Enter (from stage left) the old stick in the mud. As for the accuracy of any kit I have three words the Strombecker b-29 . So, the aircraft, military, ship, train, car, and even sci-fi model hobbies have come a long way. Why? consumer participation. Face it!, sailing ship modelers make up a very small percentage of modelbuilders. That said, Bryan had a great idea here. Take a (oh, all right) marginally representative kit, and document the ways to make it a little better. Will an accurate kit of Soleil Royal ever be released in plastic? I certainly won’t be holding my breath. Can the heller kit be modified to come closer to “accurate”? If there’s one chance in infinity, it’s possible. To those who know this kit is a piece of trash, and have stated what’s wrong with it, look to the last four words of the quote above. Offer up the fixes necessary to bring this model closer to accurate. Those who wish to build a more accurate model of Soliel royal could use the information, those who would use the kit as a beginning, can build it "out-of-the-box.
As a demonstration of just how bizarre the behavior of sailing ship kit manufacturers can be, take a look at this: http://www.modelexpoonline.com/cgi-bin/sgin0101.exe?FNM=00&T1=MA796&UID=2006092023115001&UREQA=1&TRAN85=N&GENP=
Well, at least they did something about the quarter galleries. But note the gaping hole in the knee of the head, just aft of and below the figurehead. That’s not the sort of mistake two designers would be apt to make independently.
It’s pretty clear that Mantua’s “research” for this kit consisted of buying a Heller one.
Note also the price: $899.99. Welcome to the wonderful world of the HECEPOBs.
The gaping hole in the beakhead was not invented by Heller. It is present in the large scale Paris Maritime musuem model from which almost all 20th century reconstructions of the S/R seem to have taken their cue.
Mantua probably copied the Paris Museum speciment that same way Heller did.
Maybe. My logic, though, is that anybody with any sense could figure out that the gap in the Musee de la Marine model’s bow is due to the fact that the figurehead, and its associated carvings, were never installed. Surely it’s obvious that something’s missing - and that just slapping a figurehead onto the knee of the head doesn’t solve the problem.
HECEPOB companies have pirated from plastic kit companies more than once. The Mamoli “H.M.S. Beagle,” for instance, is quite clearly a copy of the Revell one. (There’s just no way two independent brains could conceive of making a Beagle out of a modified Bounty.)
Sumpter - sure, it’s possible to turn the Heller kit into a scale model. (The two whose photos have been posted in this thread certainly come closer than the one I built yea those many years ago.) It’s also possible to turn a Lionel 0-27 steam locomotive into a scale model. Personally, though, that’s not how I want to spend the limited time allotted me on the Orb. I’d rather spend that time working from decent kits, or working from scratch - or griping about all the wonderful potential ship model subjects the plastic kit manufacturers are never going to issue.
I am posting this following a conversation with about the kit cannon.
I have had a look thro’ my records on cannon of the mid – late 17th century, and I think that Chuck Fan is correct in his observations.
But ordnance is another minefield with variations in names, calibres, and respective lengths. Cannon particularly brass ones tended to have a long career and to confuse matters there could be a mixture of periods, and types, including captured ones, present on a ship at any particular time.
I have an illustration of a bronze French 18 pounder c1665-69 which has a length of 9’ 7’’ and was recovered from the wreck of the ‘Association’ which went down in 1707.
The cannon was thought to have been captured from the French at the Battle of Vigo in 1702. The proportions of this cannon are similar to those of a much later period.
It is a puzzle why the proportions of the Soleil cannons are so different to the Heller Victory model supposedly of the same scale. As chuck Fan says over the period the proportions were not that much different.
I have found three cannon barrels left over from my Soleil build and they measure 30mm, 33mm and 35mm respectively (muzzle to cascabel) which gives a scale length of 9.8’ 10.8’ (which is within the bounds of credibility) and 11.5’ (which is probably borderline.) Even so the taper of the barrels does seem to be excessive.
All the cannon have dolphins (lifting rings) which would suggest that they are Brass/ bronze pieces, which again would be correct for the period, but whether the entire ordnance of the ship was brass or bronze is I think open to debate.
