The Wrap-up

The model kit comes with an assortment of figures depicting sailors performing various tasks. Painting and mounting them on the model is a matter of individual preference. I usually complete a model with figures if it is shown as underway, or at sea. For this reason I left them off this Cutty Sark. Clipper ships are beautiful ship models , no matter how minimal or elaborately they are built. Revells’ Cutty Sark is not the kind of model that can be built quickly though. I’ve been building models for decades and I am familiar with many techniques and I have quite a few tools to use and it still took me 8 months. That said, it will build into a beautiful model if you are patient. Take your time with the rigging in particular. Some days I spent an hour and only rigged one brace, but building ship models is a hobby I enjoy, so the time spent is spent well. If you are building or thinking about building this kit, I hope this article will be helpful.

Boats & Flag

The ships boats are left off until the all the rigging is finished, otherwise they will be in the way of the belaying points for the rigging. The boat skids and davits were all painted white. The insides of the boats were painted two shades of brown. The boat exteriors were painted white with blue trim. I don’t know if the blue trim is historically accurate but it does add a bit of needed color. The oars were painted tan.

Finally, the flag. No ship model is complete without a flag. The British merchant flag or “Red Duster” was cut from the sheet and folded around a thread and glued with a drop of Elmer’s glue.

After the glue dried I touched up the flags’ edges with red paint and rigged it to the peak of the spanker gaff

Yard Arms and Running Rigging

The first running rigging I installed is the staysail halyards and downhauls, since they are on the stays at the centerline of the ship. The halyards and downhauls would be tied together when the staysails are not installed, so I used one length of thread instead of two tied together.

The Spencer and Mizzen gafs were installed and their topping lifts rigged. No other rigging on these is done until later.

For the yardarms, I like to work from the mizzen mast foreword and from the top down. So I started by removing just the mizzen yard arms I need from the spru trees. This will prevent mix-ups. I cleaned up the excess molding flash and removed the molded on eyebolts.

The kit instructions do not include installing foot ropes and stirrups but I rigged them anyway, using thin wire for stirrups. Jackstays, made from thin wire, were also installed using super glue. The yards were then painted flat black. After the paint dries, the blocks needed for the running rigging should now be tied to the yards. This requires a decision as to how much running rigging will be installed. Since I will be building the model without sails, I chose to install all the running rigging which will still be on after the sails are removed. This includes : halyards, topping lifts and standing lifts, braces, sheets and clew lines. Using the rigging instructions as a reference, I tied the blocks needed onto the yardarms. Now is the time to do this. For me, trying to tie blocks onto the yards after they are installed usually results in damaging the parts or rigging I’ve already installed.

The mizzen royal yard was installed in the lowered position, making sure it is square and level with the mast. Before installing any other yards, I installed the halyard and standing lift. Next, the mizzen topgallant yard was installed in the lowered position. The halyard, standing lift , sheet and clew lines were now installed.

This process was repeated for all the yards on all the masts. The braces were not installed until last, when all the other rigging was finished. The rigging instructions from the kit are very good and combined with this sequence the results should look pretty good . When installing the braces, again, start with the mizzen and work from the top down. The braces on the mizzen yards should not be tied to the ends of the yards, as shown in the instructions, they will interfere with the main yard braces and the mainmast backstays. They should be tied to the yards approx. 1/3 of the way inboard from the ends.

Standing Rigging

As I said before, sometimes I deviate from the kit instructions and this is one of those times. I begin installing the standing rigging as I install the masts. I like to rig starting from the center of the ship and work outward. This minimizes the possibility of breaking parts and rigging already installed. The lower foremast stays were installed first and I worked my way up the mast. It’s very important to pull the thread just tight enough to remove the slack and not over tighten . Plastic masts bend very easily and over tightening will result in misaligned masts. I also pull each piece of thread through a cake of bees wax before I use it. This will prevent the thread from being affected by moisture in the air and it makes the thread easier to use.
After all the forestays and backstays have been installed on the foremast, and it is aligned as straight as possible, install the shroud / ratlines supplied with the kit. This is where I made a large mistake. While cleaning out old spru trees and plastic bags from my kit box, I managed to throw away the supplied ratlines. Fortunately I have a loom, left over from another kit, and I was able to make replacements.

As each mast was installed I also installed its standing rigging and ratlines.

