Model Railroad Philosophy: What constitutes Scratch Building?

I suppose when I'm worried about the NMRA I'll follow those rules. I had a grand old time snapping the plastic for my walls, cutting the rectanges for my door and window castings, and fabricating my shingles for the roof from card stock one strip at a time. My major cheat was hiring a laser cutting firm to fabricate the intricate eaves ornaments.

Yes I used castings for the chimnies, but the little spire, the station sign and the trim on the building were all me and strop styrene.

Dave

Anyone wants a looksee, click here: DL&W Franklin station in northwest New Jersey, U.S.A.

: I suppose when I'm worried about the NMRA I'll follow those rules. I : had a grand old time snapping the plastic for my walls, cutting the : rectanges for my door and window castings, and fabricating my shingles : for the roof from card stock one strip at a time. My major cheat was : hiring a laser cutting firm to fabricate the intricate eaves : ornaments. : : Yes I used castings for the chimnies, but the little spire, the : station sign and the trim on the building were all me and strop : styrene. : : Dave : : Anyone wants a looksee, click here: : DL&W Franklin station in northwest New Jersey, U.S.A. :

No, I'm pretty sure it comes from the noun "scratch," not the verb.

The scratch is the starting point; the very beginning. If you scratchbuilt a model, you've started from a beginning point at which nothing has been done for you ahead of time.

According to the generally accepted NMRA definition, that is not scratchbuilding -- the over-the-counter details are not from scratch.

Remember -- there is an advantage of giving things names that reflect their function, you can figure out what they are from the name!

OK, let's see you build something - anything - out of a scratch! ;-)

Certainly things like flatcar and gondola loads; but as soon as I put it on a freight car it doesn't qualify (I haven't attempted to build a freight car from scratch).

I've got an highway overpass concealing the end of my freight yard where it butts up against a wall made from Plastruct beams, strips and half-rounds -- plus a sheet of a "for sale" plastic sign for the railroad crash walls, roadway, sidewalk and parapet (a la Big John). The question remains: although I fabricated the posts and rails supporting the chain link fence on the parapet from styrene shapes, the chain link fence itself was from Plastruct's chain link fence material. (How is that stuff classified? The NMRA treats embossed brick sheets as a scratch building material, I wonder if chain link fence material is treated the same.) It probably doesn't matter, since there's an Alloy Forms truck on the bridge... and it's on my layout which has kits on it... *gasp*!

But then again I never claimed to be a scratch builder in any of my messages; I know what using the term means.

What did you do about the metal castings in the original FSM kit?

yes i have seen this done before.

I scratch build about 50% of my buildings useing only drawings from MR and RMC. I Kitbash about 25% of the Buildings i have and the other 25% is is from kits and alot of them get some new stuff. I love to buy pre made Wood kits off Ebay and at train shows that are less than ...... well shitey looking to say the lest and re do them into somthing nice.

Paul

Excellent job! Thanks for the pic.

Mike Tennent "IronPenguin"

Make a lot of them close together and you'll have a diffraction grating.

I think you missed my humour in response to yours!

Quote: "> Remember -- there is an advantage of giving things names that reflect their function, you can figure out what they are from the name!"

I'll give you a top Mark for that one! ;-)

You're right; I did.

Mark posts -

For the most part I frabricated similar items out of styrene and wire. The steam boiler alone required something like 37 separate parts/pieces.

CNJ999

What happens if I get a company to make brass etching from my drawings. I then build the kit I have designed. Have I scratch built or kit built?

In my opinion that would be kit built. I had a laser cutting firm make the eave ornamentation for my station. Then they said they liked the drawings I had online for another station and wanted to do a laser cut kit of that. I'll be getting a free kit when it's done to assemble and comment on. I can hardly wait!

Dave

then build the kit I have designed. Have I scratch built or kit built? I have a friend that built a passenger car. Not only did he do the drawings but he also did the etching. All things being equal he would/should get more points than you in a NMRA contest. I made the masters for a contest car that was then made into a kit by a company. I received scratch built points.

You get some ugly-looking atrocity built by some ugly-looking atrocity.

Someone asked:

To which Dave replied

With which Froggy disagrees.

Just because I have the ability to make a mold for injection molding a plastic body shell for a locomotive does not make it one tiny bit less scratch built than the one built by gluing thousands of plastic parts together. The fact is that the mold used to form the body was designed and built by me for the purpose of making the model, thus it is nothing more than just another tool. I happen to have made hundreds of things using CNC mills and lathes that operate from CAD drawings. I made the drawings, then made the items. Had I not has the tools I would have had the items made by someone who did. Never the less, I defy anyone to say, and prove, that is not scratchbuilding. You do not have to use primitive tools or methods to scratchbuild. That is a mistaken belief many people cling to. Or, if you prefer, .....to which many people cling.