Ships on Pern

[mawra]

What do you think the sailing ships looked like on? I want to get a miniture ship for my Pern opoly game I am working on.

[DragonDance]

I always imagined them as Spanish or British exploring ships, maybe a bit lighter. I want to imagine a huge Viking ship with a dragon head, but they'd prolly find that borderline blasphemous.

[Eriflor]

The design depends on what they're used for, and whether speed is at a premium.

They'd come in all sizes: small/medium/large yachts for personal travel, fishing boats for use close to shore or in the deep ocean currents, trading vessels for coastal trade or inter-continental trips (mostly clippers and schooners).

Personal and fishing boats would need more open deck space and fewer masts. Traders would be bigger, with cargo holds and probably more sails to catch the wind. Perhaps somebody could talk about the relative advantages of fore-and-aft rigging and square-rigging.

There would need to be protection against Threadfall --- metal-clad masts and superstructure, mechanisms to flood the decks with sea-water (I believe this is described in DGLP) --- otherwise ships would have to stay undercover on Threadfall days.

There could be pirate ships! Fast-moving with places for crossbowmen to shoot from.

Eriflor.

[Old Hippie]

In DD, it's stated that the sliplex ships are the schooner-type. As space was at a premium, this type vessel seems to have been built in sections for compact shipping. As there were only a few sea-faring type folks on-board, this leaves me with the feeling that only variations are sure to be the case as turns (years) go on. Things like wider and deeper hulls. I'm not saying the Gallion-type ships wouldn't happen, just that the need wouldn't be there.
JMHO

[jube]

What about rowboats or small scale sailboats? One similiar was mentioned in Dolphins of Pern, as being used by Alemi and Readis.

Barges, canoes or kayaks would also have been used, mainly river crossings, I guess.

[GinnyStar]

Well there are a few note about ships, in CoP: Dolphin Bell. DD, and something about barges with wheels from DF I think.

Also skiffs too.

[vyon]

I doubt they would be clippers or square-rigged. The ship that brought our ancestors out to New Zealand was a clipper. She had an enormous crew, and a habit of getting herself dismasted.

Schooners in various sizes would be more likely in my opinion. I can imagine something like a coracle being used in sheltered waters in Nerat and Boll too. Remember, getting suitable timber is a problem, so something with a cane frame and leather skin for small fishing trips is more likely.

[P'ter]

I've always envisaged the trading ships and larger fishing vessels as schooners (Captain's Courageous Grand Banks style).



The smaller fishing boats (as at Half Circle) I see as the old beach-yawl type. A very handy rig for a small crew to work. For a lot of the working time you can just jog along with the mizzen set



In Dragonsong, Alemi teaches Elgion to sail in a small skiff. There's no mention of a centre board so I picture it like Arthur Ransome's Swallow ...

[mawra]

I was thinking of the first pic. of P'ter's. Now I just have to finds something that looks that, but is small enough to use as a game piece. I was thinking that it is probably what the fishermen would use when going out for a large group of fish.

[GinnyStar]

at maw at P'ter and all the MoMer's here.

Nice images. I had a book on the subject but loan it my dad, I also have some images once I get the upgraded printer/scanner here.

[ElectricDragon]

Timber will be a major issue for Pernese ships, so they are unlikely to be large, or sport particularly tall masts or long spars. While an occasional schooner such as P'ter's first image might be the pride of a sea hold's fleet (or the Masterfisher), it would probably be the only such vessel in that fleet, excepting maybe the fleet's previous schooner. If more than a dozen schooners routinely plied Pern's oceans it would be surprising.

Yawls and ketches such as P'ter's second image might comprise the deep-water fishing craft, but most would probably be single-masted skiffs like P'ter's third image.

The principle trading ships would probably resemble a lanteen-rigged, two-masted caravel. Minimal masts and spars, good carrying capacity (something narrow schooners lack), and robust enough to keep the sea better in a storm than a schooner.



Any actual ships would also probably be "recycled" repeatedly, stripped, parted out, reworked and reassembled anew. The Royal Navy did this even with ships-of-the-line, and given the preciousness of wood on Pern, I would except similar economy. Once the new schooner joins the fleet, take apart the old to salvage the main members, then build a new ship around that skeleton with worn or rotted members replaced and all-new planking. Introduce a few refinements in the design. Then replace the now-old new schooner with the now-new old schooner.

