Tips for kitbashing?

mrcarkeys42

Active Member
I always used to like drawing my own spaceship designs as a kid, and recently I have wanted to try and build my own spaceship kitbashing style. The only problem is that I have never touched a modeling kit in my life, and have no idea where to even get parts. I have a budget of about $150 for this project which needs to go towards paints, styrene, and model kits. From looking on ebay, used/opened model kits go for around twenty dollars, and they dont seem to come with much (I wanted to build something about 3 feet long so it would require a lot of detailing)

Does anybody know where I could possibly find large amounts of modeling parts for not too much money? Or are there any model kits with cool parts you would recommend?

Thanks for any tips, sorry if this is a bit meandering but like I said I don't really know anything about model kits.
 
I would say look for military models, tanks, jets, support vehicles. Also you can mold and cast parts you want to use over and over without buying more kits.
 
150 bucks is a very tight budget when it comes to building a 3 foot model. Of course it depends on all dimensions and how much greeblies you want to put on the surface. I would suggest to scour the local Buy and Sell sites like Craigslist or similar to see if you can score a deal on tank kits that someone wants to get rid of that doesn't know the true value. You also could try second hand stores. Check out the kit scans of tanks to see what type of tanks would be the most beneficial. BTW, even though the tank road wheels are the most plentiful, they are easily identifiable as tank road wheels and don't do much to make a scratchbuilt model look more realistic. Greeblying (probably not a word in the dictionary but everyone here understands it) is both an art and a science (a science because the greeblie placement has to make sense). It takes skill and patience. Good luck.

TazMan2000
 
I think you may need to either up your budget or shrink your planned model. A 3' model for $150 doesn't seem doable to me. I'm in the planning process myself for a large model, and I'm planning to pretty much scratch build everything and $150 wouldn't even get me close to done.
 
Don't limit yourself to just model kits. Look for other less expensive sources for the hull/fuselage, like toys, plumbing and hardware parts, old vacuum cleaners, pretty much anything that has an interesting shape. Then detail it with kit parts. You can even shape it from wood, an 8ft 2x4 is only a couple bucks.
 
You also don't need to rely on just plastic kits for detail parts. Look around your own home for broken toys, bottle caps, old electronics, watches, etc. These items can supply you with all kinds of little detail parts.

Just as an example, this lamp was made with a bendy straw, juice bottle cap, generic rocket nozzle, oil paint tube cap, and the lens off a dollar store LED flashlight. Think outside the box, not at what a part is, but what it would like on a spaceship.

Edit- Robn1 you beat me to it!

2mpkhi0.jpg

whcac.jpg

68r52v.jpg
 
Don't limit yourself to just model kits. Look for other less expensive sources for the hull/fuselage, like toys, plumbing and hardware parts, old vacuum cleaners, pretty much anything that has an interesting shape. Then detail it with kit parts. You can even shape it from wood, an 8ft 2x4 is only a couple bucks.

Good point, I have been collecting interesting pieces of junk that I think would make cool greeblies. Some of my favorites are from electric toothbrushes and yogurt pouch caps.
 
Douglas Trumbull used a lot of Railroad parts to fill out the alien craft in CE3K- he said they offered great but unrecognizable hardware greebly. The trick is to have your sources not be obvious to the casual viewer- chopping things up with a razor saw and flipping them around helps a lot.
Hobby Lobby regularly has a 40% coupon for any non-sale item available online- the local stores here have a fairly good selection of kits which with the discount would be good donors.

A three foot model is pretty big but not every square inch needs to be covered in detail. Imperial Star Destroyers have a majority of their hull flat panels with some chips and engraved lines. One problem with some scratch builds I have seen is that they look like they were dipped in glue and rolled around a tub of parts (actually how the models for the fil 'Star Crash were made, though by school children). Look at the design of your ship and put the hardware greebly where the function is- Sensors, Weaponry, Drive System, Bridge or Command Center. The detail should support the function of the vessel and give it some visual interest, not overwhelm your design.

Looking forward to seeing what you come up with!

(BTW- the local hobby shop here has H.O. scale models of Locomotives- a full box of unidentifiable greebly!)
 
