[MOC] USS Poseidon - Minifig Scale First Rate Ship of the Line

[Luca I]

Wonderful!!! amazing!!! great shiplover!! you've always been my favourite builder!!

[Captain Edward]

Good god, it is finished! The rigging looks stunning. Must've been a frustrating couple of weeks.

[icm]

Lord Nelson would be proud to have this in his estate at Paradise Merton, if it weren't for the Yankee colors!  Are the lower decks finished and furnished, or is all the space needed for structural support?

[shiplover]

On 6/9/2018 at 11:04 AM, icm said:

Lord Nelson would be proud to have this in his estate at Paradise Merton, if it weren't for the Yankee colors!  Are the lower decks finished and furnished, or is all the space needed for structural support?

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. 

Edited June 10, 2018 by shiplover

[Cousarmy0001]

HOLY CRAP!!!!

[Roadmonkeytj]

Truely an amazing ship ... Will you be taking it to any public venues to show it off?

[mcflathead05]

This is an awesome looking Ship-of-the-Line!  I want to build one. Any suggestions?

 

J

[A_Goodman]

Simply Amazing

[shiplover]

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. 

[Wellesley]

On 9/12/2018 at 10:13 PM, mcflathead05 said:

Any suggestions?

Being your first ship(?), start smaller;)

But don't use prefab-hulls.
I would suggest a two-decker, way easier to figure out the height-width-proportion.
But the techniques you see on this beauty will work on any ship of any size, I guess. I especially like the division into several hull-sections connected via pins.

[shiplover]

On 9/12/2018 at 2:13 PM, mcflathead05 said:

This is an awesome looking Ship-of-the-Line!  I want to build one. Any suggestions?

 

J

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!

Edited March 25, 2019 by shiplover

[Jake77]

 

On 3/25/2019 at 10:05 PM, shiplover said:

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!

Dear God... I'm unable to put it into words how Incredible this is. The WIP felt like an amazing experience itself.
One day I want to build a ship in Minfig scale, perhaps a 3rd of 4th rate ship that is still going to be very large but significantly smaller than a 1st rate ship of the line.

What have u done with the ship since, have u moved it to a place to display it?

[Count Vroskri]

@Jake77. Shiplover hasn't been online since March last year, so bumping an old topic probably won't help you. If he was online I'd suggest a sending him a PM. also try not to quote an entire post as it takes up space. 

Looking forward to seeing you around,

Count Vroskri 

[shiplover]

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!  

[Supersick_]

74 gun 3rd rate! Since you’re adept at historical research and accuracy  - I think French Temeraire class ships are the perfect balance for ships of the line and their proliferation in 18th century navies (mainly French and English) yielded something like 120 ships constructed to this specific design, let alone the various other 74 gun designs. IMO 74s proved that 1st and 2nd rates eventually existed purely as flagships and chest-beating not as efficient weapons. Further evidence being the age of HMS Victory even by the time of Trafalgar - it obviously was neither economic nor effective to build 1st rates over 3rd rates. 
 

Now, Pirates getting their hands on a 3rd rate - that’s something I’d like to see! 

[Brickander Brickumnus]

16 minutes ago, Supersick_ said:

74 gun 3rd rate! Since you’re adept at historical research and accuracy  - I think French Temeraire class ships are the perfect balance for ships of the line and their proliferation in 18th century navies (mainly French and English) yielded something like 120 ships constructed to this specific design, let alone the various other 74 gun designs. IMO 74s proved that 1st and 2nd rates eventually existed purely as flagships and chest-beating not as efficient weapons. Further evidence being the age of HMS Victory even by the time of Trafalgar - it obviously was neither economic nor effective to build 1st rates over 3rd rates. 

Out of curiosity, I searched this ship class for information.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Téméraire-class_ship_of_the_line

So many of them were, one way or another, annihilated!
The sheer incompetence of the French in the naval affairs of this particular period is just unbelievable!!! 
 

16 minutes ago, Supersick_ said:

Now, Pirates getting their hands on a 3rd rate - that’s something I’d like to see! 

Me too! 

Edited March 11, 2021 by Brickander Brickumnus

[Supersick_]

13 hours ago, Brickander Brickumnus said:

Out of curiosity, I searched this ship class for information.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Téméraire-class_ship_of_the_line

So many of them were, one way or another, annihilated!
The sheer incompetence of the French in the naval affairs of this particular period is just unbelievable!!! 

Haha for real! It’s not the ship’s/design’s fault though! Sané was a master. It was actually ahead of British designs (as were most French vessels) but errr, between artillery practices of aiming at rigging foremost and cutting the heads off or disbanding most of your admiralty, I’m surprised the French navy (MNF) lasted as long as it did. And then eventually Napoleon completely misused or even abused his naval strategy that further reflects poorly once history is written. 
 

The Royal Navy liked the ship though! Hahaha. They took quite a few as prizes and even built new RN “classes” based on her lines (named after the prize ships the had captured).

Most famously they captured Duguay Trouin like 2 weeks after Trafalgar and she became HMS Implacable - whose stern is on display at the National Maritime Museum. Unfortunately she was scuttled in 1949 - what a waste! Such a shame, a surviving 74-gun would be a wonderful thing to see in the 21st century. 
 

 

 

Edited March 12, 2021 by Supersick_

[Cousarmy0001]

On 3/11/2021 at 8:00 AM, shiplover said:

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!  

Maybe enough pirate 5th and 6th rates to challenge your 1st rate should be your next project