A very very Happy 80th Jan. Enjoy.
Cheers Grant
Cheers Grant
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Fluyt in oak - Kolderstok by Janzwart
- Thread starter janzwart
- Start date
- Watchers 29
-
- Tags
- fluit kolderstok
- Joined
- Oct 23, 2018
- Messages
- 985
- Points
- 403
A little bit late, but
Gefeliciteerd met je verjaardag.
I hope you had a really nice day.
Gefeliciteerd met je verjaardag.
I hope you had a really nice day.
- Joined
- Apr 10, 2020
- Messages
- 149
- Points
- 213
Update 48
It’s time for another Fluit update.
Now it’s the mainsail’s turn.
This is the sail, attached to the yard and equipped with 2 clewlines, 2 bunt lines, 2 bow lines, and the necessary blocks.
After a bit of fiddling, it now looks like this:
And viewed from the rear:
And a detail of the mast foot:
It’s also starting to get a bit crowded with all kinds of lines. I’ve secured the sails to the yard, i.e., pulled the braces and stays and lifts as tight as possible and then tied a loop around the sail and the yard in four places. Not pretty, but the ship is here loading for a bit and then it’s off again. During that time, no “Sail” with visitors is planned. Nor a king’s visit.
Nothing has been removed from the running rigging. Only the lines that are supposed to keep everything stable are taut (bracing, lifts); the rest hang loose (buntlines, clewlines, and bow lines).
In the following photos, I’ve labeled a few lines. (Sorry in Dutch)
And an overview:
Three more sails to go: the maintopmast sail, the mizzen, and the blind sail.
Then I’ll have to figure out how to depict the loading of logs. I don’t even know how they did it.
Suppose: the ship is anchored in a harbor or at anchor in a roadstead. Behind the ship, they’ve dragged a log into the water toward it. That log now has to be lifted horizontally about a meter or two to slide through the hatch in the stern.
How do you do that??? Suggestions are welcome.
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
It’s time for another Fluit update.
Now it’s the mainsail’s turn.
This is the sail, attached to the yard and equipped with 2 clewlines, 2 bunt lines, 2 bow lines, and the necessary blocks.
After a bit of fiddling, it now looks like this:
And viewed from the rear:
And a detail of the mast foot:
It’s also starting to get a bit crowded with all kinds of lines. I’ve secured the sails to the yard, i.e., pulled the braces and stays and lifts as tight as possible and then tied a loop around the sail and the yard in four places. Not pretty, but the ship is here loading for a bit and then it’s off again. During that time, no “Sail” with visitors is planned. Nor a king’s visit.
Nothing has been removed from the running rigging. Only the lines that are supposed to keep everything stable are taut (bracing, lifts); the rest hang loose (buntlines, clewlines, and bow lines).
In the following photos, I’ve labeled a few lines. (Sorry in Dutch)
And an overview:
Three more sails to go: the maintopmast sail, the mizzen, and the blind sail.
Then I’ll have to figure out how to depict the loading of logs. I don’t even know how they did it.
Suppose: the ship is anchored in a harbor or at anchor in a roadstead. Behind the ship, they’ve dragged a log into the water toward it. That log now has to be lifted horizontally about a meter or two to slide through the hatch in the stern.
How do you do that??? Suggestions are welcome.
Translated with DeepL.com (free version)
- Joined
- Apr 10, 2020
- Messages
- 149
- Points
- 213
Update 49
I haven’t received any responses to my question asking if anyone has suggestions on how to load logs into a flute. I had expected this, since even in the literature, no one knows exactly how it was done.
I found two articles in the *Scheepshistorie* series that describe this problem.
No. 28, p. 26: Logging with Ships from the Netherlands in a Norwegian Bay.
No. 29, p. 2: Loading Hatches in Wooden Ships.
These two articles describe the existence and use of cargo hatches based on a careful study of paintings. Textual descriptions of loading and unloading processes are not known. However, the Amsterdam City Archives do contain several charter party agreements between a charterer and a ship’s captain. These agreements detail how and where the cargo is to be loaded, what tools must be available, and certain financial aspects.
