50 year old model Grand Banks Schooner maintenance

Tony Ap Lewis · 2025-11-28T10:55:37-0600

As the original wall mounted perspex glazed case was starting to fragment and some dust and debris had found its way in, I decided to provide new acrylic case to be free standing mounted on a shelf (more to follow). In the meantime some rigging maintenance was needed mainly to some of the running rigging. I am going to put a small humidifier in the new case because central heating plays havoc with rigging tension in the winter months to which I will inject water.
I built the hull at approx 1/64 scale from a Billing Boats kit in 1964 up to gunwhale but the rest is scatch built from photos of these splendid fishing vessels and any rigging plans I could lay my hands on before the internet (not much!). So don't look too close. The name is false but maybe typical of the genre.

Tony Ap Lewis · 2025-11-28T11:09:10-0600

Thanks. Not 1964 but 1974. In 1964 I was still mainly into plastic models before I went to sea.

AllanKP69 · 2025-11-28T11:09:13-0600

Beautiful model and some of the best looking sails I have ever seen. Thanks for posting the photos
Allan

Tony Ap Lewis · 2025-11-28T13:21:35-0600

Thanks Allan. I have tried over the years for attention to detail even though scale defeats on older vessels. Modern vessels with wire rigging are a bit less of a problem. But I am still happy with this work, "adjusted" later by tiny fingers before it went into a case for preservation.

Rob444 · 2025-11-28T14:22:44-0600

Tony Ap Lewis said:
As the original wall mounted perspex glazed case was starting to fragment and some dust and debris had found its way in, I decided to provide new acrylic case to be free standing mounted on a shelf (more to follow). In the meantime some rigging maintenance was needed mainly to some of the running rigging. I am going to put a small humidifier in the new case because central heating plays havoc with rigging tension in the winter months to which I will inject water.
I built the hull at approx 1/64 scale from a Billing Boats kit in 1964 up to gunwhale but the rest is scatch built from photos of these splendid fishing vessels and any rigging plans I could lay my hands on before the internet (not much!). So don't look too close. The name is false but maybe typical of the genre.

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Beautiful ship! So nice to see how it holds up after 50 years. I second Alans comments on how wonderful the sails are!

Rob

Tony Ap Lewis · 2025-11-28T14:45:01-0600

Thanks Rob. Cotton sails require lots of concentration to sew on bolt-ropes..not too much hand stitch tension required and a good steam iron after. Modern sails of polyester are a little easier with glued edges but heat distorts the fabric and it is difficult to get a "flat" sail.
Like all of mini shipwrighting and sail-making the original ways at full scale are often the best at scale. My eyes and fingers have seen better days..I couldn't sew bolt ropes like 50.years ago!

CarlosE · 2025-11-28T15:09:32-0600

Beautiful boat !!

Peter Voogt · 2025-11-29T03:41:01-0600

Tony Ap Lewis said:
As the original wall mounted perspex glazed case was starting to fragment and some dust and debris had found its way in, I decided to provide new acrylic case to be free standing mounted on a shelf (more to follow). In the meantime some rigging maintenance was needed mainly to some of the running rigging. I am going to put a small humidifier in the new case because central heating plays havoc with rigging tension in the winter months to which I will inject water.
I built the hull at approx 1/64 scale from a Billing Boats kit in 1964 up to gunwhale but the rest is scatch built from photos of these splendid fishing vessels and any rigging plans I could lay my hands on before the internet (not much!). So don't look too close. The name is false but maybe typical of the genre.

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A still very nice looking oldie! Always nice to see a (Bluenose-lookalike

) Grand Banks Schooner under sail.
Regards, Peter

John Lyle · 2025-11-29T08:21:51-0600

That is a beautiful schooner model. You did a wonderful job on it.

Tony Ap Lewis · 2025-11-29T09:24:05-0600

Peter Voogt said:
A still very nice looking oldie! Always nice to see a (Bluenose-lookalike ) Grand Banks Schooner under sail.
Regards, Peter

Yes, there was info around then about Blue Nose and Columbia, and deck photos and boom details of others in Vintage Boats by John Lewis. His drawings of a dory were used to model the four installed..of course there should be more but it is representative. Quite difficult to pin down (if you pardon the pun) main lower and top mast backstay locations, and if lazy-jacks always used but most photos of vessels under sail seem to show them. I guess in Canada there were models to inspect, but quite a bit for me here in Wales was guess work and tend towards Blue Nose data which the Billing hull lines are a prime example. A big question was to model it bald-headed but looks prevailed!
Thanks Peter for your comment.

paul ron · 2025-11-29T12:18:50-0600

it looks like the 1851 schooner "AMERICA"
Beautiful ship, especially with its sails up.

i scratch built mine back in the 60s. my neighbor sewed a full set of sails for me. the rigging has gotten brittle over the years but as long as i dont fiddle with it, its holding up well.

i do love how my sails aged, has that salted canvas patina and a very natural sag.

Tony Ap Lewis · 2025-11-29T13:16:09-0600

paul ron said:
it looks like the 1851 schooner "AMERICA"
Beautiful ship, especially with its sails up.

i scratch built mine back in the 60s. my neighbor sewed a full set of sails for me. the rigging has gotten brittle over the years but as long as i dont fiddle with it, its holding up well.

i do love how my sails aged, has that salted canvas patina and a very natural sag.

That is the problem with this model...brittle rigging and attachments. Before it went into its first case as a result of "little fingers" adjustments by my twin sons resulted in "fishing" the bowsprit and several other repairs. An earlier scratch built fully rigged Sandinavian barquentine ("onker") from Basset-Lowke drawings was irretreviably damaged at the same time. Periodic slackening and tensioning due to central heating in winter does not help so the new rigid acrylic case will have a small wet sponge humidifier recharged by sringe as an experiment. We'll see how this goes. Other fore-and-aft fishing craft builds suffer from hair line cracks in planking but so far the recent scratch built 1/25 scale model of my own Westerly Berwick ketch (30 years of faithfull service) is holding up well with its near scale stainless steel wire rigging.
Thanks for your interest and comments.