Horatio

I have built better carriages for my guns- The new line-up is (from left to right) 2x32 pound carronade, 8x9 pounder guns, and 12x12 pounder guns (with 10 more invisible 12 pounders- I still have to make them). The new carriages hold the guns with a hinge- no more wedging in the barrels. The new carronades are my favorite- they actually look like carronades, and they slide on a track set up on the foredeck. I do have some adjustments made to the Surprize, such as improved gingerbread work, which I'll take some pictures of later. She really is shaping up to be a nice vessel.

Well, I actually do have the proper round pieces- the only thing is, they are in my star wars models. I've actually already torn apart much of my Millenium Falcon- to give you an idea of how many bricks I have, my RMS Titanic was 5 feet long- so I do have a lot of pieces still to use, but I've been hesitant. Only just now did I steal back my grates from my AT-AT. Fortunately though, I have found adequate replacement parts in some cases, so I have been able to do some upgrades, such as adding a head in a quarter gallery, putting in wardroom skylights, and I also stole some stormtrooper heads (the black plain ones) to build some of cb4's guns (you don't need to see the Stormtroopers' heads though, so it's all good). Here's the new gun lineup: Left to Right, we have a 6 pound carronade, a 9 pounder gun, and a 12 pounder. Here they are out of the carriages. Here's the new gun (with obvious influence from cb4- credit is due) I still don't like the carriages; the guns are just wedged in, and they don't have wheels. However, the new cannons are nice.

Alright, I decided to do another upgrade on the HMS Cucumber, but it turned into the building of a new ship. I retained some of the items, as the masts, figurehead, and wheel, but added a smoother bow and stern, and a good deal more weight. She now is a frigate with 28 guns. The Foredeck is broader, there's a hatch on the quarterdeck, and the wardroom is larger to accomodate all of the officers. The deck is also built inside the bulkheads, eliminating the brown line that used to run along the ship. Other details I've included are the fire buckets by the mizzen mast, a galley and chimeny, as well as a capstan below deck. I still have some more work to do, such as add proper rigging, sails, and grates over the hatches. Here, I have my own attempt at one of cb4's cannons. I named her Surprize because she's inspired by the HMS Surprise, but isn't supposed to actually be the HMS Surprise, and I didn't like the sound of HMS Athena- for her figurehead.

Alright, I've done some fine tuning on the stern of the HMS Cucumber. I've tried to make it more smooth, by using some hinges I stole from my Milenium Falcon. I also found my rowboat, and until I put in the breastwork on deck, I put in railings. http://www.brickshelf.com/cgi-bin/gallery.cgi?f=482502 Also, I can't figure out how to put images on my post- I tried doing it through Brickshelf, but it doesn't seem to work. Just now, I've gone through my general Lego bucket- with all the random pieces I don't really need right now- and I found a nice amount of red, yellow, black, and brown bricks, which I intend to use to upgrade the HMS Cucumber into a true Frigate. I've also bettered my cannons, and I've made the stern a little more accurate, such as putting the windows at an angle. So tomorrow, I'm going to post some new pictures, showing the construction progress.

Unfortunately, my camera is really bad, so I'm sorry for the poor quality pictures. And since those last pictures, I have decided to make some changes. I used to have a habit of making ships look too long, but with this one, it looked a little short. So I added 12 studs in the middle, which also allowed for 2 more gun ports on each side. Then I realized that the cannon count made her now a post ship rather than a sloop of war. Since post ships are essentially Frigates without an orlop (which I do not have), I decided to add a mizzenmast. I also added another gangway on the quarterdeck, a head, a skylight, more appropriate gangways to the main deck, and a nicer bell. This is probably the last upgrade that I can do though (she's gone through 3 so far), because if she's any longer, I would need to increase the height and width, which if I had to do, I might as well build a new ship. But she is now a Post Ship- one that a Captain can be proud to command. (NOTE: some of the spars are not in their final spots, and the ratlines need to be replaced- also, I'm going to add sails soon. Again, sorry about the poor quality.

Alright, I have some more pictures. But first, in regards to the title, I originally said "My First Blogged Ship," but I didn't like it, so I changed it and I was going to explain how I've built other ships before, but I had some trouble with the pictures, so I forgot. It is the first ship that I'm posting, though. As to the crew, she has 16 gun ports, and therefore would be considered a Sloop-of-War, with a crew of 90 to 125. However, the amount of Guns she has is 22, making her a sixth rate Post-ship, with a crew of 140-160. Even if she were a 6 gun ship, her crew would need to be about 25, so if anything there should be too few aboard. I've also attached some more pictures of the crew. First are the Officers- There's the Captain, 1st Lt., 2nd and 3rd Lt., sailing master, 3 midshipmen, Purser, Surgeon, Surgeon's mate, and cook. With the Marines there's a Marine Captain, Lt., 5 privates (yes, they are holding star wars guns- I don't have muskets, and I was being lazy), and a drummer. Here are the 14 ratings (I lost one somehow). Here, I have the 3 types of cannons that I used. on the left is a 6 pounder carronade, then the middle is a 12 pounder carronade, and on the right is a 12 pounder gun. I don't have much pirate lego, so I had to build my own cannons. the 12 pounder gun was tricky, but I was able to wedge the barrel into the carriage. http://www.flickr.com/photos/66707129@N07/6074178282/in/photostream/

They Should be coming today- I just have to work out a few glitches in my pictures.

Alright, hello all! I'm Horatio and this is my first time posting images of a Lego creation. My portfolio includes Hogwarts Castle, the RMS Titanic, the HMS Surprise, and various Star Wars vehicles, the best of which is a minifigure scale AT-AT. Now, I present my first blogged ship, the HMS Cucumber. She's named so because I had the HMS Pickle in mind when trying to name her, but she's a little bigger than the Pickle, and you know how cucumbers shrink during the pickling process, thus she is the Cucumber, because she's larger than the Pickle. She's a 12 gun ship (though as I type this she's going under an overhaul to become a 22 gun ship) with a crew of 35. Her sailing type is a brigatine.