Ghost Ship in a Bottle

I've completed two ships since my last post so I thought it's about time to post something about one of them.  This one comes by popular demand.  The Ghost Ship in a Bottle.

 I came up the idea while on the yahoo forum.  Some one mentioned lighting a ship up with UV lights.  I decided to explore the idea.  I talked to a friend who had some UV LED's and we found that the purple tinted UV lights will not show through a dark root beer bottle but the light bouncing off of a white surface will.  So then I took it a step farther and used glow in the dark paint which lights up quiet nicely under the UV light.

I didn't get any pictures of the ship before I put her in the bottle.   The build went fast since I wasn't worried about to many details.  So assuming you've already built your ship paint it with glow in the dark paint.  I just got some acrylic paint from Walmart for two or three bucks and it works great.  I painted almost everything. The sails, the lines, the hull, the masts.  The only thing I didn't paint were the cannons and the anchor on the front.  The idea behind this was to let the light around it glow and the cannons and anchor would appear as just a silhouette creating a more dramatic look.  As you can see the anchor worked fine but with out a second LED behind the ship the cannons are out of sight.

Another part of building this ship was the holes in the sails.  I used a canvas type cloth for the sails. Pinching small sections I used scissors to cut holes and give it the well weathered ragged look.  I then just let it fray as canvass does and painted it all in glow in the dark paint.  

Now the fun part.  How to make it work.  First get yourself some UV LED's.  I just went to Radio Shack.  They were helpful in letting me know what I needed.  If you want them cheap go on eBay.  You can buy 300 for less then $5.  I don't know if some are better then others I just made sure they were Ultra Violet LED's.

Along with your LED's you will need a power source.  You will have to check the specifications of your LED's to see whats right for what you have.

You will also need a resistor.  Chances are your LED will be like mine and it won't light until it hits 3.7 volts.  Now try to find a 3.7 volt battery but don't go over the highest specification which is under 6.  Doing so will burn out your LED.  Since there was no such battery so I got a six volt battery and used a resistor to bring it down to the required maximum voltage.  Here's a tool to help you do that. http://ledcalculator.net/

I then searched YouTube to help me figure out how to put everything together.  Here's the video I used.  It's a bit long so skip to the parts you need.  The important thing is he helps you understand how to identify the negative and positive parts of an LED and where the resistors should go.  Best place to start is the two minute 21 second mark.

Now that you've got the wiring figure out it's time to build it into the bottle.  I decided to use the cork to hold my battery and my LED in place.

Here you can see the wire that connects to positive side of that battery and completes the circuit.  It's a very crude method but it works.  Some one with more skill and means can definitely make an improvement.

 A few more shots to give you an idea of how I put it together.

My original plan was to put an LED behind the ship as well so it would be lit from two sides showing front and back.  I got it for about two seconds before I lost the connection.  I'll keep trying.  Some one suggested drilling holes in the bottle with a ceramic drill bit.  I may try that.  With or with out the other LED I think she looks great.  The light you see around the ship is white caps I painted with the glow in the dark paint.  I tried to make the sea stand out a little.

   
She definitely stands out in the collection.

  My wife is currently writing a short story behind the Ghost Ship in the Bottle.  Once it's finished she may post it to her writing blog.  To read her blog please go here. The Ghost Ship in a Bottle

If you do plan on building a ghost ship in a bottle I would love to know how it turns out.  Email me a picture at siemensbottleingco@gmail.com.  Thank you for reading!  

Ready The Long Boats!

I stumbled across a new technique while digging through the photo's on the Yahoo forum.  I won't mention which one since SIB builders on the forum are a humble folk and don't usually take a liking to drawing attention to them selves and this blog is very public.  Did I just say take a liking?  Wow too much study for my up coming talk like a pirate day post.  Any way if you want to find the inspiration for this post dig into the yahoo forum photos and you'll find it.  As well as a lot of other inspiration, the yahoo forum files and photos have a lot of good stuff.  

So this post is all about turning a match stick...

...into a long boat small enough to fit on a dime.

