46 replies to this topic

[dukeschunke]

25a
Hello All,
I am temporarily staying with my brother (Phred) to go to school and didnt have any of my own legos here. My brother asked me to build a Xebec for him using primarily star wars sets such as the sand crawler.
I used the book he bought me for Christmas that has a nice picture of a Xebec from 1735. The one in the book is 103 ft long whereas the one I made is 78 studs long without including the bowsprit.
According to the rules we will be developing to play with the ships using weight sail size and other factors this will be a very fast ship. Also, with 16 oarmen it will make it that much faster and maneuverable.
When compared to other lego ships the rigging looks rather large, but according to the picture I think they look just right.
Duke

[Mister Phes]

The first thing I be asking is are you going add sails and rigging like the picture in the book?

[dukeschunke]

I am not quite finished with it, but yes I will be adding sails and rigging in the near future. :)

Mister Phes, on Jan 23 2007, 12:10 AM, said:

The first thing I be asking is are you going add sails and rigging like the picture in the book?
...

[Capn Kirk 911]

It looks really cool, I really like the way the beams are tilted too! By the way, what does the captains quarters look like?

[Mister Phes]

dukeschunke, on Jan 23 2007, 11:18 AM, said:

I am not quite finished with it, but yes I will be adding sails and rigging in the near future. :)

Is there any other additions you will be making besides adding sails and rigging?

[Phred]

Capn Kirk 911, on Jan 22 2007, 07:27 PM, said:

It looks really cool, I really like the way the beams are tilted too! By the way, what does the captains quarters look like?

There isn't a captain's cabin (yet)  
There really isn't anything below the gun deck right now, besides...
                     .... eh emptiness

Mister Phes, on Jan 22 2007, 08:11 PM, said:

Is there any other additions you will be making besides adding sails and rigging?

Duke will be working on mainly the interior and rigging and maybe the gundeck.  Dunno when anything'll be done.

[ZCerberus]

dukeschunke, on Jan 22 2007, 06:18 PM, said:

I am not quite finished with it, but yes I will be adding sails and rigging in the near future. :)

Ahh excellent, Phred has mentioned his brother and his love of the royal navy several times!

Since this is a thread about YOUR ship, I won't share any pictures of my own version of a Xebec... err... Galley... err somewhere in between...  but I will give you a link so you can see how I tried to do the sails and rigging!

BS Folder is here

And the thread in our board is here

[El Bucanero]

,

[Mister Phes]

I've been pondering these ships with oars...  Overall is having oars an advantage because apparently it reduces the ships maneuverability.  Since the hull needs to have open ports to allow for the oars it can't turn too acutely or  the "oar ports" will slip beneath the water level.

Henry the VIIIth discovered this was a bad idea the hard way.

[Norrington]

Mister Phes, on Jan 23 2007, 08:48 PM, said:

I've been pondering these ships with oars...  Overall is having oars an advantage because apparently it reduces the ships maneuverability.  Since the hull needs to have open ports to allow for the oars it can't turn too acutely or  the "oar ports" will slip beneath the water level.

Henry the VIIIth discovered this was a bad idea the hard way.

Indeed he did.


Mary Rose got Pwn3d!  :-P

[ZCerberus]

Mister Phes, on Jan 23 2007, 07:48 PM, said:

I've been pondering these ships with oars...  Overall is having oars an advantage because apparently it reduces the ships maneuverability.  Since the hull needs to have open ports to allow for the oars it can't turn too acutely or  the "oar ports" will slip beneath the water level.

Henry the VIIIth discovered this was a bad idea the hard way.

Well you don't ALWAYS have to row it.  I put 'closeable' ports on mine so they don't always need to be open when there isn't a need for rowing!

I would also like to point out that these are Lego ships, and appreciate the fact that people are trying something different!

[Asuka]

That´s indeed a very unusal and wonderful kind of ship. Great  work! :'-)

[Tordenskjold]

Nice MOC *sweet*    does it have a name?   I also liked the cannons. do you have a larger pic of them?

[Mister Phes]

ZCerberus, on Jan 24 2007, 02:21 PM, said:

Well you don't ALWAYS have to row it.  I put 'closeable' ports on mine so they don't always need to be open when there isn't a need for rowing!

How water tight were they?

ZCerberus, on Jan 24 2007, 02:21 PM, said:

I would also like to point out that these are Lego ships, and appreciate the fact that people are trying something different!

