HMS Vanguard 1:150, converted from Heller's Le Superbe

[PqLear]

This build log was started on modelshipworld.com where I posted for about 5 months from February-June 2025, until I had to put the project on the backburner due to moves. When I picked it back up again earlier in 2026, MSW was gone :/ I managed to resurrect the content via the Wayback Machine/Internet Archive, and will do my best to copy/paste/restore images, while also posting new content. Note though most tags and links are broken, and some of the posts/content may lack context as they're in response to other posts.

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted February 11, 2025 on modelshipworld.com

The build is Heller’s Le Superbe converted to HMS Vanguard, in what might best be described in a kit-bash-mash-up conversion with some creative license for buildability.

Le Superbe was a Téméraire-class 74 and Vanguard was not. They have different dimensions, lines, proportions etc. and while there are several other more appropriate examples of converting a French 74-gunner to an RN historical equivalent (e.g. Spartiate, Belleisle, Hercules), I wanted to see how close I could get, and… it’s the Vanguard! Nelson’s flagship at his, in my mind, most consequential battle, and possibly the most well-known 74 in history? If I invest a few thousand hours in a project, I want some name recognition!

I picked her outfit for the Mediterranean campaign 1798 as main source of inspiration, both because it’s iconic as Nelson’s flagship, and well documented. I have been playing around with the idea of making a waterline diorama of her approaching the line of battle in Aboukir Bay.

First, about the kit itself. I’ve heard there’s a new re-release but this is an old version; not dated but guessing 40-50 years old (the Glorieux box art looks like it’s a 1970’s design). I have actually built this kit before, in my teens circa 1983, and still remember the poor fit and overall atrocious molding quality… You can expect to spend 75% of your build time cleaning off chaff and excess, and the rest spackling and sanding to fill in gaps and injection holes. Compared to contemporary plastic kits (I’m a big Tamiya fan) this is night and day. I often found myself cursing using the plastic pieces instead of scratch building, and if you have the skills and tools, I’d strongly recommend following Blue Ensign’s example and scratch building as much as possible.

Also a note about historical accuracy of this kit: Heller’s Glorieux and Superbe are identical kits except for stern, quarter-galleries, figurehead, hair brackets, railings, and name plate. In reality, they were completely different ships; different designs, classes, sizes, ship builders, and built almost 30 years apart. With 99% certainty, Glorieux did not have a coppered hull. It’s a headscratcher to me why Heller decided to pick these two particular ships to recreate with the same molds? Especially since neither of them had a particularly illustrious career.

My guess is Heller wanted to do a quick/dirty twofer, and picked the names Glorieux and Superbe simply because they’re pretty good product names to put on a box – certainly more eye-catching than say Dugay-Trouin or Mucius – and they also work okay for an English or German-speaking audience. They either didn’t know or blatantly ignored these two ships were quite different in reality.

Anyway… pulling myself out of this rabbit hole… and enough knocking Heller quality and accuracy - it’s a beautiful ship! Personally, I find the 74-gun ships-of-the-line the most beautiful and awe-inspiring naval design framework ever conceived – but that’s just me, who’s only seen a small fraction of all ships ever designed. The lines, proportions, elegance, and understated raw power make this a gorgeous, gorgeous model. (Especially with the yellow/black “Nelson checker” pattern; which I believe the Vanguard had at the Nile?)

After ordering a few components (notably, sails and standing rigging components) online (HiSModel), my second order of action was to contact igorcap to check if he’d be able to help me with a figurehead and taffrail; the two components I knew I’d never be able to get right on my own. Much gratitude, thoughts and prayers go out to Poltava/Ukraine – I can honestly say without Igor, this build would still be in the box. Thank you, Igor.

Also – huge thanks to @greenskin and @Lukasvdb for their Superbe build logs on this forum, as mentioned to Blue Ensign and dafi for inspiration, and of course… @glbarlow; I’ve very liberally used your pictures in your *amazing* Amati/Victory Vanguard build log as reference for pretty much everything.

Conversion and scratch build efforts (some complete, some still at planning stage):

• Adjust number, position, and size of gun ports (see more below)
  • Upper deck: closed port #1, made ports #4-#10 smaller
  • Quarter deck: converted windows to gun ports; moved port #1
• Extend and modify profile of poop and quarter deck railings, incl. extending poop deck forwards
• Reposition masts and channels (see below)
  • Main- and mizzen mast ~10mm (~5ft) further back
  • Fore mast 16mm (~8ft) further back
• Remove drift rails and add new ones
  • I left the wales in place simply because it’d be way too much work to correct them. On the model / Boudriot plans, the wales generally follow the curve of the gun ports/decks, whereas on Vanguard / RN 74s they have a distinct curve; with gun ports cutting into them. I understand this was an intentional ship design feature, intended to add stability to the ship.
• New figure head, taffrail, and stern name plaque (thank you Igor!)
• Modify/rebuild quarter galleries. Attach stern and rudder with magnets for easy removal = allow better view of the hull interior
  • Add quarter gallery interiors, incl. floors, cupboards, and of course - easements/latrines
• Rebuild head, incl. beakhead, catheads, cheeks, hair brackets, etc.
• New details throughout: railings, stairs, binnacle, bell, lantern, bitts, pumps, capstans, cannon balls (ball bearings from McMaster-Carr) in racks, gratings (mostly Amati), hatches, cabins, etc. etc. etc.
  • Build Brodie firehearth based on Model Monkey’s 3D print as reference (I later found a better reference on RMG’s site).
• Ship boat storage: resting on boat booms across the waist, vs. sitting on the upper deck
  • If I decide to go down the diorama / Battle of the Nile idea, I assume these would be in tow anyway; not on-board the ship?
• Align the copper plating pattern on the model with waterline
• Add breech lines, cap squares, and loops over the cascabel buttons (“pomellions”?)
  • My understanding is these loops were standard on Blomefield guns after 1794; and it’s possible Vanguard at the Nile would have had these?
  • Either way they make positioning the breech lines easier (and look nice)
• All standing and running rigging components using Amati thread and either Amati walnut blocks, or 3D printed/resin blocks from igorcap.
  • Add chain stays, preventer plates, channel knee braces, etc.
• Insert metal rods into lower masts for extra stability
• Move side steps, add skid beams and boat beam
• Fabric sails and flags from HiSModel

A few notes…
I have taken quite a few liberties and shortcuts for the sake of aesthetics and convenience.

