Mantua Sergal's Sovereign of Seas

[StevieF]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

<t>Coming along a treat there Gary!! That kit seems quite well thought out and I presume the plan in the background of the last photo came with the Kit?<br/>
That's another drawback with the partwork version that I'm doing at the moment, it can be difficult at times to plan the build stages due to lack of information. All I can say is I wont be doing another ship from this company, although the kits themselves are not a BAD kit they are lacking in certain areas and the customer help-line is sporadic at best and then you need to be very patient with whoever answers the phone as they know very little about the product they are employed to deal with.<br/>
You get the idea with the "Professional" build guide connected with the product forum? Egomaniacal Tyrant, those two words sum up his attitude as far as I'm concerned, and never has he dared to display a piece of his own handiwork for all to see. Always a pleasure to look through your build diaries and I pick up quite a few good tips and ideas from you, hope you don't mind if you recognise a few of your ideas adapted for my Sovereign?<br/>
Cheers, Steve..</t>

 

[GaryM]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

I don't mind you using anything, but consider it a complement.
There are nine sheets of plans and two of them are just the wood parts. The ones on the wall are there version of the standing and running rigging with is so full of rigging errors that require Wolfram Zu Mondfelds, R. C. Anderson, and James Septon books. The plans hanging up needed to be enlarged by 1.32 which I did at a place that can make enlarge prints since the ship will be over 3 1/2 feet long.

 

[GaryM]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

I have finished the first layer of planking. To maintain the curvature at the back, the planking was done with 1.5 x 1.5 mm lime wood. I have almost 500 pieces and 188 hours into the build at this stage.
Received the fleur de lis and mounted two of them. The French fleur de lis was used by Edward III of England in making claim to the throne of France. He changed the state seal to include a quarter of the French arms. This seal existed from 1340 to 1801 when George III finally surrendered his title of 'King of France'.

 

[eric67]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

<t>Hi Gary, looks great at the moment. In picture 015a.JPG what has caused the gap between the deck and the hull at left of picture, thanks for the clarification regarding fleur de lis, a part of English history I wasn't aware of, not being there at the time, I think I was discovering America or was it Australia?<br/>
<br/>
Still no news on the Titanic?<br/>
Regards<br/>
Eric</t>

 

[jct]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

<t>Hi Gary,<br/>
Looking good, so the stern is actually concave? That will be an interesting view when she's complete<br/>
J</t>

 

[GaryM]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

It seems that the vertical wall just did not fit properly so there is a place where it is wider that I did not catch. Since there is a railing that covers this area, hopefully it will blend in and not be noticeable.

 

[GaryM]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

I used 1 x 3 mm walnut over the 1.5 x 1.5 section at the stern and it held the curve well.

 

[GaryM]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

<r>After 260 hours and 600 pieces, I have finished the second planking and will start the fun part of adding character to the hull. The new 2008 instructions do not say to plank the bottom part until much later and would make it very hard not to damage parts they say to do first. The waterline was un-laden at 19 feet 6 inches and laden at 23 feet 6 inches. which would give 76 and 92 mm on the model. If I used 92 mm as a waterline, it would come over the lower wales. By using the plans, I determined that 87 is about the right height for the waterline on this model which gives it a waterline of 22.2 feet which was also mentioned in James Sephton's SOS book.<br/>

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[eric67]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

<t>Hi Gary, your SoS looks fantastic at the moment and when it is finished it will be fantasticer-er-er.<br/>
A few questions for you, in pictures 19a-20a, the dark colour, is it dark brown or black? the curvy piece at the rear of the fo'cle, is it plastic (orange piece)? Does your models colour scheme show the area through the lower gun ports as having a red band through them.<br/>
(I will scan some pictures out of my magazine to show you what I mean, will post them Dec 4 Aust. time)<br/>
Lastly I am surprised you painted the upper hull before planking the lower hull, what was your reason for this?<br/>
Regards<br/>
Eric</t>

 

[GaryM]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

The reason I painted part of the upper hull was to see how the fake side planking would look after being painted. If you notice, the way they make the guns line up is that there is a single strip for each row of gun ports with their locations laser cut onto them that you cut out. They laser cut the fake planks in these lids and on the strip. Being curiosity about how they would appear is why I painted this part.
King Charles said that black was the only color that would be used on the ship so that his gold carvings would really stand out. The only exception is that area where there might be blood that would distract the gunners. Thus, it was traditionally painted a blood red. Thus, the bulwark walls and ports were always red.

 

[eric67]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

<t>Hi Gary, thanks for the clarification. It's just that the photo makes it look like dark brown, lighting probably. <br/>
Interesting about the red walls and ports. I have seen pics of models that have been painted various shades of blue and green, obviously modellers choice. I was going to paint mine a Royal Blue but will do it in black.<br/>
Thanks once again.<br/>
Regards<br/>
Eric</t>

 

[JeanL]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

<t>Hi <br/>
I really like the sovereign of the seas; she was a piece of floating art. Your progression quite fast. I have never seen someone measuring the time he spends on the build, but it shows how much work goes into such a model, I hope that one day I will be able to do such a ship.<br/>
May I ask a question, I was looking at the DeAgostini stern and it looks completely different to that of the Mantua version, why is that? Could it be part of the major rework that she went through?</t>

 

[GaryM]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

DeAgostini is a company that makes substandard models and does its own thing so that they will not be banded or sued by other companies as copy cats. They take advantage of those that can not put kits on credit or save up to buy the better models with cash. I did the Soleil Royal by Mantua which I got pictures from the model in Paris. If you compare it with DeAgostini, you can see they left off a bunch of stuff and just changed the scale to make a smaller model. Thus, no research and again an inferior model that looks something like the original model. Wish everyone would avoid this company. If you look at some other sights and this one, you will find people that tell you how bad the material is that this company uses. Also, they send wrong parts and have little or no customer support. Just greedy people.

