Constitution Build Log, 17 March

The work on my USS Constitution model progresses. I finally have all the yard arms up and rigged. That means it is time to get serious about creating and mounting the sails.

From plastic, to paper, to cloth,
to finished sail

As I said in my previous blog, I have to start off by creating a paper pattern for the sails. I get this from copying the vacuum formed sails that came with the model, or from sail planes from the internet or from a book that I own. Once the pattern is created, I cut it out and use a pencil to transfer it to my cotton sheet cloth. Since the pencil will represent the seams and reef points on the finished sail, I have to copy it to both sides of the sail and since light goes through the cloth they have to match pretty closely. It is not as hard as it sounds. I transfer the pattern to one side of the cloth and literally trace through the cloth to mark the other side. The material has to be marked for hemming of the edges of the sails.

One of my sources for sail plans

Once the pattern is on the cloth, I cut it out. Using a product called Stop Fray, I treat the edges of the cut sail so they won't unravel. Then I use a hemming glue to double hem them so there are no ragged edges to the cloth. The final step is to carefully add the bolt rope around the edge of the finished sail. This is done by carefully running a bead of hemming glue along an edge of the sail, then gluing the heavy thread to that edge. It is kind of a pain but seems to be working. 

So far, I have all of the sail patterns created, and over the weekend I transferred, cut, and hemmed all of the sails for the foremast. I only got the fore topsail set up with the bolt rope.

Yard arms are up

So far I have tried to build the ship in approximate order the real one would have been done, but I think for the sails I will go backwards and mount the sails at the top of the masts first, then work my way down. This is because as you mount a sail you reduce easy access to areas of the mast and deck of the ship for rigging. Since everything has to go down the mast, leaving the bottom until last seems to be sensible.

Constitution Build Log, 10 March

I have the head sails installed. This consists of (starting from the bow and working aft) the flying jib, the jib, and the fore topmast stay-sail. Before mounting the sails, I reinforced the stays with .2mm spring/music wire. It looks like thread after being painted flat black, and keeps the weight of the sails from creating an unnatural sag when the sails are hung, which also keeps the stays that don't have sails on them from sagging. The sails mostly hide the fact that the stay is wire lashed to thread. The sails are made from a $5 cotton bed sheet we found at Walmart that was about the right color. For the flying jib and jib, I used the plastic preformed sails as a pattern. The model did not include the fore topmast stay-sail, so I used the 1803 sail plan I found on line as a pattern. The sails are hemmed all the way around, but I used fray check (a special glue that you run along the edge of cut fabric to keep it from fraying) and hemming glue. On the first test sail I discovered that pencil marks don't go away, even after washing, so instead of sewing the seam and reefing point lines, I just penciled them in on both sides of the sail. In the photo, you can see the main topsail is also hung temporarily. Close examination will show a couple of hairpins holding it on. Since sails on the yard arms will restrict access to running rigging lines they will wait until almost everything else is done before they get set up. I also have all of the yard arms on the foremast completed.

I am now working on patterns for the rest of the sails. I will need to get the rest of the yard arms rigged and on the ship. Spanker gaff and boom still need to be installed. I may also start taping up the hull of the Cutty Sark to get it ready for painting soon.