I've finally put together an assembly guide for my galleys. This will soon be available as a free PDF download on my webstore, but in the mean time- here you go! I'd love any feedback on if this makes sense, and where to improve any areas.
Once the weather allows I'll be taking pictures and doing similar guides for other ships, in particular the Galleass.
Cheers!
Ths
Galleys Guns and Glory! Assembly instructions: Galleys
The
Galley in the Renaissance: An overview
The main fighting
and merchant vessel in the Mediterranean for hundreds of years, galleys in the
Renaissance became amazing instruments of war. Measuring from 140- 160 feet in
length and having between 22 and 26 banks of oars (24 seemed to be the norm).
Following the ancient doctrine of the galley being a forward facing weapon (the
sides were venerable) yet updating to the times, just behind the great “spur”
ram of the ship, Renaissance galleys had an array of cannon in the bow, with
one large “great gun” firing a 30- 50 lb ball- running down the center line
with keel, and that flanked with smaller caliber guns.
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| A Papal galley in all it's glory! |
Over the gun deck
was a sort a fighting platform, called an arumbada. From the protection of the
arumbada platform, an array of swivel guns, crossbowmen or harquebusiers would
fire down into an enemy ship while the boarding party used the spur of the ship
as a boarding platform. Although all
oared vessels of the period were built similar to each other and in the case of
Venice on a real assembly line setup, each ship had its own foibles, and was
painted and decorated to the tastes of the owners. This allows for plenty of
leeway in terms of personalizing each of your Galleys Guns and Glory! ship
models.
To help with
this, each GGG! model comes with extra parts, such as open or closed top
Arumbada, and masts with or without the sails attached.
General Assembly
This
brief guide provides some handy tips for assembly of an Galley model but aside from a few parts, pertains to all ship
models Remember, All Skull and Crown
models are designed for children ages 14+,
but should ALWAYS have parental supervision when assembling, especially when
sharp objects are involved!
This
image shows all the galley parts laid out next to the piece onto which they
will be assembled. The design is such that it’s like stacking blocks. Note that you have options for furled sail or
no sail on the yard arms (called antennae during the renaissance) as well as closed or open Arumbada
“forecastles”.
Tools of the trade
You
will need a sharp knife, a suitable cutting surface, some sandpaper and a
bottle of carpenter's type wood glue.
Cutting parts off sprues
Skull
and Crown ship models come for the most part “off sprue” and as such are ready
to go. The crew markers are sprued for convenience of painting and because they
rolled away too much in prototype phases of production. To remove any sprued parts, use a sharp blade
and nick the back of the connecting tab first, then cut all the way through
from the front.
Remember
to be very careful when handling the blade and cut away from any fleshy parts!
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| Crew markers on a sprue. Note the small tab marker |
Sanding
All parts come pre sanded, but I recommend
before assembly giving all the parts a light sanding, in particular on the cut edges.
This helps with painting later. Use medium
or fine grade sandpaper (200-400 grit is fine). I find that it’s a lot easier
to lay the sandpaper flat and move the piece to be sanded than trying to hold
the sandpaper in a traditional fashion.
Test Fitting Before Gluing
This
is probably the most important part of the assembly process!
Start
with the base which has the oars on it and build the mode up by “stacking” pieces
on top of each other. Refer to the images as to how pieces go.
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| Except for the yard arm, all these pieces are just stacked, unglued. |
After
loose fitting all the model pieces to see where they go, go through the steps below
and glue, using any wood glue. I recommend “yellow” carpenter's glue. For ease of
application, I’ve replaced the tip of my glue bottle with the smaller children’s
nozzle. Remember to be sparing with the glue, to keep the pieces clean, and to
hold the parts together firmly to get a good bond.
Assembly: Step by Step
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| Yard
arm is glued at an angle. Use the guide line lines on the mast. |
Start
by gluing sub pieces together such as the Yard arm to the mast, and the main
hull body to the oars base.
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| Hull
and aft section assembly |
Next,
glue the aft castle onto the hull and add the aft castle side railing
piece. The lantern is optional, and the location can also be used for another flag.
Pro Tip- I find that painting model pieces in
sections makes the model go faster. at this stage I will have painted the
“water” the basic oar color, the exposed wood planking on fore and aft,
and the rower’s benches.
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| Paint by pulling brush away on the lines, just like pin striping. |
Example
of pre painting pieces before full assembly. Here I’ve taped off part of the
oars so I can paint the edges. In the background you can see a hull with the
wood sections and rower bench area painted.
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| You can see that I use the same piece of blue tape over and over. |
Upper Hull and Mast
While the main hull is drying, take the upper hull
section (the one with the guns) and choose which forecastle piece you want to
use. Line the piece up with the edges of the upper hull and then glue it on.
Historically the Spanish, Papal, and some Maltese ships would have the fully
covered Arumbada forecastle, but it is easy to imagine that captured ships
would be used as is by anyone.
 |
| Open style Arumbada forecastle glued on. The swivel
guns on both pieces can be seen here. |
Next, glue the assembled mast to the upper hull. Note that the square mast holes made in the
hull is set an angle. When you put the mast in, give it a gentle twist to help
snug the mast into position.
Pro Tip- I At this point on the model if you want to put rigging on, I
suggest that you paint up the upper hull section and mast before gluing it onto
the main hull before. (see Rigging below).
 |
|
Separated sections showing assembly of other parts
|
Rigging
If you wish to rig your ship models, I strongly
suggest you paint pieces first then add the rigging. The rigging on a galley is
fairly easy (very easy compared to later period ships!)
Cut three pieces of strong thread (I use “Coats Extra
Strong” upholstery thread) about a foot
each. You will have lots of excess, but believe me, having longer thread pieces
makes this much easier.
Example
shows rigging on a Lanterna Galley, with two masts. At this stage I pull the thread
through and super glue it in place. Make sure to hold the lines taut while the glue
is drying.
Find the half of a thread and make a slip knot in it.
Loop the knot onto the mast over the yard arm, tighten it and add a bit of
super glue. Once dry run the threads through the first holes in the upper
hull on each side. Pull the thread taut and secure with super glue. Make sure you
have them dry before letting go.
Do this step two more times but on the next pieces situate
the threads such that each piece goes through to one side. Once all
rigging is dry, carefully trim the excess with a sharp blade, then sand the base
if needed and then glue to the rest of the ship.
After
dry, sand the base of the hull to smooth away any glue and thread bits.
Pro Tip- If you have already glued the ship all together already fear not!
just use a 1.5mm drill and, using the upper
hull holes, drill all the way down the model. they repeat the above rigging steps! (Yes this comes from experience!)
Final
assembly
Once all the sub assemblies are done, glue all them
together. You may need to hold the upper hull section down with your fingers or
with clamps while it dries. Once dry, if
you didn’t paint the model in stages, go ahead and paint away.
Afterwards cut out the bulwark trim and awning, as
well as flags and attach them.
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| An example of a fully assembled (but unpainted for
demo purposes) model, showing paper trim and rigging |
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| Example of a Lanterna, pre painted and rigged, before Assembly |
Painting
guides
I’m working on another full article on history of
color choices and step by steps, but until finished I would point you to my blog
where you will see several examples of painted ships
Jay While has posted a great step by step on his blog
on how he paints his ships- very good!
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| An example of variation you can get. Turkish galleys |