Long boat's, dingy's, life boats what ever you want to call them they are a fun accessory to ships in bottles.  Trouble is making one small enough to look the part.  Here is a fairly quick and easy method.  I say fairly because lets face it your dealing with super small parts and it can get tricky.

First take your match stick and mark out the size you want your boat.

Then sand the end.  It is important to leave the boat on the match stick at this point since it gives you a place to hold on while you cut and sand.

Next use a dremel to cut the spaces between the seats.  I usually use three cuts but do what you think looks right.  

The end result should be something like this.

Once that's done sand down the middle seats so they're just a little bit lower.  This makes it look like they are seats in the bottom of the boat.  

Now get out a separate match stick.  This one will be used to create the side of the boat.  Use a razor blade to cut a paper thin strip of wood.  This may take a few tries.  

Cut out two small strips.  

Cover the whole side of the ship with glue and glue the strips onto the sides.  This is important since you'll be sanding on the boat and if they aren't glued tight they can come off.  Also glue the strip so it sicks up a little above the top of the match stick.  You want it to look like you can actually sit in it.  

Now sand the boat into shape.  This is one of the hardest parts since it is so small so be patient with it.  

It is finally time to cut the boat off the match stick and do the final touch up sanding.  You may need to add another strip of wood to the back as well to match the height of the sides.  

Once the boat is off the match stick it will be much harder to handle so try to do most of the sanding while it's on.  As far as the back of the boat goes I like to taper up the bottom and sides just a bit to give it a good shape.  Pretty much just make it look like a boat.  

Congratulations your done!  From here it can be painted stained or just glued onto the ship.  

Thank you for reading and have fun building!

Split Hulls and Deck Accessories

I'm back!  I have a lot of material from my current build to go over so this will be a some what extensive post. I want to cover a couple of things this time.  First split hulls and then how to make some deck accessories that will add detail to the ship.  

This is the beginnings of my current build which is the most cliche ship of all time, the pirate frigate.  It would take a blog post in and of its self to explain all of the carving that went into this hull but for this post the important thing is the split.  

Here is the ship split.  Splitting the hull enables you to put a bigger ship into a smaller bottle.  This gives the illusion that there is no way the ship could fit in the bottle much less the mast and sails.  With this ship I've used the channel to hide the split.  The channel is the raised section of wood that goes horizontally across the hull.  The channel is used to keep the stays from rubbing against and breaking the rails of the ship.  When the ship is put together the channel will hide any creases between the split.  

This is after I applied the paint.  I use acrylics mainly.  It's easy to clean up, cheap, and it looks good.  In order to create the fine lines of gold paint I dipped the very tip of a toothpick into the paint and applied it by drawing it on like a pen.  Where it was over applied I let it dry and put the brown paint over it until it looked right.  The hull still splits it is just stacked on top of the other in this photo.    

These two shots show more of the deck.  I drew in the planking with a fine point sharpy.  I also added a hatch and a long boat.  I regret that I didn't get more pictures of these before gluing them in.  I will try and go over them more in a later post.  The hatch is made in much the same way as the other parts.  I painted lines across the hatch vertically and horizontally so it looks like a grate.  I then used my fine point sharpy to fill in where the holes in the grate would be.  I then glued a frame around the hatch and sanded it down so it wasn't coming up to far.   My general rule for applying more wood to any section of the ship is to add more and sand down rather then to get it perfectly cut the first time.  

As for the long boat I cut out a small block of wood and sanded it into shape.  I sanded off the corners in the front first then rounded the bottom finally rounding up the front and back.  This will take time and patients since the boat is so small.  I don't worry about carving out the inside it's to small for that.  I turn it upside down and glue it onto the ship.        

The next thing I want to go over is anchors.  I love putting anchors on my ship.  I like the detail they add.  I make all of my own anchors out of wire.  This way I can make them the exact size I need in order to fit my ship.  This is especially helpful in ships of this scale since I've yet been unable to find anchors that you can buy for such small ships.  I've outlined all of the steps below. 

