Card verses Plastic

[NMBell]

Does anyone have any hard and fast feelings about which is better to use for scratch building?  Card or plastic sheets, brickpapers, coverings etc?  I know that if you're building a kit you're going to use whatever is provided but scratchbuilding gives more scope.  Which is easier to paint and weather?  How do people go about weathering their buildings?

[Richard Glover]

I think the choice of a suitable material comes down to the one you are happiest working with. I personally find plastic card suits my building methods and scenic techniques best. With Wills' sheets, which are quite thick, I generally use them on their own. Slaters' are thinner and easier to shape and in this case I often use backing materials , such as foamboard and balsa. I also use plastic building kits, though often not exactly as the manufacturer intended!

Other modellers produce excellent models using card, which has a long history as an effective modelling material. There is also a wide range of card building kits, which can be used as they are or modified to taste.

So either are suitable and good models can be produced using either medium.

Weathering also has many options. In the past I tended to use acrylics as they dry quickly and give a good matt effect. Now I often use enamels as additional colours can be blended in before previous coats are fully dry. Many of my building are coated with both types of paint. I have not yet tried techniques such as dry powders, but have seen some excellent photos. Experiment, it won't work everytime, but you will soon develope a range of effective methods.

Richard

[Tigger]

Tend to agree with you, Richard.  At the end of the day some materials are better suited than others to some situations.  I've mostly used good quality artist's card which I score to represent brick or stone, laminate with several layers and then paint and weather with standard oil paints and in some cases artist's pencils.  I normally use UHU as an adhesive, which will last for many years.  It can fog the clear material used for windows so I usually use PVA for fixing glazing.

Styrene sheet is useful although be aware that it can warp if it isn't braced.  Wood makes a useful representation of - er - wood and is also useful as bracing for card walls.  The Wills range of sheets is very good, although a bit weird to cut and work sometimes.  The sheets are quite thick and some say that the detail is a bit on the heavy side but I find it's very robust and excellent for exhibition layouts.  I've found I can 'throw together' a building quite crudely and then tart it up with some fine detail afterwards!

Metcalf produce a very good range of card building kits and the perennial Superquick range, in spite of its age, still takes a lot of beating!

At the end of the day, althought you're likely to standardise on one material for the main structure, if you're scratchbuilding you'll probably end up using a whole collection of materials for all the incidental bits.

Tigger

[NMBell]

Loads of thanks all - lots of useful info here.  I've found a company called 'Freestone Model Accessories' who seem to sell loads of card kits and this might be a good start for me.

[Si]

I find that if I don't get a layout finished* quickly I lose interest, thus my approach to buildings is just to knock them up ASAP with brick paper or card kits and move onto the next building.  Then when it's all in some sort of a working state I start replacing the buildings with ones made of the textured plastic sheet that have had a little more time lavished on them. 

Although I've found that a good number of brick paper buildings actually turn out at a standard that I'm happy to leave on my layouts.

*when I say "finished" I mean in a working, OK looking, state - as we all know there is no such thing as a finished layout.