Beez Neez now Chy Whella - Edwin Fox Build

Edwin Fox Build

Beez Neez now Chy Whella

Big Bear and Pepe Millard

Fri 19 Sep 2014 22:17

Building of the Edwin Fox

We went upstairs to the wonderfully informative displays showing how the Edwin Fox was built, her first journeys and busy sailing career.

The Edwin Fox was built in 1853 as a full-rigged ship at a Calcutta shipyard in the Bengal province of India. More than a thousand trees were used of the highest quality Indian teak and saul. Teak is one of the world’s most durable timbers, it doesn’t decay, warp or crack. Unlike oak, which rusts iron, the resinous oils in teak preserve iron and repel termites. The Edwin Fox is almost all solid teak. Saul is a very strong but brittle Asian hardwood, similar to bluegum. It was used for the massive futtocks deep in the hull of the ship. Saul could not be used for planking as it was prone to splitting.

Construction cutaway diagram

Cutaway diagram showing amazing detail

The new ship’s contours would have been traced with chalk on the floor of a ‘mould loft’. The chalk lines were then used to make wooden templates as patterns for the ship’s huge ribs.

The ships ribs or frames were assembled from sections of teak hewn to match the curves of the mould loft templates. Each gigantic rib was then hoisted upright and fitted to the keel.

An elephant-powered derrick placed massive teak timbers that formed the keel or ships backbone. The teak was cut on a stepped diagonal to make a snug ‘scarf’ joint clenched with metre-long iron bolts. The scarf joints were designed to hook and lock themselves together.

The newly constructed frame sat for months in the shipyard while the timbers settled.

The thick framing timbers were clad on both sides with heavy teak planks which had been steamed over a charcoal pit and bent to shape using block and tackle. Shipwrights had ten minutes to fasten the newly moulded planks to the ship before the timber cooled and became unworkable.

Thousands of treenails - pronounced “trunnels”, fastened the cladding to the frame. Each treenail was split by hand to a standard size and pounded into auger-drilled holes. The museum housed a very well used hammer.

When the Edwin Fox was built iron “knees” had replaced wooden ones as the method for reinforcing joints between deck beams and the ships sides. Iron straps were kinked to fit around planks. The daggerknees were the first stage in the evolution of iron ships.

Tropical teredo shipworms could infest even the most durable timber and quickly eat away enough to sink a ship. A copper skin was laid over the teak planking on the Edwin Fox as protection against the pest which had moved into European waters. Coppering was a very expensive method of protecting a hull, with high labour and material costs. It accounted for one tenth of the total hull cost yet only two Far East voyages could be made before recoppering was required.

Muntz was used to reduce the erosion rate of copper, it was mixed with zinc in a three to two ratio. The finished profile.

The new deck was sealed with caulking and the many intricate fittings required to operate a sailing ship attached. A team of caulkers sealed the decks with oakum and tar. Strands of tar-soaked hemp – oakum, were forced between the planks and hot tar poured in as a final seal.

The Edwin Fox’s three masts were fashioned from oregon type timber probably shipped from England. Each mast was in three sections strapped and bolted together to form a 48.8 metre mainmast, a 33.5 metre mizzenmast and a 42.7 metre foremast. The Edwin Fox was launched as a “full rigged” ship. Forty seamen were required to handle the ship under her seven hundred square metres of sail. This style of rigging gave optimum sail power.

Barque Rig. To reduce crewing and maintenance costs the Edwin Fox was converted to a barque fourteen years after she was built. The most obvious rigging changes were the removal of the huge square mizzen – stern mast sails, and their replacement with the more easily handled triangular sails.

The likely layout for the Edwin Fox’s maiden voyage. Passengers would have provided their own cabin furniture for the voyage between India and England. When she docked, she was surveyed in London after completing her journey from Calcutta.