How much time does it take to do proper research for a scale model project?

There’s simply no definitive answer to this. I’ve spent weeks, months, and in one case for a particular subject, I’ve been researching its details for over 3 decades.

I will say, however, that there does come a point when you just have to go with what you do have if you ever want to actually get any model building done. For instance, my current project was researched for several months, and I answered the major questions that I had about it. However, there are areas of the prototype that there is simply no information for, so if I ever wanted to actually build this model, I had to decide that I had as much as I was going to get. Time to get started on the model.

For some subjects, ones that you’re most interested in, you might build a number of different models of one of those subjects over many years with each new build improving on accuracy and details over the earlier ones. All because you’ve never really stopped researching that subject. At one time I was a huge Tiger and Panther fan-boy, and I’ve built many, many models of each over the years. Every new model of those subjects that I built was (at least in my opinion) better than every earlier one because I kept studying as newer information and references became available.

Finally, there is the Model Researcher’s Corollary to Murphy’s Law which says:

“No matter how much research you do, the final bit of information you needed for the project will only manifest itself when you’ve finished the build.”

So, not only do you need to know when to say you have enough information to go forward, but you also need to learn that you’ll never have all the info that you wished and wanted.

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Yes, and all before the nerves get frayed and you lose the thread of sanity…

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Frankly I don’t do much research. I may check some photos, ask questions on this forum (you guys are a fount of knowledge and experience) and perhaps some reviews. Reason is two fold, I’d rather spend my time building but mostly it’s due to the fact that in my professional life I spent too much time doing research that it pretty much cured me of the desire to do much more.

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Thank you for all the answers, and I’m sure this well help me out greatly.
I only have to take notes and take the information out of which I’m feeling is the best for me.
I have not yet replied and I’m not planning to do a lot of chattering around in my topics anymore.
Because it is easier to read through everything if there is less chatter of myself in the replies.
Also, I believe it keeps the topic much cleaner and the stream of information much purer.
But I’am certainly reading through everything.

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Extremely true!!!

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I would also add that for some people, the research is “its own reward.” So, in my case, while I might seem to do an excessive amount of research on my builds, I enjoy that part of the project, the research, as much as all the rest. For me, the model making and the research are two sides of the same coin, and I need and want, and enjoy both aspects.

Others might enjoy just the model building, and, of course, there are some folks who are dedicated researchers. However, for me, I fall in the middle and see each as complementary of the other. In short, I enjoy learning about the subjects, and so I do the research and the model-making is part of that learning process.

Therefore, I don’t really feel that any amount of research is somehow “wasted time” nor do I feel that as long as I am making progress in that research that I need to cut it off simply to get started on the build. However, when the research does reach a dead-end or stops being productive, it is time to move on to the modeling.

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My research tends to kind of work the other way. I have a lot of resources at my disposal and I almost never use the paint or marking options provided in the kit. I don’t wholly trust them anyway, unless it’s a well known specific vehicle (e.g. Wittmann’s Tiger). I usually have a good idea of what I’m going to do with the kit when I buy it, although I do still buy for the stash. Since I tend to only model one unit, and pictures of its kit are few and far between, it’s more usual to research negatively so I get the freedom to finish the model as I want. For example, at the moment I’m in the middle of the Gecko Bedford MW Beutewagen. I know my unit used it, I’ve a picture of it in use as a Fahreschule vehicle (driving school). It looks as though it is in Panzer Grey, so that’s what it will be painted, even in 1944. There aren’t any colour pictures, so I’m “safe”!

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So, when I need help with research I could expect that you might be able to help me out?
I’m not really seeing any practical or concrete advice or so, so apologies for that.
And that’s the reason why I’ve not written anything down from you.
Anyway, I’am appreciating your reply.

I like to try and help if I can. If you have any specific questions, particularly about WW2 German subjects, although I do know a bit about other periods, feel free to post them. Remember, there are no stupid questions.

Thank you.

To me is the information-part as much fun as the building-part. There are so many good books/magazines, no part of a model is without information you can find. Now there is the internet for all this but I like the print-information much more. The only problem is the place to store all the books. I stopped counting at 500, that’s without the magazines, and my girlfriend is not very happy when there come more and more😂

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Maybe someone else has already made this point about research. In my own experience I’ve done shed-loads on a subject & convinced myself that I’ve exhausted every possible avenue. And then, I post my findings on these forums and get promptly destroyed by a smarter person than me posting contradictory evidence. Yes Frenchy/Henri-Pierre I’m specifically thinking of you, my best friend/worst enemy! :rofl: :+1:

What I’m saying is that these forums are ideal for testing your own research before you start building your project. The chances are you will be mistaken about one or more aspects, and it’s often miraculous that with help from other members you find out the more or most correct answer.

