Jump to content

Airfix 1/400 Mary Rose


Recommended Posts

Hello All,
My first ship in a lo-o-ong time. It's the Airfix Mary Rose, picked up for silly cheap in an Airfix sale to take my paints order over the free shipping threshold.

The kit and its decals are really nice, in sharp contrast to the nigh-on 60 year old moulds in the rest of this series.

It looked too toy-like without any rigging, so I did some basic rigging, much simplified! The rigging is brown sewing thread de-fuzzed by running it through PVA glue and squeezing out the excess between my fingers. I constructed the ladders by winding thread around a notched rectangular frame made from one of the sprues, gluing the thread together with brushed-on dilute PVA and then cutting the ladders out with scissors when everything was dry.

IMG_4900_zpsefgfp5rn.jpg
IMG_4901_zpspetpprun.jpg
IMG_4902_zpsaobsgq5y.jpg
IMG_4903_zps0he10cmu.jpg
IMG_4904_zpskpjeisnx.jpg

I am successfully resisting the urge to find out what the real rigging was like, so this can stay on the finished pile!

Thanks for looking,
Adrian

  • Like 18
Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • 2 months later...

Really nice rigging, I'm currently building a Mary Rose and trying to do rigging, but having problems keeping the thread taught. Can I ask how you got yours so neat?

Hi. I ran all the thread I used through my fingers with a little bit of PVA between them and left them to dry straight. This de-fuzzed them and gave them a bit of rigidity. I started the runs from a knot round a spar or superglued to a sail and finished them with a drop of superglue, holding them them tight while it dried.

It's by no means as tight as aircraft rigging. And if it is a bit loose you can just push it down to make it look like real life sag. I did that on the ropes from he mainsail because the physics looked all wrong if they were tight!

Hope that helps,

Adrian

  • Like 1
Link to comment
Share on other sites

Create an account or sign in to comment

You need to be a member in order to leave a comment

Create an account

Sign up for a new account in our community. It's easy!

Register a new account

Sign in

Already have an account? Sign in here.

Sign In Now
×
×
  • Create New...