Pre-Served Shroud Ropes

Signet

Signet

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Columbia, SC
I /think/ some of the shrouds and stays on my Ragusian Carrack should be served (at least Olha served hers), but don't have a machine to do it, and question my ability to do it in a manual way. No, I KNOW I'd fail at doing it manually, and probably with a machine, which I don't really want to buy, as well..

A search on the Net, prompted by my inherent laziness along with a desire for accuracy, found these pre-served ropes on eBay:

Pre-Served Shroud Rigging Lines

They're from a Chinese supplier (naturally), and while one of the photos shows sizes for 0.65mm to 3mm diameter, they currently sell just 0.65 to 1.2mm diameter. The quality looks good, but incredibly, (and REALLY confusing to me), is they're only available in TAN! I inquired about them, and was told I could dye or paint them, but it seems a shame they're not dark brown or black.

Has anyone tried them? Are there any other sources for similar products?

For that matter, for my 16th century Carrack, would the shrouds and stays have been served? Did they do this from antiquity, or only after a certain date?
 
Купите тросомот, и нитки Gutterman . Не занимайтесь ерундой покупая готовые канаты. Вить свои канаты довольно интересное занятие, и можно свить любой канат нужной толщины, или трос. Видео как оно делается найдете в интернете.
 
Zima said:
Купите тросомот, и нитки Gutterman . Не занимайтесь ерундой покупая готовые канаты. Вить свои канаты довольно интересное занятие, и можно свить любой канат нужной толщины, или трос. Видео как оно делается найдете в интернете.
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ChatGPT translation :-

"Buy a rope-making machine and Gutermann threads. Don't waste your time buying ready-made ropes. Making your own ropes is a quite interesting activity, and you can twist ropes or threads of any desired thickness. You can find videos on how to do it on the internet."
 
Zima said:
Купите тросомот, и нитки Gutterman . Не занимайтесь ерундой покупая готовые канаты. Вить свои канаты довольно интересное занятие, и можно свить любой канат нужной толщины, или трос. Видео как оно делается найдете в интернете.
Click to expand...
Thanks, but even that doesn't get me served shrouds, so I'd need yet another machine for that. I won't be building any other models with rigging, so it's cheaper & better for me to buy the ropes. That eliminates the trial and error of doing something new, too, and I have good quality at the start.
 
Syren Models and Parts has a pretty good one, a Chuck Passaro design. A kit, easy to assemble. I personally was not thrilled and did serving manually, with the line to be served between two vises. One of them being the vise that holds the hook for tying fishing flies. The clamp or vice part of the fly-tying vice can be turned laterally to maintain tension on the rope. However, going 'round and 'round with the spool of the black serving thread was, at best, tedious and at worst aggravating to my arthritis in my wrists, shoulders and back. I couldn't do it for very long at a stretch. I suspect this is not an uncommon malady among our members who've turned a bit gray around the muzzle.
But do not be deterred on the Passaro machine. A friend of mine, now masting and rigging the 18thc. "El Terrible" Spanish74 for the Roger's collection at the USNA, uses his serving machine regularly and extensively on that model and did so for rigging a prize winning "Fair American" fully rigged Admiralty style model with great success, having mastered the use of the machine. He loves his (even though it has become annoyingly squeaky in the gears after hours of use). Both models require a LOT of serving. So, while I was less than happy with It over the tension issue, clearly that issue is not insurmountable with the Syren Models machine.

Pete
 
I’m cheap! So I made my own following the Syren servomatic idea. With some scrap plywood and about $6.00 (usd) in lamp parts from the hardware store. Presto it works great. That said I did replace the homemade wood gears with 3D printed ones in version 2.0 (sorry no current picture). Now it works even more smoothly. IMG_7973.jpegIMG_7972.jpeg
 
I bought mine at Ali and a little hand-out:

Serving 'machine'. hand driven

Recently I bought this Serving Machine: https://nl.aliexpress.com/item/1005002827886867.html?spm=a2g0o.order_list.0.0.73c479d2h8arEe&gatewayAdapt=glo2nld In the ad it's called a Ropewalk, but it's for lining/serving a wire. I just put it together and did a test for my Bluenose. Here's my...
shipsofscale.com
Just for (probably) ones. But still operational.
Regards, Peter
 
I think you were on the right track with the two vices but instead of turning the thing by hand get an electric screw driver with a small chuck to hold one end of the thread to be served. The electric driver turns pretty slow so maybe you could use a variable speed drill motor on one end. Either way it would be cheaper than buying a machine already made. You could serve the pulley attachment ropes too although that may be more work than doing the few turns by hand. This is interesting as I don't think I have ever done a model that required the whole shroud to be served.
 
