What do YOU consider the difference between Scratch-built and Kit-bashed???

Model Railroader General Discussion (Model Railroader)
1

Hello all,

When my interest in HO scale railroading waned, in my early teens- -during the early to mid-1970’s- -I began building 1/35 scale military models and dioramas.

To create accurate vignettes of specific scenes it was necessary to- -what we now call- -kit-bash and occasionally scratch-build items.

I learned many skills that I now employ after recently returning to this great hobby.

Currently I am in the process of building HO Beer-tank Shorty tanker cars, for which I got a lot of guff…http://cs.trains.com/mrr/f/13/t/246420.aspx.

As I was perusing the PVC fitting isle at my local hardware store today I came upon a “T” fitting that could easily be the basis of the car I am building.

My current project of this car is base on various PVC piping and fittings, and commercially available detail parts; laders, trucks, wheels and couplers.

As I examined this “T” fitting I wondered, “If I use this fitting; which would replicate the tanker body and, with some modification, also include the dome, would this be considered kit-bashing or scratch-building?”

On the way home I stopped by the post office and received my Central Valley Model Works HO scale Floors & Frames (#1000) kit.

In the literature that accompanies this kit it says, “There are extra brake wheels and triple valves per sprue. We feel this pack will supply the modeler with outstanding capability for super detailing of existing freight cars and also for scratch building of many types of cars.”

When I build the CVMW kits am I scratch-building, kit-bashing or model making?

If I use a PVC “T” as a tanker car body which is it?

Thank you for all your thoughts.

2

The NMRA has “official” definitions.

For me, kit bashed is when I take something that was intended to be one thing modify it into something else.

Scratchbuild is when I take parts that are not part of a whole and design and build the majority of the model from basic shapes.

If I take an Athearn 50 ft gon, cut a 36 ft section out of the middle, cut off the fishbelly, lower the sides to 1 ft high and match that body on a MDC 36 ft metal underframe with no truss rods, add end beams and ends to match the sides to make a 1900’s era P&R low side steel gon, that’s a kitbash.

If I take scribed Evergreen styrene and styrene shapes, use Tichy queen posts, turnbuckles and NBW castings to make a “wood” 36 ft gon, that’s a scratchbuild.

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I have always considered kit bashing to be taking 1 or more kits and building something different from the kits parts. Adding a few detail parts or making a part or 2 doesn’t change this as long as the main part of the built model is basically the combination of the kits.

Scratchbuilding is where the basic model is the result of building the main parts from things not found in a kit. Using a section of PVC pipe from the plumbing section as the tank car body would be scratchbuilding. Adding in detail parts whether from a kit or bought separately doesn’t change that.

Obviously, there can be a gray area between the two.

Enjoy

Paul

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Just to muddy the waters, I have seen the term “scratchbashing” used.[;)]

By the way, photos of your efforts would be appreciated.

Cheers, the Bear. [:)]

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i thought “kit-bashing” is when you mostly combine parts from one or more kits to create something custom

“scratch-built” is when building materials are not from kits but may include some premade parts such as windows, mechanical and electrical components (see NMRA description for Scratch Built).

but isn’t more of a description of where the materials for a model came from rather than something that goes on a plaque. Although I’m sure these terms are significant for contests.

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Hi jjdamnit:

Yes, you certainly did receive some totally unnecessary and unjustified negative responses on your Shorty Beer Tank thread. Some people are very rude.

As far as whether something is scratchbuilt or kitmashed, I think that often the lines are blurred. I choose to call the HOn30 critter in my avatar ‘scratchbuilt’ but I didn’t build the drive system. I guess if I was being totally accurate I would say that “the critter was scratchbuilt using a Bachmann an N scale 4-4-0 as a donor for the mechanism”. I don’t think it qualifies as a ‘kit bash’ at all because the end result bares no resemblance to the original. It isn’t even the same scale.

In your case I think you can justifiably claim that your project is indeed scratchbuilt. Scratchbuilding almost always involves the use of manufactured parts, which is exactly what you are doing. To suggest that in order for something to be called “scratchbuilt” it requires that the builder make everything from scratch is, to me, far too restricting. Certainly there are those craftsmen who have the ability and equipment to machine all their parts from brass stock. They are to be admired but they shouldn’t have exclusive rights to the term.