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You can use "signs" from home depot as sheets to cut up and make just about anything... or better yet go clean up the signage form the last election... after its painted up nobody but you will know.

As for greeblies... look up "model lot" on ebay. you can usually get several kits built and unbuilt for under $20. try to pick ones that have "hardware" in it that you think you can use. If your ship has a lot of wings - airplaine, crunchy star wars type greeblies - WWII and car kits. stuff like that.

Jedi Dade
 
Pick up a few rolls of solder of different thicknesses. Not for soldering, but for exterior pipe work. It can be bent and will hold its shape very well.
 
Before I throw away old electronics that don't work, like printers and scanners, I take them apart and anything that looks cool and could possibly be used, I keep. Sometimes I'll keep the plastic as well because if offers movable covers and hatches that can be motorized and such. The motorization can also be found in the printer. With some wizardry in electronics you can get it to open and close and extend something like a drop ship.

I also found a nice power supply that has multiple voltages, from 3v-24v. So once you remove that, you also have a power supply that you can use to power the model or you can rig up to work as a stand-alone so you can add a power supply for testing on your bench.
 
Go to your local hardware store and spend 1/2 hours in every aisle to see the possibilities! Card stock, Bristol board, cardboard are great products to use (paneling, making all kinds of designs with a hammer and a screw driver/nail driver, panel lines, etc). As others have mentioned: laptops are the most interesting by far: mother boards, all kinds of greeblies in the keyboard, printers, cartridges, photocopying cartridges and protectors, etc), Make-up aisle (all kinds of interesting containers for lip gloss, mascara, foundation, pencil cases and tips, etc) plastic drawers and door stoppers, etc) rug making grids (plastic, most of them) jewelry making: screws, metal wires...Man, the list is endless!!!
 
i also love the toy isles. both in normal stores and resale shops. the resale shop i like the best because of the toys being broken they are dirt cheap. old transformers have alot of great pieces. i also haunt the pen and pencil isles. lots of great shapes. while at hobby lobby or micheals walk around. open your mind. fair warning once you start seeing the potential shapes, there is no unseeing them. in the summer time i hit the yard sales. boxes of toys for sale for a buck or two. i even got a half a table of models one time for five bucks! it was great. nothing like that since then though. :(
 
Thanks for all the advice! For now i have been focusing on creating the main shape/profile out of things i already own. I have no experience with styrene so i will need to practice with it. I tried cutting out a few panels out of a scrap sign i found and it was honestly a lot harder then i thought. Also how would one go about making panels for curved surfaces? i was really inspired by this guys work and wanted to capture a similar look. i am assuming the panels on the "ball" in the front were made from styrene but i have no idea how to go about that.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-nHzyxeTJ6S0/UbMC6YfMVXI/AAAAAAAAAnQ/Ma6EAUxlF8o/s0/P1010936.JPG


I was also wondering just how much and what kinds of styrene to buy? there seems to be so many sizes and thicknesses. I dont really know what should be used for larger support pieces and for smaller detailed pieces. do you guys have any suggestions for some standard sets of styrene i should buy to cover all of my possible needs? also I bought a paper cutter and tried to use it to cut up the scrap styrene signs i found, but i found it quite difficult. The styrene would always "lift" while cutting, resulting in an unstraight cut. is there some kind of technique? or is a paper cutter not sutable for thinner styrene? I was able to get more precise cuts by using a straight edge and an exacto knife, but this is also more time consuming and i was hoping to use the paper cutter for when i had to make a lot of the same sized panels qicker.


once i have the basic shape/size and get a hold of doing the basic paneling, then i will move on to kit bashing details. also i took your advice on the size and will go for something closer to 1-1.5 feet.

i also picked up some solder to practice doing piping like what was suggested.

thanks again for all the help so far, if anybody can answer my current questions or point me to some previous tutorials (there are so many i am not really sure where to start) that would be great!
 
Using found parts is great, and using broken appliance parts costs nothing but time. One thing to watch out for is that there are some plastics that will not glue together or take paint.
If the plastic feels "waxy" or slick (sometimes rubbery), it may be of this variety and should be avoided. If you find a suspect part, try test painting/gluing an area to see if it will stick.

