Soleil Royal by Heller - an Extensive Modification and Partial Scratch-Build by Hubac’s Historian

[Stevedownunder]

As usual fantastic work Marc,

Seeing my eyes haven't been calibrated today I am unable to see any problem.
Keep up the great work.

Cheers,
Stephen.

 

[Hubac’s Historian]

Keep that calibration on-hold, Stephen

 

[dockattner]

I'm an orthodontist. I see asymmetry .

This medium (styrene) is fascinating to me. How you carve something like that is very intriguing... Is there a tutorial anywhere in your build log I could reference some time?

 

[DARIVS ARCHITECTVS]

The asymmetry is subtle. The question is how to fix it.

 

[Jimsky]

I see the asymmetry only at the breast level, but according to my wife it is perfectly normal

 

[Hubac’s Historian]

I see the asymmetry only at the breast level, but according to my wife it is perfectly normal

 

[Hubac’s Historian]

 

[DARIVS ARCHITECTVS]

 

[NMBROOK]

Great work Marc

My one observation though is that the facetted grated deck sections possibly have no camber running athwartships.

Kind Regards

Nigel

 

[Hubac’s Historian]

I think, Paul, this is a good time to trot out the time-worn shop trope about how it’s really the imperfections in a hand-made thing that really lend it its character

As for tutorials, I did one not too long ago on the horsehead:

Soleil Royal by Heller - an Extensive Modification and Partial Scratch-Build by Hubac’s Historian

I was thinking that maybe certain locations specialized in specific revelations. Maybe the Hudson River would provide help with regard to the galleries. Liberty Park with the galleon. Broadway could be the source of deep insight into making deadeyes. Just thinking out loud here... Maybe I am...

shipsofscale.com

And, back here in the mother-log:

Soleil Royal by Hubac's Historian - Heller - An Extensive Modification and Partial Scratch-Build

modelshipworld.com

One under-appreciated feature of these forums is that one can do key-word searches within a build-log to find stuff. That usually gets me proximally close to what I’m looking for.

Kurt - when you look at my ship from above, the perimeter defined by the transom, the upper bulwarks and the beakhead bulkhead looks like a big trapezoid. It’s not even particularly subtle, however, over time as the rig goes up, any apprehension of that will vanish in the trees, so to speak. I am sure that I did several things wrong, when I first cut away the lower hull that contributed to these problems, but they are what they are, really.

Jim, I really LOL’d on that one!

Nigel - it’s subtle, but there will be ‘thwartship camber to the head gratings, as well as a fore and aft profile that follows the headrails. When I consulted JCL, his drawings of the ‘thwartship camber are negligible. I increased it a bit, to help disguise my symmetry problems.

My gratings probably won’t be customary criss-cross gratings, unless I can figure out how to do that with curves in both directions. I will probably do the same alternating slat grating that is seen on the Tanneron model and Heller kit.

 

[Hubac’s Historian]

Hello!

The difficulty I’ve been having with these headrail supports has to do with my fidelity to the idea that some portion of the support should fit beneath the lowest headrail.

I started by first adjusting the adjoining angles on the starboard side. I found that I had to add plastic shims, here and there:



This all worked out well enough on the starboard side, but I was not having nearly enough of a supporting ledge, when I shifted over to the port side.

More-over, when I positioned both headrails at the same time, I realized I was going to have to add significant plastic the the lower coved profile, in order to create a port-side ledge. Rather than continue to add plastic, I decided to let the matter rest for a few days. I am glad I did.

In the days that followed, my second bout with COVID (pretty mild) has afforded me the time to really think this through. I remembered that I had already set the position of the headrails so that the forward medallion was below the sprit mast. That was the whole impetus for re-designing the headrails, in the first place.

Further, I had set the cathead supports to meet neatly beneath the cathead timbers. Despite all that forethought and pre-work, I had only visually placed the starboard cathead, before fitting the supports, on the assumption that my glue blocking would locate them properly.

Wellllll, that was not a safe assumption to make. My forward medallions were actually encroaching above the spritmast, and when I put the cathead timbers in place, I could no longer fit the supports beneath them.

Once I could see the proper positioning of all of the affected elements, I knew what I must do:





The way forward would be to lop off these supporting ears (middle support):



Note: The vertical web you see on the split supports, closest to the hawsers, are only temporary for the sake of strength while I make and fit these parts. Once I did that, the support pieces nestled against both sides easily:




I can simulate that under-connection, a bit later, with an applied scroll-head.

From there, I focused on what sort of decorative embellishments I would add to the exposed face of these supports. I settled on a raised lip moulding:



I am playing with the idea of applied fleur ornaments at the base of each support. These will extend out beyond the sides of each support, which may or may not be pleasing. So far, though, they are coming along nicely:




The other tricky bit is that these cambered transverse supports for the head gratings have buttressing knees, running aft.

