Shipbucket

Ah I see, thanks. I suspected that might have been the meaning but I didn't want to do anything yet in case I was wrong. I'll look into it and see what I can do

_________________

It didn't necessarily have to be raked aft. A number of sailing ships had forward raking masts for the exact same reason; a forward raked mast had the strength of the timbers to carry the wind and wave action would push the mast against its fastenings. This tended to be more obvious in the early sailing ships though before the period of your drawing. The rake forward also supposedly made sail handling an easier task for the crew.
Some examples;

_________________
"The first rule is not to lose; The second rule is not to forget the first rule"

Denodon: You're right - to a certain extent! Ships built pre- ca. 1700 did, in fact, often have foremasts slanted slightly forward, after ca. 1700 it was not very common, and by the mid-century, slanting forward had virtually disappeared in any vessels, except locally built ones (that is in particular regions, where civilian shipwright knowledge was a far more conservative power!) - In warships and ocean-going merchant vessels, the formasts were either (depending on the ship's classification!) straight or slanted aft at a moderate angle (ca. 5-8 degrees) depending on the number of masts, the following usually had a progressively increased slanting.
Your pictures show a Dutch (or Scandinavian) pinnace from ca. 1610-20, a Tudor galeon and a, probably American or British 6th Rate of the Revolutionary War period. So, you added two pictures that cannot be very helpful for Rowdy's brig, since they are, at least some 150-200 years too early. They are very nice and interesting, though. The 6th Rate is also too big, and it's ship-rigged, with an entirely different set of rules how to step the masts than a brig had!

_________________
My Avatar:Петр Алексеевич Безобразов (Petr Alekseevich Bezobrazov), Вице-адмирал , царская ВМФ России(1845-1906) - I sign my drawings as Ari Saarinen

Haha, you are right in that none of the sail plans are really of much use. The last one is a drawing of a privateer Rattlesnake that operated during the revolutionary war period I believe. I do have some good drawings of various brigs somewhere however I do not remember where I found them so it has been tricky finding them again. These were just what I found fairly quickly in a google image search.

I recall a number of ships of the First Fleet had forward raked foremasts in the late 18th century however I do not remember how old any of the ships involved in it were at the time.

_________________
"The first rule is not to lose; The second rule is not to forget the first rule"

I don't know how helpful this is at this point but the masts on American three masted ships from the 1790's to the 1850's were raked towards the stern at angles of 2 degrees for the foremast, 4 degrees for the mainmast, and 7 degrees for the mainmast. I assume a napoleonic brig would have a similar rake with the foremast being at a negligible angle and the mainmast raked at maybe 6 degrees give or take.

_________________
"All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity, but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible. This I did." Thomas Edward Lawrence, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom

Also it may help to check out the sail plan for USS Hornet or USS Wasp. They are War of 1812 era sloops of war which were designed at brigs but had a mizzen mast crammed on the stern during construction so most of the sails and rigging especially for the forward part of the ship are identical to what a contemporary brig would have.

_________________
"All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity, but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible. This I did." Thomas Edward Lawrence, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom

Hey Rowdy, thanks for giving me the template to work with to make my own fictional Brig Sloop, the USS Defiance:

_________________
"It is better to type nothing and be assumed an ass, than to type something and remove all doubt." - Me

American ship-rigged sloops are different from brig sloops, they were intentionally built that way, not suddenly redesigned during construction.

_________________
"It is better to type nothing and be assumed an ass, than to type something and remove all doubt." - Me

That is true for most but not Hornet and Wasp. The mizzen was added as an afterthought. Check out Canney's Sailing Warships of the US Navy.

_________________
"All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds wake in the day to find that it was vanity, but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act their dreams with open eyes, to make it possible. This I did." Thomas Edward Lawrence, The Seven Pillars of Wisdom

And...
To make it more interesting (and create a counter point):

American ship captains had the traditional right to ignore the recomendations of the ship designer. For whatever reason it was presumed that the "sea" captain as a sailor had more practical knowledge about rigs and sails.

As a general statement...great hulls tended to get over canvassed and over gunned. Hull loading got heavy, sluggish. They could also get overpowered with too much top weight and sail power.

It was common to change the masting in an effort to improve handling. It was also common to swap out, increase or reduce the gun numbers and calibures to improve sea keeping.

There are great examples in Chappelle's books and "6 Frigates" mentioned in the USS Constitution thread from a couple months ago.

Yikes!
CraigH

_________________
In active progress
More Ships with Sails
Early Torpedo Boats in SB and FD Scales
Some railroad stuff
More random stuff that strikes me!