La conception des formes de carène sur les galères de la fin du XVIIe siècle - article ; n°1 ; vol.14, pg 253-258

Archaeonautica - Année 1998 - Volume 14 - Numéro 1 - Pages 253-258
Mediterranean shipbuilding is mostly known due to archaeological data a large part of which consist in wrecks of ancient sailing merchant ships. Galleys are practically never encontered in underwater excavations, which oblige us to utilise written records and iconographical data.
No plan of a 17th century galley has been discovered to this day because shipbuilding emerged from a non-graphic culture in which other existing methods enabled the form of the lower part of a hull to be designed. The first galley plans appeared in France around the 1730s on the impulse of shipbuilders such as Reynoir the younger. When the shipbuilder proceeded by trial and error it was on paper and not on the building site. Thanks to the graphic documents, the builder preserved and exploited the experience gained dunng his career and that ofhis predecessors.
The methods used in the 17th century by the galley builders, the direct heritage of the medieval period, were very different from those used in the 18th century. The carpenters used «technical formulas », obtained empirically, to define all the dimensions and draw theform ofthe lower part of the hulls.
The builders used moulas and rising squares, kinds of model for the frame, as well as ribbands. The latter are wooden rods fixed longitudinally onto the hull after the central ribs have been placed. They enable the builder to draw the frame of the ends by means of appropriate measurements. The ribs of the central part are drawn with the help of moulds and rising squares taken from the tracing ofthe midship frame. The evolution of the forms of the lower part of the hull is obtained by moving these moulds and rising squares around over each other. The ribs of the hull's aft extremity are made by associating the ribbands and moulds, moving them to give the shape of the frame. The form of the ribs ofthe hull's fore part is solely defìned by a network of ribbands.
Experience and good judgement play a determining role especially for the shaping of the fore and aft parts, the pronounced sharp bottom of the extremities is not conducive to the sole use of moulds.
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