Scratch Building the Portuguese Carrack in 1/700th Scale

[Rui Matos]

A little bit Off-topic (sorry Callen)

I haven't seen the finished result of my work on those canons!
Do you have an overall view of the dio?
Thanks Filipe

Back to topic:
Callen,
Even with the cost issue, the brass masts are definitely the best option...
You'll have a good strong base for sails, ratlines (even if they are pe) and a continuos and tapered surface... holes in resin masts, imperfections on such a small and highly visible parts will give you much work and cost (silicone and resin expenses), that you could use in brass masts.
Also another tip on sails: have you tried Jim Baumann's technique with cigarette paper?
You just need to see it's works to realize that it is a good option

Rui

[callen]

Filipe feel free to post additional photos of the Dio. It's not off-topic as far as I am concerned.

Rui, I agree that brass masts are definitely the best option. I'm trying to remember the cost break down when Bruno and I ordered the parts, but I remember that the price of the suite meant that building eight or ten builds (as I intend to do) got a little pricey for my wallet as things stand right now. That is why we started looking into other options. Having said that, I'm about to order another set of that beautiful brass from Bruno. I can't bring myself to use what I have (they're like treasured jewels to me) until I know I'll have more.

Thanks for hanging out here in 'carrack land.' I'll have more soon.

[Rui Matos]

Callen,
Another way of financing this project would be to sell some of the resin Carracks... have you considered this option?
I would have a set
Cheers
Rui

[Filipe Ramires]

I would have a set myself as well!!!
Regarding more photos of the diorama I don't have a single one with the overall....yes, shame on me!!! Even more that we don't get the chance to see the diorama again since we was given to Brazil as a gift by the Navy Museum....!!! I have others so I will post them later. They were in my old Mac so I had to move them to the new one and have to reduce the size.
Regards,

Filipe

[Filipe Ramires]

Right, here are a few more photos of the Departure of the Portuguese Royal Family to Brazil. 90% of the elements were scratchbuild apart from the figurines from L'Arsenal modified to early XIX Century standards (job done by a fellow modeller Filipe Martins) and the two dingy boats which were found in my spare box!!!!

[maxim]

I would also buy a set of the carracks!

[Rui Matos]

Thanks Filipe!!!

Callen,
Four sets!

Cheers
Rui

[callen]

Ok.
Here is the latest news from 'Home Grown Carrack Land!'

After six months of building masters that have to be cast, rather than actual models that one can paint and detail in the normal way, I was finally able to actually begin building models from my resin casts...

I was very much hoping to get some pieces glued together and painted up in short order so that I can show these ships in more appropriate and realistic colors, but, alas, the enthusiasm of building took me down some rabbit trails, as you will see.

A completed Carrack Forecastle in Resin.

These pieces are rather flawed on close inspection. The bulwark of the lower 'flat-iron' piece (Rusty's term) has a slight curve to it, and the forward bulwark of the cap piece is not quite straight on its lower border. The hole at the left end corner in this picture resulted from my attempting to correct the flaw by sanding it straight. No big deal. I will be refacing these with either strip plastic or details to hide the defects later.

Air bubbles in the back, but this is no problem, as I will cover this with either styrene or PE facade.

View from the top. The best angle.

In my giddy enthusiasm of seeing my very first resin casts, I did not notice some imperfections that later became apparent. There are some globs of material partially obscuring the planks at near the waterline of both Fatty and the San Bruno hull. Not impossible to fix, but something I want to improve on next time.

More imperfections. I will probably try to hide the lack of 'post surgery' detail here with waves and wakes at a later point.

The bow is fortunately clean.

Cleaned up.

[bgire]

Hello

Just got my first samples in the mail today...
Pictures don't do justice to Neal's outstanding job, believe me!
Now will be busy this week to finish designing their PE detail sets...

_Bruno (from France)

[callen]

So let's make a Carrack!
I want this first one to be 'high charged' but not impossibly so. The great thing about these resin hulls is their adaptability to different configurations. Let's sand down the forecastle before adding a superstructure.

Forecastle in place. This looks rather blank at the moment, but the long plain sides of the forecastle will be filled later with custom PE by Brass Master Bruno Gire.

Let's add some height to the poop deck.

I want to cut that wedge deck shorter, to give it some variety, and also to create more open space for the upper cargo hatch. I made the decision when creating these wedge decks to try to make them so that they could be applied either to the bow or the stern, and also to make them of maximum length so that I could shorten them to create variation in the different builds. The whole idea was to make as many options as possible, in order to help disguise the common origin of the relatively few pieces.

After 'castle' in place. Not a dry fit, not a pose, actually glued on... FINALLY !!!!

Overhead view of 'Carrack #1.

[callen]

Bruno!
Great news!
Feel free to post pics of your PE work here so that everyone can see it. I for one can't wait!

[callen]

Carrack 1 took about twenty minutes of work.
What else can we do?

How about the fabled 'Flemish Carrack' of the 'WA Kraek' engraving that is present in virtually every book on the subject?