• Most notably…. the Superbe is a full 15ft (4.6m; 30mm at this scale) longer than Vanguard, which I understand can be attributed to a few reasons: a larger/longer hull provided room for an extra gun on the upper gun deck (30 vs. 28); which in turn provided more space (=more comfortable accommodations for officers) on the quarter deck (12 guns here instead of Vanguard’s 14), more space for crew and marines (~700 total complement vs. 600 on an Arrogant class), and perhaps most importantly, more space for provisions for longer journeys, as France did not have the same access to friendly ports as the British. My understanding is the ship’s length in and by itself did not meaningfully impact ship handling or gunnery – rather it’s the lines below the waterline that would determine sailing and handling characteristics – but I suspect I may be missing or misunderstanding something here.
• Anyway, Heller’s Superbe model has 15 gun ports on each side of the upper deck, whereas Vanguard had 14. While it was easy enough to close port #1, it means the spacing/position of the remaining 14 ports is slightly off; impacting position of the channels (which I wanted to keep in the same place relative to gun ports), although of course this also in turn impacts the position of the masts – it would look strange if the shrouds were pointing forward, at an angle. Final result: on “my” Vanguard, the forecastle and head will look like it’s extending a bit too far, like she has a little snout.
• I started the project using glbarlow’s Vanguard (Amati/Victory) build log as my main visual reference, until I realized I could just buy the plans from Amati. I wish I had done this sooner.
• I didn’t have plans or images of Vanguard’s gun deck (no such thing in the Amati/Victory model), and so instead have relied on dafi’s Victory build, with some inspiration from Boudriot.
• The trunnions on the Heller model are not in the center of the gun barrels; they’re distinctly offset from the bore. The sketch in the Heller instruction sheet specifically indicates the trunnions should be “up” = the barrel should “hang down” into the gun carriage, quite significantly. I believe in reality, at least on an English ship, it should be the other way around; trunnions “should” be either in the center of the barrel, or slightly below; meaning the barrel would sit a bit “above” the carriage. Unfortunately, on Heller’s model, both solutions cause problems: if the trunnions are “up” / “higher”, the bottom of the gun barrel hits the front of the carriage, whereas if the trunnions are “down” / “lower”, the gun barrel will point up and hit the top edge of the gun port (=you’ll need to sand down the wheels of the gun carriage to make it fit nicely in the center of the gun port). Oh Heller. I went with the former solution – “trunnions up”– and filed a semi-circle in the front of the gun carriage. It means the gun barrels now point down slightly, which I think gives them a nice, aggressive look, but more importantly they sit well centered in the gun ports.
• Like others on this forum, I scored planking (freehand) in the exterior hull and gun deck (with ruler). Note in this soft plastic this can result in quite significant “ridges”, which I recommend cutting/shaving off, rather than sand down (which grinds the plastic dust into the grooves).
• I contemplated getting wooden decks but (a) I don’t have a workspace for sanding wood at scale – too much dust in a relatively small apartment – and (b) scratch building deck beams to lay down a wooden deck instead of the plastic deck is beyond my current modeling comfort level; and the alternative – laying down wooden planking on top of the plastic decks (as I’ve seen some users do on YouTube using the wooden decks from HiSModel), would elevate the guns too high in the gun ports.
• Except for copper hull (Testor Enamel rattle can), I’ve used Tamiya acrylic paints throughout; either air brushed (decks, guns, hull interior) or hand painted (hull exterior, all details). I love the Tamiya paints but note they have to be thinned by as much as 2/3 when air brushing; for hand application, I usually add about 1/4 thinner. (You can’t really work with this paint undiluted.)

Some general build notes:

• On this model, you likely won’t be able to insert the upper gun deck into the hull, if the lower gun deck is already solidly glued in place (which it will have to be, in order to position the 32 pounders where they should). Chances are the hull will crack/break trying to squeeze in the upper gun deck. I ended up cutting he upper deck into two pieces lengthwise and mounted them separately.
• As mentioned, the fit on this model is not great and you’ll need to do a lot of filling and sanding to close gaps. On this relatively small model, this requires a lot of manual handling, increasing the risk of breaking off any small or protruding pieces. I recommend thoroughly thinking through the assembly order, e.g. finalize beakhead and hawses before adding gun deck details, gun ports, channels, and similar pieces that may easily break or break off while manually handling the model. Same goes for painting; even basic priming could (should?) wait until all main “architectural” components are assembled.
• The hardest part to get right (thus far; by far) has been the quarter-galleries; which needed to be modified both for shape/design, to fit new positions of drift rails and wales, and new shape taffrail. (They don’t fit that well out of the box, for that matter.) I have not modified the number of windows (Heller: 10, Vanguard: 8), at least not yet.
• I’m posting this very first build log about 7 weeks/180 hours in, ~90% of which is scratch-building or modifying existing conditions. I’m doing a lot of this for the first time, so takes a bit longer for sure.

Current state: hull nearly complete, channels in place, head ready for beakhead and gratings, stern ready for galleries. Then (1) deadeyes, (2) gun deck, (3) upper deck, (4) quarterdeck/gangways/forecastle and poop deck, (5) masts and standing rigging "one tier at a time", (6) running rigging and sails, (7) boats and anchors, (8) gun port lids. Easy!



Original: most/all quarter deck gun ports have moved, drift and sheer rails have been replaced, profiles of poop and quarter deck railings altered, and head, hawses, cheek, forecastle profile changed. (Note this black hull is from the Glorieux "sister kit"; same hull as Superbe, despite being two entirely different ships historically.)


Original head & hawses



Note new cheeks & hawse holes. Greek warrior figurehead courtesy of Igorcap, using the Victory/Amati model as reference.