Yes, this is a good point however its already been done in LEGO ships several times.  Its not intended to be a criticism though, more of a curiosity into how these things work...


Apparently the Black Pearl has this capability as well which you would notice if you to look at the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie.

[ZCerberus]

Mister Phes, on Jan 24 2007, 06:21 PM, said:

How water tight were they?

How water tight are gun ports? the lower gun deck any many ships was very low, in fact often making them unusable with sea swells, the oars are no different.  The oars are not at water level, they are above it like a gun port would be.

Mister Phes, on Jan 24 2007, 06:21 PM, said:

Yes, this is a good point however its already been done in LEGO ships several times.

Being one who has used oars on a ship, I would like to make several points...

1) The ships I have seen using them were the types of ships that were BOTH rowed and sail powered, Xebecs and Galley's being the biggest two.  To be fair, theses ships in real life usually had the oars placed higher up on the ships than those of us who have been implementing them here, but historically speaking there were several types of ships, including large warships (Spanish Galleys) that were both sail and oar powered.  

2) When I first made my oar and sail powered Xebec I was unaware of ANYONE who had done so in the past.  After boneparte made the index, I saw only one or two others that were oar powered. so I would hardly consider it to be an epidemic.

3) As far as I am aware, there are only a handful of ships on the entire forum that are oar powered, the two of them are Xebecs, so maybe then a real question should be why we are all building Xebecs!

Here are the Xebecs and oar powered ships.  As you can see, three Xebecs including the one in this post, two are oar powered, three oar powered ships, two are xebecs.




I guess my point is the oar powered ships I have noticed appear to be Xebecs which historically were oar powered as well as sailed.  As such, like I said before, perhaps the real question is why is everyone making Xebecs?

[dukeschunke]

The only reason I made a Xebec is because that is what my brother asked me to build with his legos. He chose it becasue he thought they looked cool and happened to have a picture of one. After building most of it (I am still not finished) I wanted one of my own, because I like it so much. I will likely build a nice bomb ketch of my own instead, just to diversify our collections.
In our gaming with the ships, water coming through the oar holes will not be a concern. It will only give this ship an advantage. I beleive that is part of why my brother wanted this ship.
I have some of the rigging done so far, and my brother and I are both very satisfied with it. I am also detailing the lower level to include the very tight captain's quarters.  
More pictures will be coming soon of the ship and a closeup of the small cannons.

[Phred]

Mr Tiber, on Jan 23 2007, 07:09 AM, said:

The picture from the book looks very familiar... Your xebec is a wonderful ship, I'm looking forward to see it with sails and rigging. I'll wait with further comment till there is rigging and sails...

Yes Mr. Tiber that's from the infamous Ship book from the smithsonian.

Mister Phes, on Jan 23 2007, 07:48 PM, said:

I've been pondering these ships with oars...  Overall is having oars an advantage because apparently it reduces the ships maneuverability.  Since the hull needs to have open ports to allow for the oars it can't turn too acutely or  the "oar ports" will slip beneath the water level.

Henry the VIIIth discovered this was a bad idea the hard way.

I may be mistaken, since i'm not from europe, but aren't the seas around the British Isles known for their roughness when compared to the Mediteranian?  Therefore, a vessel made for calmer, coastal seas definetely wouldn't fair very well by the UK.

ZCerberus, on Jan 24 2007, 06:46 PM, said:

How water tight are gun ports? the lower gun deck any many ships was very low, in fact often making them unusable with sea swells, the oars are no different.  The oars are not at water level, they are above it like a gun port would be.
Being one who has used oars on a ship, I would like to make several points...

1) The ships I have seen using them were the types of ships that were BOTH rowed and sail powered, Xebecs and Galley's being the biggest two.  To be fair, theses ships in real life usually had the oars placed higher up on the ships than those of us who have been implementing them here, but historically speaking there were several types of ships, including large warships (Spanish Galleys) that were both sail and oar powered.  

2) When I first made my oar and sail powered Xebec I was unaware of ANYONE who had done so in the past.  After boneparte made the index, I saw only one or two others that were oar powered.  They were also Xebecs, so it made sense they would be both oar and sail powered.

3) As far as I am aware, there are only a handful of ships on the entire forum that are oar powered, the three I can think of off the top of my head are all Xebecs, so maybe then a real question should be why we are all building Xebecs!

