Friday, October 23, 2020

New Bedford Whaleboat Paper Model - Scale: ~1/30

This is the Fiddler's Green Whaleboat with a lot of added detail. The model is 11 inches long, roughly 1:30 scale. Whaleboats generally varied from 28 to 33 feet in length and were manned by a crew of 5: a bosun, four oarsmen, and a harpooner.

I tapered dowels for the mast and spar, scratch built the harpoon and lance, carved a wooden tiller, made oarlocks from plastic rod, added standing and running rigging, and rigged the whale line, including coils in the line tubs and at the bow. Other added details include paddles, a water pail for lubricating the whale line, a "firkin" to hold drinking water, a "crotch" to hold the ready harpoon, a wooden drag (beside the tiller) used to help tire a harpooned whale, and a hatchet to cut the whale line if the "Nantucket sleighride" went sour.

These boats typically carried a lot of tools and gadgets. I modeled fewer than half of them.







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