What is scratch building in 2012?

[kandc_au]

If I were to enter a scratchbuild competition, I would like to think that my entry was being judged alongside similar entries made in the same way. Unless you are comparing like for like, then what is the point for competitions. I once saw two similar signal box's entered in local competition, one fully scratch built while the other had etched brass window frames. Judges declared the latter as the winner , which to my mind was wrong, consideration was not given to the methods used in construction.

 

And therein lies the issue.

If you enter a competition, they are the type of things that are NOT taken into consideration.

That said, some people cannot make window frames and/or their idea if what is good and the general modellers view of what looks good can be to completely different things.

So we are back at square one.

Modellers up until the mid 60's tended to make most parts themselves, as true scratchbuilders....

Nowadays, we have the skills to mass produce items that modellers, on the whole wouldn't waste their time trying to make, as it would like reinventing the wheel.

 

I think the definition will be a real conundrum not easily defined.

I stick to what I enjoy best, kit/scratch and cut and shuts.

Call, it what you will!

 

Khris

[RBE]

i agree. I am definately in the building it from scratch is scratchbuilding rather than building it all by hand camp. At the end of the day if you use any form of tool whatsoever to make something then it appears it is no longer scratch built. I see no difference in turning the feed on a lathe to instructing a CAD driven machine to cut a shape. I would like to see a 'scratchbuilder' in the definition that some would have it on here scratch build a model of a diesel loco and painstakingly hand file each and every grille mesh on the loco. I do agree that making a 3D model isnt scratch building on its own thats just silly however just as silly is the notion that making parts to use as part of a scratchbuilding project using etching or 3d printing is somehow all of a sudden not scratchbuilding. I have produced the part I need using a tool as surely as if I had turned it on a lathe or drilled it with a pillar drill.

[halfwit]

I see no difference in turning the feed on a lathe to instructing a CAD driven machine to cut a shape.

 

As someone who spent 19 years working as a centre lathe turner I have to disagree, turning requires manual skills, just as using a piercing saw does.

[Pugsley]

I agree Bill, I enjoy the way I model but the way it is going it will be called scratch building sticking the vac pipes on a Hornby train.

Now that's just a plain silly statement. Not that it really matters, but sticking bits on to a commercial model could never be considered scratchbuilding, although I guess you could consider it kit building...

 

As I see it, scratchbuilding is assembling a model from parts of your own design, no matter how those parts were made. CAD is equally as valid a tool as pencil and paper. A CNC mill is just as useful a tool as a pantograph mill, and etching is as valid a way of creating shaped metal parts as a piercing saw. There are skills involved with each option, just different ones.

 

The CAD/CAM, over marking out and cutting manually, fallacy is an interesting one. It appears that some posters imagine that you can create the components for a model in a few clicks, then just send that file to a CNC machine tool, which then spits out your desired kit of parts. I can assure anyone reading this that this is nothing like reality, as someone who is currently scratchbuilding something using these 21st Centry tools.

 

There is the design phase to consider, which I estimate is going to take me in the region of 60-80 hours to complete, including research time. I then have to lay out the component drawings into a sheet for etching, which is going to be another 10 hours, I expect. Once this is done, I have to assemble the actual wagons from the parts, and that's before I've even taken into account the castings, which I'll make myself, from 3D prints with the exception of the buffers and some other parts which I will have cast in brass for me, as I'm not geared up for that. If I had the facilities to cut my own parts out by CNC Mill, I'd have to add further time to that to generate and check the G Code to run the machine.

 

Considering that the old fashioned approach of manually designing and cutting out parts takes about the same amount of time and effort to CAD design and etching, I find the suggestion that it isn't a valid approach faintly insulting.

 

Whilst I could adopt the 'hair shirt' approach and manually cut and shape all of my parts, the resulting model would not be as good and as accurate as it will be using the tools that I'm using. Things have moved on and we have incredible technology to utillise in the building of our models - it would be a real shame not to use it and embrace it, instead getting hung up on using the tools and techniques of the past.

[Revolution Mike]

As someone who spent 19 years working as a centre lathe turner I have to disagree, turning requires manual skills, just as using a piercing saw does.

 

I think Cav's point is that all we are talking about is different types of skills. In your case your lathe skills - I wouldn't know where to start, but I do no my way round generating a 3D drawing suitable for printing.

 

Our starting points may be the same ie a set of drawings or photos, but the tools we use to get to the finished product could be very different depending on our personal skills.

 

Edit - what Martin just said!

 

Cheers, Mike

[Pugsley]

How long will it be (if it isn't here already) that you can feed a photo and/or a GA drawing into a computer and print a 3D image. Will that still be scratchbuilding?

I guess that would depend if you designed the model yourself, or purchased it from someone else, wouldn't it?

