kurigan

Sorry, couldn't resist More about the build later.

@Wellesley First off, thank you for the credit. *nod* Next: I think you may be in the wrong forum to be concerned with sail function, but never mind that. I stopped by casually and have been reading over, looking up and racking my brain about this question for an hour now. In my quest for greater understanding I've found precious little on lateen sails, but think I have some concept of how they work. In general it seems, that unless the sail was particularly large, most handling was done by dropping the yard down to the deck, making any necessary changes and re-hoisting the whole thing. With that in mind I don't really see a need for buntlines. Perhaps on a huge galley or particularly large xebec frigate, it would make things a little easier but even in such a case work on a given sail is not done while under the press of the wind. Either the entire vessel is turned off the wind or the yard being attended to is swung around to go slack. Working sail under pressure is only done in desperate situations where speed simply cannot be lost, but it's a reckless affair. So, it wouldn't matter what side they are on. Buntlines would lift the foot of a limp sail the same for either side and with the crew still needing to handle the fabric, any bias could easily be overcome with a bit of pushing and pulling. Lateen sails are essentially the like Lug sails. The primary difference is that Lug sails are truncated and Lateen stretch out. I find the Wiki on Lug sails to be a decent starting point. There's an entry on Lateen sails, but talks more about the history and origins than the working or function. With Lug sails balanced and standing rigs stay on one side of the mast, deforming around in on one tack while filling competently on the opposite. this is why you see xebecs rigged like the yellow one in the painting so that some sails will deformed while others are full on any given tack. Many simpler rigs use a dipping system where by the yard can be swung around to either side of the mast to best serve on that tack. The split sail in the drawing above is a clever way to achieve something similar with out having to handle the entire weight of the yard, sail and tackle every tack. Trouble is, I'v never seen anything like it anywhere else before. That's not to say my knowledge so complete that my ignorance invalidates the concept. It does illustrate the trouble with anecdotal evidence as well as why you'll see the same ships modeled time and again. You can torture yourself looking for more reference material or guess at an interpretation, which may be way off in the end, or you can pick up "Anatomy of a Ship" or purchase plans taken from admiralty records and know for sure what you're making is correct and sound in theory. I know things like Game Labs are tossed out as a great sources of "information" because of the wealth of shared images, but they're really not. Out of context it's just cute ideas nothing of real substance. Stick with NRG especially if you really want to find someone who can tell you more about a strange duck like that. The wind in the painting makes perfect sense to me. The Galley on the far left as well as the xebec on the far right have their sails "gull winged" out as the wind is very close to right aft, putting them at a speed disadvantage for this type of rig. The yellow xebec, center, seems to be taking advantage of this to press their attack, dashing in across the wind in hopes of taking the smaller xebec before the big galley can come down on them. Well there it is. I have no idea how I get caught up in these things, perhaps I'm just susceptible to flattery. In any case, it's out here now, do with it as you wish. Cheers! Dave

Are you really asking this, mate? You can skip right over all my works if you want and go right back to my original inspiration: Cutty Sark by Henrik Hoexbroe I mean, why re-invent the wheel? Dave P.S. I almost forgot about Bumblebee and Nuisance and theses MOCs.

Nope, not having that conversation. k, you do you Yes.

@Wellesley Classically cat heads weren't very long as they only had to be long enough to keep the anchor from fouling on the hull. The longer the timber, the greater the chance it could break under strain. The shorter of these two is likely sufficient.

@Cyberfounder Hahaha. Awesome, TY.

Well it looks like I'm still reply bane.. sorry bout that. Can't expect too much of the MOC forum these days anyway. I think you misunderstand me on labeling. If you built a duck, call it a duck, by all means. What I'm referring to is what I call the "just" defense. "Go easy on me because it's just a toy". It just goes hand-in-hand with accepting the criticism on offer. Enough of my personal crusade, though. My advice always starts off fairly generically. Start small. Do one thing well and build from there. In this 21st century there is no lack of (free) information it just takes patience to build. After the better part of a decade of experimenting, building and rebuilding I had only a tiny cutter as my master work. Two years later I tore it down to parts and rebuilt it twice before calling it anything like done. Let's look at what you have here though. *sigh*... I've added to this and deleted it so many times. I just can't commit to anything I come up with. I don't want to "out nerd" you, filling a page with corrections and specifications. I also don't want to force my values on you. The only advice I can come up with is generic and vague. I had really hopped someone else would have come along by now. The truth of it is I don't really like them. While I get that you're tying to capture the dynamic shape of a wooden ship and that pleases me, I find your approach direct and exaggerated. Pick your favorite builder and tell me that the beauty of their technique isn't suitability. Wooden ships are nuanced things, curving and changing gradually across their entire structure. Even CGH advises with his famous tutorial, that there's a limit to how much you can really add to a pre-fab hull before it looks distorted and I find that technique pretty direct in its own right (not bad nor wrong, don't lynch me). It also seems that the pre-fab hulls are holding you up. Frankly I hate them as they do not produce a realistic ship shape. They wind up making hot dogs (or bananas when sheer is forced through progressive plate stacking) when ships are really shaped more like ducks, or at least their bottom halves. I think it boils down to this; if you want to do history, get off pre-fab hulls. If you just want to make "Lego Ships" there's still no reason to re-invent the wheel. All that aside I do appreciate that you did a sheer hulk. It's an important piece of the history that is often overlooked in modeling, especially in Lego. Dave P.S. I too have (im)famously taken inspiration from SlyOwl, pretty clever guy that one