Masts

Before installing the foremast I assembled the bridles which will attach the Mainmast fore stays to the deck and installed them. This is a lot easier then installing them after the foremast is in place.

Assembling the masts is pretty straight forward. The lower masts are in 2 halves and are cemented together after cleaning up the flash and mating surfaces.

Squadron green filler putty was used to fill the seams in the lower masts.

The main mast has a jackstay for the Spencer gaff as part of it.

I removed it temporarily to fill the seam it was covering and reinstalled it after painting. The openings in the mast caps and tops were too small to allow the topmasts to pass through without scraping the paint off. A little work with a small round file remedied this. The lower masts and the doublings were painted testors flat white and the rest of the masts were painted testors flat brown.

This is the best time to install the chains that support the yards. After the yards are installed the small eye they tie to will be more difficult to get at.

Looking ahead to the rigging, I installed the blocks for the running rigging now before the masts are installed. The instructions say to install the yardarms while the masts are being assembled but this will make the rigging process more difficult then it already is. So, I leave the yardarms off for now.

The foremast is installed first and to align it I tied 2 fake backstays from the maintop to the bumpkins and made sure the mast was straight with the ships centerline and slightly raked toward the stern. This will provide opposition to the forestays, backstays and shrouds while they are being installed and keep the mast in alignment. This was repeated for each mast as they were installed.

Bow Spirit and Jib Boom

The bow sprit was installed after sanding the seam and applying a coat of white paint. I drilled the holes at the bottom of the martingale (dolphin striker) to make it easier for the chains to pass through them.
The bowsprit shroud chains were blackened and installed with an eyebolt made of twisted wire.

The jib boom had quite a lot of flash on it from the molding process and needed considerable cleaning up, including opening up all the holes. The square end which fits inside of the bow sprit was too wide to fit correctly so I whittled it down with an exacto knife until it fit and cemented it in place. The martingale stays were installed by first drilling small holes in the bottom of the collars were they attach . I made eyebolts from small wire passed through the last link and twisted into a kind of stem. This was cemented into the previously drilled hole. The chain was then passed through the martingale and up to the bullseye where it is made fast. The kit supplied chain is not long enough for both martingale stays, fortunately I have some chain left over from another project which I used. The other jib boom shrouds were installed per the instruction sheet.

Display Stand

For the display stand, I purchased an oak drawer front from home depot. I think it cost around six dollars. After locating and drilling the mounting holes I glued a couple of ¼ inch oak strips on for risers and a couple more on the tops of the risers to help hold the model in place. Stain, a couple of coats of varnish and the model has a nice looking display stand.

Rear Deck House

The rear deckhouse is a bit tricky to assemble so it looks right. I started by installing the railing which will locate all the parts behind it. The deckhouse sides were set in place but not cemented. I had to remove the bottom half of the locating pins to get the sides to sit flush with the deck. The aft wall of the deckhouse was next cemented in place. This required the removal of the bottom of the locating pins also.


Using my fingers, I squeezed the deckhouse sides against the aft wall and cemented them using super glue on the inside seams. The forward walls of the deckhouse were cemented in place with just the removal of the bottom half of the locating pins.

The roof of the rear deckhouse went on with no problems. The tabs on the bottom of the companionway sides prevented it from being installed in the correct position so, as with the other parts I removed material from the tabs and test fit the parts until they fit satisfactory between the rail and the deckhouse. They were then cemented in place. The curved roof over the companionway needed a little manipulating but it went into place ok. Again I used a little white glue, applied with a toothpick, to fill little gaps here and there, then touched up the paint as needed .

To glaze the skylights and portholes, I used Model Master clear parts cement and window maker. It dries clear and is thick enough to fill the square skylight openings with one application.



The remaining items to install back here are the stanchions and railings, which went on with no special problems.

The best way to blacken chains is to use a metal toner. This is an acid which is available in the railroad section of many hobby shops. I cut the chain to the length I need and using a piece of small wire, dunk it into the toner. After a few minutes , the chain begins to turn black. When it has reached the needed color, I rinse it in a cup of water standing ready for this purpose, then dry it with a paper towel.

