WiP: Schooner

[kabel]

inspired by the team contest I decided it was time for me to come back to the pirate forum. Seems like I finally have enough bricks to work for two themes. Anyway, here's may latest project, an 18th century top sail schooner, based on the USS Hannah.

The deck will envtually be tan, as you can see on the one corner. The half fences are what I'm going to use in order to attach the shrouds. The only think I'm not quite sure about is the masts. Somehow I feel like the brick build ones might look a little too thick on the small prefab hulls. I'll see how it turns out.

[Sebeus I]

Yes! More small hull ships .

The black top looks great on that white hull, The original masts pieces work great on these small ships I think.

I'm looking forward to an interesting stern design .

[Mr. Townsend]

Off to a good start Kabel. I agree that 2x2 rounds will end too thick. The prefab masts would work well though. I had thought about using those on my schooner but I would have had to pull from my Imperial Flagship. I think that the yellow line sags too far in the middle. I think if the lowest yellow 1x8 was black it might look more sleek.

Have you ever contemplated building waterline off the prefabs? I saw your port on flicker and it would be awesome to have your ships sit perfectly in your display.

Brick on Kabel!

[Captain Braunsfeld]

Looks promising - Thanks for sharing the work in progress with us.

Not sure about how far black and yellow should go. I'll judge once the work is completed :-)

Masts? Should be ok with 2x2 round bricks.

Keep going!

[-DoNe-]

She is looking great so far!

I really like the color scheme!

[kabel]

Thanks for the encouraging feedback guys. Its actually great building in this era again after an almost 2,5 year break.

@Seb: I will try to use the prefab masts, but I wonder if they reach high enough. I shall see. And yes, getting to the stern really proves to be a challenge on the small prefabs.

@MrT: I've swapped the 1x8 plate for a black one already, definetely an improvement! As for waterline ships, I'm not quite sure yet, I've just bought new prefab hulls so I might as well use them. And regarding my harbor town, it's actually set in the late medieval/early Renaissance period and this ship will not appear there.

@Capt.B: I believe that showing wips usually helps quite a bit to improve things. I hate to take everything apart after I started the rigging. So pics from early on should help to mend out the worst flaws.

@DoNe: that's what I really like about this era of ships, they always have such nice colorschemes.

[kurigan]

I'd love to compare notes and such. Naturally my first notes should come as no surprise and may not be what you want to hear. First and for most; get her off those prefab hulls. I read what you wrote about money spent and trust me I understand the sentiment. I don't know that you’re going to do yourself any favors or your design any justice with those, particularly as your using the more narrow variety. Hither to, small hulls haven’t been quite so popular in part because of the scaling issues. Legos just don't tend to allow you to get quite small enough and maintain realism or detail. Tiny vessels then wind up being of similar length and breadth as much larger ships. A fine case in point is DPW's Pickle. The real pickle is downright diminutive, smaller even than your Hanna, yet his built on the newer, larger pre-fabs, is still cramped on deck. My own Green Schooner is as long and wide as my SES.

My first impression is that you’re exaggerating her scale, which seems evident in the height of her free board. Check these guys out they have a model kit of Hanna and very nice images thereof. On those you can see that the gunwale is only up to about knee height. Your seems as though it would come up above the shoulders of your mini-figure there. It also appears that you intend to build a separate focsle there by sinking the gun deck like the waist of a frigate. I didn't see that in any of the reference material I found. Rather the only division was amid ship where the quarter deck was slightly higher than then the gun/weather deck. I find here proportions to be very similar to the replica vessel Sultana of which I have a few detail shots for my own reference. Check them out, perhaps you’ll find them useful.

[Kolonialbeamter]

Neat little ship, I like it so far. But I partially agree with Kurigan, the small prefabs are at least treacherous, ships based on them become too tall easily, take care (which I'm sure you will)!

Anyway, good luck and keep it up!

Oh, and I'm glad you started building in the Pirates' forum again.

Regards

[Admiral Croissant]

Great to see you building these kind of ships again!

This seems to become another nice project, but if you really want to make a LEGO model of USS Hannah, I agree with Kurigan that a custom hull could fit the original shape better.

But if this ship is more "inspired by" USS Hannah it could just be a great ship MOC.

By the way, how's the Endeavour coming along? Or did you abandon that project? I thought that was a very exciting project!

[kabel]

Hey guys, thanks for the feedback!

@Kurigan: thanks for all this input, it took a while to digest all of that. I really apreciate it, but there seems to be a bit of a misunderstanding here. I'm actually not trying to build an excact replica of the Hannah but I much rather take her as an inspiration in order to do something in minfig illusion scale. So basically what I'm trying to achieve is something like Bonapartes Xebec, just in different colors and as a different type of ship: in short, to finally create something cool on the small prefabs, which is something we don't see so often. I'm sorry I didn't say so more clearly.