Here are the Xebecs and oar powered ships not including the one in this thread which is obviously an oar powered xebec.  As you can see, three Xebecs including the one in this post, two are oar powered, three oar powered ships, two are xebecs.
...
I guess my point is the oar powered ships I have noticed appear to be Xebecs which historically were oar powered as well as sailed.  As such, like I said before, perhaps the real question is why is everyone making Xebecs?

We didn't think the picture shown, and other Xebecs we saw online didn't have ore hole covers.  A book mentioned that Xebecs were made for coastal seas and not for the open seas.

And I wanted a Xebec mainly cause i liked the way yours turned out and wanted to see how well one could be built with all my SW sets. (Mainly the sandcrawler and sail barge).  Also i found out that Xebecs were extremely fast vessels that could out run and out manuever any other ship out there, but can hug the coast very well too.

[ZCerberus]

phred, on Jan 25 2007, 12:30 AM, said:

We didn't think the picture shown, and other Xebecs we saw online didn't have ore hole covers.

Well they don't!  it was just something I added.  I was just mentioning it to Phes, mostly to show that these aren't just thrown on, but that people actually do think about them first!

phred, on Jan 25 2007, 12:30 AM, said:

And I wanted a Xebec mainly cause i liked the way yours turned out and wanted to see how well one could be built with all my SW sets. (Mainly the sandcrawler and sail barge).  Also i found out that Xebecs were extremely fast vessels that could out run and out manuever any other ship out there, but can hug the coast very well too.

Yes, Xebecs were mainly used on the Barbary Coast, but a few were used in the Caribbean as well.  Galleys would have been more common in the golden age of piracy, but Xebecs sure do look cool!

Don't you just despise Lego moving to reddish brown!!!!!  Since nearly everything on Duke's Xebec is reddish brown, it isn't as annoying as if you had to mix them more, but it often times makes me upset!!

[Phred]

ZCerberus, on Jan 25 2007, 09:03 AM, said:

Well they don't!  it was just something I added.  I was just mentioning it to Phes, mostly to show that these aren't just thrown on, but that people actually do think about them first!
Yes, Xebecs were mainly used on the Barbary Coast, but a few were used in the Caribbean as well.  Galleys would have been more common in the golden age of piracy, but Xebecs sure do look cool!

Dude, Xebecs look awesome! *y*

ZCerberus, on Jan 25 2007, 09:03 AM, said:

Don't you just despise Lego moving to reddish brown!!!!!  Since nearly everything on Duke's Xebec is reddish brown, it isn't as annoying as if you had to mix them more, but it often times makes me upset!!

Z,
Don't get me started on rown!  The only mixing of the older, better brown was 16 1x2 plates under the ore ports, 2 1x2x2 windows, and the hulls. Otherwise everything else is rown.

Edit:
Test run to see if it's possible to have two thumbnail pics go to a single page:


This is by no means anything related to this thread.

[El Bucanero]

,

[dukeschunke]

I used 5 center sections on this ship. With my brothers legos I could have made it pretty much as long as I wanted, but I felt 5 was proportionate. *sweet*

[dukeschunke]

I finally found the time to do some work on me bros ship. I used the string he got me for the rigging and some fabric I picked up at Wal~Mart for the sails. I tried to copy the basic rigging layout from the ship in the book and am quite pleased with the results. *sweet*

[dukeschunke]

On the picture of the Xebec there was a swivel gun facing to the rear. I tried to mimic it and here is the result.



Here is a top view of the ship showing the driver's controls. If you look in front of the compass there is a 1x1 clip turned sideways to indicate where the ship is traveling to the driver. This was a feature on real ships of this era. (I got this idea from my bro)




This is a close up of the front on the main deck. Due to limited cannons the two larger cannons each use a front and side gun port. You can also see a guy going to the downstairs.



Here is a picture of the lower deck revealed. It shows the oar-men and the drummer to keep them in sync.




Here are the tight captain’s quarters at the rear of the ship.



This is a close up view of how I did the rigging at the top of the masts.

[Mister Phes]

dukeschunke, on Feb 3 2007, 12:44 PM, said:

I finally found the time to do some work on me bros ship. I used the string he got me for the rigging and some fabric I picked up at Wal~Mart for the sails.

My Lordie!!!   8-o   Those sails look magnificent!  In fact they make the entire ship look magnificent, not that it isn't magnificent without them but those sails really add to the ship.

What kind of fabric are the sails made from, Duke Schunke?

[ZCerberus]

The rigging looks nice.  I like it Duke!!

It looks like you glued the string to the sails though, is that so?