Scratch built Brodie stove. Someone said somewhere "in this small scale, if it looks too big, it is too big".
So, so true - but it's so, so hard to make some details even smaller

Guns

• individually cleaned from chaff
• scored planking in carriage and assembled
• cut space in front of carriage (see above)
• added cascabel button loops (28 gauge brass wire)
• drilled boreholes
• airbrushed barrels: semi-gloss black, and carriages: flat red; hand painted wheels semi-gloss black
• weathering wash using Winsor & Newton raw umber oil color + odorless mineral spirits
• dry brushed barrels: flat aluminum, carriages: buff
• added cap squares (made from excess material from eye bolts), breeching lines, and eye bolts (next picture)

Stern, taffrail and stern gallery assembled and primed, awaiting final polish and painting. Cut off original taffrail and glued on 3D printed one from Igorcap. Cut off sides of original stern gallery to change its curve, created new railing and balusters from 22 gauge copper wire. Made new bottom part from plasticard, and added horizontal rail under the 3D printed name plate. Cut out the existing four-pane astrigals, will add new ones to make nine-pane windows (but will keep 10 windows instead of 8 as in the historial Vanguard - I think, for now at least).


Original stern, with igorcap's new 3D printed pieces overlaid for sizing.


New details and rails, made upper deck gun ports smaller, shaved down 4th wale. My Superbe kit is this milk chocolate brown color for the most part, with the Superbe-specific parts in gold (see stern above) in a distinctly different material that is more brittle and therefore hard to work with; and guns and running rigging pieces in red.



Before left, after right. Plasticard FTW!

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted February 17, 2025 on modelshipworld.com
As expected, the stern turned out to be quite the project! There are many similarities between Superbe and Vanguard: both have a semi-circular taffrail, a stern gallery with a walkway outside the captain's cabin, a stern gallery with windows only in the gun room, two chase gun ports, and both have quarter galleries.

There are also several differences: the name plaque is straight, not curved, on the Vanguard; the windows are nine panes, not four; the cabin walkway gallery is curved all the way around on the Superbe, whereas on the Vanguard it's only curved in the middle, and straight at the edges; and Vanguard's taffrail is ornamented.

• Le Superbe - walkway (green) runs the width of the ship, and easements (in quarter galleries) are in front.
• The Vanguard - walkway runs between the easements (orange) only.
• Original out of the box (and Vanguard name plaque provided by Igorcap)

Cut off the original taffrail, and superglued on the one made by Igorcap (see Post #1) instead. I cut off the ends of the original railing also, and built new endings of the railing from 22 gauge copper wire. Note magnets at the bottom.


Stern, primed. Glued on a strip of 1mm plasticard at the bottom, to create a straight bottom edge for the name plaque, and for the bottom of the stern itself.


Added floors inside the quarter galleries, and cut off/rebuilt the bottom (which had a big swirl on the Superbe).


Final (almost) inside of the stern. Note addition of rear walls and windows in the quarter galleries. Removed galleries at the top of the quarter galleries; the Vanguard had "flat" roofs, which I built out of 0.25mm plasticard.


Final stern!


(Here's a glimpse of the original out of the box Superbe design here.)

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com February 24, 2025

Worked on the head, incl the hair brackets, beakhead, and figurehead this week. Out of ~30 pieces used in the final build, two came from the kit, the rest had to be built using plasticard and metal wire.

Original beakhead on sprue. Note bow chase ports, and the fife rail at the top of the railing, with stanchions. I also re-used the original grating, was however curved so dipped it in boiling water to be able to flatten it.


Started with a sheet of 1mm plasticard to make main rails.


Cut out strips to make middle rails and cross pieces to form the rest of the hair bracket.


Beakhead and grating are only two pieces out of the box. Main rails assembled from four pieces of plasticard; the main shape, two extra pieces to form the stanchion, and a round profile (shaved to be half-round) to form the decorative lower edge. Made rounded easements by cutting up a plasticard tube.


Hair bracket pieces glued in place using CA.



Painted. Made new hole for bowsprit gammoning.


Beakhead bulkhead. Cut up and reassembled fife rail, closed chase ports, shaved down doors, and added easements.


Extended the fife rail to run the width of the forecastle. Made decorative molding (arches), door hinges and door handles out of 24 gauge wire.

Painted figurehead, 3D printed by igorcap.


Finally assembled and painted.


A few details remain to be added - heads, knee for the bowsprit, gammoning, etc. but overall quite happy with how this is coming along!

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com March 5, 2025

, raise your hand if you've ever mounted the channels and drilled holes in them for the shrouds to line up nicely with the upper deck gun ports, to carefully avoid a 24-gunner blasting away the chains with the first broadside of the battle. Great I see a lot of hands! Now, keep your hand up if you realized a bit too late they ALSO need to take the 12-pounders on the forecastle and quarterdeck into account... ping me your nick and I'll send a membership card -- you're welcome to join my club!

I'm sad to report my Vanguard might have some issues with their main mast shrouds, after the quarter deck 12-pounders have shot away the 5-9th shrouds. Oops.

Last week -- deadeyes (Amati), chains (28 gauge copper wire), and preventer plates (0.4mm plasticard).

Did Vanguard have 9- or 12-pounders, or even carronades, on quarterdeck & forecastle?

I tried a few different methods to loop the chain around the deadeye, and settled for a configuration with one short and one long end. The white plasticard strip will become preventer plates.


An earlier attempt had both ends of the "chain" wire of equal length, but I ended up cutting one end about half-way down.


The loose ends of the wire meet "in the middle" of the chain, and when glued together with a small bead of CA, almost gives the appearance of two chains (which I believe the RN 74s had?)


The upper preventer bolt is a filed-down head of an embroidery pin, cut off to ~1.5mm length and glued in place into a hole drilled into the side of the hull, or the upper wale.


See what I mean about making sure the chains avoid getting in the way of the gun ports?


It appears Vanguard has one more shroud than the Superbe, nine rather than eight, on the fore mast, and the deadeyes/shoruds ended up being a bit crowded. Forecastle 12-pounders should be fine, with one in the gap between shroud 4 and 5, and one further to the fore.


Preventer plates cut to size; punched a dent to create appearance of lower preventer bolt.


Starboard main channel, deadeyes, and chains. The quarter deck guns will struggle to fire between the deadeyes


Final appearance when painted; quite happy with the look!


I believe I'll be able to bend some of the main mast deadeyes to create better gaps for the 12-pounders, or I may need to move them around and drill new holes in the channels, before proceeding with the port side.

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com March 5, 2025

Browsing through some other Superbe threads, I found a comment that confirms my guess the original kit was launched in 1977. I also stumbled across a YouTube channel with some pretty neat CGI recreations of historical battles, Epic History - YouTube, including a half hour episode of the Battle of the Nile which appears well researched and filled in a few gaps in my understanding both of the battle itself, and the lead up. I especially appreciated how it gives a sense of the scale and distance to shore.