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Roland,

I’ve been following this as I am a classical researcher in military history, my BA is History and a minor in philosophy so it’s fair to say that I’ve researched and written too many papers in my day (and that was before PC’s, when doing a bibliography for my thesis a wrong period or comma meant retyping the page, white out was not allowed and a Smith Corona electric typewriter was the Cadillac of type writers).

I’d suggest narrowing your purpose in the research. Define what you are after, as one professor said for a paper “tell them what you’re gonna tell them. Tell them. Tell them what you told them.” This means intro, argument/evidence and conclusion.

I have a big stack of the Squadron In Actions and I’d suggest using those a start to your library. Just enough details you can do some scratch building of details, plenty of inaction shots if you are trying to figure out what a tank looks like in the field.

Then there’s more specialized books that gone into lots of history about the subject. These will probably run you 4 to 5 times per book versus the Squadron (btw I don’t work for them but for a good reference, easily found at a good price they are hard to beat).

Finally, you may find unit histories. My experience is they are wonderful but harder to locate, I’m including one in a picture for you that I found at a used bookstore for $9.00 usd , reprint from 2010 for $50usd new. So it pays to dig around used bookstores.
Here’s a shot of some Sherman references
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3 different books for 3 different purposes. Squadron, easy to do scratch modifications, stowage, what they look like in action. The Esteve Sherman book much much more detailed. Higher cost to add to the library. The Third Army, I’ll flip thru and maybe see a particular vehicle I want to model at a particular place and time, the other books fill in the fine details during the build.

In a way your question is too broad. Say you asked about 8th AF B-17’s, well I have one college paper. Two rolls of microfilm from the 8th AF archives and dozens of books, none of which answer what are you researching? If you want to model a very specific B-17 which may have been shot down and I can find either a print or a micrfilm machine I’m your answer. But maybe you just have questions on some interior details, I got dozens of books (it was my senior thesis so I’ve accumulated related books for 40 years now). So knowing specifically what you are after is key and points you in the right spot. Because some of my research books have zero application to modeling the finer details cause they may have only a dozen pictures but are 500 pages of text. Now those Squadron books are all pictures and captions-do you see where I’m heading with this?

Now if I recall you do mostly WW2 armor. Those Squadron books would give you a good start to provide ideas for adding detail, camo, how they looked in the field (mud dust dirt), how did the crew add stowage or modify and a general timeline of the models. So for under $15.00 usd a beginning guy like you or me has just enough research to add detail, probably steer away from something inaccurate and learn a bit about the vehicle. Because I don’t think you are to the point that you are taking tech drawings and measuring your to kit to discover that the slope of the turret is off by .05 degrees or that the hull and upper part need to be chopped apart and 1mm added to make it perfect. As far how much time, I’m flipping thru those books at different stages of the build at specific areas that I think are in my capabilities to do. But what I’m not doing is trying to research the entire life of a particular serial number Tiger 1 to build a kit, most of that detail is unit histories w typically few reference pictures. Nor while I’m building a Nashorn am I worried about how many were built at what factory in November 1944 and what happened to them to build my kit. That’s research for reading and research sake, not hobby model building.

I know this was lengthy, apologies but I saw your comment tonight that few replies answered your question so I thought the best help to give you were the examples above to help you narrow your research focus and spend the time building. Answer what you specifically are researching (interior shots, was it used at XYZ in 19##, etc)

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my god, so recognizable :-):-):slight_smile: Aint we getting old

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I feel you on that. Did a 400 page dissertation back in the 80’s. My Smith Corona was a light blue. Only got rid of it a few years back.

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As an example of what you can do with pretty much just the internet and almost no print references, I’d offer up this. This is the research that I did for my current project. The vast majority of the information came from various on-line sources, and a large number of those were suggested to me by members right here on KM.

Searching for Soviet 2P19 Scud TEL Information

You can follow the time-stamps on the posts and see that this thread ran from 3 to 23 May before I posted up my final conclusions. I probably spent 2-3 weeks before beginning this thread looking for and collecting information. So, in total, I spent about 1-1/2 months of discretionary hobby-time doing research for this build.

If you go through the entire thread, you’ll see that I went down several dead-end paths of study and examination before I arrived at my final conclusions. These may still turn out to be wrong, but I feel that I exhausted pretty much every avenue of research that was reasonably available, and once that point has been reached, it’s either time to start building or time to shelve the project while you continue to do more study.

The final information has been made available to the entire modeling community (and anyone else interested in such details) here:

Modeler’s Guide to the SCUD Missile and Launcher

(I also uploaded the same guide to my FB account for those who can’t access DropBox.)

Finally, here’s the link to the actual build blog here on KM/Armorama:

Trumpeter 2P19 Launcher with R-17 Missile SCUD B

Now, this might be considered excessive or simply too much for many (heck, even most) modelers, and that’s just fine. As I mentioned above, I enjoy the research and study and get a lot of satisfaction out of solving the “puzzles” that sometimes exist when it comes many of our modeling subjects. This was a fine example of just that, a puzzle - really all about getting the cable and hose connections as correct as possible on this model. Those are hugely visible and key interest points for anyone looking at the model, and I now know one heck of a lot more about the SCUD missile and its launchers than I did when I started. In many ways, the model build is just “icing on the cake.”