EDIT: Having read the NMRA definition of "scratchbuilt’ I suppose officially you should be calling the tankers ‘kit bashed’. Personally I would just say that “I scratchbuilt the bodies” and leave the rest for others to figure out.

The other thing I would say is don’t worry about the definitions. Do things the way you want to

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Hello all,

Thank you!

Maybe this should be under the "What do you get out of these forums and what keeps you around?” thread.

Hope this helps.

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Some peoples’ opinions are more important than the facts. This ‘fact’ plagues just 'bout every social venue, whether out in the fresh air or on-line.

I have done precious little of either, no matter how one defines them, but I would say that kit-bashing means modifying the intended structure, as designed, created, and packaged, to look decidedly different. It could be a modified roof line, a gable that wasn’t there, added, moved, or removed windows…the possibilities are almost endless. You could craft the needed materials from raw materials or use parts from other kits. For example, if you kit-bash a building by modifying windows or their position on a wall, and use the frame from a supplier or from another kit…what’s the problem? You’re still modifying the kit from what it was meant to be. I would say it INS’T kitbashing if you use some other materials, but the finished kit looks as intended by the sellers. Say you wrecked a wall somehow. You have some sheet styrene and you cut the sheet to fit the wrecked item, complete with openings. Then you go on to finish the kit. It ain’t bashed!!

Scratch building means, to me, taking parts or raw materials and crafting something that looks recognizable. It could even closely resemble a real kit! So, to me, you CAN scratch-build a kit. It’s just that you can’t have purchased, or been supplied with, and use, the major components that are commercially available from the issuers of the recognizable kit. For example, you want to build the kit Grandma’s House, but you want to claim to have built it from scratch. If you use two of the walls that some other guy had left over because he scratched something from two kits, or bashed it, and had the two walls left over, you couldn’t really say you had built Grandma’s House from scratch. At least, I wouldn’t ever claim to have done so unless I also was sure to poi

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I just read through all of the post on JJ’s linked thread, and I didn’t see or read anything offensive. Did I miss something?

I’d call it scratch building, but it doesn’t matter. Whatever you want to call it, it’s your build, built with what you found that does the job.

I’m with others on showing pictures.

Mike.

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I think if you build something using just kit parts (other than styrene sheet/plate to join the pieces) I think it qualifies as a kitbash.

If you build all the major components (other than mechanism/trucks/ect.) It’s a scratch build.

Then you can go all in between those two points.

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"I think we’d all be interested in your contest quality models built from those materials. Please post some photos so that we may learn from your techniques.

RT"

The OP never suggested that he was trying to make “contest quality” models. All he said was that he was building models to suit himself. RT’s response was clearly condescending. He clearly meant to suggest that the OP’s models would be no good.

Mr. Otte is probably going to be really peeved with my comments come Monday morning, but if he chooses to censor me then he should also censure JT’s uncalled for comments too.

Let’s please get back to the original subject matter.

Dave

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I’d consider a kitbash to be either a modified kit or combination of kits, and a scratchbuild to be mostly available materials (wood, styrene, metal, etc.) along with pre-made or self-fabricated detail parts, but there are some gray areas where the distinctions are blurred.
There have been calls for photos, so you can agree or disagree with my assessments…

…a kitbash using a Bachmann Ten Wheeler…

…and a Varney boiler…

…along with a cab from a Bachmann Consolidation and a bunch of brass detail parts…

…another kitbash, this one involving eight Athearn Blue Box boxcars. First, remove 6" from the height of the cars…

…then glue the roofs and rivet strips at the eaves back onto the lowered car…remove the cast-on ladders and grabirons…

…remove the cars’ ends…

…and replace them with ends from Tichy…

…then remove the original roofs, while leaving the rivet strips at the eaves in place…

13

You are always going to have different oppinions on this subject.

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I could claim my grade crossing on my last layout was “scratchbuilt” because I sculpted the entire assembly out of epoxy putty. You sure will have a hard time getting more “scratch” than that.

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Some people claim a Walthers warehouse is “kitbashed” just because they installed a chimney from a DPM kit instead of the one that came in the Walthers kit.

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None of this matters, and I will never care. All that matters is if the finished product is completed and makes the owner joyful and proud with a feeling of accomplishment.

