Achilles099

Yeah that is one of my biggest frustrations, I wish there was a way to do both detailed and accurate rigging and maintain tons of access to the interior, but I haven't been able to figure out a satisfactory way to do that. I've consider things like making the sides of the hull along the gundecks removable, but then that precludes doing things like gun tackle, which I really like having. On my last ship I made sections of the deck removable, but that also proved unsatisfactory as even if those sections of deck didn't have any rigging connecting directly to it, all of the rigging made it extremely difficult to actually maneuver the deck segments off the ship and clear of the rigging. One thing I am going to experiment with is having the stern galleries open so that sections at the rear of the gundecks can slide out, but I am also planning on including a functional and accurate rudder linkage which will certainly pose serious challenges.

Thank you! I'm not sure I follow your question? Right now the hold is accessible by removing the orlop, and the plan is for the gundecks above (everything above the orlop deck, in fact) to be removable to give access to the orlop. The gundecks themselves will not be very accessible, which is just because of the level of realistic detail I am including there. I've been thinking about how I might be able to make some areas of the gundecks accessible, but for the most part they will be sealed up once the build is complete since the rigging requires solid structures that will not shift (since the rigging supports the masts).

I'm curious if you've tested this latest design in real bricks yet? That sail design looks cool, but it also looks very heavy and I wonder if it might cause the masts to lean forward quite severely.

Very nice model! Just fyi, a 28 gun ship would be a sixth rate, not a fifth rate. The rating system only accounted for long guns, so carronades and swivels didn't count towards a ship's rating (hence why ships rated as 38's in British service actually carried 46-48 guns in the French Revolutionary and Napoleonic Wars, but were still only rated as 38's).

Have you thought about making it longer and wider? It's going to look very squat once you add additional decks and the upperworks, in my opinion.

Ambitious project, great progress so far! What's the length of the gundeck in studs going to be?

Nice build! Are some of these custom minifigures, and if so, where'd you get them made?

Thank you! Me too, I was worried about using all LEGO strings at this scale but I think it turned out great! I'm thinking about adding more of the running rigging if I can get some more white string, but I need to reinforce the spars somehow otherwise the weight of string on them will be too much. Thanks for the kind words!

Thanks so much for the kind words!

Thanks! It is in fact 100% LEGO strings used for all of the rigging!

Thank you for all the compliments! Yeah photography is not my strong suit, I might resubmit if I can get some better shots. If the sun would finally come out where I live I could get some decent natural lighting hopefully! Thanks! No problem at all, high-quality sources on this topic are sometimes hard to find and difficult to assess the reliability of so I figured many people could benefit from knowing some of the sources I found were best! Enjoy the reading!

Thank you! I built it very large so I could cram in as much detail as possible! Check out the full album to see all the below-deck details too!

Thanks, that's what I was going for! It is taller than me when it's on a table! Thanks! Thank you, glad you like it! Now I just need somewhere to display it! The rigging was a lot of time and effort but it is also one of my favourite parts to work on because the payoff is so great when you can get it to look the way you want. Thank you!

Hello! I'm excited to share my nearly complete MOC of HMS Diana, a fifth-rate Artois class frigate launched in 1794. I set out to make this ship as close to true minifigure scale as I could get it, and I am pleased with the result. I also wanted to improve on the design of my previous frigate in terms of achieving greater accuracy and detail. IMG_1171 by Andrew Cardy, on Flickr The ship took me over a year to design and build, which included lots of time reading up on rigging. I'll include a list of the books I read at the end of this post in case anyone is interested. I re-designed several aspects of the ship multiple times. IMG_1168 by Andrew Cardy, on Flickr IMG_1202 by Andrew Cardy, on Flickr The ship is built with 100% LEGO elements, including all of the rigging. When I began working on it I intended to make the masts and rigging the same way I did with my first frigate, but I soon realized that I could improve on that design and make it more accurate, albeit with far more pieces and many more LEGO strings. All of the standing rigging (the lines which support the masts) is included, as well as some of the running rigging. All of the spars are supported with a series of ropes, just as they would be on a real ship. The spars can all be lowered and raised using the rigging, in these photos the spars are in the raised position, where they would be when the sails were set. IMG_1161 by Andrew Cardy, on Flickr The ship is 45 inches tall at the mainmast, and 46 inches long when measured from the beakhead to the taffrail. It is 65 inches from the tip of the bowsprit to the tip of the driver boom. IMG_1166 by Andrew Cardy, on Flickr IMG_1197 by Andrew Cardy, on Flickr Click the album for more detailed pictures, it was difficult to get some decent shots with the entire ship in frame but I did my best! Some books I read: Mondfeld, Wolfram zu. Historic Ship Models. New York: Sterling Publishing Company Incorporated, 1977. Ball, Nick, and Simon Stephens. Navy Board Ship Models. Barnsley: Seaforth Publishing, 2018. Petersson, Lennarth. Rigging Period Ship Models: A Step-by-Step Guide to the Intricacies of Square-Rig. London: Chatham Publishing, 2000. Lavery, Brian. The Arming and Fitting of English Ships of War: 1600-1815, n.d. Anderson, R.C. The Rigging of Ships in the Days of the Spritsail Topmast, 1600-1720. New York: Dover Publishing Inc., 1994. Lavery, Brian. The Ship of the Line: A History in Ship Models. Barnsley: Seaforth Publishing, 2014. I also used the Anatomy of the Ship series extensively, especially the one about HMS Diana of course, but also several of the other entries in that series. I hope you all enjoy the model and let me know what you think of it!

No problem! Here are some of the sources I've found helpful in my own building if you're interested: Mondfeld, Wolfram zu. Historic Ship Models. New York: Sterling Publishing Company Incorporated, 1977. Ball, Nick, and Simon Stephens. Navy Board Ship Models. Barnsley: Seaforth Publishing, 2018. Petersson, Lennarth. Rigging Period Ship Models: A Step-by-Step Guide to the Intricacies of Square-Rig. London: Chatham Publishing, 2000. Lavery, Brian. The Arming and Fitting of English Ships of War: 1600-1815, n.d. Anderson, R.C. The Rigging of Ships in the Days of the Spritsail Topmast, 1600-1720. New York: Dover Publishing Inc., 1994. Lavery, Brian. The Ship of the Line: A History in Ship Models. Barnsley: Seaforth Publishing, 2014. As someone else in this thread also suggested, the Anatomy of the Ship series is another great resource. In particular the books of that series about HMS Diana, HMS Bellona, and HMS Victory would probably be useful to you. Several of these books have lots of diagrams and/or pictures of models that should help you to properly locate your masts. Good luck!