Paddlesteamer Pevensey by Richard44 - FINISHED - World of Paperships - 1:100 - CARD - Paddlesteamer

[Richard44]

The paddlesteamer Pevensey was built in 1910 at Moama on the Murray River (Australia), as the non-powered barge called Mascotte, but in 1911 the vessel was equipped with a steam engine and renamed Pevensey. This turned it into one of the largest towing boats on the Murray, and it itself was capable of carrying 120 tons of cargo. In 1932 she was almost destroyed by fire, was rebuilt in 1933-35, ran a regular cargo run in 1939, but was then made redundant and tied up at Mildura. In 1975 she was slipped at Moama and completely restored. A 1983 Australian TV series called "All the Rivers Run" starred her as the PS Philadelphia. The Pevensey is now based at Echuca and runs tourist trips along the Murray.

 

The kit from World of Paperships (from the Netherlands) has two sheets of general information (with some photos), one sheet of diagrams, four sheets of English instructions, five sheets of printed parts (some sheets are printed on both sides) and one small sheet of lasercut parts. The sheet of diagrams is complex and in places difficult to follow, hopefully this won't cause problems later.

 

The bottom of the hull was tacked to a sheet of glass to act as a building board for the initial stages of the build. Two dabs from a glue stick sufficed for this. The sides were glued to the frames and the rubbing strakes added (forgot to take photos at this stage) then the deck was fixed in place.

 

A portion of the foredeck had been removed and a replacement glued lower down to represent a shallow cargo hold. A cutout was also made to allow for the engine space.

There are triangular supports between the underside of the deck and the sides. To ensure that the deck did not develop any waviness, a small steel rule was clamped to the top of the deck (the hull was off the glass and upside down for this step) while the supports were glued in place.

Many of the parts of the boat could be made either as a simple version or a detailed version. This photo shows the simple version of the engine and its surrounding safety railings, folded up from the provided card print.

The detailed version has 40 parts...

....and is the one I built. Unfortunately, I've somehow lost/deleted the photos I took of the completed engine, standing alone.

 

A template was provided to allow construction of the main framework that is around the engine space, and it, and the safety railings, were made from 0.5, 1.0 and 1.5 mm square styrene stock.

The framework supports the base of the superstructure that will be above it, and so had to be carefully fitted so that it was flat, even and of the correct height. Temporary "scaffolding" of wood strips and folded card was put in place to achieve this. The engine, engine space and surrounding framework (the latter is not quite complete). There is a small crew cabin just aft of the engine space.

Cheers

[Blue Ensign]

Another interesting card project Richard, they make up into such attractive models.

I look forward to seeing your progress .

 

B.E.

 

[AJohnson]

1 hour ago, Blue Ensign said:

Another interesting card project Richard, they make up into such attractive models.

I look forward to seeing your progress .

 

B.E.

 

Agreed, a great looking and unusual project Richard. Following along with interest, the engine came out really well, I hope you will be able to some of it when the rest of the superstructure goes on. 

[Richard44]

16 hours ago, Blue Ensign said:

Another interesting card project Richard, they make up into such attractive models.

I look forward to seeing your progress .

 

B.E.

 

Thanks for your comment B.E.

 

I've visited Echuca quite a few times, firstly about 20 years ago. I thought then that I'd like to make a model of one of the paddle steamers, but no models were available.

[Richard44]

14 hours ago, AJohnson said:

Agreed, a great looking and unusual project Richard. Following along with interest, the engine came out really well, I hope you will be able to some of it when the rest of the superstructure goes on. 

Hi Andrew,

 

No, not much chance of seeing much once the superstructure goes on. A lot of models, ships/boats, aircraft, whatever, seem to have a lot of hidden detail that only the builder knows about. Sort of the modeller's curse - do I add that bit that will take much patience and a fair amount of time, knowing full well that no-one will ever see it. Ah well, it is a hobby 😁.

 

Cheers

[Richard44]

The paddlewheels could also be made as a simple version, or a more detailed version. I decided on the detailed version which has lasercut "wheels", rim, spokes and hub, plus card blades.

These are all quite delicate, so to minimise the chances of damage while these were being assembled, a simple jig was devised to hold the rims in place while the blades were glued between them. This was successful and the completed paddlewheels looked very good.

BUT, BUT, when I tried a test fit of the paddlewheels into the slots on the sides of the deck, they wouldn’t fit! 😖😖 What the…☹️. Everything seemed to have been assembled according to the instructions, but as I had decided to build the detailed version, I totally ignored the instructions, and in particular the printed parts, for the simple version. Big mistake 🥴, as if I had taken notice I would have seen that the blades needed to be inside the actual rim, rather than standing proud as I had made them. Now what 🥴. Trimming the blades flush was not an option, as most of the blade would have been removed, and damage was almost guaranteed. If they had been made of wood I could probably have de-glued them using isopropyl alcohol, but the fragility of the wheels and the unknown effect of the alcohol on the lasercut material suggested this was not going to work - I did try and it didn't.

 

I therefore got in touch with Jeroen from World of Paperships and he very kindly sent me a replacement lasercut sheet free of charge 🙂🙂. So, paddlewheels, second attempt.