The trunnions do indeed look as if they are set too far forward of the dolphins, and they are outside of the second reinforcing ring. They are however tapered in shape which again is correct for the period (whether this is by Heller accident or design I don’t know)
The carriages are of truck and bed construction which is I think acceptable for the period, the change to truck and axle coming in around 1720.
The trucks on the left over carriages I have are all the same size,whereas the forward trucks should I think be somewhat larger than the rear ones.
All this just serves to present the Soleil builder with further distractions. Replacement of the ordnance would be a major exercise.
Last night I completed (I’ll take photos tonight) all of the decks, with guns installed. I just have some touch up work and some other little things to take care of. So, at the end of the evening, I called up the two people who will make up the bulk of criticizm of my work…my wife and step-son Jacob. My wife looked at it (she’s not one for warships, but loves sailing vessels) and complimented all the gold work. She loves how decorative it is, which is one of the primary reasons that she may allow me to display it on the mantle downstairs. Then Jacob, who is always wanting to see my work, looked all around the model, peeking in the various openings, straining to look down the lines of guns, all the while asking “what’s this for?”, “When are you putting the masts on?”, and the one comment that told me, me that is, that it ultimately doesn’t matter for my home that a model has errors, or is not completely accurate. It doesn’t matter if it’s painted like it’s supposed to be, or if it’s painted how it “might have been”. No, none of that matter. Jacob merely looked me in the eye with a grin on his face and said “That’s cool!”.
That was all I needed.
I’m not going to take any one side. There is a need for historical accuracy when it comes to modelling actual historical ships, or anything historical for that matter. There is a need because we need to remember our history, where we come from, and how we got there. Accurate models are needed to show us, to give us true representation. But, if you build a model that is not accurate, but is still extremely beautiful, like the Royal is most definitely, build it with pride. As long as you know it’s not completely accurate and you don’t present it as such, there is no reason you can’t display it and be proud of it.
It’s not necessarily the end result of a model that is the thrill. For many modellers, such as myself, it is the thrill of the build itself. The thrill and focus, the relaxation of the brush strokes, the sound of the sandpaper or the dremel. For me, just being able to look at my creation and say “I did that.” is enough for me. And the Soleil Royale, though flawed, is definitely not trash. It is beautiful and I will build it and be thrilled about it. The paint job won’t be right in some eyes, the stern won’t be right in some eyes, the rigging (especially since I did it) will definitely not be right in anyone’s eyes. But it is my work, and I’m happy.
Like I said, I’ll take a few pics tonight, and fight with this forum’s programming to get them up. Not the best build in the world, but I’m happy. Just don’t use the pics as a launchpad for more debate about the historical accuracy of the ship. I think we’ve had enough of that.
And to keep this thread on track, for those with the skill and resources, it is not too difficult to cutout the balconies that are supposed to exist on the sterncastle. There are several pics on the web. Making that modification goes a long way towards improving the appearance of that area of the ship. I will not be doing it myself since I don’t want to chance ruining the detailing on the pieces, but I’m sure many of you out there possess the skill, and styrene sheet, necessary to accomplish the task. I’ve seen it done keeping the detailing and must moving it in to the hull, and without the detailing, showing the hull itself instead. I like the former myself, since it keeps the wonderfull detailing that looks exquisite in gold.
There’s a good question. Has anyone ever attempted to paint the stern castle decorations in natural colours, like flesh tones on the statuary, greenery for the wreaths, and whatnot? I’ve heard argument that it was actually painted that way. It would look fantastic, but it would be a heck of a daunting task to accomplish.
Phil i can relate to everything you said. I started gearing up for my build today by ordering Dr Andersons book, dremel, paints etc, and more info on those pics you speak of would be great…i’m assuming there different than the ones already posted eariler in the thread. I’ll be keeping an eye out!
Michael.
Yes, I have. Natural colors might look better if it is allowed to stand out against an entire hull painted blue. Historical evidece does suggest S/R was painted mostly blue above waterline. But if much of the hull is in natural wood color, then I think the decoration definitely looked better gilded.