Your going to need a set of needle nose pliers to do this the smaller the better.  Use plenty of wire you'll be cutting off the excess in the end.  Clamp the wire in the middle.             

Then simply fold it in half. 

Clamp the wire together just below the end.  The top portion that is not clamped together will make the eye of the anchor.  

Then decide on the size of your anchor.  For bigger sizes I like to twist the wire together for added strength.  When you get real small this become impossible.  

You then want to bend the ends around the needle nose.  The closer you get to the end of the needle nose the smaller the loops will be so use that to decide the size you want this part of the anchor to be.  

 Then trim off the ends and make final adjustments according to how you think it should look.  Another SIB builder who I shared this idea with added a little strip of wood on top that is consistent with real anchors.  I didn't add this until I saw how well her's turned out and have since included it.  It can be a pain to get it to glue just right.  As always have patience and keep trying.

 I now want to go over a very popular accessory to ships the cannon!  A pirate ship would not be a pirate ship if it did not have cannons.  I use two methods of canons on this ship the first is the cannons in the side of the ship.  For these I used wire insulation with the wire taken out.  This works well because it has the hole where the cannon balls come out so it adds a little bit of realism there.  For these I drilled into the side of the ship and glued them into place.  That to me is the simplest way to add cannons to a ship of this scale.

 I also used a more complicated method for the cannons on deck.  Unfortunately I ran out of room on deck or I would have added more.  In any case for this method I used a dremel to sand down a tooth pick into the shape of a cannon.  The simplest way to explain it is sand down the middle section and then round off one end and keep the other end straight.  This takes time and patients as well.  It is hard to hold and sand such small parts so take your time and work with it.  

 The next part is to make the base of the cannon.  Cut out a small rectangular piece of wood and glue two toothpick sections for the wheels.  Then glue the cannon on top.


















 This picture just shows the cannon on the deck of the ship.  The other cannon will soon be glued down on the other side.

Thank you for reading I hope this has been informative.  I will be posting more on Ships in Bottles and this particular build later.  If this blog has inspired you to build your own SIB please email me a picture at siemensbottelingco.gmail.com.  I would love to start a followers gallery and show off your work.  Thank you again for reading.

A Brief History

**Sorry about the late update readers. We will be back on schedule for our March 17th post**

Building ships in bottles is a fascinating, and to some people, a daunting task. It’s no wonder they are also known as patience bottles. The first SIB’s were built in the late 18th and early 19th century. While the person who started building ships in bottles is unknown, the reasons are not hard to see.

Being a sailor on a ship was a lot of hard work but not all the time. While traveling the world at a speed of 20 mph or less there was only so much that could be done. So it’s easy to see that one day a sailor is looking at the trash he’s about to throw over board, consisting of old rope, yarn, whale or walrus bones, wood and of course bottles and he gets an idea. Why not build a replica of the ship he’s sailing in and fit it in a bottle.

In looking into the history of ships in bottles I found there was really three reasons people built them, religious gifts given to churches to bring sailors good fortune, gifts for family or lovers at home, and sheer boredom. Today it has become a fascinating craft of amazing detail and skill. There are associations worldwide whose sole purpose is to keep the art of ship in bottle making alive. The Ship in Bottles Association of America has over 500 members and produces a quarterly newsletter.

The modern world of SIB builders has created many great techniques that add to the detail of their creations. SIB’s have become more like paintings in that some builders elect to put more detail in their ships while others withhold some details that the imagination fills in.

Also in recent years there have been many SIB builders that are notorious in the SIB community for their craftsman ship and style. One such Builder was George Fulfit who is known for his incredible ships and for putting seagulls that seem to fly around the bottle. A short documentary featuring George Fulfit was made by Robert Fresco entitled “Steady as She Goes” and can be found at http://www.snagfilms.com/films/title/steady_as_she_goes.

Ships in bottles have come a long way over the last 200 plus years of the craft. In my opinion, it is not going away. As long as people can feel the thrill of sailing and the awe of the enormous and elegant tall ships or have a fascination for the impossible there will always be Ships in Bottles.