Witsen also writes about this in “Aloude en Hedendaegse Scheeps-bouw en Bestier”:
…… that the skipper must provide himself with a set of hooks, winches, and other equipment to be able to load the masts …….
Furthermore, shipwreck excavations sometimes reveal the existence of cargo hatches on the side of the bow or in the sides of all kinds of ships, not just flutes.
The earliest evidence of loading ports can already be seen in a drawing of a cog.
There are also a number of paintings depicting cargo being loaded onto wooden ships.
This is usually shown through a loading hatch on the side.
Here, the log is loaded through a loading hatch in the bow. But this isn’t a very heavy log—it’s more like a pole. It can be loaded without a hoist.
Sometimes wood is also loaded onto the deck. In that case, the ship’s own hoists can be used.
The title page of Scheepshistorie 29 shows a ship being loaded with logs. However, this scene takes place in Quebec around 1880 and features more modern ships. Here, the ship’s own hoists are clearly being used. It appears that they have placed a derrick on the bow from which the hoist is suspended.
This gives me an idea to use a whaler-style boat. A boat like this has a heavy beam on either side of the aft deck, from which the rowboats are suspended for transport.
Of course, you could also attach a hoist to it and use it to hoist logs up to the loading hatch.
But of course, you don’t just happen to have a whaling ship on hand when you want to load wood.
You could, of course, mount two beams toward the stern of your boat, but that doesn’t seem very practical to me.
I found one drawing showing wood being transferred from a cat ship to a hektjalk using a hoist.
The section on the right is slightly enlarged, but it doesn’t make it any clearer.
Still, this seems the most realistic to me. In a timber-loading port, there are bound to be workboats where you can attach a hoist, and if necessary, “hire” them to help load your ship.
So I’m going to use this principle when demonstrating the timber loading process. But then I’ll need a second ship of roughly the same scale.
The only model I have that comes close is a boeier. It’s enough to illustrate the principle.
And now, a little progress. The foresail is ready to be hoisted:
And here it’s hanging temporarily. Just a few more lines to tighten.
To be continued
I haven’t received any responses to my question asking if anyone has suggestions on how to load logs into a flute. I had expected this, since even in the literature, no one knows exactly how it was done.
I found two articles in the *Scheepshistorie* series that describe this problem.
No. 28, p. 26: Logging with Ships from the Netherlands in a Norwegian Bay.
No. 29, p. 2: Loading Hatches in Wooden Ships.
These two articles describe the existence and use of cargo hatches based on a careful study of paintings. Textual descriptions of loading and unloading processes are not known. However, the Amsterdam City Archives do contain several charter party agreements between a charterer and a ship’s captain. These agreements detail how and where the cargo is to be loaded, what tools must be available, and certain financial aspects.
Witsen also writes about this in “Aloude en Hedendaegse Scheeps-bouw en Bestier”:
…… that the skipper must provide himself with a set of hooks, winches, and other equipment to be able to load the masts …….
Furthermore, shipwreck excavations sometimes reveal the existence of cargo hatches on the side of the bow or in the sides of all kinds of ships, not just flutes.
The earliest evidence of loading ports can already be seen in a drawing of a cog.
There are also a number of paintings depicting cargo being loaded onto wooden ships.
This is usually shown through a loading hatch on the side.
Here, the log is loaded through a loading hatch in the bow. But this isn’t a very heavy log—it’s more like a pole. It can be loaded without a hoist.
Sometimes wood is also loaded onto the deck. In that case, the ship’s own hoists can be used.
The title page of Scheepshistorie 29 shows a ship being loaded with logs. However, this scene takes place in Quebec around 1880 and features more modern ships. Here, the ship’s own hoists are clearly being used. It appears that they have placed a derrick on the bow from which the hoist is suspended.
This gives me an idea to use a whaler-style boat. A boat like this has a heavy beam on either side of the aft deck, from which the rowboats are suspended for transport.
Of course, you could also attach a hoist to it and use it to hoist logs up to the loading hatch.
