[WIP] French 4th rater

[Okke]

Hello everyone.

This is what I been working on lately. What started out as a frigate with 4 mid-section has now grown in to a 7 mid-section long two-decker.

Even though its not nearly finished yet I thought I would share with everyone here who been a great source of inspiration. So, here comes some pics.

A shot showing the curves in the hull.

And from above. The hull is 20 studs at the widest part.

Comments and tips are appreciated.

/Okke

[Admiral Croissant]

Welcome to EB, I'm sure you'll have a great time here!

Your ship looks very promising! The shape and colours are perfect. I can't wait to see more of it

Good luck

[Bonaparte]

Hey there, it's nice you decided to join us and share your work-in-progress pictures.

So far what you've done looks perfect to me. The hull shape is spot on! You've made the hull 4 half studs wider using the "jumper technique" which is also what I'd do for a ship of this length. And building the ship on one side first and next copy to the other side is the most efficient/practical approach to build a ship like this. You are well under way to make a beautiful 4th rater

I'm looking forward to see more progress pics!

[Captain Blackmoor]

This is a very good start on a very good looking ship! The curves really stand out already.

Excellent work so far, good luck with the build!

[Commodore Hornbricker]

Indeed, welcome! Your ship really looks nice so far. It is a very good example of a CGH Technic ship in the middle of the build. I hope you will post more pictures as you progress.

[Captain Green Hair]

This looks like a promising start, you've got the shape right!

I would try to lower it though, Try to get the red stripe 1 brick closer to the hull and perhaps lower the red stripes by 1 plate, otherwise she might appear as a bit high when finished.

Good luck on her!

[Big Cam]

I forsee this ship being awesome. Looks really good so far.

[Zorro]

As some ship-building experts posting before me into this thread already said, you started out very strong, and also I am looking forward to follow up on your progress.

Thanks for sharing, and I wish you a very good time on our boards !

[Okke]

Thanks for all the feedback, really good fuel for my coming building evenings.

You've made the hull 4 half studs wider using the "jumper technique" which is also what I'd do for a ship of this length.

It might have something to do with me having my eyes on that lovely HMS Prince of Wales when I started building. Hope you don't mind.

I would try to lower it though, Try to get the red stripe 1 brick closer to the hull and perhaps lower the red stripes by 1 plate, otherwise she might appear as a bit high when finished.

Might be a good idea to try lower her. I see a way of lowering the gun ports at least a brick. I´ll see what I can do. It was quite tricky to build the curves when I only used around 75 black jumper plates, I should have ordered some more. I had to figure out ways to get it to hold together anyway, using different colored jumper plates hidden further inside the hull and then connect those with wider plates.

I would like your opinion on how I should continue my color scheme. Should I keep the stern and the the details on the bow in red or should I go wild and put in some yellow? I´m thinking windows, headrails, the colored stripe on top of the walls and all the "bling" the french put on their ships.

I´ll post an update in the near future. Thanks.

[Captain Green Hair]

I would like your opinion on how I should continue my color scheme. Should I keep the stern and the the details on the bow in red or should I go wild and put in some yellow? I´m thinking windows, headrails, the colored stripe on top of the walls and all the "bling" the french put on their ships.

I´ll post an update in the near future. Thanks.

Yellow can definitely work, you might also consider tan or white for ornaments. But if you really want to go wild, use pearl gold and some dark red as well.

You can always post some more WIP pictures for my opinion.

[Okke]

An update on my build. The hull is now 2 plates lower and also less curved in the vertical, giving a sleeker look.

The red stripes are also 1 plate lower, lowering the gun ports 1 brick in total. I have also play around with different

colors and I think I will go for this. Red, black and some highlights in yellow. Dark red would also been nice too but

I simply don´t own any bricks at all in that color. If I did i would probably mede her in dark red instead of red.

I been giving her a preliminary stern but i have no clue how to connect it with the broadside in a good way.

And finally another shot from above to show some nice curves and the upper gun deck or "the hole".

Next up will probably be to finish up the rest of the walls and start on the bow.

[Tycho McKorley]

You could potentially find some way to connect the two ends by using Lego rubber bands (or regular rubber bands if you aren't a purist) and hooks like this:

or any other variety of the many Lego hooks available.

[Swab]

A very fine ship so far! I think it is very nicely proportioned. It does look better now that you've lowered the gun deck. Will you be using string for the ratlines and rigging? I look forward to seeing your progress.

-Swab

[Okke]

You could potentially find some way to connect the two ends by using Lego rubber bands

I been rebuilding the stern a couple of times now and it´s much more stable.

I´m using 8 1x2 hinge bricks instead of 3 4x5 hinge plates. I think you understand which part I´m talking about.

Using rubber bands to tighten it up further is a good idea, if the stern keeps falling down.

I will have to wait and see how it turns out.

