shiplover

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  1. shiplover

    [MOC] HMS Victory main top 1:45

    I don't want to irritate anyone by responding to an older topic, but I really love this moc. It's really great to see the progress and creativity in designing ship elements when someone really focuses. Great job.
  2. I'm still around. The ship is sitting in my basement taking up ALOT of space. I've considered donating/lending it to a local hospital. I'm also considering starting a new project - the minifig scale pirate ship counterpart. I'm sure it would be smaller than this ship, maybe a 2nd or 3rd rate. But, who knows, maybe we need a good minifig scale first rate pirate ship!
  3. Sorry for the late response, but I do have a few suggestions. First, consider the time you have. Do you have the time to put something like this together? Second, consider the $. There are thousands of dollars in legos in this ship. If you think you have the time and the $, then its pretty simple going forward. If you don't have the time or $, follow the advice on the forum and just start smaller. Here was my general approach. (1) figure out a real life ship to pattern your building after and for a source of ideas. I chose the HMS Victory because its still around and there are many books with detailed pictures and diagrams for a non-sailing person like me to use. This was invaluable when building the ships ovens, the capstans, the anchors, the small boats, and many other detailed aspects of the ship. Of course, this can be just a model for ideas like it was for me, or it can be your end target. I had the proportions and specifications of Victory, but then I added significantly to the length and width of the ship I built because I wanted something larger at that scale than the Victory. I was shooting for something that would compete with the largest masted sailing ships ever built, which the Victory was clearly not. (2) figure out your scale. If you are shooting for minifig scale like I did, find one of the many websites that have already wrestled with this problem and offer solutions. If it's illusion scale or really no scale, don't worry about scale and just go for it. (3) As soon as you have your model and scale, decide whether you are going to build the entire hull or a partial hull like I did. There are the obvious practical issues to consider of stability, cost, and appearance. This can have a tremendous impact on the cost and time to build your ship. If you look through the forum, you will see some amazing work on ship hulls that consumed so much time, the ships were never completed. With the size of my ship, I was concerned more about stability than anything. I felt I needed a good flat base for everything to rest on. That's why I selected the design I picked. (4) I then recommend building a four or five inch cross section from the bottom of the hull up to the deck so you can test your basic design and figure out things like canon port size, mast size and design, yard size and design, the height of each deck and the hull, etc. I did this and found it extremely helpful. I tested several concepts. The canon port size and mast size are serious problems that are wrestled with anytime someone starts going bigger than the typical ships on the forum. This would be a good time to decide whether you are going to build your own cannons or go with lego's pre-built canons. While I really think some of the brick built canons on this site are amazing and really add the next level of realism, I decided to go with lego canons mainly on time and cost concerns. I needed over 150 canons so this was an important decision. (5) Using your scale, calculate measurements at each deck on the ship, including at the first level of bricks. Put this on a piece of paper to reference and help keep you on track as you build up so you don't end up off track. (6) layout the first level of plates and bricks and start building! (7) Pay special attention to details that are important much later in the building. This is the real advantage of picking a real life ship to model your build after. For example, eyelets needed to be embedded low in the hull that were not necessary for years later when I was working on the rigging. I am very confident that every brick on my ship is the third, fourth, or sometimes even the tenth version of whatever I was trying to accomplish. The brickbuilt hull and especially the bow were built, rebuilt, rebuilt, rebuilt, and rebuilt many times to get to something that worked and looked right. After all of that, I rebuilt the bow at least twice after the hull was long complete and I was working on masts and bowsprit. Very early in the process I just accepted that everything I initially built was just the "test" build that almost always had to be redone. GOOD LUCK!
  4. A question came about the masts in another forum. How do they remain stable with just a stack? Simple, there are steel rods through the center. Although, after having completed the ratlines and the standing rigging, I bet they are not necessary. Similar but smaller rods run through the yards or they would never work. With the exception of those rods and having to modify a couple of parts for those rods, all the rest of the parts on the ship are connected in traditional manners without any modification. Only one part is glued and it had to do with the ships wheel. It simply would not stay put, although it connected traditionally.