Cheers

[Canute]

Great save by you and Jeroen.

[Richard44]

So, having sorted out the paddlewheels, time to fix them in place. The framework aound the engine space has also been completed.

The kit provides extra doors etc so that these can be doubled to give some impression of depth. Two of the extras are the fire extinguishers and the life buoys (these actually have the boat’s name on them). This photo shows those as printed, and cut out, edge coloured and ready for mounting.

Next are the boxes that cover the paddlewheels, only two parts each but multiple bends. The doubled fire extinguisher and the life buoy can be seen on one.

Cheers

[Richard44]

Thanks for all the likes .

The parts for the wheel house.

The instructions suggested that the main part of the wheelhouse (G3) be cut so that you would get four separate pieces - front, back and two sides. Then after gluing in place the internal details, glue the four pieces back together - seemed odd to me, so I didn’t. I simply folded G3 around the bottom (the yellowish piece) after adding the internal front and back doubled walls. The bottom was too small and some card had to be used to fill the gap between it and the walls. The completed wheel house, including a lasercut wheel, in place on the top deck.

The passenger cabin was a simple unit, and it was glued to the top deck behind the wheelhouse, and this deck was then fixed in place, resting on the framework above and around the engine, and on the edges of the paddlewheel boxes. The engine is barely visible from the front and not at all from the sides, but I know it’s there!

Cheers

[Richard44]

Various pieces added to the cabin - towing mast, funnel, chimney, whistle, nav lights, corrugated iron water tank and an iron bar across the rear of the cabin to provide protection from the towing rope (when used).

Like other parts of the model, the winch can be made detailed (my choice) or simply. The image shows the parts for the detailed version at the top, the parts for the simple version at the bottom, and in between, the diagram is the only guide as to how the detailed pieces go together. Ah well. As I could barely make out that diagram, I decided to make a copy of the detailed pieces and attempt to put them together. It took some fiddling, but I did end up with a reasonable version, not quite as it should have been but close. I then built the final version, which looks very reasonable at normal viewing distance. Some styrene was used in place of card.

Next, the railings. These were either printed or lasercut. I didn’t like the printed ones, so used the lasercut ones, and to represent the metal netting, I used some nylon net from the local fabric store. This was glued to the lasercut pieces, very carefully using gel CA, then trimmed. The railings were then glued in place, again using small drops of gel CA. The two ladders going from the main to the upper deck were assembled and glued in position.

Cheers.

[Richard44]

Next thing to do is form, from styrene stock, the frameworks, fore and aft, that support the sunscreens. No particular problem, but a bit fiddly.

The stays now have to be fitted.

 

The two fore stays pass through the roof of the wheelhouse and through the sunscreen. The roof had points marked where the stays should go but the sunscreen didn't. Two templates were therefore used to locate the correct positions on the sunscreen for the required holes. The first template was chopped around until it fitted around the stays which were temporarily in position. This template was then used to give reasonably accurate locations for the holes on the second template and these were fine tuned and marked on the actual sunscreen. The stays were then fastened in position as was the sunscreen.

 

The two aft stays presented a problem as they passed through the roof of the deckhouse and also the railing. No points were marked on the roof. The use of a template as I did for the fore stays was not an option, so a strip of card was used as a guide to finish with a best guess as to where the stays passed through the roof and the railing. Only one chance at this. Close but not perfect.

 

The rudder was attached and I used the finest chain I had (instead of the printed option) to run from it to the rear of the deck. Finally, seats, tables, a barbecue and some buckets were added.

The kit had some problems, nothing serious, occasional misidentification of parts. Some of the sheets were printed on both sides, but often the patterns didn't match, the rudder being an example. Instructions could definitely be better including more diagrams.

 

Thanks for all the likes and the comments.

 

Cheers

Edited October 29, 2023 by Richard44

[AJohnson]

Great job again Richard! 

[Louie da fly]

Beautiful work, Richard.

 

I remember All the Rivers Run very well. Fortunately Sigrid Thornton's acting improved with experience.

[ccoyle]

A fine result, Richard!

[Blue Ensign]

Very nice work Richard, another sweet model to add to your paper Navy.

Well done.

 

B.E.

 

[Richard44]

Thanks everybody for the likes and comments. I remain in awe of your skill with wood, B.E., and yours with card Chris.

 

On to the next build, a wooden boat this time. The build log will start soon.

 

Cheers

[Richard44]

21 hours ago, Louie da fly said:

Beautiful work, Richard.

 

I remember All the Rivers Run very well. Fortunately Sigrid Thornton's acting improved with experience.

Thanks Steven. I never saw the TV show, so can't comment on Sigrid's acting ability. Didn't see Sea Change either. 😁

[Louie da fly]

She was terrible in Rivers, and perhaps even worse in The Man From Snowy River - very much a matter of "Show us your other facial expression, dear!"

 

 But by Sea Change - in which she starred with David Wenham (alias Faramir) - she had developed quite a sharp comedic gift.

 

Steven

[GrandpaPhil]

Nicely done!