Norgale said:
I think you were on the right track with the two vices but instead of turning the thing by hand get an electric screw driver with a small chuck to hold one end of the thread to be served. The electric driver turns pretty slow so maybe you could use a variable speed drill motor on one end. Either way it would be cheaper than buying a machine already made. You could serve the pulley attachment ropes too although that may be more work than doing the few turns by hand. This is interesting as I don't think I have ever done a model that required the whole shroud to be served.
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I had a very large-scale clipper ship (53" on deck) to restore, and completely re-rig. I did all the stays and shrouds by hand using the method I described. My right hand was killing me for days.
Your suggestion sounds very good. Thumbsup All that hand cranking is pretty hard on the right hand as well.

Thanks, Pete
 
On the subject of Stays, zu Mondfeld's table indicates the Main Stay on my model should be 1.9mm in diameter. My question is: Is that the ROPE size, and any serving will increase the diameter (probably to about 2.2mm), or is that the FINISHED size of a served rope? I would think the ROPE size, as that is what determines the strength. Thus any served line would appear larger than the size specified.

Thoughts?
 
I think your right Signet. Good question. I built three clipper ships and not one ever signified that serving was appropriate. I'm not saying it wasn't that way for some of the rigging but I just haven't run into this up till now. I always thought that shrouds were like the stays and didn't move except to keep the mast properly aligned. Therefore a covering of tar or other water proof material was all that was needed to preserve these lines. Serving could be used where ropes got a lot of wear and tear from operating the ship. Please correct me if I'm wrong.
 
You may be spending a lot of effort for no real reward. The small amount of archaeological evidence suggests that shrouds that early may not have been served, although most of the evidence is from northern Europe, rather than the Med.

As just one example, the only served cordage found on Vasa is on the clews of the boltropes in the sails and the gun breechings and breeching tackle block strops.. The finds included a set of seven shrouds from an older ship (taken on board as breeching material), which clearly had never had serving. There are some shroud remains from Mary Rose as well, but I do not know if there is any serving.

By the 18th century, partial or full serving of shrouds was relatively common, traditionally the lower parts of the shrouds to protect from water, and all of the foremost shroud on each mast to protect it from abrasion from the course yard and sail.

Fred
 
Signet said:
I /think/ some of the shrouds and stays on my Ragusian Carrack should be served (at least Olha served hers), but don't have a machine to do it, and question my ability to do it in a manual way. No, I KNOW I'd fail at doing it manually, and probably with a machine, which I don't really want to buy, as well..

A search on the Net, prompted by my inherent laziness along with a desire for accuracy, found these pre-served ropes on eBay:

Pre-Served Shroud Rigging Lines

They're from a Chinese supplier (naturally), and while one of the photos shows sizes for 0.65mm to 3mm diameter, they currently sell just 0.65 to 1.2mm diameter. The quality looks good, but incredibly, (and REALLY confusing to me), is they're only available in TAN! I inquired about them, and was told I could dye or paint them, but it seems a shame they're not dark brown or black.

Has anyone tried them? Are there any other sources for similar products?

For that matter, for my 16th century Carrack, would the shrouds and stays have been served? Did they do this from antiquity, or only after a certain date?
Click to expand...

It's actually not hard at all....just extremely boring and repetitive serving by hand. I serve all but the topmost shroud lines and the thickest of thick stays as they just look way out of scale, even using sewing thread to serve. I don't know, I just consider it a private pride moment that that detail is included in my ships although I doubt any non-modeler would know what they're looking at.
 
I felt that way too TKAM. We go to all this trouble to build an accurate model and then find out that nobody gives a damn anyway. 99% of the people who will ever see this model will never know what they are looking at and after your gone only another modeler would be interested in your models. The kids will set them on fire an give them a Viking funeral or put them in a dumpster some place.
 
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