  5. Take a look back through the photos. It's fully finished on every level. Over 400 minifigs that you can't see from the outside except when you separate the ship into its three pieces.
  6. The ship is done. I'll get some photos soon. Number of legos . . too many to count. Tens of thousands. Cost . . . . c'mon they are legos . . . a lot.
  7. Almost finished with the sails. Should be able to post pics soon. Final process with the sails: (1) obtain the right fabric from the fabric store (I went with Kona Natural, 044 IN 17032 RN 35055, Kona Cotton Solids). (2) carefully measure the needed sale from the ship and draw the outline of sail on fabric. (3) pencil in cosmetic seams for appearance of sail panels (in my scale I did 1 inches wide and 3 inch tall pencil marks), (4) pin the sail on each corner to a wood board. On any bending lines, place several pins along the bend (I just use normal cork board push pins, and inserted all pins at angle toward sale so that in subsequent steps the cord and wire are pushed to the surface of the sail, (5) place extra pins to allow ends of cord and wire to be tied away from sale, (6) string 30 gauge wire (I used generic 30 gauge wire distributed by MSPCI and obtained a craft store) on exterior of sail along pins and on interior seams of sail with spacing on interior seams at roughly six inches (the wires give the sail body and allow it to be shaped later), (7) run 30lb hemp cord (I used bead smith 100% crafters hemp cord) over the top of all of the wire. (8) glue the hemp cord and wire to the sail (I use "Unique Stitch" fast drying adhesive), this can be a little tricky and takes some practice - I used a good bead of glue on both sides of the cord and wire and then ran my finger along to push the glue into the cord and wire on both sides. I would push the wire under the hemp cord as much as possible. The goal is to glue the hemp cord to the sail with the wire as closely tucked under the inside of edge of the hemp cord as possible. When done properly, the wire is almost invisible. In this step, glue everywhere not covered by tacks. (9) wait for the glue to dry, (10) remove tacks and glue areas where tacks were, (11) wait for all glue to dry (12) carefully examine hemp cord and wire and anywhere it does not appear securely glued, re-glue. The glue dries almost invisible so don't be afraid to use a lot, (13) when all the glue has dried (I would wait 24 hours from last step), use scissors to trim the sail to the outside hemp cord. Carefully avoid cutting the wire and if you have successfully glued the wire to the inside of the hemp cord, the chances of this go way down. (14) turn the sail over and match with pencil the cosmetic seams on the other sides of the sail. I could almost always see the seams through the sail and just match them by eye drawing the lines with a pencil and using a long rule. I used a 24 inch ruler to keep my lines straight. (15) spray the sails with starch and let dry (I used "Faultless" heavy starch). (16) Iron the sails carefully, (17) install the sails. The starch and embedded wires allowed me to mold the sails to get the look of wind blown sails. Since some of my sails were over 20 inches long/wide, the weight was still a problem and I had to do the best with attaching lines at various places to help maintain the wind blown look, but it worked pretty well. I'm satisfied with the result.
  8. It's been a busy summer so I haven't made much progress. I have experimented with sails and some sail construction techniques to give a full sail underway look and avoid a droopy flat sail look. I've found the material that I like and built and hung four or five full sails as part of this experiment. As is typical with this ship, all of these have been or will be scrapped and replaced with the final version. But, I think I have finally figured it out now and have an idea for making them work. I'll post some pics soon.
  9. Significant work and effort was put into making the ship so it can be moved. It's movable. I'll show photos of moving at some point.
  10. shiplover

    Help Plan a Roebuck Class Fifth Rate

    Go for it. I calculated the dimensions of Poseidon exactly the same as you are doing in your first post. I used the same methods for the location and height of the masts, the yards, and almost all of the major features. Then, adjust as needed to make it work. Build, tear it apart, build, tear it apart, build, tear it apart, and build again. With some patience, persistence, and a lot of time perusing ideas on this and other websites, you will get there. For me it's been five years. Five years later . . . its worth it!
  11. Almost done! After several experiments, I think I have the process for building sails figured out. 95% of the rigging is complete. Three of the furled sails are in place. A few more weeks to finish the sails and all that will be left are the boats and to get the last two hundred of the crew in place. I'll get some updated photos soon.