This subject has come up recently in the field of nautical archaeology. For many years it’s been assumed that the seventeenth-century Swedish warship Wasa, now preserved in her own museum in Stockholm, was largely painted bright blue with gold-leafed carved ornamentation. (The carvings on the Wasa are spectacular - quite comparable to those of the Soleil Royal.) Recently, though, the researchers have done a study of the surviving paint samples. They now believe her hull was coated with tar (i.e., very dark brown) from the keel to the uppermost wale (with no indication of the waterline), and a dark, rich red above that. The dozens of carved figures appear to have been painted in natural colors, with gold leaf only on such things as sword handles, coats of arms, etc.
I think most people would agree that the old concept of the Wasa’s color scheme was better looking, but the evidence seems to be pretty clear. (I do hope nobody who’s built the excellent Airfix kit and painted it blue and gold now feels obligated to fall on his sword.) I would, however, be hesitant to make the leap from the Wasa to any other ship. Gold leaf does seem to have been applied pretty liberally to English and French ships in the seventeenth century - though some scholars think that some, at least of the ornamentation that was gilded on the English “Board Room” models was painted yellow in real life.
It might have looked like this:
Painting by French artist P. Hippolyte Boussac (1846-1942).
If only photography had been invented (much) earlier…
Prof. Tilley is right about the colour scheme of the Wasa. At the museum there are copies of some of the carvings on display, painted in the colors the researchers discovered. They look like this:
It does take some time to get used to this new look, however, back then in 1628 the ship would have been quite impressive nonetheless.
Painting a model of Wasa – especially the Airfix 1/144 one – is of course extremely difficult considering the small scale. Even the models in the Wasa museum are not painted this way (although the former blue has been changed into red).
If you ever find yourselves in the neighborhood of , be sure not to miss this star attraction of the Swedish capital. It’s the oldest preserved man of war in the world and, with 95% of her timbers being original, forms the best example of early seventeenth century shipbuilding anywhere. Even people with no special interest in ships whatsoever are in awe because of her sheer size and beauty.
Now, back on topic, painting Soleil Royal in natural colors also isn’t easy even though her scale is somewhat bigger. I probably wouldn’t try it, although it is rather tempting.
The only carvings I would paint in natural colors instead of gold are the Royal Coat of Arms on the sterns of English ships.
Many thanks to bryan01 for posting a couple of most interesting pictures.
The picture of the Soleil Royal’s stern is especially interesting in comparison with the one in the Louvre, which I’ve cited before in other threads: http://arts-graphiques.louvre.fr/fo/visite?srv=mipe&idImgPrinc=1&idFicheOeuvre=9612&provenance=mfc&searchInit=
It looks like these two colored engravings share a common ancestry. The Louvre version is identified as being by Jean Berain I. The one Bryan posted is identified with a different artist, and several features are different. The text block at the top doesn’t appear on the Louvre version, and the Louvre version has a scale bar near the bottom that isn’t on Bryan’s. Otherwise, it looks like one is a copy of the other - but with considerably different color schemes.
Both apparently are monochrome engravings, with the colors applied by hand in the form of watercolor. It looks like the artist who did the tinting on the Louvre version didn’t get finished. The colors on that work obviously have faded, but it looks like some of the background paint was blue and some was red. It seems to show considerably more gold than Bryan’s (bearing in mind the difficulty of representing gold with watercolor), but there’s room for doubt about the figures on the upper part of the port side. They certainly seem to be blue.
Another interesting discrepancy: in the Louvre drawing it’s pretty clear that there are open balconies on the two lower levels of the quarter galleries. (Note the absence of window muntons in the outermost, window-shaped openings on each side of the ship.) In Bryan’s version those spaces are painted solid, rather dark blue. Is that because the artist didn’t quite understand what he was looking at - or because the openings had been boarded up? Do these two pictures rrepresent the ship at different points in her career - or are both of them artists’ renditions of a ship that hadn’t been built yet? (Bryan’s apparently dates from the nineteenth century, but it may have been based on some earlier source. The Louvre site doesn’t give any dates - or any other information - regarding M. Berain. I’d assumed the Louvre drawing dated from the seventeenth century - but maybe not.)
A close look at the Louvre drawing also suggests that there were projecting open balconies in the middle of the upper and middle levels of the transom. Notice how the artist has indicated shadows underneath them.
