Assembly technique

In general it is rather simple to make a sail ship in a bottle. At first you make a model on a table bearing in mind its further articulation/segmentation and assembly/disassembly. Then you disassemble the ship model and get down to the final assembly inside the bottle with the help of special tools.
The matter is in these special tools. Any craftsman has his own secrets and he will not tell you all about them.
Usually a craftsman makes use of a flexible shaft with tweezers at the end. For application of micro drops of glue/cement very long hollow medical needles are used.
The assembly procedure in the bottle is started with the elements that are situated at one far end from the neck, so that they would not prevent new parts from installation.
The longer and narrower is the bottle neck, the more elements and details are in the ship model, the more the inner volume of the bottle is filled, the higher value the model get at the competitions, among the appraisers, collectors, judies.
Here you can see the assembly procedure for the battleship “Slava Ekaterine” (Fame of Catherine).

Lower part of ship casing is placed into bottle first.	Casing in cemented to support inside bottle.	Important operation is to swing all masts back down accurately.	Every mast is pushed inside through bottle neck – very delicate work.
Upper deck with masts in placed inside without damage.	Two parts of casing are cemented together and now you can’t take ship out.	Masts are raised up carefully with special hook.	Each thread of rigging is pulled slowly. Operation needs great care.
All thread is glued bowsprit and ends are cut out.	Minor parts are installed through bottle neck by means of forceps and glued.	Bottle cork is secured with nail. It is secret is in thread.	Last drop of glue. Installation is over.

There are minimum 14 main installation procedures for ships in bottles. Every craftsman has its own procedure. For instance, the submarines are cut into parts then installed inside a bottle and glued carefully one part to another. Bat any sail ship is the most complicated, interesting and beautiful work. There are ships assembled from very many small parts inside bottles, such ships are rare because it takes month to make them. Another way of assembly, when masts are laid down and pushed into the bottle, is easier. The secret of this procedure is in the hinges used to attach masts to the deck. And one more secret (know-how) is the ropes (threads) which help to pull up masts inside the bottle. These ropes (threads) should correspond to that historical period of time and should be stretched and tightened to make you feel wind in the bottle. Then it is a well-made sail ship in bottle.
In some cases all the masts can be pulled up simultaneously. But more complex ship models do not allow it. In such cases every mast is swinger up on its hinge slowly. After tightening the ends of the ropes (threads) should be cut at the bowsprit with the help of a sharp blade secured to a wire.
After that the finishing operations should be started. Make use of a special pair of tweezers to install cannons, lifeboat, markers, and other small parts and secure them with glue in their places. If you make stains of glue on the ship inside the bottle, then it is spoilage.