Thank you for reading! After this post I will begin explaining and describing how to do some different types of ships and the little details you can put on to them.





Sources

http://www.shipbottle.ru/english/associations/

http://www.shipsinbottles.org/history.html

http://www.shipbottle.ru/english/tips/article6.shtml

http://www.snagfilms.com/films/title/steady_as_she_goes

How to Build a Schooner in a Bottle

Welcome to the world of building tiny ships and putting them into bottles.  Before we get started I’d like to direct your attention to the About & Gallery pages.  There you can learn a little about me and why I started this blog as well as see some of my work.

To start off I wanted to show you how to build a simple ship and get it into the bottle.  I will use later post to explain some of the more detailed work you can put into these ships.  One of the easiest types of ships is a schooner.  I find that schooners have the simplest rigging with the least amount of knots needed to make it work.

The first thing you will need is the bottle.  The type and size of bottle will determine how big you can make the ship.  For this ship I used a flask but I suggest you start off with a regular bottle that can be laid on its side and has a wide mouth.  Not too wide of a mouth, you still want your friends to be awed with how you got the ship into the bottle.

Next you will need a thin piece of wood, about a ¼ in thick. I got a $.35 slat at Home Depot and it’s lasted me a while.  Cut it to the size you want and that will fit in the bottle.  For this ship I used about 2in of wood.  Be sure, as you work with the wood, to check it against the bottle and make sure it will fit through the mouth with some room to spare for your mast.

Begin shaping the wood by sanding each side smooth and then draw out the front of the ship so you know where to carve.

You can use something as simple as a pocket knife to do the carving.  Then carve out the rest of the ship, rounding out the bottom so that if you turn the ship on its side it looks like a “D”.  To make it look even more realistic sand the front and back so they curve up.

Once everything is sanded smooth you are ready to paint.  I suggest staining the ship to bring out the wood grain and then painting the sides (if you choose to).  If you do choose to stain, this would be a good time to stain the tooth picks or skewers you plan on using for your mast.  After the stain dries then you can paint the sides.

The next step is putting on the bow.  Start at the point of the ship, drill straight down about 1/16in, be sure not to drill all the way through. Keeping your drill in the same hole, turn the drill to the angle you want the bow and drill in about ¼ in. Then trim a toothpick to the desired length of the bow and glue it into the hole. 

While the glue is drying, use needle nose pliers to bend a piece of wire into a metal loop with a straight piece that will run against the bow.  Place the loop on the tip of the bow and make sure there is enough room between the loop and the bow to run lines through the loop.  Glue the loop down and secure it with a whip knot.    

  

Now, using a #61 drill bit, you will drill holes into the deck for your mast.  Mark out on the deck where you want the mast to be and then drill two holes on each side of the masts.  Again, do not drill all the way through the deck.   You will also need a #61 drill bit to make tiny holes in the toothpicks you use for the mast.  On the toothpick you plan to use as the foremast you will need two holes, one near the bottom and one near the top.  The bottom hole needs to run side to side compared to the deck for the hinge.  The top hole needs to run back to front for the line you’ll thread through it later.  On the toothpick you’ll use for the mizzenmast you just need one hole near the bottom for the hinge.

Next you will put the mast together.  Using the bottle to give you an idea of how tall your mast can be, trim your toothpicks to length.  Be sure that the top of the mast won’t actually touch the top of the bottle.  Then trim a piece to make the gaff and lay it out next to the mast at the desired angle (I generally eye ball this to whatever length/angle looks good).  Do the same with the boom.  You will now tie the gaff and boom to the mast using a whipping knot.  Start the knot at the top of the mast, glue the ends to the gaff and then tie a separate whipping knot around that.  Use the same process for tying on the boom. 