However, who's to say the next project mightn't be something more realistic, who knows ...

@Kolonialbeamter: I've finally amassed an amount of bricks where I can build for two forums. It took quite a while though ... So now, I'm actually working on 5 wips (3 GoH, 2 pirates) simultaneously, which allows me to use most of the bricks I encounter while grubbing through my bricks.

@AC: Actually, I took the Endeavor apart in order to build the caravel, on which I've just started the rigging. So what you see here is me trying to downsize the Endeavor and use her bricks and plates (yellow and blue) to build something smaller. I know that that was sort of dumb, but trying to construct the Endeavour's rig and of course that small yellow window frustrated me so much, that I decided to go for something not quite as large and compilcated.

[Admiral Croissant]

@AC: Actually, I took the Endeavor apart in order to build the caravel, on which I've just started the rigging. So what you see here is me trying to downsize the Endeavor and use her bricks and plates (yellow and blue) to build something smaller. I know that that was sort of dumb, but trying to construct the Endeavour's rig and of course that small yellow window frustrated me so much, that I decided to go for something not quite as large and compilcated.

I remembered something like that had happened, but couldn't find the exact post and wasn't sure.

Still a shame, I really thought it was becoming one of the best LEGO replicas I'd ever seen. Very promising.

However, perhaps you might still give it a try after you've finished this vessel.

It could be a good training for some techniques, or for the rigging.

Anyway, best of luck with this project! It's nice too

[kabel]

I actually haven't made that much progress yet, but I took in some considerations and the full extent of the hull is becoming visible

@sebeus: it's actually possible to bend the broad side a little, check this out:

[Sebeus I]

Not much progress but an interesting Idea .

Although the shape looks great, I don't think I can get myself to bend the broadside on my own ships, too afraid of tension in the construction .

[kabel]

There is more tension in my late medieval ships than in this one, where I'm only bending innward by one stud. So given the length of your broadside, I'd say woud could see even less tension.

[Mr. Townsend]

She is coming along nicely Kabel. I like that you applied tension to get the hull to slope in like that. I also really like the use of black windows for the gunports. I do however, think that to achieve the best look with those windows the black line at the bottom needs to come into contact with the windows rather then having the yellow underneath. I apologize that I hadn't noticed this last time I mentioned raising the line but I hadn't noticed the use of the window frames do to the port covers. I support your having gotten rid of those covers by the way.

I'm curious which way you will decide to build the masts. 2x2, 1x1 technic connectors, or prefab masts.

I too am disappointing about the loss of the Endeavor. That ship inspired me to use tan on Pinnacle. Understandable of course, and I'm glad to see you are using her bits to keep your building in the pirate's era.

[Sebeus I]

I too am disappointing about the loss of the Endeavor. That ship inspired me to use tan on Pinnacle. Understandable of course, and I'm glad to see you are using her bits to keep your building in the pirate's era.

I agree, the Endeavor had some very nice details I haven't seen on any otehr ship, like those red covers over the stairs.

[Captain Golden Hook]

Your ship looks like a cute little baby beluga that was hacked in half!

(Sorry, I couldn't resist) ;P

Edited May 9, 2014 by Captain Golden Hook

[Sebeus I]

Your ship looks like a cute little baby beluga that was hacked in half!

(Sorry, I couldn't resist) ;P

You just wait when you're posting your hornet .

[kabel]

well thanks guys. I know progress is slow, but I wanted to show that I took in some of your considerations!

@Mr.T: that is the big question. Currently I'm meandering between brick build 2+2s and prefabs. I can't decide either way.

Sorry about the Endeavour guys, but the caravel isn't turning out so bad either, so I think it's a good compensation. Maybe I'll try myself at her again another time, once I've come up with a good idea to get the windows right that is ...

@CGH: Beluga's are the most amazing animals, wouldn't wanna hack 'em ...

[kabel]

thought I might let the interested know that I was working on this project again:

[Captain Braunsfeld]

Thanks for sharing the update - this is going to be a very fine vessel!

[Sebeus I]

It's coming along nicely, I would think the yellow and tan wouldn't look good together but It seems to work out just great.

I noticed you may be intending to make some kind of grates in the center of the ship,

using the half fences SNOTted on headlight bricks.

I don't know what it is but this technique just won't work whenever I try that, the construction never fits.

[__________________________]

This looks excellent. Looking forward to the finished MOC.

[Mr. Townsend]

I'm excited to see progress on this. She's looking good to my eye my friend. Keep it going.

[kabel]

Thanks for the encouragement lads! Going is slow as I only use pieces that are sort of left overs from my other projects, so it takes a while for all the pieces to get together. However, I should be able to finish the brick part pretty soo. What I really dread though is the rigging. That has always been the stage at which I gave up on ship projects, so I hope it's not going to happen this time.