It’s also clear that, somewhere back in the convoluted history of this topic, there’s a link of some sort connecting these two drawings, the Musee de la Marine model, and the Heller kit. The proportions of the stern in the drawings are a long way from those of the Heller version, but the carvings are unmistakably similar. As I understand it, the Heller kit is based on a “bakelite model” by a gentleman who, in turn, based his work on the Musee de la Marine model. Whether that model is a misinterpretation of these two drawings, or the model is based on some other contemporary source, I have no idea.
I’ve just about become convinced that the story of this ship is beyond sorting out. In the unlikely event that I ever did want to build another model of her, I wouldn’t want to try it without spending some time in Paris looking at the contemporary documentation - whatever it may be. (And since the possibility of my having the money in this lifetime to make an extended research trip to Paris for the purpose of building a ship model is just about zero, we can just about rule out the possibility of my building such a model.) I have the impression that nobody is really sure what she looked like. Perhaps some French scholar of naval history will publish a detailed discussion of the available primary sources some day. Until then, I’ll build models of other ships. I like to work with subjects that call for some interpretation and filling in of gaps in the historical records, but this one just goes too far for me.
A visit to the Wasa Museum is slightly less unrealistic. My wife and I have a list of trips we’d like to make after we retire, in a few years; one of them is a summer Baltic cruise, with stops at the Wasa Museum, the Viking Ship Museum in Oslo, and the Russian National Maritime Museum in St. Petersburg. It probably won’t happen, but dreaming is harmless. Some months back I happened to catch a TV broadcast of a concert by Claudio Abbado and the Berlin Philharmonic, performed at the Wasa Museum. The site - and sound - of that great orchestra playing Wagner’s overture to “The Flying Dutchman,” with the great ship looming in the background, was pretty awe-inspiring.
Thank you prof. Tilley for providing us with this link. For the sake of this discussion I will show it again in this post:
For Jean Berain I or Jean Berain the elder (1640-1711) see this article on Wikipedia:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Jean_Bérain_the_Elder
Now back to the colors used for the decoration of the ship.
One of the characteristics of the Louis XIV style was the use polychrome marble in interior design. Several sorts of marble with contrasting colors were laid in geometric patterns and were thus used to decorate the walls in royal palaces, especially the palace at . Many details of these interiors, like columns, fire places and friezes were highlighted by (gilded) lead or bronze ornaments.
The same principle, by the use of marquetry, was used for the decoration of furniture. The master of this technique was André Charles Boulle. A quote from the article says: ‘…he had workrooms…near those of André Charles Boulle, for whom he made many designs for furniture’.
The most important quote from the article is however:
‘After the death of Charles Le Brun (1690) Bérain was commissioned to compose and supervise the whole of the exterior decoration of the king’s ships’.
So, this Jean Berain was probably the designer of Soleil Royal. Not of the ship itself of course, only its exterior decoration. Looking at the stern picture of Soleil Royal, the stylistic elements of Louis XIV interior and furniture design are very much visible. I think it is therefore very likely that the colors used on the ship followed the same trend.
To prof. Tilley: make the summer Baltic cruise, you will not regret it. The city of is most enchanting and has – apart from Wasa – a lot to offer. Highlight of the cruise however will undoubtedly be . It is, in my opinion, after the most beautiful city of the Western world.
Founded in 1703 by Peter the Great on the banks of the mighty river Neva near the Baltic Sea, and divided by many canals (modeled after those in ) she is a real ‘nautical’ city. Apart from the , the Hermitage, Fortress of Peter and Paul, St. Isaacs Cathedral, Kirov Theatre, Admiralty and cruiser Aurora are all worth visiting. The whole city center is a UNESCO World Heritage Site and, thanks to the tercentenary celebrations of 2003, got a thorough cleanup making this city even more beautiful then it already was.
Very interesting indeed, Bryan. (I should have thought of Wikipedia.)
It looks like the Boussac print is a modified copy of the Berain one - with different colors added. That Berain was responsible for the decoration of the actual ship certainly seems like a reasonable inference.
The Louvre web page identifies the Berain drawing as being the “recto” (right) half of what I gather to be a two-page spread taken out of a folio of some sort. (The impression of the printer’s plate around the edges certainly seems to confirm that.) I wonder if it is in fact part of a series showing the decorations throughout the ship’s exterior. If so, are the other plates in the series to be found in some French archive or gallery?