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That being said… I would LOVE to see some work in progress pictures of these interesting sounding builds.

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-Kevin

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The late MR editor Linn Westcott took issue with the evolving NMRA definition of scratchbuilding, because he felt their definition permitted too many purchased parts and features. Westcott was not a snob or purist but he was a stickler for correct vocabulary and he felt scratchbuilt meant everything was fabricated by the builder. Thus back in those days a scratchbuilt steam locomotive meant making your own drivers, frame, turning your own wheels. I think he permitted purchased motors and gears, but there WERE guys back then who, yes, made their own motors and cut their own gears. And their own structural shapes when making structures for that matter. But Westcott did not regard a structure that used commercial windows and doors to be scratchbuilt even if the entire rest of the structure was scratchbuilt.

There was and still is no good alternative term to describe the bulding from parts plus partial scratchbuilding that has come to be called scratchbuilding.

But Westcott’s era is over. Until something better is proposed I think the NMRA contest and achievement award criteria and definitions are workable.

By the way the late Art Curren, who in many ways was the king of kitbashers, did not care for the term, as it sounded too violent and undisciplined. He preferred the term our British counterparts use: kitmingling.

Dave Nelson

15

I made 2 covered bridges for Boothbay Railway Village

The first is a Campbell HO scale covered bridge that I kitbashed shorter and narrower for our HOn30 line in the waterfall scene

Then I took the plans and used them as a guide to scratch build a G scale covered bridge

16

Ok, hold on a minute. Back on the other tankcar thread, “A lot of guff” were posters recommending buying existing models, recommending kitbashing articles in MR, posting links to eBay to existing models (all helpful replies), then one disagreeing opinion on cost (a subject that the OP brought up), one asking for photos, and the last post which also asked for photos using the word “please”. Wow.

Look, I know as well as anyone that text does not convey feelings that well, but to take the last post on the old thread as some kind of attack is really reaching. I’d also like to see contest quality models made of hardware store parts. That would be very interesting to see. Have I offended by asking? To me, the “insult” in that old thread (3 years ago!) is in the eye of the beholder. Try re-reading it in a serious voice and see if it’s still bothersome.

hon30critter,
There was one post that was perhaps negative, and that’s only if you read into it that way. Not multiple examples.

Look, maybe it’s because I’ve been online for 20+ years, but that exchange in the tank car thread is as mild as unsalted plain potato chips. It was nothing to get excited about.

And yes, the OP did indeed say that he made contest quality models with scratchbuilding techniques using non-traditional materials: “When I enter these in contests, if the score is sufficient, the credits go to my NMRA Achievement Program.”

The one post by RT Trains was not “clearly condescending” because if it was, then why would mbinsewi need to ask you what was offensive about it? And no, I’m not being offensive here. I’m simply disagreeing with your opinion. Sigh. It gets the point sometimes where you can’t wish someone online a g

17

I call a project a kitbash if it began life as a kit (or RTR) and has been heavily modified by the builder. I dunno what I call minor modifications like just putting wire grabs onto a molded styrene freight car. I call it a scratch built project if it began life as bulk materials (scribed siding, roof stock, strip wood, or brass or plastic shapes and the like). And there are some intermediate cases. For instance your tankers made from PVC pipe I would call scratch built. But if you added complete underframes from old kits, then I dunno what I would call them.

18

In Wargmaming we use the word “conversion” to describe the alteration of a stock kit to match a different prototype or version of the model.

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I think CONVERSION is a term that model railroaders could adopt easily to descibe the minor alteration of a stock kit.

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-Kevin

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Okay, but what about ‘customizing’, or even the world you used to explain conversion, Kevin…"alteration?’ You are introducing new terminology before we have anything close to consensus about what the two terms introduced, words used for some time in the hobby, and which we are attempting to operationalize, themselves mean. Let’s not change horses in mid-stream.

20

Hello all,

Thank you for all the great points of thought!

I went back to my local hardware store and bought the “T” this morning.

While rummaging through my car building stuff I came across a Titchy Train Group Tank Car Detail Set (#3007) which contains two domes in addition to other detail items.

Without using 3rd party photo hosting I believe I have found a way to post photos.

Keep your fingers crossed and…

Stay tuned!

Hope this helps.