I suppose that one lesson that can be drawn from this example is that you don’t actually need a large and expensive library of reference books (although I confess to having just that myself), and with persistence, time and effort, there is a surprising lot that can be learned just from the internet and careful study of photos.

I certainly don’t go to the level with every build. However, sometimes “cracking the code” or “solving the puzzle” is enjoyable in its own right. Sometimes, I’ll spend a lot of effort just trying to figure out a single - some might even consider small and insignificant - detail before I start a build.

Here’s the result of one such “single detail” research effort, again, published online for the rest of the modeling community:

Modeler’s Guide to US WWII and Korean War Tank Radios and Antennas

The point of this, from the modeler’s point of view is the possibility to add just a few touches of unexpected color to many builds (check out the antenna ferrules and clamps in the guide). I would also add that the vast majority of this information was, once again, found on-line in free, open-source documents and public websites. Most of it was taken from Signal Corps technical manuals that were down-loaded as .pdf’s. Again, a vast library of specialized reference books is not always needed.

This is actually an on-going interest of mine since I also collect militaria and have a number of US WWII radios, field phones and radio “remote control” devices. I’ve recently done some fairly in-depth research on the US SCR-300 / VRC-3 radio and will likely publish up these research results separately or up-date the Modeler’s Guide (much of what I’ve recently found concerns the VRC-3 radio which is the vehicle mounted version of the SCR-300 “Walkie Talkie”).

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My god this hit me in the feels, I got my phd in physics last year. Editing the dissertation on a modern PC was a big enough headache. I can’t even imagine doing it on a type writer.

I also love the adage. “Tell them what you are gonna tell them, tell them, then tell them what you told them” ever since I first heard it in grad school I try to tailor any argument/presentation/paper in that way

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I believe the same approach works here. To apply the three parts you just have to decide what the goal of the build is. For instance right now I’m assembly line painting 5 projects, each one is 1/35 armor and I’ve airbrushed them and now painting stowage, tools and details, one color on the pallet. Hit 5 kits in a row if they need that color. Sorry, that’s more of a side bar. 2 are OTB modern German stuff that I did zero research on, a Marder and some 6 wheeled APC type thing dressed as an engineers package just for fun and they caught my eye at the LHS. Next in line is Tamiya M42 Duster. With just a hand full of references I added some very easy scratch details, just dressing up what’s there, it’s an ancient kit. Nostalgic build from when I was a kid about 40 years ago but I’m pleased at where I took it. The final two are Sherman based kits, Tamiya M4A2 that someone on the old forum gave me a link to improving so it was an off and on couple of year build that progressed as my skills did, probably 10 times as much time in modifying vs building. The other is Italeri’s Sherman recovery vehicle. Some scratch building but both these Sherman’s got lots of extra attention detail wise and PE etc. I knew where I wanted to take them. Gathered materials and add ons. Planned it, pulled every applicable reference in my office out and went to work. I’ve also got Tamiya’s Stug III Ausf B with a full PE work up and some minor scratch building all based off a CPL of pictures in a Squadron books that caught my eye. Plus I learned what the heck the square and circle cut outs were for on the rear fenders, they aligned w the convey light and running light so when the fenders were flipped up because of mud they wouldn’t be blocked off.

So like SdAufKla was saying above (paraphrasing so forgive me) sometimes 1/2 the fun in doing the research is discovering something new. But not to get bogged down you need to decide your approach and goal of the build. His SCUD example was perfect, I’ll note one thing that stood out. His attention was drawn to the hoses as they are so prominent to a nice build. Now he goes the extra mile compiling his research, which he gets as much satisfaction from as the build, and spreads it around. Some of us do it thru build logs etc

Anyways, interesting topic, I hope our expanding on it helps Roland refocus what his goal on research is for and keeps him from getting bogged down and forgetting that the kit building is the fun part (not that researching isnt fun, it’s just can be a pursuit for its own sake

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Indeed!

In the end, how much effort and how much time to do research really only matter as they suit the builder. Roland should do exactly as much (or as little) as he needs and wants to be happy with his own project. The only person he has to make happy with his model building is himself.

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How much time does it take???
Simple answer, years and years.
I started casting and selling my own kits way back in 2004-2005. Some of those kits have been reworked at least 3 times each due to new information that comes to hand.
So with every new mould made, at times, it’s not the first iteration of the part.
My ASLAV series of kits changed 5 times over it’s life. And is about to change again.
Sure, I could jump in and start pumping out kits, but I like them to be as accurate and builder friendly as possible.
Cheers Jason ACM

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