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com March 6, 2025 -- by Chapman

If you have a deeper interest in the Battle of the Nile I can recommend the following book.
There are certainly many books about naval battles, and a lot has been written about the Battle of the Nile. For me, the best book about the Battle of the Nile is: Nelson and the Nile: The Naval War Against Bonaparte 1798 by Brian Lavery. This tells the story before, during and, often neglected, after the battle in great detail. In particular, the description of how the ships, some of which were badly damaged, were repaired on site after the battle.

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com March 10, 2025

With deadeyes completed, have turned my attention to the inside of the hull again, and started assembling the gun deck. A light sanding of the guns will make it easier to glue them in place, although unfortunately it also meant some of them will now sit a little too low in the gun ports. Will go even lighter on the other side.

(The small hole in the bottom of the gun carriage is left over from airbrushing/painting.)



A tiny dot of CA will hold the breeching line nicely held together just under the cascabel. Note eye bolts at end of breeching ropes -- they're from Amati, I cut off ~4mm and used the excess to make cap squares.


Gun deck half-way assembled. Starboard battery, anchor cables, and pull strings for gun lids remain before upper deck can go on.


As mentioned above, I cut the upper deck in two pieces to be able to put it in place without breaking up the hull. Even this approach is proving quite complicated -- wish me luck, I'll need it! I started this part of the project by adding beams under the upper deck:


All in place, glued onto the larger part only...


... so that I can add the upper deck as a two-step process; first, the larger piece, then the starboard battery -- quite tricky to maneuver the guns and breeching lines in place between the beams, but hopefully it'll be okay -- and finally the smaller deck piece. Unfortunately, this means I won't be able to take a picture of the entire gun deck fully assembled


Started prepping the forecastle/quarter deck. First, original piece (note new holes for masts, as described ^^)


Started by cutting/shaving everything down -- gratings, stairs, gun racks, placeholders for buckets, etc. -- to get a flat deck. Filled resulting holes with squares of 2mm plasticard.


New location and different dimensions for the midships opening. Narrower gangways.


Cut new opening and closed up resulting gap in forecastle.


Plenty of filler to close holes and cracks. Note extended front of poop deck also.


As always, thanks to @glbarlow and @dafi -- I've used your build logs liberally as inspiration and reference (e.g. here, and here). Not all my gratings, stairs,capstans etc. are in the correct places since the hull dimensions are different, but I'm quite happy with the result (which no one will ever see anyway

)

I should probably have thought about this sooner... but finally got around to buying the instruction book for Amati/Victory's Vanguard -- realized it'll be invaluable for the rigging, but it would probably have come in handy for the hull, too. Oh well.

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com March 16, 2025

I spent much of this week going back to two other reference build logs, @RMC's Vanguard and @flyer's Bellerophon -- both incredibly inspirational, absolutely gorgeous, and terribly humbling I use my 1:150 scale as justification to not get even close in terms of detail and execution!

I was happy to pick up a few new details -- e.g. a brick floor under the Brodie stove -- and noticed a few others a bit too late to incorporate in my own build, e.g. the design/size of the stern name plate. I'm increasingly realizing there are so many historical accuracy details I could have researched or respected more closely but didn't, out of enthusiasm to get going and make progress. I suspect this is a common dilemma for many builds -- with such fragmented access to historical reference material, you don't know what you don't know, where do you draw the line between research and execution? How do you ensure not letting perfect get in the way of good?

I have a big decision to make soon -- whether to weather or not, and if so to what extent. An oil paint/mineral spirit wash on hull and deck will add texture and bring out details and generally looks great, but will require multiple gloss varnish coats prior, and multiple matte varnish coats after. Each application involves the risk of clogging, orange peeling, unwanted residue, uneven sheen, etc., and the risk is especially great when you airbrush on to a highly irregular shape (such as a deck between hull sides with holes in them), which makes the air / varnish droplets flow in irregular and unpredictable micro patterns. And it's incredibly hard impossible to reverse a poorly applied coat of varnish... I feel a bit insecure about my skills here.

In meanwhile, I continued assembling the upper deck and prepped the quarter deck:

• Added all furniture and starboard side guns to gun deck
• Glued both parts of upper deck in place
• Cut/sanded/adjusted quarter deck to fit (almost 1/8" too wide out of the box)
• Cut off 1/8" of rear of upper deck, so that stern would fit properly
• Finished upper deck furniture (gratings, stove, capstans)
• Painted black/white diamond floor tile pattern in ward-room and captain's cabin
  • I was contemplating building out compartments, dividers and furniture but ultimately decided against it -- after all this will be Vanguard readied for battle!

Next steps:

• Clean up, paint, assemble, and customize upper deck 18-pound guns (been dreading this...)
• A few remaining upper deck furnishings (stairs, garlands, eye bolts for ships boats, etc.)
• Finish Brian Lavery's Nelson and the Nile
  • Also ordered his The 74 Gun Ship Bellona
• Digest the build plans for Amati/Victory's Vanguard (also on order... realized way too late into this build I should have started with this!)
• Finalize specs and plans for masts and yards
  • As mentioned in a few other build logs here, the out of the box pieces are too flimsy to support the tension from standing and running rigging. They might be okay for a simplified rigging configuration -- e.g. stays, shrouds, sheets and braces -- but I'd like to at least have the option to add a more complete rigging scheme
  • Iirc, @Blue Ensign made new masts and yards out of wood, and @Admiral Beez added carbon fiber rods for additional stability -- both good ideas which I may get back to. Current thinking is making these as 3D prints, and currently exploring this route with @igorcap
• Finalize specs for a few other pieces to be 3D printed -- anchors, lanterns, admiral's barge, fire buckets, decorative trim pieces, etc.

Gun deck with furniture and guns in place. Messenger rope is too thin and nippers in wrong place (I think?) but at least explains the concept. Once the upper deck is in place, this build log might be the only evidence this even exists... it's been fun to build though!


Port piece of upper deck in place, waiting for the starboard piece. In retrospect, I wish I had (1) aligned the deck beams with the gun ports, and (2) then aligned the openings for gratings based on the position of the beams.


Last third of upper deck in place, hull pressed together with "temporary rigging" while glue is curing overnight.


Also wish I had painted (airbrushed) the wardroom floor before assembly -- had to hand paint instead.


