Copper plating on HMS Pegasus?

[Tangopapa]

I'm looking at perhaps HMS Fly or Pegasus for a next model, by Victory. Fly can come with an enhanced package, but Pegasus seems to be already an upgraded version for less than the Fly + Upgrade. Here is the thing: Pegasus comes with copper sheeting, which I am not fussy about, but it only sailed 2 years, 1777 and 1778. Widespread copper sheeting didn't appear in the RN, according to the Greenwich Museum, until 1783. Is that technically a mistake? Fly survived much longer, and well into the copper bottom period however. Any thoughts on this?

 

[Teal2]

On my HMS VICTORY model I used copped tape available at stained glass shops.
Indent the strip to simulate bolts and scratch length marks for each plate on the tape to whatever scale you want.

 

[Uwek]

I'm looking at perhaps HMS Fly or Pegasus for a next model, by Victory. Fly can come with an enhanced package, but Pegasus seems to be already an upgraded version for less than the Fly + Upgrade. Here is the thing: Pegasus comes with copper sheeting, which I am not fussy about, but it only sailed 2 years, 1777 and 1778. Widespread copper sheeting didn't appear in the RN, according to the Greenwich Museum, until 1783. Is that technically a mistake? Fly survived much longer, and well into the copper bottom period however. Any thoughts on this?

The history of copper sheating in the RN is well explained here:

Copper sheathing - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

With the American war in full swing, the Royal Navy set about coppering the bottoms of the entire fleet in 1778......
......Middleton in May 1779 placed orders at the Portsmouth Docks for coppering all ships up to and including 32 guns when next they entered dry dock. In July, this order was expanded to include ships of 44 guns and fewer, in total 51 ships within a year. It was then decided that the entire fleet should be coppered, due to the difficulties in maintaining a mixed fleet of coppered and non-coppered ships. By 1781, 82 ships of the line had been coppered, along with fourteen 50-gun ships, 115 frigates, and 182 unrated vessels.....

Nevertheless you can find in Threedecks this information about the HMS Fly:

British sloop 'Fly' (1776)

British sloop 'Fly' (1776). Dates of service, name changes, previous and next incarnations, dimensions, armament, commanders, officers and crewmen, actions, battles, sources

threedecks.org

HMS Fly (1776) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

HMS Fly was coppered during July and September 1778 according Rif Winfields book......

HMS Pegasus was leaving the docks at March 1777 and never was back in any dockyard - so I guess based on these information the HMS Pegasus was never coppered

British sloop 'Pegasus' (1776)

British sloop 'Pegasus' (1776). Dates of service, name changes, previous and next incarnations, dimensions, armament, commanders, officers and crewmen, actions, battles, sources

threedecks.org

HMS Pegasus (1776) - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org

 

[Tangopapa]

That's what I concluded -- it was put into service a bit too early, and its service life was too short, to have been copper bottomed.