[t-b-g]

Now that's just a plain silly statement. Not that it really matters, but sticking bits on to a commercial model could never be considered scratchbuilding, although I guess you could consider it kit building...

 

As I see it, scratchbuilding is assembling a model from parts of your own design, no matter how those parts were made. CAD is equally as valid a tool as pencil and paper. A CNC mill is just as useful a tool as a pantograph mill, and etching is as valid a way of creating shaped metal parts as a piercing saw. There are skills involved with each option, just different ones.

 

The CAD/CAM, over marking out and cutting manually, fallacy is an interesting one. It appears that some posters imagine that you can create the components for a model in a few clicks, then just send that file to a CNC machine tool, which then spits out your desired kit of parts. I can assure anyone reading this that this is nothing like reality, as someone who is currently scratchbuilding something using these 21st Centry tools.

 

There is the design phase to consider, which I estimate is going to take me in the region of 60-80 hours to complete, including research time. I then have to lay out the component drawings into a sheet for etching, which is going to be another 10 hours, I expect. Once this is done, I have to assemble the actual wagons from the parts, and that's before I've even taken into account the castings, which I'll make myself, from 3D prints with the exception of the buffers and some other parts which I will have cast in brass for me, as I'm not geared up for that. If I had the facilities to cut my own parts out by CNC Mill, I'd have to add further time to that to generate and check the G Code to run the machine.

 

Considering that the old fashioned approach of manually designing and cutting out parts takes about the same amount of time and effort to CAD design, I find the suggestion that it isn't a valid approach faintly insulting.

 

Whilst I could adopt the 'hair shirt' approach and manually cut and shape all of my parts, the resulting model would not be as good and as accurate as it will be using the tools that I'm using. Things have moved on and we have incredible technology to utillise in the building of our models - it would be a real shame not to use it and embrace it, instead getting hung up on using the tools and techniques of the past.

 

Can you explain how the process you have outlined above differs from the design of a kit? You draw artwork, have it etched, have parts cast. That sounds exactly like what kit designers do. It is nothing to do with time taken as I fully appreciate that using such methods requires a great deal of time and skill. Yet if the finished item can be multiplied many times over by ordering more etches or castings, how can a model built from the parts be scratchbuilt? To me, that is clearly a kit.

 

I would also say that the work of the best kit designers eclipses the work of all but a handful of very top scratchbuilders in the hobby and that kits are an integral and important part of my modelling but they are kits, not scratchbuilds.

 

I go back to the idea that if you build a model from the parts you produce, it should be classed as scratchbuilt but if you let me have a set and I build it, my identical model, from identical parts is now a kitbuild. My simple logic can't get around that one.

[Pugsley]

Using CAD to produce drawings is not a problem but paying someone to cut out all the parts is not scratch building.

So you're saying that designing my parts and cutting them out on my own CNC mill is valid, but paying someone else to cut them out on their machine, because I don't have one (they are rather expensive), isn't?

[Wummyock]

Why not forget how something was made and judge it on how it looks at the end?Seems to me the thread is a bit of a "my dads bigger than your dad" type argument from the school playground.Isnt the bottom line of it all is we're all modellers of different standards?The important bit being "modellers".

[t-b-g]

I guess that would depend if you designed the model yourself, or purchased it from someone else, wouldn't it?

 

I wasn't talking about designing anything. I was talking about taking an existing photo/drawing, scanning it into a computer and printing it in 3D. No design work involved there.

[billbedford]

If I were to enter a scratchbuild competition, I would like to think that my entry was being judged alongside similar entries made in the same way.

 

That would only be possible if 'sratchbuilt' was defined in the competition rules.

[Pugsley]

Can you explain how the process you have outlined above differs from the design of a kit? You draw artwork, have it etched, have parts cast. That sounds exactly like what kit designers do. It is nothing to do with time taken as I fully appreciate that using such methods requires a great deal of time and skill. Yet if the finished item can be multiplied many times over by ordering more etches or castings, how can a model built from the parts be scratchbuilt? To me, that is clearly a kit.

If you buy the parts from me, you're building a kit. If I'm building a model from a kit of parts that I've had made to my design and specification, then it's scratchbuilt.

 

I go back to the idea that if you build a model from the parts you produce, it should be classed as scratchbuilt but if you let me have a set and I build it, my identical model, from identical parts is now a kitbuild. My simple logic can't get around that one.

Not that it really matters, but say I soldered 4 brass sheets together, donned my hair shirt, and cut the parts out using a piercing saw, then sold you two of the sets of parts for you to build. You're building from a kit of parts you've bought, so kit building.

 

My model, IMO, would be scratchbuilt, as I'd designed and cut the parts myself. I could also make multiple models from the same parts, as I've effectively cut 4 models worth at the same time or would this now be kit building as it isn't just one model?

