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Armor/AFV: Techniques
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Scratch Build 101
hliu24
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California, United States
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Posted: Sunday, February 24, 2013 - 02:08 PM UTC
Finally have to get out of my comfort zone, How do you guys build things from scratch? what kind of Basic material and tools will be needed for building and measuring ?

Any opinion will help.

Thank you so much

Jay
corsutton
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Oklahoma, United States
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Posted: Sunday, February 24, 2013 - 03:38 PM UTC
Well, I am no expert at scratch building but when I do it, I use Evergreen Styrene and Plastruct Styrene. They offer all different sizes of round, square, flat, half round, hex rods; different variations of flat strip, and sheets of various thickness that are generally easy to cut and shape. I mostly use a plastic welder, Tenax, Bondene, Weldene, or Ambroid to secure the styrene together.

For measuring, I use digital calipers. They are pretty cheap at Harbor Freight. I also use a miter box with a stop in it to cut several pieces all the exact same length.

Hope that helps and good luck!
mother
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Posted: Sunday, February 24, 2013 - 04:41 PM UTC
You can achieve with a small amount of basic tools. Here is what I use…



And Everegreen Plasic. Sizes, well that's up to you for what you will be building.





You pretty much know what everything is, however I’ll pass on some tips. Get yourself scale cards, you can find them on-line, look under “The Scale card”. They are great for scartchbuilding, say you need to make a part that is 7ft 9in. well take the card out, lay it down and presto; the card does it for you. They are marked out in feet and inches.

Mechanical pencils work better than a regular pencil, they don’t leave heavy graphite residue and can be painted over.

A metal ruler in millimeters and inches, but don’t waste your time with the inches. You’ll drive yourself crazy trying to makes parts in 9/32nd by 4 and 9/16th. It’s much easier using 11mm by 116mm.

Using the Tamiya glue helps glueing parts that need to be checked before glueing into place, if you super glued first and checked and seeing you need to move or remove you be in trouble.

Over time you’ll pick up your own tips and style.

Another time you’ll need is time…time for research on the net. Google is your best friend. Type key work many times, example…I want to build a container box, well Google search “container box data” and if you know the name of the box type that in as well.

Hope this will get you pointed in the right direction…now go cut some plastic

Happy Modeling,
Joe
ericadeane
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Posted: Sunday, February 24, 2013 - 05:54 PM UTC
Start small by adding detail work to your model projects. One of the most valuable things are good photos and drawings, if possible. While doing research, just ask b/c there are many online photo archives. Put up a posting here and people can chime in.

Some things I've done:

1) replaced the warped wood slats of this cargo truck:


2) replaced body panels on this Academy M3 Lee to make a M31B1


3) converted a Studebaker truck into a dump truck


I'm willing to try most things except lathe type work with wheels/tires/barrels. Start with small modifications to build up your skills and techniques. Good luck!
Hisham
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Al Qahirah, Egypt / لعربية
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Posted: Sunday, February 24, 2013 - 06:25 PM UTC
Thanks for starting this, Jay, and I hope you don't mind my joining in.

Now, I've kind of "scratchbuilt" some simple items in the past, things like boxes and cabinets and stuff.. they're not as clean as yours, Joe, but I still feel good about having made them from scratch. But they've always been things that I drew out myself with measurements I set up myself.

So, my problem is trying to draw out a plan of something that already exists from looking at a picture of it... or even if I can find a plan for it, then how to translate that plan into parts... especially if it has a lot of different angles and stuff.

Have there been any books in the past - or videos - about this kind of thing, where you have a project from start to finish.

Joe, if you have any free time, would you be willing to lead an "online class" type of thing, where you would distribute a plan of a simple vehicle to whomever wants to join.. and then go step by step of how you would go about it, and we would try to do each step on our own and then show pics.

Of course, I don't mean to put you on the spot or anything like that. This is just a suggestion/wish. It wouldn't have to follow any specific timing. You would do each step whenever you find time for it, and then we would try to follow what you did. Think of it like an interactive campaign. Or maybe you can do a video that you can offer for sale!

