Another milestone in the production of the Victory model.  The Middle Deck framing is complete.  My model has 4 decks.  The Lower Deck shown in earlier blog, the Middle, the Upper and the Quarter Deck.  In the real ship there are also decks below the Lower Deck which are below the water line but I have not built them.  That would just be silly anal.

Anyway if you look at this framing you will note some large sculptured timbers leading from the main mast (the middle one) to the hull side.  These carried the huge thrust of the main mast and sails to the exterior frame and would have required huge beams.

When you look at this model you realize why building the Royal Navy (this ship was built in the 1750s) would have required massive harvesting of  trees.  England was originally covered with forests of Oaks and Elm but is largely rolling meadows today thanks to the demand for the navy.

Middle Deck Framing