Here is the engraving enlarged from a book on my reference clipboard. Notice the very light double decker staging for the fighters to shoot from during battle. The Carrack was a very manly type of warship, since the whole design was created to facilitate hand to hand combat. I am hoping to mount the two decks with enough space so that you will be able to see into the lower decks. A powerful-looking, yet light and fragile structure.

Here I have plastic as spacers to approximate the configuration of the superstructures in the final assembly. Imagine on top of the fore and aft castles the additional gabled framing for the anti-boarding nets. This will be a very imposing ship if I can put it together right.

Carracks 1 & 2 together.

Now that we have two 'Fatty' builds, how about a build with the San Bruno hull? Iberian Nao...

[callen]

Shoot!
Hit the submit button at the wrong point.
The previous post is slightly out of order...

Here you can see the shape of the Nao forecastle with built in sheer is slightly misaligned. The rear edge will need to be trimmed on the starboard side to make it even.

The Nao took about 5 minutes. Time for Carrack #3.

This one we will leave the 'cap' off and have only a 'flat-iron' wedge at the front end. Notice the raised after castle, block-like. I'm trying to get that 'Anthony Roll' look. The rough plastic sides of the after castle will be 'faced' later. Maybe she will be a small English carrack.

Group photo. Carrack 3 uses the San Bruno Hull, while Carrack 1 is made from 'Fatty.'

Significant difference in height. I feel that 3 would probably lose to 1 in a fight.

Ouch!!!! Who else has done this?

Dry fit experiment. Carrack forecastle cap with wedge? Does that look like a Galleon? Not really... But maybe we can make a galleon somehow from the San Bruno Hull.

[callen]

San Bruno Iberian Nao.

Clipped the back end of the stern rather than leaving an overhang. Again to create variety. The open end can be easily faced with strip plastic.

This was the reason for resin casting, so that I could build a large number fairly quickly. There are some additional builds not yet covered in detail above, including a Levantine Argosy (Fatty hull + 2 full length low wedges fore and aft) and a slightly smaller 'Flemish Carrack' similar to the one above but with shortened forecastle deck. In addition I plan on building several 'Fatty' hulls without superstructures to serve as 'hulks' or 'urcas' etc.

Closeup of the Levantine Argosy. Notice damage to mizzen mast chain plate.

This looks like a very disappointing crack in the deck piece...

However the piece is actually undamaged. Some kind of flaw in the molding. All that is needed is to sand down the underside.

Included in this group shot is the 'not-really-working-galleon' dry fit which I did not wind up doing.

[callen]

New Casts from Rusty.
Uh oh. Bits of pink mold rubber showing up in the casts. Sure enough, in the next batch there were blobs of resin (flaws) in the hull. Rusty had told me that a mold ought to last for up to 40 casts, but we are already having issues at around 20. It seems that while the small details of these masters are castable, they produce shorter-lived molds.

More imperfections showing up...

A large bit of rubber adhering to a fatty cast. More flaws can be expected...

Ouch again!!! This one really hurt. Sliced my finger wide open right next to the nail! It has opened up several times since then too, very painful. The cause was a dull curved blade. Dull blades are more dangerous than sharp oneS!

Carrack #4 with enlarged forecastle. The 'Maxed Out' Carrack.

How would we make a galleon? This profile from a book of mine gave me an idea...

[callen]

Classic Armada seascape. Some of these ships are quite tubby. Couldn't we make a galleon from a carrack hull? Maybe the Bruno hull, since it has finer lines?

Step 1. Sand down the forecastle.

Step 2 create a beak below the edge of the forecastle. That was the idea the above illustration gave me. Suddenly it's starting to look right.

Funny upswept curve on the beaks of many of these galleons. On reflection, the relationship between the Galleon and the Galleass types is a little clearer. This beak seems straight off of a Lepanto Veteran. And many of the illustrations from the period seem to confirm this. I had thought that the term 'Galleon' bore no relation to 'Galley' or 'Galleass,' despite the similarity in sound; that there was no fathoming the Byzantine confusion of 16th Century warship terms. But I'm starting to feel now that there really is a relationship between the Galleon and the Galleass. Many details of structure are similar between the two types. Of course, many differences as well... Feel free to comment. I'm not an expert.

Funny looking at this stage!

Stem is trimmed. Feeling good about this one... I'll keep going...

[callen]

Ok. A galleon in earnest...

[callen]

Yes. A Spanish Galleon, with Crenellations...

...and a stern gallery...

Group comparison shot. The Galleon is significantly lower than the Carrack and the Nao.

[callen]

That stern gallery wasn't working... we need to do this properly...

That is way beyond my abilities to model in this scale, but maybe I can do something simpler...

[Filipe Ramires]

Depending of the "school" of the galleon usually they were faster and lower ships when compared to the na�s which were basically large armed cargo ships that could travel very long distances. For instance the n�us that did the �ndia route early in the 16th Century: