Historic Model Ships From Scratch

Aimed at both beginners and amateurs, this volume contains instructions on building model ships from scratch. There are drawings and photographs of the completed models, plus close-ups of deck detailing and fittings, rigging and sail making, systems of hull building and mounting of models.

Model ship building does not have to be an expensive hobby. The author of this book takes you on a journey through one of the oldest crafts - nowadays a hobby - and shows you how you can build an end product of fascination, history, skill and value using low-cost materials and a minimum of tools - from scratch in fact. The book begins by explaining hull lines and hull construction methods and then moves on to: masts, yards, booms and gaffs; deck equipment and furniture; anchors; painting; rigging and blocks; armament; simple sail making; mounting and displaying the finished model.

The United States and Europe. Whether you're a beginner or an expert, and whether you have hours to spend on a project or years, you'll find money- and time-saving ideas on every page. Book jacket.

The vast majority of period ship models are built from kits, usually primarily of wood with some ready-made fittings. Although these commercial offerings have improved significantly in recent years, all of them can be enhanced in accuracy or detail by an experienced modelmaker. This book, by an expert ship modeller, distils lessons gleaned from a lifetime practising the hobby to the highest standards, setting out methods of improving basic kits and gradually developing the skills and confidence to tackle the construction of a model from scratch. Using a variety of kits as the starting point, each chapter demonstrates a technique that can be readily improved or a feature that can be replaced to the advantage of the finished model. Topics include hull planking, representing copper sheathing, many aspects of more accurate masting and rigging, and how to replace kit parts and fittings from scratch. Ultimately, the impact of a period model depends on its accuracy, and the book also provides guidance on plans and references, where to find them and how they are best used. The plank-on-frame model, sometimes with exposed frames in the Navy Board style, has always been considered the crowning achievement of period ship modeling, and this book concludes with coverage of the very latest kits that put fully framed models within the reach of ordinary mortals. Offering advice, expertise and inspiration, Ship Models from the Age of Sail has something for anyone interested in building a period ship model, whatever their level of skill.

Building a model from a kit is an excellent way to develop your modeling skills. But once you've mastered the basics, where do you go? If you're looking for a challenge, you move on to scratchbuilding. And that can be imposing: With a kit, you worked with someone else's plans, materials, and building instructions. Scratchbuilding makes you master of your own fate. You do the research, choose the subject, the scale, the material. The choices are limited only by your enthusiasm. Edwin B. Leaf scratchbuilt his first model--a Baltimore clipper--nearly fifty years ago, and he's been refining and building on his skills ever since. In Ship Modeling from Scratch he lays out the principles--from concept to construction to display--on which scratchbuilding is based. In clear, concise language complemented by detailed illustrations he tells how to interpret existing drawings or create your own, what materials to choose, what tools to buy, and what techniques to use to build everything from plank-on-frame, plank-on-bulkhead, or modern steel hulls to creating sharp and properly scaled details--paint to portholes. Building a model from scratch is a singular pursuit that requires patience, confidence, and ingenuity. With Ship Modeling from Scratch open on your workbench, you have your own private tutor guiding you through the troublespots. Ship Modeling from Scratch expands the horizon of any kit builder looking for a challenge, including choosing the right subject finding and interpreting historical material building from plans drawing scaled plans from photographs buying tools and materials building everything from half models to plank-on-frame or plank-on-bulkhead versions of traditional sailing craft to modern steel cargo ships painting and displaying your model

With A Special Set Of Full-Sized Paper Patterns For The Famous Ship Benjamin F. Packard And A Chapter On American Clipper Ships And The Lines And Plans Of A New Bedford Whaler.

The author explores the practical and important role played by the model ship in maritime development over the centuries from Ancient Egypt's funerary models, through the Middle Ages and ex voto models to the seventeenth century when models were used to illustrate developments in naval design. He deals with the