1/72 HMS Victory Cross Section

Steve Jones

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Hi Jim

Good news with the jabs. Glad there were no side effects

Just had a very enjoyable catch up. The hammocks were so nice. Wonderful work on the pails and other detailing. It really is comming along a treat. Certainly one of the builds of the year so far. Keep up the great work my friend
 

Jim R

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Hi all
Once again I am so chuffed that so many of you are following this and I'm very encouraged by your kind comments.

Now this has slowed from my usual snail's pace to a geriatric snail's pace :rolling:. That is mostly due to the complexity of the next stage - four 32 pounder cannons to go in the lower gun deck. There are 2 wooden frets for the carriages and wheels.
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... and metal barrels which needed some clean up.
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The barrels were primed with Stynylrez, which worked fine, and then I airbrushed them black and then gave a coat of satin varnish. The carriages went together fine and were painted Yellow Ochre. You drill holes in the carriages to fit in the gun rigging rings. I airbrushed the rings with Stynylrez and when it died it simple flaked off - God knows what metal the rings are made of. Anyway I found a tin of exterior black metal paint in the garage, left over from a metal gate I had painted. So the rings were painted with that :tongue-out3:
The trunnions have cap squares over them. The kit gives some pins which are too long and the heads are the wrong shape. Luckily I have a rivet maker so punched out styrene rivets and CAed them in place. You can see the kit pin in the photo.
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Each cannon was built with a slightly different barrel angle. They have wedges fitted at the back to adjust the angle for aiming.
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So after a good bit of time I now have four 32 pounders. Daft as it seems each cannon has 25 parts :thinking: Rigging them next which looks a nightmare.
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As always thanks for sticking with it and all your comments and likes.

Jim
 

wotan

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Jim

This continues to be a fascinating and beautifully executed build. Great job on the 32 pounders. Incidentally most gun crews tended to name their guns and the name was painted free hand, in small letters along the side of the carriage. They tended to choose names like "Thunderer, Beelzebub ship smasher etc" Here's a couple of guns from the film Master and Commsnder if you fancy trying to ad names.

Gun 1.jpg

gun 3.jpg

John
 

Jim R

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John and Tim - appreciate you looking in and sorry for such a delay in thanking you.

John's post got me thinking and I did a bit of reading up on HMS Victory's armament. Couple of facts I found which surprised me. Each 32 pounder on the lower gun deck weighed over 3 tons and the gun crew was 9 to 14 men.

The guns are rigged. Each gun has a heavy breech rope and 3 sets of pulleys - one on each side and one on the rear. Threading everything up was a nightmare. Each knot had to be sealed with dilute PVA and getting the cord through the pulleys took a lot of time. It all looks a bit like "cat's cradle" at the moment but when the guns are fitted I'm hoping the ropes will be able to be tightened up - the instructions show the ropes tighter and neater.

It starts off OK, just simple attachment of the single pulleys.
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But then ARHHHHHH!!! Eventually you get this though :tongue-out3:
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So onwards and upwards.
Stay safe
Jim
 

wotan

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Jim

Good job with the rigging. A tip I found when fitting guns might help. The ends of all the lines were usually coiled down on the ground to keep them tidy. This is a really tough thing to model in place. You can make rope coils that are separate from the attached lines by simply coiling some thread and soaking with PVA glue. When these are dry just stick them onto the decking over the trimmed ends of the real lines and the effect is complete.

John
 

Archetype

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Wow Jim!

I've mentioned before I live locally to this ship and have been aboard many times (EDIT - redacted on the grounds of questionable accuracy!) and when I started reading your post about the gun builds I winced when I remembered how they are rigged! You have done a fine job of them, they do look incredible.
 

Tim Marlow

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Nice knitting Jim :thumb2: That looks great, it will look fantastic when they are in place......
There’s a lot of rigging on them. They need to be able to be run in and run out, and to be lashed tight....wouldn’t want three tons of gun running amuck during a bad storm.....I assume the big cable through the breech ring is there to stop them recoiling too far.....
Don’t think I’d like to stand on the other ship in an engagement! Three shots a minute at point blank range would destroy anything in front of them.
 

yak face

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Completely missed this one in January jim , just had a read through and wow , excellent work , a superb bit of building. Its going to be a showstopper when its on display in the house , cheers tony
 

Steve Jones

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I really look forward to the updates on this build. That must have been a trial of your patience to get those cannons done. A real dedication to the cause. Beautiful work my friend.
 

boatman

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HI Jim really fantastic work on those cannons an i can see that you enjoyed building these as it shows on how well you have made them brilliant work sir i take my hat off to you an just looking at them brings back memeriores for me an jen when we was lookin at the real things in victory as we have been over her about 3 times an your cannons look the spitting image of the real guns very well done on this model its a showstopper in our opinion as i shew jen an she aggrees with me on how well this model is made an jen said will you have some figures in like nelson lyein on the floor after his mortal wound ? as i think jen thought up a good idea there but up to you on that again though very well done :thumb2:
Chris an jen
 

Lee Drennen

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Jim. Nice build and those Cannons are looking good
 
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