santa maria was built by roy tonkinson of willenhall in the early 1950s. roy was a remarkable teenager with a really good future until he contracted hodgkins disease.
he made this model in hospital scratch built from plans. he then scratch built a 1/2 scale copy of a model built by the science museum from plans and photos obtained from one of the curators. the model was of the "elizabeth jonas" built to a scale of 1:48.
shortly after completeing this last model he died. he was 21 years old.
he was my only uncle and i was about 5 years old when he died. i am 60 and my mother has asked me to restore both models. i will do santa maria first.
this model has never been in a case. she is very dirty, her rigging is in some places broken and showing signs of rot. her canvas is very brittle and will almost certainly need to be replaced. the sails were made from a nurses apron. the wood trim has suffered from drying out caused i imagine from central heating and some of the glue (animal)has failed
so far i have removed all bits lying on deck to a safe place and have blown the dust off with low pressure from my airbrush. next need to do test areas to find safe way of cleaning further. also need to decide on how much to re-rig and how much to paint.
hours 4.
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