[Pugsley]

I wasn't talking about designing anything. I was talking about taking an existing photo/drawing, scanning it into a computer and printing it in 3D. No design work involved there.

Really? How do you think you take a 2D photo, or drawing, and turn it into a 3D model? Even laser scanning doesn't create a perfect model - just ask Dapol how long it took to make their point cloud into something that could be used to create a model of a Western.

 

CAD modelling isn't just a matter of waving a mouse, and 'hey presto', it still takes many hours of skilled work to create something usable.

[Rumblestripe]

Interesting debate this (and good to note no silliness)

 

Firstly, I don't like to think of modelling as a competitive activity. So quibbling about the term "scratchbuilt" is to me an exercise in pedantry. I appreicate that to others it may be otherwise.

 

Secondly, if we go back to a strict definition of "scratchbuilt" then very few models indeed would qualify. Bought in wheels in particular would disqualify just about every single item of rolling stock. I tried to make a point about a model of a particular locomotive using Romford wheels vs one using a 3D printed wheel from a 3D CAD model. From the accepted definition model 1 is "scratchbuilt" as CAD is not involved yet model 2 is not despite it being a more accurate representation requiring a variety of skills and considerable time.

 

As someone who spent 19 years working as a centre lathe turner I have to disagree, turning requires manual skills, just as using a piercing saw does.

 

If you think that using CAD is simply "telling the computer" to make you a Belpaire boiler for a GW tank or a window frame for a signal box, you would be in for a very big surprise if you ever tried. It is an undertaking involving a lot of practise and knowledge AND skill! If you accept that not everyone can use a lathe to the level of a chap with 19 years of experience then I don't see why CAD should be excluded? Cutting out parts using a pantograph milling machine is OK but etching them through a combination of CAD and photoetching is not?

 

Surely "scratchbuilding" is a state of mind, a determination to represent in miniature something that cannot be purchased. The manner of its creation is not important is it?

[t-b-g]

So is the money in your bank account -- doesn't stop people treating it asa real money though.

 

Treating something as real and it being real are two different things entirely.

 

The money in the bank isn't real. It is an electronic record of what I have (or in my case haven't!) got in there.

 

If all the computers and cash machines failed terminally overnight (or if everybody tried to draw everything out at once, as has happened), you would soon see just how unreal all the "money" in them really is. It just doesn't exist.

 

Confusion over what is real and what is virtual is an interesting area in itself! If we could eat virtual food, produced on a computer, world starvation could be cured in a moment. But a loaf of bread drawn on a CAD package is just that, a drawing.

[t-b-g]

Really? How do you think you take a 2D photo, or drawing, and turn it into a 3D model? Even laser scanning doesn't create a perfect model - just ask Dapol how long it took to make their point cloud into something that could be used to create a model of a Western.

 

CAD modelling isn't just a matter of waving a mouse, and 'hey presto', it still takes many hours of skilled work to create something usable.

 

My original post asked the "When the technology has advanced......"

 

There is one manufacturer who takes a photo and has software to turn it into artwork for etching already.

 

I am not saying in any way shape or form that there is no skill or time involved in CAD design and in producing artwork for etching. I wish I could do it and would use it if I could. I am simply questioning whether it is scratchbuilding.

 

Are you saying that the Dapol Western is scratchbuilt?

[Revolution Mike]

Can you explain how the process you have outlined above differs from the design of a kit? You draw artwork, have it etched, have parts cast. That sounds exactly like what kit designers do.

 

It doesn't - both a scratchbuilder and kit maker are doing the same initial process ie using the tools at their disposal to create something. The only difference is that the kit maker is then using the components as masters to be re-created repeatedly.

 

I was talking about taking an existing photo/drawing, scanning it into a computer and printing it in 3D. No design work involved there.

 

When you invent such a magic machine please let us know. I suspect we are still a significant amount of time away from that. Taking a 2D image doesn't really take you that far in creating a 3D image. As Martin says even with 3D scanning it is still only a starting point unless the resolution of the scan is incredibly detailed. Even with a very detailed cloud of points you still have a lot of design work to make that into a printable scaled model (certainly in 2mm and 4mm you have to make design compromises).

[Revolution Mike]

I am not saying in any way shape or form that there is no skill or time involved in CAD design and in producing artwork for etching. I wish I could do it and would use it if I could. I am simply questioning whether it is scratchbuilding.

 

Great so all you are quibbling about is the use of different skills...

[halfwit]

If you think that using CAD is simply "telling the computer" to make you a Belpaire boiler for a GW tank or a window frame for a signal box, you would be in for a very big surprise if you ever tried. It is an undertaking involving a lot of practise and knowledge AND skill!

 

I don't! I know that using CAD is a highly skilled process. I did once program CNC lathes and that was complex enough (I hated it by the way!).