Masking using 6mm Tamiya tape -- looks like blueberry pie!


Bleeding from hand-painting turned the wardroom floor into a Rohrschach test...


... but came out okay after some manual touching up


Much better results when airbrushing -- no freehand touch-ups needed!

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com March 23, 2025

I’m thinking Benedict Cumberbatch or Jude Law would play Nelson in the movie version of the Mediterranean campaign and the Battle of the Nile, with Aidan Turner as Saumarez, and Pedro Pascal as Admiral Brueys. What a great movie! I visualize the 18-minute action sequence in the midst of the battle… the crew of the Alexander frantically hacking away at their anchor cables—twice—to get away from the burning L’Orient; her captain Commodore Casabianca jumping overboard with his 10-year old son, a midshipman, as he realizes the ship is beyond saving; Bellerophon, herself dismasted and drifting, picking up survivors, stripping off their own clothes to keep them warm; and finally… the blast… echoing off the Pyramids nine miles away; gunners aboard the Orion having the wind knocked out of them from the impact; tinders and shrapnel igniting top sails and shrouds all over the Aboukir Bay; the shock wave pushing nearby 2000-ton ships of the line hundreds of feet off course, tilting so violently from the shock they’re at risk of capsizing...

Any movie producers out there?

Aside from reading and dreaming, I’ve spent the week assembling the upper deck: 24 x 18-pounders, stove, capstans, hatches, shot garlands, ladders, rope railings, cleats, eye-bolts for the train tackles, wardroom bulkhead, rudder head, a cabin for lieutenant Galwey, and the captain’s and officer’s pantry. I ran out of cannon balls so had to order some more ball bearings (from McMaster-Carr), then I'll close it all up. Sniff.

Like with the 32-pounders, cleaning up and trimming out the guns wasn’t particularly fun and I’m glad it’s done. Good news is they came out great and I’m really happy with the result (most of which no one will ever see anyway…).

I got the full set of plans for the Amati/Victory Vanguard, as well as copies of Lavery’s The 74-Gun Ship Bellona and Nelson and the Nile. I should have started my project with this part, the additional research has certainly made me question a few of my design decisions, and I need to keep reminding myself I’m doing this (a) for fun, and (b) to learn! (If this build is confusing or offends any naval historians out there—sorry.)

Hull size aside (see above), recreating Vanguard as she sailed into battle in Aboukir Bay (my original vision) raises a few questions how/if to recreate?

• Her entire foremast, and main- and mizzen top masts and up, were jury rigs I haven’t been able to find detailed documentation for, except that both Nelson and Captain Berry were quite pleased with the sailing abilities. The bowsprit had also been sistered/braced in multiple places.
• She may have had a mizzen yard (Whitcombe painting) instead of a driver gaff & boom (most/all other paintings, plans and models).
• Her cutter had been lost; and the remaining three boats would have either been in tow, possibly filled with furniture from the officers’ cabins, or hung from the stern or off the sides of the poop deck.
• She had four lanterns hanging either horizontally or vertically, either from the “mizzen [yard] peak” or the “mizzen mast”, lit either at the start of the battle, or only later as it got dark, or only when actually needed for identification—depending which source you choose to believe.
• She would have had a sheet cable pulled through one of the stern ports, some paintings show the last gun port of the broadside, some show out the stern chase port, with a spring presumably going another broadside port or chase gun port.
• Most sources state all RN ships flew white ensigns, although the sources provide a very inconsistent picture. Some show a blue flag (Nelson was Rear-Admiral of the Blue), some show blue pennants, some show blue ensigns, some show one or more Union Jacks, and I’ve seen two paintings with Vanguard flying a large blue and yellow flag, divided vertically, from the top of the main mast. Not sure what this is?

& Cetera. Representing some of this but not all would give an inconsistent and confusing look, and I’m increasingly thinking the only way to get this right is to (a) make a full-on waterline diorama, including crew, full weathering, and full rigging, and (b) get a time machine and take some photographs.

I’m not doing that … the complexity of time-travel aside, the hull size/dimensions “disqualifies” this project from being a historically accurate representation anyway. So… I’ve been going back and forth a bit what to do here. I even considered changing her to Spartiate or another French prize, like Admiral Beez—which however raises a whole host of other questions around to what extent French ships were “Royal Navified” when refitted for British service; presumably with the standard response it depended on which ship we’re talking about and the specific date, and… we’re back at the top of the rabbit hole, in analysis paralysis without any actual building happening.

Current thinking is a “museum build” (on stand, with no weathering; just shading and highlights) as she would have looked leaving Chatham a few months earlier. It’s already been a really fun project and I’ve learned a ton, so—success!

Finally, I’ve worked with @igorcap on a 3D-printed solution for the masts, using ABS plastic instead of resin. More to come!


It's not a big deal to tidy up chaff and injection dots from 5 or 6 of these, but 74...? Ugh.


Inserted a (heated) regular sewing pin into the bore holes to prep for air brushing (Tamiya X-18 Black semi-gloss).


Carriages equally in need of cleaning up individually before airbrushing; attached to strip of masking tape. Tamiya XF-7 Red.


Left ten carriages are airbrushed and wheels hand painted (X-18), twenty carriages to the right have a dark brown oil paint (Winsor & Newton Raw Umber) wash (Gamsol odorless mineral spirit) freshly applied. Sides are gently scored to represent planks.


Final result with a dark brown wash, drybrushed high lights (carriages: XF-57 Buff, barrels: XF-18 Flat Aluminum), and cascabel loops (28 gauge wire) in place. The 18-pounders had to go with the "trunnions down" (not "up" as the kit instructions show; see more above). Assembled cannons are ready to get fitted with breeching ropes and cap squares.


Some of the ladders from the kit can be reused, but scratch built others, as well as gratings and main mast bitts.


Both batteries assembled and glued in place using CA. Added breeching ropes with eye bolts, excess metal from eye bolt was bent to form cap squares. I had built the galley stove a bit too big and had to cut off the bottom third. I read somewhere it sat on a foundation of bricks?


Rudder head -- Lavery's Bellona (p.80) refers to a "hexagonal" rudder head, although all pictures show it being octagonal? Built both, the octagonal looks better.