But of course, you don’t just happen to have a whaling ship on hand when you want to load wood.
You could, of course, mount two beams toward the stern of your boat, but that doesn’t seem very practical to me.
I found one drawing showing wood being transferred from a cat ship to a hektjalk using a hoist.
The section on the right is slightly enlarged, but it doesn’t make it any clearer.
Still, this seems the most realistic to me. In a timber-loading port, there are bound to be workboats where you can attach a hoist, and if necessary, “hire” them to help load your ship.
So I’m going to use this principle when demonstrating the timber loading process. But then I’ll need a second ship of roughly the same scale.
The only model I have that comes close is a boeier. It’s enough to illustrate the principle.
And now, a little progress. The foresail is ready to be hoisted:
And here it’s hanging temporarily. Just a few more lines to tighten.
To be continued
- Joined
- Apr 10, 2020
- Messages
- 149
- Points
- 213
Update 50
I recently spoke with my fellow townsman, Victory-builder Henk van Luinen. (See https://www.henkvanluinen.com/). I also asked him how logs were loaded onto a fluit in the 17th century.
Henk is skilled in using ChatGPT and posed my question there, receiving the following answer.
Question: How to Loading Logs
Loading logs onto a 17th-century **fluit** (or fluit) was a technical feat. Due to the ship’s unique, pear-shaped design—with a very wide lower hold but a strikingly narrow deck—it was physically impossible to lower long logs from above through the normal deck hatches. The logs were simply too long to make the turn into the hold.
To solve this problem, Dutch shipbuilders devised a modification that was as simple as it was ingenious: **the wood gate**.
## The Loading Process
Loading the meter-long logs (often oak or spruce from the Baltic Sea region) followed a fixed sequence of steps:
1. Rafting and towing in the water
The logs were thrown into the water at the harbor and tied together into large rafts. They thus floated around the fluitschip. Water also helped support the weight of the heavy logs during maneuvering.
2. Opening the timber hatch
At the stern, in the rounded rear section (the transom) of the ship, just above the waterline, there was a special hatch: the timber hatch. Sometimes the rudder hole (the opening through which the rudder stock passed) was enlarged and used for this purpose. This hatch was completely broken open just before loading.
3. Hoisting aboard
Using manpower and pulleys, along with ship’s winches (kaapstanders) and thick ropes that ran over the masts, a log was hoisted out of the water by one end. The log was maneuvered horizontally in front of the timber hatch and then pushed straight forward into the deep, wide hold.
4. Caulking the hold watertight for the return voyage
Once the hold was completely packed, the ship’s carpenter would seal the timber hatch extremely thoroughly. The cracks were caulked with rope fluff and tar to ensure the ship was absolutely watertight for the stormy return voyage across the North Sea.
This isn’t really news to me. What I’m most curious about are the details of point 3.
A follow-up question to Chatgftp yielded this answer:
The question was: “How did they move the logs inside the ship?
Moving and stacking the heavy logs inside the ship was perhaps the hardest and most dangerous part of the entire operation. Because the hold of a flute ship was pear-shaped (wide at the bottom, narrow at the top), the logs had to be stowed very carefully to prevent the cargo from shifting during a storm, which could have caused the ship to capsize.
The process inside the hold relied on a number of clever techniques and tools:
1. Hauling with winches and a floor of pulleys.
As soon as the head of a log entered through the timber gate (or the “hennegat”), a new line was immediately attached to it inside the hold.
• This line ran to the bow of the ship, where it was connected via a pulley (a block) to the central capstan (a large, vertical winch on the deck) or hand winches in the hold.
• While workers outside the ship helped guide the log, those inside gradually pulled it further forward, deep into the hold.
2. Rolling over “oiled” beams (Slieten)
A log weighs hundreds to thousands of kilograms and does not simply slide over a wooden ship’s floor.
To minimize friction, the crew used skids (smooth, thin logs or beams) placed across the bottom or on the lower layers of wood.
• These logs were often coated with animal fat (lard) or whale oil to make them slippery.