@TomSkippy That's cool then. Good price too, they were going for more a while ago. If I recall correctly, i might have sold one for as much as $12 but that's just where the market was. I did go digging but didn't find any either @Cyberfounder I would very much like to see a photo of that.

Well before you jump to the conclusion that you've been cheated, understand that not everyone on bricklink is even as much of an enthusiast as yourself, let alone an expert, nor do they need to be. What you're holding may be the result of an honest mistake. That being said, I did a bit of searching and can find no reference to the cockade ever being intentionally printed on the opposite side of the hat. Even mine from childhood all match the bricklink image. It could be that what you have is a rare printing error or even a custom. The best advice is always to reach out to the seller. Perhaps they know the provenance of the thing and can shed some light on its origins. If it came from a collector/customizer it may very well be a custom print, maybe a total fake. If it came from a random Craigslist buy, who knows? I've accidentally sold a total fake once before, it happens especially when you're moving a lot of bricks. Of course I made good on it with a refund then went and checked every neck stud in inventory for a Lego logo. If I had gotten that hat, depending on what I paid for it, I might just hold on to it as a novelty but not before reaching out to the seller. Most are honest and will help you, but they can't until you let them know there is a problem. You may also do them a favor as my customer did for me, in filling me in. Turned out that I had several fake DC characters, all from the same buy. I got the others out of inventory before anyone else could order them. I'll be curious to know how this ultimately works out. If/when you learn anything, please let us know. Dave P.S. I'll dig into back stock to see if i have one. if you can't get satisfaction from this seller, perhaps we can work something out. For bricklink and eurobricks I use the same username P.P.S. Ha, looks like the links are still in my signature. Though they dd away with those. Neat!

It seems fate or some other force lead me back here tonight. I didn’t pull this thread knowingly, but here I am. I’m sure I'll come to regret it, but I'll take up this mantle and chime in with the best I can offer and let the chips fall where they may. It has been my hard-won experience that people here rarely actually want advice, criticism, or input. Most who show up here are looking for a “pat on the back” and a “good job” expecting or hoping that they will astonish everyone with their grand works. The few that may actually be genuinely interested in a peer review tend to handicap themselves such as you’ve done. You open with a paragraph of excuses and self-deprecation then continue on throughout the post to specify exactly what it is you don’t want to hear. To be clear, I am guilty of these bad habits myself from long ago, so when I proffer my advice know it comes from genuine experience and a place of self-reflection. There is value in what I say even if it is inconvenient. Pick a path and stay on it. Either accept the criticism of the community as it is offered, or keep your work to yourself. You're not going to get good advice by trying to force the hand of your judge and there is no glory nor honors to be won by being “the best”. Often the best advice comes from those with wildly different goals and ambitions than you. For one, they often come from a similar starting point and have developed along with their skills and experiences. It also helps to consider the ideas generated in differing pursuits as it may lead to something new and innovative to your own method. When you say what this “IS” with such certainty as to exclude all other possibilities a lot of builders throw up their hands and back away, not wanting to intrude with their own ideas. Much of what you’ll get in advice will be pointless and useless in your own idiom. Suffer it for the sake of the rare gem or don’t bother. Ask yourself, before you think me the villain, had you spent years building up your knowledge, skills and technique, came and offered it freely, would you appreciate in turn being told that your particular brand was not welcomed on a particular thread? Also and furthermore, if you so appreciate and respect the builders and works you’ve observed here, why do you feel it necessary to explain what it is you have on offer as if they can’t make it out for themselves? Keep it short and sweet. If they touch on a sensitive point or one of no interest, “nod and smile”. They didn’t have to bother, but they tried to do you a kindness. In all this one thing relating to the actual build, rather than the presentation stood out to me. While they seem just a bit short, the artillery on the deck of your supply vessel do not seem at all like carronades, but rather smooth bore, muzzle-loading long guns. In fact, the design you used was invented by users here (I don’t recall exactly who, but likely one of our old veterans since they’ve become fairly conventional) to represent long guns. It’s just this kind of over explanation that can lead to a bad reputation and make you look like, well... a butt. Again, I know, done it myself. (I’ll check back and if I find you edited that, I’ll edit this out so you can look cool again? call it a kindness from one megablocks to... well let’s reserve judgement just yet) Standard disclaimer: I only bother because I'm intrigued. It’s not that I'm anything like “the great man” that my opinion is so invaluable. Instead, your work intrigues me, thus I feel a certain comradery that I feel is best served by honesty. As a ship builder, you show good merits and great potential, so I'm inspired to take a chance and extend my hand. It's no small thing to sit up late at night and compose a reply as such, so understand if I didn’t care, I wouldn’t bother. Dave