I had applied a glue ledge for the grating slats, and at the ends I have applied these blocks that I will fit to the headrails, and then file to shape. What I have drawn upon them is only a rough approximation. Again, these details are always easier to dial-in with the files:




Steadily, now, the bow is rounding into form. Thank you all for your likes, your comments and for looking-in.

 

[NMBROOK]

Excellent work Marc.There are MANY aspects to juggle to get this area to be cohesive

Kind Regards

Nigel

 

[Hubac’s Historian]

Thank you, Nigel! This has certainly been one of the most challenging aspects of the project - if not THE most challenging. There are so many things to remember, in the absence of plans.

 

[aurélien wolff]

Looking at the hull like that, I'll say your is a "oeuvre d'art". The scratch, the painting, it's all verry good for me.

 

[Hubac’s Historian]

It is very much appreciated Aurelien!

 

[aurélien wolff]

It's a verry solid build with loads of scratch technics I could use later on for mine when I'll get it (talked to my parents about the kit, seing it and its numbers of part, my mom said "are you sure?") and for other kits (including scratching planes interior such as on the heller musee kit like the leo 451 who need more details[I got 2 of them]).

 

[Hubac’s Historian]

The Heller SR is a big undertaking. I started my first one when I was 8. I got to the upper deck when I stopped for a while because my skills weren’t quite up to par. I picked at it through my teens, and finally finished it in my 20’s. I learned a lot, although I did zero scratch work on that model.

Scratch-building has been a revelation to me, adding bottomless interest to the hobby. Thank you for your interest, and I look forward to seeing you build your model.

 

[Stevedownunder]

Hello!

The difficulty I’ve been having with these headrail supports has to do with my fidelity to the idea that some portion of the support should fit beneath the lowest headrail.

I started by first adjusting the adjoining angles on the starboard side. I found that I had to add plastic shims, here and there:

View attachment 336843

This all worked out well enough on the starboard side, but I was not having nearly enough of a supporting ledge, when I shifted over to the port side.

More-over, when I positioned both headrails at the same time, I realized I was going to have to add significant plastic the the lower coved profile, in order to create a port-side ledge. Rather than continue to add plastic, I decided to let the matter rest for a few days. I am glad I did.

In the days that followed, my second bout with COVID (pretty mild) has afforded me the time to really think this through. I remembered that I had already set the position of the headrails so that the forward medallion was below the sprit mast. That was the whole impetus for re-designing the headrails, in the first place.

Further, I had set the cathead supports to meet neatly beneath the cathead timbers. Despite all that forethought and pre-work, I had only visually placed the starboard cathead, before fitting the supports, on the assumption that my glue blocking would locate them properly.

Wellllll, that was not a safe assumption to make. My forward medallions were actually encroaching above the spritmast, and when I put the cathead timbers in place, I could no longer fit the supports beneath them.

Once I could see the proper positioning of all of the affected elements, I knew what I must do:

View attachment 336837
View attachment 336841
View attachment 336842

The way forward would be to lop off these supporting ears (middle support):

View attachment 336840

Note: The vertical web you see on the split supports, closest to the hawsers, are only temporary for the sake of strength while I make and fit these parts. Once I did that, the support pieces nestled against both sides easily:

View attachment 336839
View attachment 336838

I can simulate that under-connection, a bit later, with an applied scroll-head.

From there, I focused on what sort of decorative embellishments I would add to the exposed face of these supports. I settled on a raised lip moulding:

View attachment 336836

I am playing with the idea of applied fleur ornaments at the base of each support. These will extend out beyond the sides of each support, which may or may not be pleasing. So far, though, they are coming along nicely:

View attachment 336835
View attachment 336833

The other tricky bit is that these cambered transverse supports for the head gratings have buttressing knees, running aft.

I had applied a glue ledge for the grating slats, and at the ends I have applied these blocks that I will fit to the headrails, and then file to shape. What I have drawn upon them is only a rough approximation. Again, these details are always easier to dial-in with the files:

View attachment 336834
View attachment 336844

Steadily, now, the bow is rounding into form. Thank you all for your likes, your comments and for looking-in.

Hi Marc,
Good to hear you are recovering well from your second round of Covid.
And even better to see some progress on your magnificent Soleil Royal.


Cheers,
Stephen.

 

[Hubac’s Historian]

Thank you, Stephen - I almost feel normal again. I made what felt like a ton of progress today, although it won’t amount to much in pictures. I think, though, that I have crossed the major hurdles of the head. The ornamental fleurs look really nice, actually.

 

[aurélien wolff]

Ah you got it twice, recover well from the second one. On the delphin at the end of each railing, you choosed to installl them because they were there post radoub and on the proposal showing the bouteille?

source: https://afcan.org/tribune_libre/soleil-royal.html
I noticed heller opened the bouteilles "galleries" on their most recent boxart (but didn't on the model)