Anyway, like I said.. just a suggestion. I mean, I don't mean to impose on what you do with your free time

Hisham
lone-ronin
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Mississippi, United States
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Posted: Sunday, February 24, 2013 - 06:37 PM UTC
One item that was extremely useful for the few scratch build projects and pieces/parts that I have done is a digital caliper. Can get them at Harbor Freight fairly cheap with a coupon or on sale. Converts millimeters to decimal inches to fractions with the touch of a button, and the sharp points can be used to scribe sheet styrene.
M113Fanatic
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Singapore / 新加坡
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Posted: Sunday, February 24, 2013 - 09:45 PM UTC
another good material would be the aluminum sheets from soft drink cans.
PedroA
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Valencia, Spain / España
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Posted: Sunday, February 24, 2013 - 11:49 PM UTC
Hi Jay.

All material can be useful if you want to make a model in scratch. Principally you can to use the wide game of plastic produced by Evergreen, also brass, cupper, aluminium, etc.

Some time ago, I posted a step by step showing how to make a model in scratch using different techniques.

https://armorama.kitmaker.net/forums/170136&page=1

Best regards.

Pedro.
fitzgibbon505
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Posted: Monday, February 25, 2013 - 12:38 AM UTC
I use an 8" mill bastard file a lot. It seems like a large tool, but works well for truing and cleaning up edges. I also use a small pair of smooth-jawed pliers I found in the fly-tying department of a sporting goods store. I am always on the lookout for wire, and have picked up several spools in varying materials and thicknesses. The fly-tying department is also a good place to find lead wire, which is easy to shape.
gcdavidson
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Posted: Monday, February 25, 2013 - 08:40 AM UTC
cut stuff oversize and then trim/sand flush.

if you are building a complex shape, try to see it as a selection of component parts; a rectangular box here, a cube there, a cylinder here etc etc.

Surgeon General's Warning: Scratchbuilding is addictive and may cause you to give up on paying for conversions.
mother
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Posted: Monday, February 25, 2013 - 08:58 AM UTC

Quoted Text

Surgeon General's Warning: Scratchbuilding is addictive and may cause you to give up on paying for conversions.



Now that's funny and sooo true. I have tons of aftermarket and countless kits that will never get touched. Our last club meeting I bought two armor kits, M109 and M60A1. Club guys were like "why did you buy them" you don't build kits.

Happy Modeling,
Joe
mother
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Posted: Monday, February 25, 2013 - 09:00 AM UTC
Hisham,
Yeah that's something I can do, let me think of a plan. Do you have skype and maybe with video. If so PM me with skype name and we can chat more about it.

Happy Modeling,
Joe
berwickj
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Fyn, Denmark
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Posted: Monday, February 25, 2013 - 09:06 AM UTC
@ Hisham: Great idea with a Scratch Building class.
@ Joe: If you're up to it, I'd love to sign up for the class. I'm about ready to take the leap of faith into scratch building.

John
tankmodeler
#417
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Posted: Monday, February 25, 2013 - 10:05 AM UTC
One key tool for scratchbuilding is a square, or several of them. Nothing screams "WRONG!!!" more than a box shape or join that is out of square. I have multiple squares and right angled set-up blocks that I use to ensure that parts are glued together at right angles. Get that right and a LOT of other mistakes will be forgiven. The human eye is unbeaten at immediately spotting things that are not to the correct pattern.

As for metal rulers in inches, these are perfectly fine as long as you get them marked off in decimal inches! Fractional inches are a pain, but decimal inches work just fine and given that many rules are marked off in .020" increments versus 1mm (or ~.040") increments on metric rules, you actually can manage better accuracy for the smaller parts.

Paul
corsutton
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Posted: Monday, February 25, 2013 - 11:32 AM UTC
Just when I got excited about a new tool, The Scale Card, I find they have gone the way of the dinosaurs, gone! That's right, they are no more. That is really too bad because I was looking forward to new tools! I always like the tools!
Thudius
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Posted: Monday, February 25, 2013 - 11:59 AM UTC
One tool I wish I had discovered earlier is a simple, single edged razor blade. Great for cutting strip stock. And very useful for shaving off detail from a donor kit. Be prepared to make mistakes, and try to think "outside the box" it's part of the learning process.
Hisham
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Al Qahirah, Egypt / لعربية
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Posted: Monday, February 25, 2013 - 08:51 PM UTC
Pedro, thanks for posting the link to your thread.. it has a lot of useful information.