Not sure exactly to which part you’re referring so I put the terms which apply in bold so you can look them up. The outer most part to which the figurehead is attached and where the head rails terminate is called the beakhead. Below that the portion of the prow or stem which counter curves to break the surface tension is a cutwater. Further down, below the water line, the forefoot curves back under the hull to meet the keel; which is essentially the spine of the ship, running the rest of the length to the stern post. The entire forward part of the ship, which meets the sea, it called the bow. Those basket like railings are called head rails and form a kind of toilet seat for use by the common seaman. Larger ships, with enough space to afford to them would also augment or replace the old fashioned railings with seats of ease. The lower most portion of the mast which protrudes out ahead of the hull is the bowsprit. Attached to that, extending it further, are the jib booms. The first vertical mast is the foremast and the portion of the ship’s hull which makes a wall for preventing the sea from washing over the decks is the breakwater. From what I see here it seems to me that your figure head is too big and the beakhead is much more structure than needed to support it. Historically, most figureheads were carved to be simple without a lot of extended limbs to break of in the ocean. Often they were placed to be the very end of the beakhead, so that there was nothing more above them to interfere with the bowsprit. They were rarely of life size except on the largest ships and not all were anthropomorphic, taking the shape of an animal, crest or abstract decoration instead. Legostone’s image of Essex shows well what I’m referring to here. The figure’s head is above the beakhead and only slightly higher than the deck of the focsle allowing the bowsprit to sit at a low 30 degree angle (which would allow her to carry more and/or larger head sails between the bowsprit and fore mast). On my own models I rarely have any decoration on the prow, simply because I don’t warrant them large enough to accommodate any, in reference both to the fashion of their type in history and in the physical size of their construction in Lego. What I have used as decoration has been small of the 1 X 1 variety, like a parrot in one instance or a flower in another. Keep in mind, that though the scales of our respective works are different they are similar in size. Even my tiny sloops are wider than pre-fab hull sections by several studs. There you go, lots of free information, do with it as you will.

Surprise

Indeed...

"He" did indeed do some bit of a tutorial, but it turned out to be a lot more work than it seemed worth. I only ever got so far before I had to stop but you can start here.

Though we do appreciate your interest and enthusiasm we do ask that you refrain from bumping old topics. For your edification please revisit the Site Guidelines as well as this topic on Bumping Old Topics. Thank you for understanding.

I'm done. I quit. I'm out.

@Bregir Alright then: I like this one too. May I suggest a few things though? First, I appreciate the sand green lower portion; looks like oxidized copper. If you used a combination of plates on end and those same slopes in a manner similar to what I did on Bumblebee, you could make the curves match, in theory. I've wanted to do something like this, with the sand green on my own ships, but never come across enough sand green, anything. Also, if you use more than one fulcrum you can make the bows bluffer than the stern. From my experience with this style, it doesn't appear you've gone beyond the natural tolerance built into the bricks, not even close really. You could get much more curve without damaging the bricks which would help up forward. On that note, using the brick-bricks to look like planking was clever. With a bluffer bow you can also shrink the cutwater to a single stud wide, which IMHO would just look better. If you do get those top-down views I'd love to see your gun and how it's mounted. I might have an idea or two for ya there too.

Here's another great site worth checking out: https://www.historicnavalfiction.com/general-hnf-info

@Bregir I would love this design, more as a schooner than a brig, of not for those pre-fabs. They're just so unnecessary here and they just brings the waterline down too low. She looks as though she got hung up on a sand bar at high tide and has wait for it to come back in. Where your chain plate is now, is about where the waterline should be... Ah who am I kidding! You don't care. Have fun mate!