The same would certainly be done with caravels. Yawls and skiffs might not be worth the effort and their members more similarly exposed to damage by time as the skin of the ship.

[vyon]

If you can't get suitable 3D pieces, Mawra, you might have to print out small pictures and glue them to cardboard squares for playing pieces. Or put them, upright, into bases made of DAS or some other modelling clay.

[GinnyStar]

Originally Posted by vyon

If you can't get suitable 3D pieces, Mawra, you might have to print out small pictures and glue them to cardboard squares for playing pieces. Or put them, upright, into bases made of DAS or some other modelling clay.

Sometime you can find something up.

I read some were that for a game they fold then into triangle a with the images on both sides and taped a coin to the underside to act as a stand/weight.

[mawra]

I wish the game would hurry up and get here.

[ElectricDragon]

Originally Posted by Eriflor

The design depends on what they're used for, and whether speed is at a premium.

They'd come in all sizes: small/medium/large yachts for personal travel, fishing boats for use close to shore or in the deep ocean currents, trading vessels for coastal trade or inter-continental trips (mostly clippers and schooners).

Personal and fishing boats would need more open deck space and fewer masts. Traders would be bigger, with cargo holds and probably more sails to catch the wind. Perhaps somebody could talk about the relative advantages of fore-and-aft rigging and square-rigging.

There would need to be protection against Threadfall --- metal-clad masts and superstructure, mechanisms to flood the decks with sea-water (I believe this is described in DGLP) --- otherwise ships would have to stay undercover on Threadfall days.

There could be pirate ships! Fast-moving with places for crossbowmen to shoot from.

Eriflor.

Fast-moving, well-equipped ships would be unlikely to fall into pirate hands, and would attract too much attention too soon if they did. Contrary to pirate movies, pirates almost never took, operated or commissioned a true warship. There just weren't enough pirates, of enough skill and in good enough health to take on a man-o-war, or even a merchant with a large crew.

Most pirate ships were small and shabby, and relied upon deception to get close and surprise to overwhelm. The most heavily armed pirate ships were generally converted merchantmen that were only heavily armed by virtue of being commissioned as privateers by one government or another. Facing any sort of true man-o-war generally spelled doom for the pirate, and almost no pirate vessel sailed well enough to out-run a man-o-war.

However, being small, and shallow-draft, a favorite pirate tactic was to evade close in-shore where a man-o-war couldn't follow.

Most Pernese pirates (what few exist), will probably be fishermen by day and pirates by night, and their craft will probably be coastal and tiny. In all probability, a ship would be tackled by a small swarm of skiffs, or chaika that during the day are tending nets.

There aren't going to be very many pirates on Pern, however. It's very hard for pirates to operate in the presence of air cover. All it will take is one word from the Masterfisher to the local Weyr and in very short order a dragon rider is going to see a raid go down, watch its perpetrators return to base, and report where that is. The Masterfisher, the legitimate fishermen and the Lord Holders' armsmen will do the rest.

Part of the reason for Somalian piracy is that there is no continuous air surveillance in the area. And most of the piracy is conducted with small arms, the occasional RPG (Rocket Propelled Grenade) launcher, and from small motor-boats operating from a slow, ungainly mothership that doubles as a fishing trawler.

The boat that sank under Captain Jack Sparrow as he cruised up to the dock was a more typical pirate craft than the Black Pearl, and no pirate ever took a frigate like the Interceptor or a ship-of-the-line like the Dauntless. Pirates were lucky to even have cannon, and only a handful at that in most cases. The biggest and best privateer ships were typically converted East India merchantmen and were lucky to mount 20 cannon, barely enough to match the weakest "frigate" in service, most of which mounted 28, 32, 36, 38 or 44 guns and carried much larger crews.

[Anareth]

I never could figure out in the first PotC how two guys were supposed to operate a British warship by themselves....

[GinnyStar]

Originally Posted by Anareth

I never could figure out in the first PotC how two guys were supposed to operate a British warship by themselves....

You mean Pirate of the Caribbean?

Speaking of ships, how about ones transporting goods inland? Barge with wheels were talk about in DF

In DD and CoP First Fall: Dolphin's Bell, they were give lots of what they looked like.