[Guest Natalie Graham]

Considering that the old fashioned approach of manually designing and cutting out parts takes about the same amount of time and effort to CAD design and etching, I find the suggestion that it isn't a valid approach faintly insulting.

 

Whilst I could adopt the 'hair shirt' approach and manually cut and shape all of my parts, the resulting model would not be as good and as accurate as it will be using the tools that I'm using. Things have moved on and we have incredible technology to utillise in the building of our models - it would be a real shame not to use it and embrace it, instead getting hung up on using the tools and techniques of the past.

 

Who is suggesting that this isn't a valid approach? it is a perfectly vaild approach, one that quite likely would give a 'better' finsihed model than cutting all the parts by hand. It is just a different approach from scratch-building. If as you say, and I am not disputing it, CAD designing to get parts etched and 3D modelled is equally as skilled as cutting parts by hand why not be proud that your model is built that way and call it by what it is, a CAD designed model? If building models this way is so much more evolved than the traditional scratch-building techniques why are it's proponents so keen to associate themselves with those outdated techniques? Why not just say there is no need to scratch-build these parts now we can CAD design them and get them produced for us?

 

I'm not sure why cutting out parts by hand should be sen as a 'hair shirt' approach. Personally the pleasure I get from building models is in cutting out the pieces and putting them together to make them into a model. It is not a means of obtaining a model of xyz to me but a process of building something out of basic materials. I have built kits in the past but for me it isn't a rewarding activity since all the fun of making the parts is gone.

[Karhedron]

Are you saying that the Dapol Western is scratchbuilt?

Are you arguing that Dapol are not making a new model from scratch?

 

You are confusing the process of making with the final owner. I am buying from Dapol a model that they have made from scratch but which is sold to me finished and ready to run.

[S.A.C Martin]

I am wondering if a significant point has been missed. It's the initial action of designing/making a new/unique model which is scratch building.

 

Of course an exact replication then becomes "manufacturing" - but what CAD produced model hasn't taken a few alterations with each proving model (thank you rapid prototyping!) to perfect the design?

 

I tried learning (am STILL learning!) to draw 3D images to produce my own parts and I have an admiration for anyone who can produce something which resembles the prototype they intended, let alone the truly talented who can create artistic masterpieces which become models.

 

The medium may be different, and the skill too; but I would argue the process of getting to that finished article remains the same. And whether you've etched a side tank for a tank engine or 3D printed a drawing of a side tank for a tank engine, if it is wholly your own work, then it's scratch built. The propagation of either becomes a case of manufacturing.

[Revolution Mike]

it is a perfectly vaild approach, one that quite likely would give a 'better' finsihed model than cutting all the parts by hand. It is just a different approach from scratch-building. If as you say, and I am not disputing it, CAD designing to get parts etched and 3D modelled is equally as skilled as cutting parts by hand why not be proud that your model is built that way and call it by what it is, a CAD designed model? If building models this way is so much more evolved than the traditional scratch-building techniques why are it's proponents so keen to associate themselves with those outdated techniques? Why not just say there is no need to scratch-build these parts now we can CAD design them and get them produced for us?

 

I am far from convinced by your argument that it is a different approach to scratch building - it is still designed from scratch ie nothing.

 

Flipping your argument why are "scratch builders" (by your definition) so keen to disassociate themselves from people who create with more modern techniques? Do you also distinguish between people who build in plastic vs metal because it seems an equally spurious distinction!

 

Sorry but as soon as the word "traditional" is introduced into the argument the alarm bells start ringing...

[billbedford]

If you buy the parts from me, you're building a kit. If I'm building a model from a kit of parts that I've had made to my design and specification, then it's scratchbuilt.

 

And that is the problem with many, many etched kits. However good a set of etched part are, they still require the kit builder to have the much same skill set as they would need to build the same model from scratch.

 

Is it no wonder that some many etched kits languish in forgotten dark corners of cupboards?

[Rumblestripe]

Why not just say there is no need to scratch-build these parts now we can CAD design them and get them produced for us?

 

A straight question for you Natalie, Do you build rolling stock? If you do, I assume you buy in wheels, etc. Surely this is actually as great a deviation from "scratchbuilding" as using CAD to produce some parts? Yet few do otherwise.

 

 

I'm not sure why cutting out parts by hand should be sen as a 'hair shirt' approach. Personally the pleasure I get from building models is in cutting out the pieces and putting them together to make them into a model. It is not a means of obtaining a model of xyz to me but a process of building something out of basic materials. I have built kits in the past but for me it isn't a rewarding activity since all the fun of making the parts is gone.

 

You are right, this is a hobby and (most of us) do it for enjoyment. As such it will always be up to the individual how they get their pleasure. Vive la difference!