Tag Archives: third mate

From the Perspective of the Kids

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It’s always nice to hear what children have to say about our RELIANCE Project; when we get some of their input, it’s always interesting. Here are some recent examples:

Stephen and his Dad came for a visit after sailing school; I asked Stephen to give us his impressions of the boat. Several days later, he came back with a Lego diorama: a waterfront scene just like the one at the sailing school, but with RELIANCE at her mooring. You’ll note that RELIANCE has a bow-mounted cannon. Stephen says: “Every big sailboat needs one!” If only Charlie Barr were so inventive…

The scene is complete with a navigational buoy in the foreground. I like what the sailing school is teaching its young students, but now I’ll have to see if Stephen has smuggled a small cannon onto one of the HH12 1/2’s….

1 stephen's lego

Charlotte brought Queen Elsa to visit her Scandinavian subjects, but it seems the Third Mate has other things on his mind!

2 Queen Elsa

Finishing Off the Deck Edge

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Denise delivered the third mate’s jersey, complete with all the details: hand embroidery of RELIANCE NYYC, ribbing at the collar, and ribbing at each sleeve end. Thank you very much!

1 third Mate

Meanwhile, Bill, Herb, and Sandy have dry fit one of the deck edge toe rails into place so we can perfect our plans to complete attachment.

2 deck edge dry fit

This toe rail assembly was actually an extension of the shell plating at roughly deck level to hold an angle iron piece with bull nose at the top. At the bow of the real RELIANCE, the nickel steel shell plate was 5/40″ thick, which lead to another of our “moments.” In our scale, that is 1/48″ thick!

3 detail of shell plate

Our RELIANCE model–with its deck the length of a J-24–had only 21 web-frames to which tobin bronze and nickel steel plates from about 1/48″ to about 5/128″ thick were attached. Imagine sailing your J-24 with that hull!

The toe rail really finishes off the deck, as you can see here:

4 deck view

(The bottom of the angle iron had been laid earlier as can be seen in the foreground)