 

[JeanL]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

<r>Thank you for the insight, I did not know that they were such a criticized company. Although I would never have bought something from them - My father always tells me to buy the whole thing at once and not pay for it every month, because in the end it is always more expensive. I was looking at their webpage once more and I have found a rather odd thing. The picture they have of their Sovereign of the Seas is a plank on frame ship that looks nothing like what is in the kit.<br/>
<URL url="http://www.model-space.com/gb/build-the-sovereign-of-the-seas.html"><s></s><LINK_TEXT text="http://www.mod...the-sovereign-of-the-seas.html</LINK_TEXT><e></e></URL><br/>
Unfortunately I am rather sure that it is not the only company that produces low quality kits and advertises them as "high quality" or "museum quality " kits.</r>

 

[GaryM]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

Currently, I have 400 construction hours and used 1250 pieces building this ship.
This revised version had added some very nice features that really enhance the models appearance. Their grate spacing is still too large and the decking should have been revised to four plank spacing instead of two. The spacing between the cannon ports was revised slightly, but the casting were not adjusted to make them fit right.
The carvings on the stern above the enclosed walkways do not match any pictures or description of these carvings. Also, below the walkways is incorrect. Amati made a version of this ship at the same scale. The plans and castings are still available. Amati’s side casting are not correct but the stern casting mentioned above are very close to the right ones and I used these on my model. Also, the front below the forecastle had flour de leis with a crown on top. Thus, Amati fittings were substituted for those supplied by Mantua. Also, their lion and unicorn, far superior castings, were used on the stern.
The two sets of framing that extends from the bow needs to be preformed before gluing the inside and outside walls together. They must curve to match the existing deck. Once you are sure that the inside and outside pieces follow the contour, only then should you glue the two pieces together.
The railings that go along the side of the ship and on top of the forecastle should only be two types. The lowest one (K1) in the middle of the ship dose not get the plank that makes a solid wall for it full length. Otherwise it should be made the same as all the others. The one around the forecastle (K2) says to do it different than the other enclosed walls. I believe that it should be made the same as the other 3 walls (K3, K4, K5). I believe that uniformity was key to building ships and avoiding confusion and would have prevailed throughout. Thus, I built it the same but used K6 to hold the vertical post in proper place while the glues set.

 

[eric67]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

<r>Hi Gary, your model is looking fantastic and truly inspirational.<br/>
<br/>
<I><s></s>"The two sets of framing that extends from the bow needs to be preformed before gluing the inside and outside walls together. They must curve to match the existing deck. Once you are sure that the inside and outside pieces follow the contour, only then should you glue the two pieces together."<e></e></I> <br/>
On my model they supply 1.5mm plywood pieces. I saw a post (builders name escapes me) his ship has blue instead of black and that's when I decided that I will build up that part using the hull primary planks. The bamboo planks I have have too much of a bevel on them, I still have a lot of planks left over from the Endeavour and will use them but with a small bevel on the planks.<br/>
<br/>
Keep up the good work Gary, looking forward to the next stage.<br/>
<br/>
Regards<br/>
Eric</r>

 

[GaryM]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

Thanks Eric. Mantua shows blue, so a lot of people that do not know that the king demanded only black be used and mistakenly paint the background blue. I am looking forward to the next stage also. lol

 

[GaryM]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

This is the ship after 500 construction hours and over 2,000 pieces. The next stage is to add the dead-eyes. Mantua sends you 5 and 7 mm sizes. The 7 are for the lower masts and 5 for other masts. Since dead-eye diameter is 1/2 the diameter of the associated mast and the largest mast is 12 mm, their sizes are all wrong. The fore and missen lower dead-eye should be 5 mm and the main mast should be 6 mm. Also, the blocks they send are 7 and 5 mm. Since the size of the block is about 12 times the sizes of the rope diameter, almost all of the blocks will be replaced. The rope used on the block in the picture is 0.5 mm. Thus the triple block used was 6 mm, not the 7 mm Mantua chose. Note that Mantua leaves the quarter gallery top extension with out any support. All pictures of the ship show two fancy supports which I added.
I saw the line error in 31a after the picture was posted and corrected it.

 

[eric67]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

<t>WOW! Gary your ship is looking magnificent! A ship fit for a king.<br/>
Gary you talk of a 1mm difference in size in the blocks, would you sand the block down or can you buy the correct size?<br/>
<br/>
Truly inspirational.<br/>
Regards<br/>
Eric</t>

 

[eric67]

Re: Mantua Sovereign of Seas

<t>Gary, does your construction time include dry fitting and any adjustments that would be needed?<br/>
Eric</t>