Reason I am asking for this is Ships of Pern and I am looking for background for my first Pern based fan fic and need to transport a water-wheel and parts needed to run sawmill and could do other top of milling flour on the side, in nine pass Pern from the smithcraft hall to its new hold.

[P'ter]

I'll have a think about that scenario.

[GinnyStar]

I fould the fan flc I was looking for
http://www.fanfiction.net/s/5026658/1/
PM for more information and careful how you word it. Perhaps one of FanFic.Net can explane better than I can.

[ElectricDragon]

Originally Posted by Anareth

I never could figure out in the first PotC how two guys were supposed to operate a British warship by themselves....

You noticed that too, eh?

[P'ter]

Ginny: I think you'd better transport the water wheel pre-fabricated in sections for final assembly on site. Have you decided whether the wheel is overshot or undershot?

Barges on wheels was an idea of either Fandarel's or Haiman's (so, if your story is set pre-9th pass you have an Anne-omoly problem). I'm not sure any were ever built, but it was a proposition for the transport of raw ore.

There was a type of harvest cart in the mid-west called a 'barge on wheels'.



Apparently this was taken in Minnesota.

[Anareth]

Originally Posted by ElectricDragon

You noticed that too, eh?

The only theory I could come up with was "one of them can run and climb very, very fast (at Warner-Brothers-cartoon-character speed." And MY rigged-ship experience is limited to wandering around USS Constitution at anchor. There were probably yacht crews and reenactors and naval historians tearing their hair out at that scene.

[GinnyStar]

Originally Posted by P'ter

Ginny: I think you'd better transport the water wheel pre-fabricated in sections for final assembly on site. Have you decided whether the wheel is overshot or undershot?

Barges on wheels was an idea of either Fandarel's or Haiman's (so, if your story is set pre-9th pass you have an Anne-omoly problem). I'm not sure any were ever built, but it was a proposition for the transport of raw ore.

There was a type of harvest cart in the mid-west called a 'barge on Apparently this was taken in Minnesota.

They use in Wisconsin too. Nice image.

Its was Fandarel's idea, talked about in DQ.

Have you decided whether the wheel is overshot or undershot?

Not yet, working on it. Depending on the current and where I am going to place it. I known they had both three undershot ones at the MasterSmithCraftHall and a too large for what I've got in mind at the dam and power plante south of Landing, (most comes from my mind. And I know a bit how a overshot one works for it was right down the road, from me (It was my father's boyhold home, and birthplace. My dad bought the land right next to his birthplace. He told me one side was a gristmill and the other side was a lumber mill. Its still used for power by my uncle who now has the land.

[Hans]

All posts about crappy war movies, planes, trains, automobiles and naked Val Kilmer's moved to this thread: http://forums.srellim.org/showthread.php?t=6942

[GinnyStar]

Originally Posted by Hans

All posts about crappy war movies, planes, trains, automobiles and naked Val Kilmer's moved to this thread: http://forums.srellim.org/showthread.php?t=6942

Thanks Hans madejas Hans in Dutch. Boy what a suprize when I was reading that thread. Dank u wel in Dutch via Edith.

I am going to have to work on this a bit at a time. For one thing I am still trying to get the background for this, and also know that I have more to work with then I thougth.

[P'ter]

A pure undershot relies mainly on the speed of the water going past the bottom of the wheel. Overshot utilises gravity (i.e. the weight of the water in the buckets).

You can get composites where the water is delivered partway down the wheel so that, although it is undershot, gravity also comes into play.

[GinnyStar]

Originally Posted by P'ter

A pure undershot relies mainly on the speed of the water going past the bottom of the wheel. Overshot utilises gravity (i.e. the weight of the water in the buckets).

You can get composites where the water is delivered partway down the wheel so that, although it is undershot, gravity also comes into play.

Thanks for the informaton P'ter, I found out that the water turned a set of turbines, that ran the power for the two mills, from the dad, on this out of town trip with him.

He was also a j.o.a.t. at two differnt places working in lumber yards.

Which has a relations, to frozen water, for that how Grandfather and his worker got all of the wood, above the water, cut it up, and burn on the ice, pulled with animal teams on sleads, and more well have to wait. To sleepy to type.