The remaining external hull items are the figurehead, bobstay, bumpkins and rudder pendant chains. I installed these parts in accordance with the instruction sheet.
The figurehead is very well done and has great detail which I did not want obscured by a coat of white paint. I decided the best way to keep the detail visible is to paint the figurehead a light gray color and highlight the details by using a wash and dry brush technique. For the light gray I painted the figurehead Model Master Camouflage Gray. I mixed up a water color wash of gray by mixing purple with a touch of black and applied it after the gray paint was dry. After the wash dried I removed the excess and dry brushed the highlights with Model Master Flat White.53

Forecastle Deck

First I attached the 2 large bulls eyes to the foc’sel deck . Instead of tying them to eye bolts, I twisted thin wire around one end and installed it through the hole with super glue.

The windless side pieces will be the rear locating pieces for the focs’l deck. Unfortunately, the deck was located a little too far aft and this caused some fit problems for parts installed later. The sail lockers sit a little crooked because they hit the rear of the focs’l. The remedy for this is to remove the raised frame on the deck which locates the sail lockers and remove the pins from the bottom of the sail locker sides and front. This way the sail lockers can be installed straight.

The catheads also interfered with the railings at the bow. To remedy this, I filed away plastic from the top of the catheads until the rails fit flush with the hull. There were still small gaps between the hull and the rail and I used white glue to fill them.



The rest of the parts associated with the bow and focs’l were installed with no problem.

Deck Houses and Machinery

One of the great things about this kit is the detail which is molded into each part. In order to preserve this detail and make it stand out , I use the painting techniques of wash and dry brushing.After removing the deckhouse parts from the spru trees and cleaning them up, I placed them on a piece of cardboard which I covered with double backed carpet tape. The parts were spray painted with Testors Flat Light Earth. This is a good medium brown color. After the paint was dry, I mixed a wash of dark brown water color thinned with a couple of drops of dish washing liquid. This was liberaly applied to all the parts on the board.

When the wash dried, it had settled into all the low spots and around the raised details, highlighting them. The light earth color was mixed with a little white to lighten it and dry brushed on.

This highlights the highest raised areas, the effect is to prevent the details from becoming lost in the monotonous brown color. To give the brass portholes in the rear cabin a more authentic look, they were painted a light green color and then testors gold was dry brushed over the green.

The winches, pumps and other deck machinery, which are normally black, were painted dark gray and highlighted with a black wash and light gray dry brushing. The hatches and deckhouse roofs were painted flat gull gray, to look like weathered teak. I used a dark gray Prismacolor pencil to bring up the molded wood grain on the roofs. A wash of black watercolor was used to outline the hatch covers.

Two 4”lengths of anchor chain were cut and blackened. I used super glue to attach them to the chain gates on the rear end and a drop of super glue on the front end to attach it to the deck. Even though the glue frosted over it will not be visible under the foc’sl deck.

The Deck

After removing the deck sections from the spru trees, I remove all flash and excess plastic with an exacto knife and sandpaper, just as was done with the hull. The deck sections were carefully test fit and sanded where necessary for the best fit. The holes for eye bolts and other parts were drilled out at this time too. When I was satisfied with the fit, I painted the deck sections with Testors Model Master Flat Dark Tan FS30219 from a spray can and let them dry overnight.

A lot of modelers use the technique described in the instructions to bring out the wood grain relief of the deck but I have found a different method. After painting the deck, as I’ve already described, I lightly drag a colored pencil over it. In this case I used a Prismacolor dark umber # PC947. The pencil is sharpened and the side of the point is lightly dragged, length ways mostly, until completed. If I’m not satisfied with the way it looks, the pencil pigment can be removed with soap and water.

I glued two 1 inch long sections of 1/8 inch styrene tube to the bottom of the center deck section at both ends. This is to add support were the deck section joints are. Two A blocks were installed in the deck sections for the halyard rigging which will come later. Again, thin wire was twisted around the eye on the block and inserted thought the hole in the deck and super glued underneath. This also makes a very strong and neat installation.

The deck sections were now carefully put in place and liquid cement was applied along the deck-waterway seam. Building plastic models can sometimes be a challenging experience. My case in point is the deck installation. Despite all efforts I still had gaps in some places between the deck and waterway. One gap along the side of the poop deck required the use of small Dia. plastic rod for a filler. Then I filled the gap with white glue. After the glue dried I painted the filled areas to match the deck color. Although I painted the focs’l deck at this time, I did not install it. That will come later. After installing the deck sections, the pin rails were installed along the bulwarks. The masking of the area were they were glued did not turn out as good as I had expected. This meant touching up the paint in quite a few areas. The results were pretty good in the end but a bit more work then I had expected.