Upper deck finally assembled, a few more shot garlands to stock up before putting on quarter deck & forecastle. Eye bolts and rope railing staunchions made from 28 gauge wire; stove, main mast bitts, garlands, hatches, and ladder to gun deck from plasticard; capstans carved from wood; wooden gratings from Amati. Deck got a very light coating of same wash as gun carriages, just to bring out some of the texture.



Built a cozy little cabin for lieutenant Galwey -- apologies to other officers and Master Clodd for not getting permanent cabins -- pantry, and wardroom bulkhead.


Not the best working environment... esp. not during battle...

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com March 31, 2025

Been a busy week irl but started to make some progress on the quarter deck and forecastle, both of which are now firmly glued in place.

• stocked up shot garlands on upper deck
• added upper deck "topping lifts" (strings for gun lids)
• adjusted poop deck to fit
• added 4 x seats of ease in quarter galleries
• added forecastle railing
• started experimenting with scratch building carronades, using a cut-down barrel from the kit's 8-pounders
  • I've been referencing Brian Lavery's Nelson and the Nile for the gun outfitting, it states Vanguard had two 24-pound guns and ten 24-pound carronades on the quarterdeck, and two 24-pound long guns and four 24-pound carronades on the forecastle.
  • Since the kit itself doesn't have any 24-pounders--after fitting the gun deck and upper deck I have two 36-pounders, two 18-pounders, and twenty 8-pound guns left from the kit--I'll try and come up with some creative alternative... current thinking is to use the left-over 18-pounders as 24-pound long guns; use 8-pounders as 24-pounders, and scratch-build fourteen carronades using the barrels from the 8-pounders. At least that's where I'll start, I may end up trying some other alternatives.

Forecastle railings from strips of Evergreen plasticard strips: railings 0.5mm x 1.5mm; timberheads 0.75x0.75mm. Made cut-out for 24-pound gun between shroud 4 and 5, and cut-outs for carronades in front of shrouds. Likely some creative license here as relates to exact size, placement and spacing, but I think the final result looks nice. It works around the challenge with the crowded foremast shrouds (how to sort out the main mast shrouds is a different matter... ) and occupies some of the empty space in front of the foremast (due to the kit's/Superbe's) longer hull).


Scratch built carronade carriage from plasticard and used barrel from kit's 8-pounder. Perhaps looks a bit small? Next to it is a left-over 18-pounder from the upper deck; which will work as the 24-pound long gun. Will try building a few more carronades before deciding if I look into other options.


Added some furniture to the quarter galleries--other ideas what these spaces were used for? Surely must have been used for storage, for...?

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com April 7, 2025

Worked on the quarterdeck and forecastle batteries this week. While not 100% properly to scale, and the location of some of the guns will cause a variety of issues, I'm quite happy with how it came out.

Cut off the barrels of the 8-pounder guns in the kit to create short, stocky barrels. Drilled 0.9mm hole for the bore.


Cut strips from 0.8mm plasticard, put them in a stack to sand round corners.


Cut out longer pieces for the carriage, shorter for the slide, sanded down rounded corners. Drilled two holes in carriage and cut a groove for the slide.


Added elevation pivot and chock from strips of plasticard, and wheels from plasticard rod. Left-hand carriage is assembled and hand painted, with eye bolts for the tackle.


Used 28gauge metal rod for elevation thread.


Added cascabel loop to barrel, and assembled on carriage against elevation thread with CA.


Airbrushed all carriages red (XF-7) and barrels black (X-18), hand painted details (carriages, elevation threads, wheels, elevation pivots, eye bolts), and gave them a dark brown wash.


Light drybrush of carriages (XF-57) and barrels (XF-16) before mounting on forecastle. 1mm Amati thread for breeching ropes, "spliced" with diluted textile glue. Breeching rope eye bolts are the plastic ones that came with the kit, a bit too large but I was concerned the small (0.9mm) Amati eye bolts (visible on the carriages) would be too small and flimsy. The "24-pound long gun" to the left is an 18-pound gun from the kit, left over from the upper deck battery.


Starboard quarter deck battery. The "24-pounder" to the left is an (undersized...) 8-pounder from the kit, but I think looks okay next to the "24-pound" carronades. I suspect they're all a bit small, but space is at a premium here and with rigging, ladders, kevels, stanchions etc. this space will be incredibly cluttered once done. I haven't decided on gun tackle yet, but added eye bolts to the carriages anyway to have the option later. These carronades will probably blow the main shrouds to shreds if ever used in action


As per Lavery's Nelson and the Nile, she's armed with ten carronades and two 24-pounders on the quarterdeck. I suppose it's anyone's guess which guns went where but I placed the 24-pounder to the fore, and left the aftmost gun port empty. I'm theorizing they might have done this, i.e. (1) moved one gun from quarterdeck to forecastle, and (2) used carronades rather than regular long guns, to create some extra space, since Vanguard was fitted to be a flagship?

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com April 14, 2025
This has been a really fun week, where I learned a few more do's and don'ts of kit converting

Don'ts:

• Start building without a *complete* plan

Do's

• Pay really close attention to the location of guns. As I've found out the hard way, the rest of the ship is 100% constructed around the layout of the guns, which will influence just about *everything* else. Or put differently, if gun ports are off, the rest of the ship will be a bit off, too.

I've covered above how converting a [French] 30-gun upper deck to a [British] 28-gun upper deck meant the gun ports will be a bit misaligned, but I didn't think more of it at the time. After all, it's not realistic anyway within the constraints of a kit conversion to start moving all the gun ports around. In retrospect, knowing now how important this was, I might have taken a different route.

I've covered already how 30 => 28 ports has impacted location of channels, shrouds, masts, etc. One more revelation this week, perhaps not the most consequential but still... Yeah, this won't work:

... and this looks weird, too:


So, I decided to move the ladders from gangways to upper deck to the front of the waist. The French 74s have four ladders, one in each corner of the waist, and Lavery's Bellona shows two in the front only (however coming down from the forecastle, not the gangways). So while not entirely historical, it doesn't appear as a complete fabrication either?

For all model shipbuilding veterans and naval historians on here, these are blatantly obvious points, and I sometimes feel a bit embarrassed for admitting to the shortcuts taken in this project But hopefully someone else can learn from this in the future and avoid my mistakes.

Anyway, it's been a fun week! More varied scratch building, as I focused away from guns to the rest of the fittings on forecastle and quarterdeck.

Belfry made from plasticard, the bell from the kit, and a piece of copper wire for a bell arm.


