Manufacturer: Billing Boats

Manufacturers comments:
A building slip for models up to 90 cm long.The notched keel support is screwed to the baseplate. Two guide blocks, one permanent and one adjustable to match all sizes, secure the positioning of the keel. A wooden rod ensures that the foundation is stable. The middle piece (square) slides back and forth and is useful in positioning the frames at right angles.

My comments:
I have purchased this Building Slip to assist me when I start building my Smit Rotterdam so I thought it would be useful to share my observations and views on this product so far.

Firstly the numbering of the product is bit confusing as on the Billing Boats website they refer to it at No.396 but on the box it is clearly marked as No.301. As far as I am aware Billing only make one model of Building Slip so clearly the number on the site seems to be wrong.

I have received the following e-mail early in 2004 from a fellow modeler, so I have decided to add it here. Thanks Tjalling.

"Hi,
I guess BB does have 2 models of the building slip. Yesterday I received mine and the box number was 396 like the one on the site. Looking at your pictures I also saw that there is some space between the keel support and the base plate and that the support is screwed to the base. I have to glue the keel support directly to the base plate, without leaving any space.
I ordered my box from a mailorder company in the US, maybe they carry different models in Europe and USA, although the model number and picture from the US are the same as the picture on the European site.
Anyway, I hope results with the 2 slips will be great! I’m also building the Smit Rotterdam.
Kind regards,
Tjalling Kalkman
Holland"

The second issue was that on the box it says "Laser Cut" referring to fact that all the wooden parts have been laser cut, I would tend to disagree with this because as you can clearly see in some of the pictures there is some splintering on the edges of the wood which clearly indicates this was cut by a saw and not a laser. Though I wood expect the long pieces of wood to been sawn I would not expect to see some of the flat pieces laser cut and some sawn, especially when they have not been sawn to high standard. .

Click here some pictures of the Building Slip in the box, and during assembly.