I can haz joining bounty? As has become my wont, I've been keeping my current projects under wraps but this was just too perfect, so enjoy a sneak peak, courtesy of my ridiculous cat!

Yeah, pretty much what he said

This, is incredible. Sorry I took so long to get around to saying so, but I do love everything about this. The design, the execution, the scenario, it's all just too much fun. Thanks for sharing !

@Cousarmy0001 Alright, I'll chime in... As for guns, I agree with Cousarmy. For size and scale brick built is the way to go. Handily enough, there's a link in my signature to a few purist friendly designs which may be of use. Check out The Foundry. It's very incomplete and needs a lot of work, but it's start. There's also the ones I put on Reckless and if you really like those and ask real nice, I can show you some I've come up with which no one has yet seen. My initial impression of Aurora was "oh, like Moshulu" She's a ship turned restaurant in Philadelphia where, incidentally, I had my wedding reception. This likening I based on both the setting and her hull shape. I'll expound; brace your selves! I don't think you owe any one credit in particular for any technique used, not that I can think of. In fact, I think you've invented a new one with the flex tube and flags. It’s really quite clever and looks great. You've achieved a complex shape at the bow which thus far has seemed like something of a chimera. I also like GeoBrick's idea and think it might work out if you tried it. Perhaps it's the color scheme or the thickness of the bulwarks, but I just didn't see a wooden hull, until I forced myself to look for it. She struck me right off as an iron or steel hull, something from the late 19th or early 20th century, and I don't think that's bad place to be. A lot more late-period metal hulls survive today than wooden hulls anyway. As a museum ship on a trendy waterfront, like Philly's own Penn's Landing, that makes a lot more sense to me. If you go that route, loose the cabin and round your stem into a fantail. You can use the same technique as on the bow. Also lose the guns outright, save the trouble, and give her a more benign back story, why not? OK now is where my advice gets... unpopular. While I realize the whole point was to play around with the pre-fab hulls, my best advice is to strike em. They are a handicap and a crutch at the same time, IMHO. You put Sirius at the top yourself. I shouldn't need to offer any more encouragement than that to convince you that you're a better builder, no? OK, then let me put it like this: These are to car design what pre-fabs are to ship building. You'll do as you will, but I don't see why you can't use something like Sirius' technique in combination with the flags and tubes to make a truly remarkable, unique and innovative design. Sorry all, but the "bad guy" shtick isn't over just yet. Rigging. Insist on purism here if you must, but Lego was never intended to simulate anything like a ship's rigging in anyway and always falls short. Short of truly looking the part or offering even token support to a ship model's upper works. It is my considered opinion, that in such cases, where there are simply no Lego pieces to do the job, it should be OK, even by purist standards, to introduce non-Lego elements. After all you're just substituting one piece of string for another. If difficulty and time consumption are your worry, take it from me, it's unfounded. Though it's not a task for the faint of heart, string rigging is nowhere near as challenging as it would seem most believe it to be. If you wish to give it a shot, reach out to me and I can do a lot to get you started. One more thing and again I'm repeating myself here but, ah... research, research, research. You don't need to be a "book worm" to run a few Google searches, but being able to say "This! I am definitely making one of these." is invaluable. Just like you did with Sirius, you saw a shape you liked and worked to recreate that. Alright, finally, my standard disclosure. When wondering in what tone to take my words, air in favor of benevolence rather than animosity. Though I may seem heavily critical, that I even bothered should be seen as encouragement, not discouragement. Plenty of builds go by and I say nothing. It takes time to compose all this, so take or leave my advice, but don't do so lightly. She's a great build so far. I say; keep building and thanks for sharing! edit: 1 "offering even token support to a ship model's upper works" may he too bold of a statement. Those Classic Pirate shrouds offer quite a nit of support being rigid plastic. 2 I remembered HM Bark Endeavor after I shut everything down to finally go to bed. She uses a similar technique and you may find her an interesting bit of inspiration.

Welcome aboard mate! I see that this is your first and only post. There is a place for conversations of this sort, where you may find better luck, the Buy, Sell, Trade forum (BST), check it out. While you're taking a tour of the site, you might as well brush up on the Site Guidelines; never hurts . Also, are you aware of sites like bricklink.com or brickowl.com, where you can buy specific bricks in specific quantities? You can even take that parts list and make it a wanted list so the site can find the best store(s) for you. One more thing, you'll find it's in good form, and likely to generate more cooperation (and garner less attention from the staff) if you make some sort of introduction for yourself. You could share some of your own MOCs or tell us all a little about your self here. Cheers!