Hjejlen: Danish Excursion sidewheeler, Billing Boats

[Carleroo]

After scratch-building a couple of locomotives, I decided to try my hand at another ship kit. This time it is the Hjejlen, a sidewheeler, originally built in 1861, completely redone in the early 1900s, and is reputed to be the oldest coal-fired sidewheeler out there. The kit was originally issued years ago, but this is a new, revised, and upgraded version. I have built a few Billing Boats over the past years and while I have always been pleased with the outcome, I dreaded the Billing instructions - very minimal and often left me scratching my head trying to figure things out. This time, along with the upgraded materials, there is now an instruction booklet with plenty of photographs. I am a bit disappointed in that there are almost no written instructions, which I think would have been beneficial for a number of the more complicated steps. Still, a big improvement over the previous Billing Boats instructions. I have already begun the project and will post photos and commentaries about my progress.

 

[Carleroo]

The photo instructions suggest holding off on installing one of the frames (number 15) until after the decks have been glued on. The problem is that it is almost impossible to install the frame once the decks are glued on. There are too many tabs that interfere. It was only possible to install this frame after snipping off some of the insert tabs that attach the decks to the frame. Only then could the frame be lowered into its proper gap in the keel. This was not a major problem, since the deck has many points of contact for gluing down, and the tabs were not "mission-critical". The photos here do not show the specific problem, but for anyone planning to build this kit, pay attention to this.

 

[Carleroo]

The planking of the hull is the stage of construction that gets me most worried. Despite all my attempts to do a decent job, I have always made a major mess of things on previous builds. A bit too much chamfering, gaps, bulges, raised edges, etc.. Thank goodness for filler and sandpaper. In this case, the planking was very straightforward. The shape of the hull was not too irregular, so I had to do almost no trimming of the planks. You can see that for much of the hull, the planks just stretched across from bow to stem with very little need for adjustment. Also, hardly any bevelling or trimming of the frames was needed. For modelers with clumsy hands, this was a real plus.