Once you have your masts put together you can make the sails.  Lay down the mast on to the cloth you plan to use for sails and trace the inside.  Cut out the sails and glue on. (stripes/design optional)

Now that you have mast and sails all put together, they’re ready to attach to the deck.  Using a 1 ½ in piece of wire, hold the middle with needle nose pliers and bend wire in half, making a “U” shape.  Have the bottom part of the “U” wide enough to support your mast.  Thread the wire through the mast, trim the wire so that the bottom of the mast barely touches the deck, and then glue the wire ends into the holes. You’ll want the mast to be able to swing easily on the hinge, so give your self plenty of room.

Next comes the rigging, which is the hardest part.  The secret to doing some of these tiny knots is to not be afraid to use and maybe waste a lot of thread. You’ll want to make large loops so you can get the thread through and then pull everything into tight little knots. To start off with you’ll drill holes into the side of the ship, two on each side.  Place the holes just behind each mast.  Then glue some wire into the holes, it doesn’t matter how long the wires are, you’ll trim them later.

Start with the back stays.  These lines will tie the masts to the side of the ship and keep the mast upright, perpendicular to the deck.  I like to use dead eyes to make the back stays adjustable.  Thread the line through one of the holes in the dead eye and out another hole.  Then loop the line around the wire on the side of the ship. Then use a slip knot to go around the out side of the dead eye. Adjust the dead eye to be centered between the top of the mast and the wire.  Make sure the mast is perpendicular to the deck and then tie off your line near the top of the mast.  Bend the wire back so it’s tight against the side of the ship and keeps your line in place, but loose enough to adjust the deadeye; then trim off the excess wire.  Once the back stays are done on both sides, adjust the dead eyes so when the back stays are tight the masts are straight up and down. 

The next part is the stays.  This is the line that runs along the top of the ship and pulls the mast forward.  The stays pull forward while the back stays pull back holding the masts up.  Tie the stay to the top of the mizzen mast.  Then run the line through the hole in the fore mast.  The line must be allowed to move freely through the foremast so that everything can fold down against the ship.  Now thread the line through the metal ring on the bow.  Keep around eight inches of extra line off the bow so you can pull the sails up once the ship is in the bottle.  Next, tie a line to the fore mast just below the stay.  Run this line through the metal loop in the bow and again keep eight inches of extra line.  Cut out a jib sail that will fit between the fore mast and the metal loop on the bow.  Glue the jib sail to the second stay.  Make sure not to glue it to the first so that it can move freely through the foremast.

This next part is purely decorative, but I like to make these SIB’s as realistic as possible.  You can put in running lines by ting a line from the back of a sail to the wire pieces on the side of the ship.

You are now done with building the ship!  

Now it’s time to prepare the bottle.  I use blue clay for effect and to help keep the ship in place.  Start by flattening out a piece of clay that will fit in the bottom of the bottle.  Then take your clay and carefully roll it up so you can fit it through the mouth of the bottle.  Once it’s in, use a hook to unroll and press the clay into the bottom of the bottle.  You can make a good hook by cutting apart a wire hanger and bending the end at a 90 degree angle.  I recommend having two hooks; what I call a clean and a dirty hook.  Use the dirty hook for maneuvering clay in the bottle and the clean hook for maneuvering the ship in the bottle.  That way you don’t get clay all over your ship. 

Time to put the ship into the bottle.  Fold the mast down against the ship and carefully put the ship in back end first.  It might be a tight fit but don’t force it too hard.  

Once it’s in the bottle, pull your lines so the mast pops up.  When you’re sure everything looks as you want it, use a hook to put a dab of glue onto the end of the bow where the lines are coming out.  When the glue is dry you can cut the excess line. With the help of your hooks, maneuver the ship to where you want it and press it down into the clay.

In the case of a flask you do need to turn the ship so that it rest on the bottom properly.  This can be a little tricky, thus why I suggest using a bottle that can lie on its side.

You have now made a Ship In A Bottle!

Thank you so much for reading!  I hope this has been helpful for you.  If you have any comments, questions or suggestions please leave a comment. Also, we’d love to see your finished works.  We plan on making a “Fan Gallery” page so if you want to send in a picture e-mail it to siemensbottleingco@gmail.com