A Boat a Day (no.42)

Good Afternoon!

A boat a Day no. 42
A Ship in a Bottle

Monday is the new Saturday! I have been lounging around watching films, researching boats and trying my hand at a boat in a bottle... My first attempt is somewhat childish and clumsy, but fear not I will be trying again! Though with a bit more technicality.

This is an extremely simplified version of a ship in a bottle, here's how it's done.

I started with a bottle, an extremely cool bottle I have been keeping for no reason. Not only is it a navy seal rum bottle it even has an embossed anchor on the glass!! After a long soak in warm soppy water I scrubbed the labels and excess glue until squeaky clean and left upside down to dry while I hunted for suitable boat materials.

I came up with a wooden dowel rod for the mast, some cartridge paper for the sail and an old battered cork board for the boat. I also gathered some thickish wire (to use for hinges) some thread, a hacksaw, scissors, pins, craft knife and awl. All useful things! (I had to run to the shop for some super glue as my handy hot glue gun is still on the run somewhere!!)

Now I read a number of different sources on how to assemble the boat, some were extremely hardcore, some a little tricky and others simple enough for kids. So I just made it up from there, basically your ship hull needs to be thin and flat enough to fit through the mouth of the bottle. I built mine from layers of cork board and super glued them together with an extra bit for the aft deck. Keep checking your hull against the bottle to make sure it still fits. I found cork really good as it squashes a bit.
Next you need to make some holes in your mast (after cutting it to fit upright within the bottle...try making it as big as you can get away with to fill the space!), a hole all the way through at both ends. (I whittled the end of my dowel a little to make it tapered.)

Attach your sail to the mast, make sure it is made of something that can bend or roll, remember it all needs to fit through the bottle.
Now here comes the magical part. Thread a stretch of wire through the hole at the bottom of your mast bend it at both ends to form a U, this will be your hinge. Attach it to the hull of your ship securely, (this again was really simple for me as the cork is made for piercing.) Have a bit of a play making your mast lie stand tall and lie flat. Now attach some thread to the top of the mast through the other hole you made, make sure your thread is fairly long, long enough for you to keep hold of it while you manouvre your ship through the bottle mouth, when pulled this will raise the mast and sail inside the bottle...Magic!

Now here's where I prove to be an impatient fool, I wanted to test my boat so I put it in and only once I got the mast up did I realize I had not thought of a way to attach it to the inside of the bottle. so my ingenious plan? Funnel blue-glue into the bottle! Messy! I would suggest you think about this WAY before this stage. The PVA glue works just fine, it'll take a little while to dry but it does the job. If only I had remembered about that awesome anchor on the glass before I filled it on the wrong side and had to do a tricksy clean -up job with a chopstick!

So other than the fact the my poor boat is sinking, and the mast is oversized and I made a sticky mess of the inside, I'm pretty pleased with my ship in a bottle. Next time it will be awesome!