Steering wheels from kit. I ended up making the stanchions from plasticard instead of using the one in the kit:


Quarter deck and forecastle railings were extra fun plasticard projects! Quarterdeck railing in progress:


and forecastle railing and knees:


Made the gratings out of wood; these were the smallest I could find from Amati, not to scale but looks so much better than metal and plastic alternatives I've seen elsewhere. Made the coamings out of wood strips for the forecastle/QD also, looks much better than the plasticard strips I used below deck.


Quarterdeck: added steering wheel, binnacle, gratings, ladder, cleats, shot garlands, and poop bulkhead. I've taken some creative license and extended the clerk's and master's cabins forward.


Forecastle dryfitted:


Quarterdeck railing - quite happy how this came out:


Foremast bitts -- before and after oil paint wash:


QD and forecastle fittings nearly complete -- hammock netting and hatchway and ladder railings remain before moving on to the poop deck. TBD if I fit out Nelson's cabin also. Note revised location of ladder from gangway to upper deck. The obscenely oversized capstan was the very, very first thing I built, and now it's so solidly superglued into place it will never, ever come off (believe me I've tried). Fortunately, it'll eventually be hidden by the ship's boats.


Everything's been given a light wash of umbre oil paint and a light beige dry brush, not as much for weathering, but just to bring out textures and contrasts a bit more.


Had to order even more 1mm ball bearings to stock up the shot garlands... my third order now! Who knew they needed to have so many cannonballs handy!


Word of the week: cavel cleat. I've also seen it as "kevel", e.g. in the Superbe kit instructions. Same origin as "gavel" (to bring a court to order), and in Swedish, we use the word "kavel" for rolling pin. It's not clear to me from the Victory/Amati Vanguard instructions what the rearmost cavel cleat is for; will I need to pull a thread through here before glueing on the poop deck (assume will be near impossible after it's on)?


Once I have the masts, I'll figure out what to do with the mast collars (nylon washers from Home Depot). The current holes are likely a bit too large and gaps will need to be covered in some way.

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com April 21, 2025

Another exciting week, continued fitting out forecastle and quarterdeck and also received first batch of 3D-printed masts and details from @igorcap!

For hammock netting, found a $1.99 frying pan splatter guard at Marshall's:


Cut out and sealed edges with CA:


Crafted hammock cranes from 26gauge wire, flattened the base with pliers to get a surface for an anchor pin. These will go on the railing between waist and quarterdeck.


Airbrushed Tamiya X-18 Black semi-gloss.


Hammock netting airbrushed XF-2 White.


Ready for assembly


For the QD/Waist railing, I attached the cranes to the railing first, then pressed the netting in place, and finally inserted a 30gauge wire in the little loops at the top of the hammock cranes (not in this picture); which were then hand painted. It was quite fiddly, and both railing and cranes broke a few times and needed reassembling. I'll try a different approach for the next set of hammock nets...


... for the star/larboard QD railings, I instead assembled the netting, cranes and wire rail separately. I skipped the little anchor pins and simply glued onto railing.


Final result with all QD hammock nets in place.


3D-printed masts and yards from @igorcap came out great! Scale, shape and detail is vastly superior to what's in the kit. The white resin material used for lower masts and bowsprit is quite rigid and way better than the material the kit uses, whereas the black ABS material used for top masts and topgallants (and yards) is slightly better. We'll do some more testing and iteration to confirm warping/bending/integrity won't be an issue when under tension from rigging, but very encouraging first pass.

Igor also helped provide some additional details, e.g. cat heads and stem decorations; 1:150 lanterns, anchors, fire buckets, etc.

Added a bulkhead for Nelson's cabin, still TBD if I furnish further. Any good suggestions for visual references for furniture? Desk, chair, rug, chests, pictures?


Were QD bulkheads permanent or removed while clearing deck for battle? References I've seen mostly just say it's a mix; some stayed, some were taken below decks or stowed in the ship's boats, in tow. I know there should be doors from the great cabin to the quarter galleries (and from cabin to stern gallery), but would there also have been additional windows? The stern gallery/screen bulkhead is at a fairly sharp angle in the kit (as built), in Boudriot it's shown at a much lesser angle, and as per Bellona it should be upright / perpendicular to the deck -- which seems to make the most sense. (In general, Bellona is a great reference and I really wish I had had it earlier in my project.)

Handrails around waist, tried both rope/thread and 30gauge wire and ultimately decided on wire for better integrity. When glued to stanchions (26gauge wire), it's not as fragile.


Referenced Lavery's Bellona to add five boat booms, resting on top of and held in place with brackets.


Also added QD handrails and a strake I realized I had forgotten.


Nelson's and Hardy's cabins from aft. Since stern will be detachable, contemplating adding some furniture.

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com April 29, 2025

Work on quarterdeck, poop deck and waist fittings continued this week, the end of work on the hull is in sight! Trying an alternative approach for masts, stay tuned for update.

Hammock nets for waist, incl. hand rail


Gun port lids for stern chase guns


Made skylight from 0.5mm plasticard. Cut out the windows rather than try to build a mesh from separate strips.


Cut off the five standards in the kit piece and replaced with four from 1mm plasticard


Belaying kevels and mizzen bitt


Everything painted and assembled, added eye bolts. Poop deck looks kinda empty without carronades, no?


WIP poop deck railings


Done!


Ended up spending another few hours fitting out the quarter deck... bulkhead between Nelson's sleeping cabin and the lobby; an oval table for lobby, rug, desk, chair, a couple paintings and sea chests for the great cabin.


Wall mounted barometer in the back. Mounted magnets for stern in the end of the sea chests.


And then of course... it will all be covered up when poop deck is glued in place


Waist hammock nets and boat booms in place. Experimented a little with making the hammocks themselves out of white styrofoam packing chips, will need to think of something else.


Some of the Great cabin furniture in place, incl. a genuine Turner in 1:150


That's a portrait of King George to the left.


Surfaces look a bit flat without wash and highlights, will take care of that later.

Not that anyone will ever notice the difference anyway though

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com May 5, 2025

This week marked the four-month point of the build, and I'm a little over 500 hours in. It was also the week when I completed the hull! Well almost -- there are a few more eyebolts left to be attached to the hull (technically probably part of rigging?) and attaching the stun sail booms (also rigging, technically?) to the channels. s need prepping and mounting, I haven't started the ships boats (technically, probably not "hull" either), and I'll do the gun port lids last. But other than this relatively short punch list, I'm really happy with the progress!

