have to do this once. I opted for putting lines on either side.

One more part that differs from the plans. Technically there is separate lines used to pull the gaff tight and liftthe boom up. Both these lines can be added but I decided to keep it simple. The two sets of linescan be consolidated by tying a line from the gaff to the boom. This also tightens up all of the lines. You can see how the yards will be set at this point.