The
Nautical
Archaeology
Digital Library

Sultanah. 14 gun Omani fully rigged ship (1833) 

Carlos Montalvão

Sultanah is a top rate museum standard ship model made for the permanent collection of The National Museum – Sultanate of Oman.

The hull, masting and fittings are made of Swiss steamed pear wood and African ebony.

No paint is used, just natural wood. The hull is coopered under the waterline with more than 1100 scaled down copper sheets. The copper was coated with a varnish used in the automobile industry to prevent oxidation. The canons are scaled down replicas of XIX’ 12 pounders Bloomefield pattern casted in light metal. Metal fittings are made of brass and darkened with acid.  The masts are of pear wood and the yards are of ebony. They both were turned in a precision lathe machine. The blocks are functional and the ropes were made in a home maid precision rope walk in order to have the rigging precisely at scale. The figure head was 3D milled and hand carved in wood.. The metal fittings are made of brass, the canons were casted in a light metal alloy and the rigging is made of cotton.

The model’s dimensions are the following:
Extreme length ( from the taffrail to the neck of the figure head) 1,51 m
Length with rigging: 2,15 m
Maximum height: 1,70 m
Extreme breadth: 0,35 m
Length of the main yard: 0,85 m – Scale: 1/24