• Sometimes wooden rollers (wooden cylinders) were also placed under the logs, allowing the log to roll forward across the floor, as it were.
3. Positioning with Hand Levers and Tilting Hooks
Once the log was in the correct position lengthwise, it had to be placed tightly against the ship’s side or against the previous log. This was purely manual work for which heavy levers were used:
• Hand levers: Thick wooden poles that served as levers to pry the logs into place centimeter by centimeter.
• Tilting hooks (or “forest hooks”): Large iron hooks on a wooden handle that provided a grip on the round log to turn or tilt it.
4. Stacking and “securing”
Stacking was done from the bottom up and from the outside (the ship’s side) toward the inside. The hold of the fluit had to be used as efficiently as possible:
• Following the shape: The bottom logs were chosen so that they followed the rounded shape of the ship’s hull.
• Brevon and wedges: Because tree trunks are never perfectly straight, gaps would form. These empty spaces were filled extremely tightly with smaller pieces of wood, wedges, and firewood. This process is called stowing. The wood had to be wedged so tightly that there was literally not a millimeter of movement. If the cargo started rolling while sailing, the ship was lost.
Loading a timber raft therefore took days to weeks, during which the “stowage crew” or sailors had to perform grueling physical labor in the dark, cramped, and often slippery hold.
Question: Were other ships used to load the logs onto the fluit, or did it do everything on its own?
That’s a very astute and logical observation! There’s simply no way you could push a log hanging vertically out of the water through such a relatively low hatch in the stern. To position the logs perfectly horizontally in front of the opening, auxiliary vessels and the tides were almost always used, supported by the ship itself.
So the answer is a combination of both: the barge did the heavy lifting, but smaller auxiliary vessels ensured proper positioning.
Here’s exactly how that collaboration worked outside the ship:
1. The role of auxiliary vessels (barge-like vessels and rafts)
In ports and loading sites (such as the Norwegian fjords or Baltic Sea ports), the barge was usually anchored in deeper water. The logs were not towed to the ship individually, but were arranged in organized rafts or transported on barge-like vessels (flat, wide wooden boats).
Sometimes, a specific dinghy or small workboat was indeed used to maneuver and stabilize the logs. This ensured that the logs were positioned in a controlled manner directly behind the stern of the fluit.
2. How was the log positioned horizontally?
To position the log horizontally in front of the gate, they used a clever trick involving two different ropes (winches) that ran from the bow:
• The bow tackle (bow/mast): A thick rope (a tackle) ran from one of the large masts to the head of the log closest to the ship.
• The stern line: A line was also attached to the rear of the log (which was still in the water or floating on the raft).
When the winch aboard the flute began to turn, the head of the log was pulled out of the water and hoisted toward the timber gate. At the same time, the men on the support vessel or the raft ensured that the rear end of the log was either held back or guided along with the rest of the log.
As soon as the front end reached the timber gate, it rested on the gate’s threshold (often equipped with a roller or a smooth beam). From that point on, the log lay more or less horizontally: the front end rested on the barge, and the rear end was still floating in the water or resting on the edge of the flat barge or dinghy.
3. The Lever Effect
Once the first section of the log had been pulled on board (using the winches inside the hold), the edge of the timber gate acted as a seesaw or lever. The further the log slid inward, the more its center of gravity shifted inward. As a result, the rear section that was still hanging outside automatically came to hang horizontally “in the air” until the entire log had been pulled on board.
In short: without the stability provided by the rafts and prams (auxiliary boats) on the outside, it would have been impossible to position the logs directly in front of the hole, but the sheer pulling power came entirely from the flute itself.
Question: Is there any documentation or are there any sources?
Since these kinds of specific historical maritime techniques are often scattered across old books, archaeological reports, and museum archives, there are a number of excellent online resources where you can delve deeper into this topic.
For additional information and visual aids regarding the fluitschip and the timber trade, you can consult the following sources:
1. Museums and Maritime Heritage
• Museum Kaap Skil: They have a beautiful exhibition featuring a detailed cutaway model of a fluyt. This model shows exactly how the hold and the timber hatches are constructed. You can view their collection on the Museum Kaap Skil Fluyt pagina.
• Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands (RCE): A few of the world’s best-preserved fluyt ships lie on the seabed in the Baltic Sea (such as the recently discovered wreck “De Zwaan”). Information about the archaeology and construction of these ships can be found in the MaSS (Maritime Stepping Stones) database.
Continued in next
I recently spoke with my fellow townsman, Victory-builder Henk van Luinen. (See https://www.henkvanluinen.com/). I also asked him how logs were loaded onto a fluit in the 17th century.
Henk is skilled in using ChatGPT and posed my question there, receiving the following answer.
Question: How to Loading Logs
Loading logs onto a 17th-century **fluit** (or fluit) was a technical feat. Due to the ship’s unique, pear-shaped design—with a very wide lower hold but a strikingly narrow deck—it was physically impossible to lower long logs from above through the normal deck hatches. The logs were simply too long to make the turn into the hold.
To solve this problem, Dutch shipbuilders devised a modification that was as simple as it was ingenious: **the wood gate**.
## The Loading Process
Loading the meter-long logs (often oak or spruce from the Baltic Sea region) followed a fixed sequence of steps:
1. Rafting and towing in the water
The logs were thrown into the water at the harbor and tied together into large rafts. They thus floated around the fluitschip. Water also helped support the weight of the heavy logs during maneuvering.
2. Opening the timber hatch
At the stern, in the rounded rear section (the transom) of the ship, just above the waterline, there was a special hatch: the timber hatch. Sometimes the rudder hole (the opening through which the rudder stock passed) was enlarged and used for this purpose. This hatch was completely broken open just before loading.
3. Hoisting aboard
Using manpower and pulleys, along with ship’s winches (kaapstanders) and thick ropes that ran over the masts, a log was hoisted out of the water by one end. The log was maneuvered horizontally in front of the timber hatch and then pushed straight forward into the deep, wide hold.
4. Caulking the hold watertight for the return voyage
Once the hold was completely packed, the ship’s carpenter would seal the timber hatch extremely thoroughly. The cracks were caulked with rope fluff and tar to ensure the ship was absolutely watertight for the stormy return voyage across the North Sea.
This isn’t really news to me. What I’m most curious about are the details of point 3.
A follow-up question to Chatgftp yielded this answer:
The question was: “How did they move the logs inside the ship?
Moving and stacking the heavy logs inside the ship was perhaps the hardest and most dangerous part of the entire operation. Because the hold of a flute ship was pear-shaped (wide at the bottom, narrow at the top), the logs had to be stowed very carefully to prevent the cargo from shifting during a storm, which could have caused the ship to capsize.
The process inside the hold relied on a number of clever techniques and tools:
1. Hauling with winches and a floor of pulleys.
As soon as the head of a log entered through the timber gate (or the “hennegat”), a new line was immediately attached to it inside the hold.
• This line ran to the bow of the ship, where it was connected via a pulley (a block) to the central capstan (a large, vertical winch on the deck) or hand winches in the hold.
• While workers outside the ship helped guide the log, those inside gradually pulled it further forward, deep into the hold.
2. Rolling over “oiled” beams (Slieten)
A log weighs hundreds to thousands of kilograms and does not simply slide over a wooden ship’s floor.
To minimize friction, the crew used skids (smooth, thin logs or beams) placed across the bottom or on the lower layers of wood.
• These logs were often coated with animal fat (lard) or whale oil to make them slippery.
• Sometimes wooden rollers (wooden cylinders) were also placed under the logs, allowing the log to roll forward across the floor, as it were.
3. Positioning with Hand Levers and Tilting Hooks
Once the log was in the correct position lengthwise, it had to be placed tightly against the ship’s side or against the previous log. This was purely manual work for which heavy levers were used:
• Hand levers: Thick wooden poles that served as levers to pry the logs into place centimeter by centimeter.