We’re left with the question of just what the Berain drawing is. (It looks like the Louvre hasn’t done much research on it.) Is it a design drawing, prepared prior to the construction of the ship? If so, did the shipwrights and carvers actually follow it, or not? (It’s not safe to assume they did. Such designs frequently got changed in the process of actual execution.) The drawing is significantly different from the Musee de la Marine model, which apparently dates from the nineteenth century. Why? Did the modeler simply screw things up? (That doesn’t seem likely. He quite obviously was an extremely skilled artisan.) Was he working from some source other than the Berain drawing(s) - some source that reliably represented the ship as built, rather than Berain’s preliminary design? Or did he work from some source that was seriously defective, and should we believe the Berain drawing instead? I have no idea. Maybe the answers are lost to history - or maybe they’re waiting to be uncovered in some French archive. Or maybe some French maritime historian has already sorted all this out, and thinks we’re idiots for not knowing the answers.
In any case, I think I’ll stick with ships I know how to research.
The Baltic cruise idea is indeed an idylic one. When my wife was in college she got to make a trip to St. Petersburg (or Leningrad, as it was then known). She got a good, cheap price for a tour that included Leningrad, Moscow, and various other places in the (then) Soviet Union. The reason for the low price was that the trip took place in the middle of winter. She asserts that she’ll never do that again - but a summer cruise in the Baltic does tempt her.
Regarding whether the SR stern followed the contempary French architectural style, there is that little, thorny problem of the SR sternn shown in Bussac illustration being totally irreconcilable with Paris National library illustration. The Bussac stern is the one used in the Paris Martime museum model upon which Heller apparently based its kit. The Paris National Library drawing, however, is much more in keeping with the contemporary architectural style. What is more, the lines of the National Library drawing, or what of it there is, is much more in keeping with a ship build in the last decade of 17th century, while the Paris Maritime museum model looked more like a ship of 1660 - 1670s.
So it seems to me that the Bussarc drawing, the Paris Martime museum model, and the heller model depicted an earlier Soleil Royal. While the really famous Soleil Royal of 1690s was in fact a ship that didn’t look very much like it.
The Boussac drawing does not match the Musee de la Marine model - or the Heller kit. The height-to-breadth ratios are different, as is the number of windows in the transom. Some of the height-to-breadth ratio discrepancy could be explained by the fact that the drawing (presumably) is a “true view,” with the transom projected onto a vertical plane; since the transom was in fact slanted at a considerable angle, a photo of the model taken with the camera slightly below the waterline, and slightly tilted, would tend to make the transom look taller for its breadth. But that isn’t enough to explain all the difference in proportions - and certainly doesn’t explain the discrepancy in the number of windows.
But the decorations certainly seem to have a common heritage. The reclining figures on the taffrail, and the central figure of Louis in his chariot, are too similar for coincidence.
It’s certainly possible that the Musee de la Marine model, on the one hand, and the Boussac and Berain drawings, on the other, represent different ships. (Two ships of the same name might well have had carvings of Louis in his chariot on their transoms.) The article by Mr. Romaniak, a link to which Bryan kindly posted on the first page of this thread, implies another plausible explanation: that the ship underwent a major rebuild in which the stern was heavily modified.
That sort of thing certainly wasn’t unknown, during the seventeenth century and later. (The Sovereign of the Seas came out of a “great rebuild” looking like a different ship, and H.M.S. *Victory’*s transom was dramatically altered at least once during her long active career.) Perhaps what we’re looking at are “before and after” views of a stern that got rebuilt - perhaps with some of the original carvings surviving the process, and others not.
That, however, is complete speculation on my part. I really wish a qualified French naval historian (somebody of the stature of Jean Boudriot) would do a thorough search of the extant primary sources and publish a detailed study of this ship - and whatever other vessels carried the same name. A set of modern drawings of her, to the standard of M. Boudriot’s reconstruction of the Bonhomme Richard, would, quite apart from its contribution to scholarship, be a thing of great beauty.
As someone just getting back into building sailing ship models. one question, when will this thread get back on the topic “Heller Soleil Royal… the ultimate building guide.” Beginners need help as there are very few styrene sailing models left and, it looks like, few or none to come.
Can those experts who have built the SR and are knowledgeable of the many errors currently listed, please help the ignorant like myself. This is “one hell of a box of plastic”. It can be improved, everything can.