Joe, I'm glad you're ready to consider this idea.. and I hope enough people will be interested to join in and learn.

A for Skype, I've tried using it before with video, but my PC just ends up freezing up. The Internet speed we get here is really pathetic.. I tried it a couple of times with sound only and it worked, but there was a lot of sound delay. Anyway, I'll contact my service provider to see if I can up upgrade my DSL speed so that I can get decent quality streaming video.

# For now, my idea was basically to have this like a kind of campaign.. except all members who join will be working on the same project.. which you will choose based on your experience and what you think will be easy enough to start people with.

# If you choose a plan that you already have drawn out, then you can send it to the members' e-mails so they all print it out.. and each of us will have the same plan to work with.

# Then you would start the first step (hopefully with clear pics) showing how you take measurements and how you measure angles and things like that.. and how you start cutting pieces and all that.

# As for frequency of the steps, that would be totally up to you. A step a week.. or a step a month.. you decide based on how much time you're willing to give this project. I don't want you to feel pressured, then get fed up with it and quit So, for each of us taking part in this, this will be like a project that's running in the background.. each of us learning at his own pace without any deadlines. And maybe it could become a "sticky" in the scratchbuilding forum... any ideas from the moderators?

Sorry for the lengthy post, but I just wanted to let you know what I was thinking of.. and maybe as an incentive, you can get your modelling club involved in this too

And if anyone is interested and has any ideas, please do post them.. let's get the blood running and do something totally new for some of us.

OK, enough talking... Joe, and all who are interested, think about it and join in with your ideas.. and I hope we can get this going.

Hisham
hliu24
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California, United States
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Posted: Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - 08:20 AM UTC
Thank you all and You guys blew me away already

Cory, thank you for that information, it is really helping me to get started.

Joe, Can i call you mother-feel like beening in "Matrix" thank you for the picures and the information, it will help me get further.

Thank you Roy, good idea and your scratch looks great.

Hisham, thank you for helping out.

Ronin, Digital caliper sounds neat!

Pedro, I looked at the link, you are the ture master!

david, soda cans? tell me more please.

Jim, Graeme and Paul, good tips!

Jay




hliu24
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Posted: Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - 08:48 AM UTC
This is a good one as REF.

From Maurizio
https://armorama.kitmaker.net/forums/198023&page=1

I will keep looking and posting here if I find some.

Jay
Hisham
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Posted: Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - 02:06 PM UTC
No one's interested?!!

Hisham
berwickj
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Posted: Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - 07:06 PM UTC
Yes, mé!!!

John
ninjrk
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Posted: Tuesday, February 26, 2013 - 11:28 PM UTC
As an aside, for scratchbuilding from plans and. Even scratchbuilding with them (amazing how often plan views don't actually match or you need to figure out hidden areas) I can't recommend the book "Model Design and Blueprinting Handbook Vol 1" by charles Adams highly enough. Best book for translating photos or dodgy plans into useful part templates that I've yet seen.

Matt
ninjrk
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Posted: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 - 01:58 AM UTC

Quoted Text

One key tool for scratchbuilding is a square, or several of them. Nothing screams "WRONG!!!" more than a box shape or join that is out of square. I have multiple squares and right angled set-up blocks that I use to ensure that parts are glued together at right angles. Get that right and a LOT of other mistakes will be forgiven. The human eye is unbeaten at immediately spotting things that are not to the correct pattern.

Paul



On that note, would you know where to find right angle blocks? I remember seeing a set of them years ago at AMPS East made out of aluminum (I think) having three dimensional blocks would be a bloody Godsend!

Matt
tankmodeler
#417
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Posted: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 - 03:25 AM UTC

Quoted Text

On that note, would you know where to find right angle blocks? I remember seeing a set of them years ago at AMPS East made out of aluminum (I think) having three dimensional blocks would be a bloody Godsend!

Matt


I've been lucky in that I work around machine shops in my engineering day job and have friends that pass me off-cuts on ocassion. My first suggestion would be to look to local precision machine shops and ask if they have any square off cuts. Very handy.