Week started with glueing the poop deck in place, forever hiding all the interior details of the quarter deck... I needed to shave down the poop deck railing (using a small hobby planer), possibly I could have taken off another mm or two?


Lanterns, fire buckets, trail board and cat heads 3D printed by @igorcap thankfully, he provided a double set as they're fairly brittle + required a bit of customization/experimentation, so great to have a few spare pieces for experimentation.


On the quarterdeck, I used the belaying pins & rails from the kit, which didn't come out that great. They're too small to use for rigging at this scale, required a lot of cleanup, and don't extend far enough out from under the hammock nets. For the poop deck railing, I decided to scratch build from plasticard and sewing pins; with a dab of CA to make the handle.


Lanterns painted and attached. Experimented a bit with placing decorative trim on the roof of the quarter galleries, eventually decided against it. May come back to this later. Added the little "mini channels" for the mizzen backstays, and eyebolts on all other channels. I spaced the stanchions for the handrails without making gaps for carronades, thought it would have looked weird and given her a "toothless" look with empty gun ports. (Decision to skip poop deck carronade discussed elsewhere in this and other threads.)


Painted and attached the rudder chains, and topping lifts for the rear chase ports. I assume none were needed for the lower half? At some point, may get back to score the stern transom planking -- advice for others would be to do this before painting and assembling the hull...


Quarter- and poop deck finalized with wash and highlights, with kit's masts dry fitted. Removed the trim from roof of quarter galleries, added hammock net for rail at break of poop deck; ladders, and hand rails.


On other end of the ship, scratch built cat heads from a 2x2mm plasticard square profile, using 0.1mm x 0.2mm strips for decorative trim, and 3D printed crowns. I used the kit's sprit topsail yard cut in half for boomkins. Shaved off the tip to make a reverse cone shape, and inserted a piece of 24gauge copper wire in the other end for stability.


@igorcap's horn-of-plenty trail board snuck in snugly between the cheeks. Figurehead and the kit's bowsprit dryfitted. All will eventually get a wash/highlight, but I've decided against any additional paint in the hair bracket.


The single blocks at the tip of the boomkins were the smallest I could find from Amati, 1mm single blocks. They still look a smidge too large, and a little too square/blocky -- suggestions? Tumbler? Knightheads look a bit skinny, may make new ones.


Still need to attach the boomkins stays, but my last 0.4mm drill bits broke so couldn't drill holes for the eyebolts I've gone through a total of ~50 of the 0.3-0.6mm drill bits now -- they break very easily when drilling through the kit's plastic.


The feature to attach the rudder and stern with hobby magnets worked great, four for the stern, and two for the rudder (can you see them all?) It's possible to see along the entire length of the lower gun deck, but upper gun deck and quarter decks are blocked by bulkheads.

 

[PqLear]

Originally posted on modelshipworld.com May 15, 2025

Worked on anchors and ship boats this week, just got the new set of 3D-printed masts also so will work on these next.

s were 3D-printed by @igorcap, look great when painted, washed, and dry brushed. Added loops wrapped with rope.


Kedge anchor attached to one of the anchors.


v1.0 set of 3D-printed masts looked great but warp/curve got worse over time. Thinner pieces -- yards and top masts -- worked great without warping.


After a few tries, we gave up on 3D-printing masts -- made out of pearwood instead -- but kept the tops, cross trestles, and yards.

As per Lavery, the Vanguard left England with four boats but lost one in the storm May 12, 1798. So, the three boats from the kit will have to suffice Aside from the hulls, a few more pieces can be reused. Started with prepping with plenty of filler for injection artifacts.


Made oars and decks from plasticard.


Assembled and painted, also made stands for the boat booms.


Final assembly, with a light coat of umber wash and light beige dry brush, tied down oars.


Still dry fitted, will wait with glueing anchors and boats in place until rigging is done.

 

[PqLear]

-- back to current era... had to pack up my build in May 2025 as I moved, and got back to continue the build about a month ago. I left things off with the hull all but complete, and I've been dreading the rigging.

As mentioned above, the pieces included in the kit are too flimsy for full rigging, and I had worked with Igor to make 3D-printed versions. We eventually settled on printed tops and crosstrees, and wooden masts. Even so, there's a fair amount of work to clean up the chaff and injection dots in the printed pieces, and TBH I'd recommend making everything out of wood instead. It's also harder to paint and get details right.



I'd never done shrouds before so created a test harness to experiment a bit before doing it on the kit:


Main top, painted, fitted with deadeyes, bands and railing.


All three masts assembled and painted, fitted with blocks and back stays dryfitted. Started with the main shrouds.


Tied ratlines by hand with Amati 10/25 natural thread (will stain black later), and made catharpins out of thread rather than metal.


All shrouds complete -- phew. Never thought I'd finish. Oh wait, starboard topgallant ratlines are missing :/


Masked the rest of the ship to stain the ratlines -- Tamiya XF-1 Black diluted with 3/4 airbrush thinner


Most of bowsprit standing rigging in place; fore stay & preventer stay, martingale- and bob stays, and bowsprit shrouds.


Bowsprit handropes tied and ready for staining.


Main mast crowsfeet, with spreader from plasticard. Walnut blocks, deadeyes, and thread is from Amati.


... annnndddd that bring us back to present day; current status of build -- Hull done except for gun port lids, standing rigging nearly complete (back stays and shifting stays left -- but all running rigging left, incl. the yards. Hopefully I can get back to posting progress here weekly -- look forward to feedback, suggestions, inspiration, ideas etc. from the SoS community!

 

[PqLear]

I haven't decided yet if it's great or terrible to work in 1:150... it's certainly easy to handle and manage such a relatively small model, but oh so tiny and fiddly everything is, and my eyes are not what they used to be.


Some of the back stays and shifting stays remain. I don't plan to add any sails.

 

[PqLear]

standing rigging done for now, next step yard arms and running rigging. As mentioned above the kit’s yards are too flimsy to resist the tension from full rigging, and I’m concerned the 3D printed versions won’t work either; they’ve warped slightly over the past year and not sure I trust them fully. Will explore options with Igorcap — may end up using pear wood, like we did for the masts.