Interesting theory. Iāve long thought that if you like model tanks you probably like model railroading. My only evidence of this is myself and a few friends who like both.
As for your statement, I donāt like fast motorcycles and fast cars. Although I do like modeling fast motorcycles and armoured fighting vehicles. Not many opportunities for both together, unless youāre modeling the tank meets bike scenario I alluded to above. Cars havenāt really done ir for me since I was about twenty.
Then of course the conversation could take a different tangent - I was thinking about this the other day when I mentioned that I know someone has more than once taken one of my clean builds, added to it, and passed it off as his own. I doesnāt bother me one whit. Car ābuildersā the 1:1 kind, generally take a built car, add new brakes, wheels, exhaust, maybe bigger carbs, taller cams, give it, er, pay for, a cool paint job, and they are ācar builders.ā I"m not talking about the guys with their own TV shows, Those guys are a whole different breed.
Then you take a bike builder. Youāve got the guy who takes an old CB750, cuts all of the ugliness off of it, add clip ons, rear sets, an LED headlight, maybe some air filter pods. Voila! Heās a bike builder.
The guy who takes a base armor kit, already assembled and painted, but weathers it, adds stowage, maybe some battle damage, maybe swaps out a resin gun mount for a different gun - thatās really not much different.
Iām thinking about this because of the post I read the other day in the āDeath of Scratch Buildingā thread.
Iām doing a lot of conversions right now. Not a lot of scratch building going on though. If I shorten the frame on a truck and turn a 6x6 to a 4x4 well, that might be fun, but it aināt scratch building. Similarly, I donāt consider swapping parts from one truck to another much of a scratch build either, but I do have a cool project coming up soon (when one of the kits arrives) that Iāll add to a dockside diorama Iām doing. Even so, in the end itās pretty much a part swap.
Then there are the guys who make their own frames, make their own parts for a bike on a lathe and a mill, hammer out a tank, and weld everything together. Iāve tried to be that guy, but my welding āskillsā are not yet solid enough to trust my ass on a 100 mph death machine, which it would surely be.
I imagine if Stickframe built lifesized cars, heād probsbly fit more into that category. Hell, heād probably dig up some iron ore, smelt it into steel, and hammer out body panels for his own muscle car.
So while your theory is interesting, Iād be more interested in knowing if model builders take the same approach to model building that they do with real life projects - the bolt on, part swap method, or the all out creation of something truly from scratch. Recognizing of course that unless your name is Burt Munro you donāt have to cast your own pistons from an exotic alloy you created yourself.
Not judging - both methods produce fine results. Iām just curious.