Will you be using string for the ratlines and rigging?

Yes, I planed to do the rigging with strings of some kind. The mast will be Lego´s

prefab tho, at least for now.

[Okke]

Hello again. It's been awhile and my ship have mostly been standing in dry dock collecting dust but I started working on her again.

I made some quite big changes, actually I started over from scratch. With 200 brown jumberplates and some brown bricks and plate she

now has a nicer line. The black under the gun ports looks better, if you ask me. It still bugs me a bit that the brown and black line

doesn't match up with the red. I been testing some design for the stern but nothing ready to be shown yet. I'm trying hard to make

that look of an late 1700s, Napoleon war design.

Fedback much appreciated.

[Captain Becker]

Its coming very nicely together. But i think the front mast is fa too front of the ship, move it back about 8 studs backwards and look what it does look like. Its difficult to say how many studs you have to move it backwards but its absolutly too front. Otherly, very good job. Keep us updated

Captain Becker

[Admiral Croissant]

Looks very promising! The curve and the colours are very nice.

I agree with captain Becker about the foremast, but 8 studs is too many, I'd say 4 studs at the most.

With a finished bow I think the position of the foremast will turn out (almost) allright.

For the rest I can't tell much more about it. Only change the colour of the rudder in the future

Good luck!

[Okke]

Been a long time since I posted an update on this build. I have rebuild here several times and not sure if it is the same ship anymore.

Anyhow this is how far I have come this time.

I changed the color of the stripes to yellow and the mast will be brick built. Notice that the mast are placeholders at the moment,

just to give a feel how she look when finished. I'm thinking of rebuilding her again, this time to a frigate, perhaps with only 6 mid-sections.

Right now she is built on 7 but it makes here too narrow in my opinion, and the two decks makes her look tiny for her crew.

I thought I would share some pictures in case I take her apart.

Egyptian theme for her figurehead.

In this view you notice she is a bit too narrow for her width. The strings are part of her steering. The rudder can be connected to the wheel and is actually working.

Edited June 12, 2014 by Okke

[kurigan]

Indeed she is to narrow, and her widest part is a bit too far forward. It'd be a shame to loose her out right though, as she seems to be shaping up nice if only in profile. My advice to you is much the same as it is to everyone: get her off those prefabs and brick build the entirety of her hull. Keep the same profile, but widen her appropriately.

[Kolonialbeamter]

Wow! I'm a bit ashamed I never noticed about your ship before

That being said, I can only encourage you to persue building her as a two decker, for I think she's a beauty, and turning her into a frigate would be a waste of both time and work you've put into this project over the last years. Sure, this being minifig-illusion-scale makes a vessel look a little narrow and small in relation to a crew of minifigs, but those are issues that come with the use of prefabs, so even frigates are 'too small'.

I think she's not TOO narrow, and by very far doesn't look odd. If you check one of my first ships, Vengeur, THAT is too narrow...

You've come a long way, the tumblehome you've applied looks nice, and your side galleries are very well shaped. And in the end, there are always ways to make her appear wider than she is, lower her where you can, steepen the tumblehome a little from midship on astern, if you are concerned for the quarter deck and poop deck to become too narrow, make the yards just a tad longer... 'squeeze' her a little.

You could instead also simply get rid of those prefabs and brick build your own hull to widen her as you please. Or make her a 'hybrid', à la Imperial Shipyards' NextGen technique, or 'the other way around' as I used to do. But please, keep her as a two decker, you can always build a frigate later.

Thanks for sharing your progress, keep us updated!

Good luck and brick on!

Edited June 13, 2014 by Kolonialbeamter

[Sebeus I]

I agree with Kurigan here, widen the ship, prefab hulls are not suited for a 4th rate battleship.

I love the side view, the galleries look great, keep it up!

[Captain Golden Hook]

Great Moc so far, I tried to build a ship like this and ran into part and budget issues.

Don't give up, this will be so much cooler if it is a 2 gun deck ship!

[Okke]

I've been taking up building lego again after a long break. I know this is an old thread but thought I would share my progress on my ship. She is slowly taking shape but it mostly the Shell that's pretty much done. 

It's a 64-gun ship built on Seven midsections. Many new technics have been shared though the years and I have borrowed a few and I like to thanks the community for all your awesome ships I seen. 

Could'nt figurer out how to post an image here but here is the link. I hope you take a minute and have a look. 

https://imgur.com/gallery/69U6p81

[Jack Sassy]

9 hours ago, Okke said:

I hope you take a minute and have a look. 

I was not familiar with this topic until now, but she does look lovely as she is now. Good luck on further updates! 

[Cousarmy0001]

Man, talk about a blast from the past!  I wasn't even on EB when this was originally posted.

You've certainly advanced a lot in your technique.  I'm interested to see your finished product.  Hopefully it's less than 12 years away!