Then there are tool supply houses. In Canada KBC TOols is good for small shops & home machinists and has reasonably priced items as well as professionally priced ones.

http://www.kbctools.com/can/Navigation/NavPDF.cfm?PDFPage=0688

adjustable parallels are handy:

http://www.kbctools.com/can/Navigation/NavPDF.cfm?PDFPage=698

and adjustable squares are good too:

http://www.kbctools.com/can/Navigation/NavPDF.cfm?PDFPage=719

Of course, the costs for new measuring tools are always relatively high and you really do get what you pay for, so cheap imports are to be avoided if you can. A great source of inexpensive, if previously loved, tools is Ebay. Machinists lots frequently have really good name brand tools for next to nothing when you consider you can get several items in one lot. Do searches for "Machinest tool lot" and you'll turn up lots of crap but yet often enough, some jewels hidden in the dross.

Inside & outside calipers are greaat for transferring dimensions from drawing to part:

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/VINTAGE-MACHINIST-TOOLS-COMPASS-CALIPERS-LOT-OF-7-STARRETT-CRAFTSMAN-ALL-USA-/321080484874?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4ac1e3640a

Height gauges are especially handy not only for measuring, but also if a pencil or scribe is taped to the arm, marking or scribing lines perfectly parallel to the base surface, especially odd shapes that can be hard to mark out otherwise.

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/Vintage-Machinist-Tool-Lot-ENCO-MAGNETIC-HOLDER-340-DEPTH-GAUGE-VIS-MICROMETER-/121072880941?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1c30818d2d

Here's a mixed bag for you:

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/7-Work-Holding-Bench-V-Angle-Block-Machinist-Milling-Gunsmith-Toolmaker-Tool-Lot-/251235710898?pt=BI_Tool_Work_Holding&hash=item3a7ed0b7b2

You get the idea...

Paul
hliu24
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Posted: Wednesday, February 27, 2013 - 05:31 AM UTC

Quoted Text


Quoted Text

On that note, would you know where to find right angle blocks? I remember seeing a set of them years ago at AMPS East made out of aluminum (I think) having three dimensional blocks would be a bloody Godsend!

Matt


I've been lucky in that I work around machine shops in my engineering day job and have friends that pass me off-cuts on ocassion. My first suggestion would be to look to local precision machine shops and ask if they have any square off cuts. Very handy.

Then there are tool supply houses. In Canada KBC TOols is good for small shops & home machinists and has reasonably priced items as well as professionally priced ones.

http://www.kbctools.com/can/Navigation/NavPDF.cfm?PDFPage=0688

adjustable parallels are handy:

http://www.kbctools.com/can/Navigation/NavPDF.cfm?PDFPage=698

and adjustable squares are good too:

http://www.kbctools.com/can/Navigation/NavPDF.cfm?PDFPage=719

Of course, the costs for new measuring tools are always relatively high and you really do get what you pay for, so cheap imports are to be avoided if you can. A great source of inexpensive, if previously loved, tools is Ebay. Machinists lots frequently have really good name brand tools for next to nothing when you consider you can get several items in one lot. Do searches for "Machinest tool lot" and you'll turn up lots of crap but yet often enough, some jewels hidden in the dross.

Inside & outside calipers are greaat for transferring dimensions from drawing to part:

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/VINTAGE-MACHINIST-TOOLS-COMPASS-CALIPERS-LOT-OF-7-STARRETT-CRAFTSMAN-ALL-USA-/321080484874?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item4ac1e3640a

Height gauges are especially handy not only for measuring, but also if a pencil or scribe is taped to the arm, marking or scribing lines perfectly parallel to the base surface, especially odd shapes that can be hard to mark out otherwise.

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/Vintage-Machinist-Tool-Lot-ENCO-MAGNETIC-HOLDER-340-DEPTH-GAUGE-VIS-MICROMETER-/121072880941?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item1c30818d2d

Here's a mixed bag for you:

http://www.ebay.ca/itm/7-Work-Holding-Bench-V-Angle-Block-Machinist-Milling-Gunsmith-Toolmaker-Tool-Lot-/251235710898?pt=BI_Tool_Work_Holding&hash=item3a7ed0b7b2

You get the idea...

Paul



Tools are expensive!!!

Jay
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