I don’t know jtilley, but based on the determination and expertise in all his writings I have been fortunate enough to read, he is probably out at a hobby shop right now buying another Heller SR kit and getting ready to build it in superb fashion and surprise us all!! Whaddya think??
Bill
Well, this thread has finally produced a question I can answer definitively. Saddletramp - I can tell you with virtual certainty that jtilley is NEVER going to buy, much less build, another Heller Soleil Royal. If I ever tackle another Heller kit, it’ll be the galley Reale (which I have in the attic, as a matter of fact), or maybe - just conceivably, after I retire seven or eight years down the road - the Victory. Both those kits are scale models. But the Soleil Royal - never again. Once is enough.
There are, indeed, too few really good plastic scale model sailing ship kits out there, but there probably are enough to keep me busy for the rest of my time on the Orb. I also have a scratchbuilt project in progress, and ideas for several more down the road.
I’ll say it again: we all build models for our own reasons, and anybody who wants to take on this kit has my best wishes. But it’s not for me.
Even lesser warships of Louis XIV navy had highly individualized decorative motifs. So it seem unlikely that 2 pretigious 3 deckers would simultanously try to make do with the same motif. The only scenario I can readily accept for 2 3 deckers ships sharing a same motif is if the first ships was built and then lost, and before the style in vogue has changed greatly, a second ship of the same name had been built to replace the first ship. The style in vogue and the hull constructional technique weas changing fairly quickly at the end of 17th century. Warship design and decoration probably changed more between 1660 and 1700 than between 1700 and 1800, so the service life of the first ship would have to be short.
I think Boussac drawing and the Maritime museum model mostly likely represent the same original piece of work. Whether that original work was actually the real ship Soleil Royal of 1691 is hard to say. It could be another inventive drawig now lost. The discrepencies between the 2 works is probably mainly attributable to lack of rigorous accuracy on the part of one or the other of the representation. It is also possible that the one representations is in fact based on the other, but with some licenses taken.
This still does not explain the dramatically different Paris National Library drawing of Soleil Royal with flatter sheer, low stern and rounded, enclosed quarter galleries. I personally think that drawing shows a more probable configuration for a ship of 1690s than the open gallery design in Boussac drawing or Maritime Museum model.
Well, I’ve gotten to a point on the Royale that I’m going to snap a couple of pics, of which I’m sure more debate will be generated. Please excuse the numerous paint errors that I need to touch up. After staring at the hundreds of small details, my eyes start to hurt and my hand strays a bit. But, I have finished 95% of the hull work and the guilding for one side of the gallery. I loved the natural color pics, but had already started the gold, so I stuck with that. All in all it has come out beautiful in my eyes and my son (who is working on a Cutty Sark in a bottle while I work on the SR) is just amazed at how the ship looks.
Talking about the gallerys. It is quite ironic, and more than a bit funny that the galleries are enclosed. The reasons that Heller did this will forever remain unclear, but the funny part is that the cover art on the box, which shows the ship from aft, clearly has open galleries. So this is sort of an admittance by Heller themselves that the stern was wrong. Perhaps it was a cost issue, or maybe just an oversight, but, all in all, the ship is still quite beautiful.
JTilley, even though you’ll never build the ship again, I wonder what you could do with a kit like the Royale. And let me know when you start the Reale. I’m chomping at the bit to start on mine. I’ll probably take a break from the Royale while I wait for the Spritsail Topmast book (an obvious xmas gift). I was going to tackle a Revell 1:96 Constitution, but then my wife dropped the Heller Reale in my lap. An extraordinary kit, though the sails will obviously have to be replaced with cloth.
I meant to put pics up this morning, but I couldn’t find my SD memory for my camera. After class and work I’ll take some pics and hopefully have some up tonight. As I’ve already said with certain paranoia and dread, don’t laugh too hard…
Another question. I have not rigged the guns. In reality, there are really not that many guns to rig, but I just decided not to do it. I do have time to change my mind. What would be the best way to approach it? It seems all the eyelets I have found, while good enough for normal rigging, are just too out of scale for rigging the cannon. And I’m talking about simple rigging, not all the blocks and tackle I have seen on some builds.
Grymm