• Tilting hooks (or “forest hooks”): Large iron hooks on a wooden handle that provided a grip on the round log to turn or tilt it.
4. Stacking and “securing”
Stacking was done from the bottom up and from the outside (the ship’s side) toward the inside. The hold of the fluit had to be used as efficiently as possible:
• Following the shape: The bottom logs were chosen so that they followed the rounded shape of the ship’s hull.
• Brevon and wedges: Because tree trunks are never perfectly straight, gaps would form. These empty spaces were filled extremely tightly with smaller pieces of wood, wedges, and firewood. This process is called stowing. The wood had to be wedged so tightly that there was literally not a millimeter of movement. If the cargo started rolling while sailing, the ship was lost.
Loading a timber raft therefore took days to weeks, during which the “stowage crew” or sailors had to perform grueling physical labor in the dark, cramped, and often slippery hold.
Question: Were other ships used to load the logs onto the fluit, or did it do everything on its own?
That’s a very astute and logical observation! There’s simply no way you could push a log hanging vertically out of the water through such a relatively low hatch in the stern. To position the logs perfectly horizontally in front of the opening, auxiliary vessels and the tides were almost always used, supported by the ship itself.
So the answer is a combination of both: the barge did the heavy lifting, but smaller auxiliary vessels ensured proper positioning.
Here’s exactly how that collaboration worked outside the ship:
1. The role of auxiliary vessels (barge-like vessels and rafts)
In ports and loading sites (such as the Norwegian fjords or Baltic Sea ports), the barge was usually anchored in deeper water. The logs were not towed to the ship individually, but were arranged in organized rafts or transported on barge-like vessels (flat, wide wooden boats).
Sometimes, a specific dinghy or small workboat was indeed used to maneuver and stabilize the logs. This ensured that the logs were positioned in a controlled manner directly behind the stern of the fluit.
2. How was the log positioned horizontally?
To position the log horizontally in front of the gate, they used a clever trick involving two different ropes (winches) that ran from the bow:
• The bow tackle (bow/mast): A thick rope (a tackle) ran from one of the large masts to the head of the log closest to the ship.
• The stern line: A line was also attached to the rear of the log (which was still in the water or floating on the raft).
When the winch aboard the flute began to turn, the head of the log was pulled out of the water and hoisted toward the timber gate. At the same time, the men on the support vessel or the raft ensured that the rear end of the log was either held back or guided along with the rest of the log.
As soon as the front end reached the timber gate, it rested on the gate’s threshold (often equipped with a roller or a smooth beam). From that point on, the log lay more or less horizontally: the front end rested on the barge, and the rear end was still floating in the water or resting on the edge of the flat barge or dinghy.
3. The Lever Effect
Once the first section of the log had been pulled on board (using the winches inside the hold), the edge of the timber gate acted as a seesaw or lever. The further the log slid inward, the more its center of gravity shifted inward. As a result, the rear section that was still hanging outside automatically came to hang horizontally “in the air” until the entire log had been pulled on board.
In short: without the stability provided by the rafts and prams (auxiliary boats) on the outside, it would have been impossible to position the logs directly in front of the hole, but the sheer pulling power came entirely from the flute itself.
Question: Is there any documentation or are there any sources?
Since these kinds of specific historical maritime techniques are often scattered across old books, archaeological reports, and museum archives, there are a number of excellent online resources where you can delve deeper into this topic.
For additional information and visual aids regarding the fluitschip and the timber trade, you can consult the following sources:
1. Museums and Maritime Heritage
• Museum Kaap Skil: They have a beautiful exhibition featuring a detailed cutaway model of a fluyt. This model shows exactly how the hold and the timber hatches are constructed. You can view their collection on the Museum Kaap Skil Fluyt pagina.
• Cultural Heritage Agency of the Netherlands (RCE): A few of the world’s best-preserved fluyt ships lie on the seabed in the Baltic Sea (such as the recently discovered wreck “De Zwaan”). Information about the archaeology and construction of these ships can be found in the MaSS (Maritime Stepping Stones) database.
Continued in next