I've even used the vacuformed packaging that other products came in as shapes for building models. Be creative! If you can glue it and paint it - anything goes!
 
Try looking thru a dollar store. lots of cheap toys and interesting shapes to be found.

For the multi direction curved panelling I have heated sheet plastic and pressed it over the original curved shape, let cool and cut out panel.

For just a tube shape I have various sizes of plumbing pipe to form the sheet plastic around.
 
i was really inspired by this guys work and wanted to capture a similar look. i am assuming the panels on the "ball" in the front were made from styrene but i have no idea how to go about that.

http://4.bp.blogspot.com/-nHzyxeTJ6S...0/P1010936.JPG

That's one of my old spaceships, made in the 90's and its made from an assortment of "found" objects, detailed with model kit parts and styrene sheet of various thicknesses.
The front was a clear plastic baby's toy that used to roll on the ground with coloured plastic balls inside. The neck is made from heat formed PVC pipe sections. The main hull is an acrylic plastic bowl followed by an acrylic terrarium and another plastic bowl. The engine nozzle is an acrylic cup. You can find a bunch of posts about building using found objects and kit bashing on this site and my blog rcscifi.blogspot.com

That spaceship was made after I had been an industrial and then VFX modelmaker for a number of years, but I started just kitbashing a model kit with some styrene sheet when I was 15 after having seen Star wars. In fact the first one I made was by turning an x wing kit back to front and scratch building a Y wing style cockpit at what was the back end. I glued three of the x wing engines together and stuck them on the chopped off nose of the x wing hull. It was overall a pretty terrible result but it got me started and I made several a few more bad kit bashes before progressing to a larger Martin Bower style ship.

I recently completed a kitbash using a 1/35 scale helicopter kit here on the RPF http://www.therpf.com/showthread.php?t=257881

If your are just starting out I would just try bashing a model kit or two together and make something smaller than 3ft (900mm). This will enable you to learn all the techniques you need and with more practice you can get more and more ambitious in scope and size. There are a lot of tutorials on You tube that cover working with styrene and all the tutorials for military modelling will be applicable but the main learning is in the doing, so I encourage you to just have a go.

mung
 
what kind of paper cuter did you get? one of the old guillotine type like schools used to have? or one with a razor blade that slides back and forth down a track? if it's the second type you just have to apply a little more downward pressure on the bar that holds it down. i kind of walk my hand down the rail just behind the sliding razor. if the guillotine type good luck. i have never been able to get them to cut plastic right. i usually use a good sharp razor and a metal straight edge to cut my plastic, most plastic you just have to score the surface and then you can bend and snap it the rest of the way through.

as for curves, there are several methods.what you use depends on the situation, or your skill/preference. it will also depends on how tight of a turn you want to make. a real tight turn and heat would have to be applied, i use a variable setting heat gun for this. it will take some planing around to get used to applying just enough heat to make the plastic malleable but not melt it. the trick is to keep the heat source moving over your entire piece not just one area.

nice sweeping curves can be achieved by creating a skeleton underneath in the shape of the form of the shape you want. like this:

bow-skeleton-front.png



then you can bend the plastic over it and glue it down.

here's a link to my photobucket on that model. i had to pretty much scratch everything on it. and almost the hole ship was a complex curve. there were some times i had to heat the plastic sheet and use a skeleton to get the achieved angles.

http://s1015.photobucket.com/user/raser13/library/probert richter ambassador class?sort=3&page=1

you can also see where i used a picture of the ship to aid in cutting and layering the pieces to make much more complex pieces. plus if you go through the other models there you will see alot more of how i scratch other things and used found stuffs. i have boxes of awesome shapes.

i to recommend making a smaller model first. one to try out ideas, or practice needed methods.then build up to doing the model that you really want to do. you don't want to have an idea in your head that is that one model you want to turn out perfect, try and do it, and have it not turn out to good because you rushed to fast to get there. it will frustrate you and might turn you off from trying again. i am not saying don't try to do it!! or to just give up now. not by any means! quite the opposite. i just don't want you to bite off more than you can chew and scare yourself into not trying again,

as for thicknesses of plastic to use and buy. i don't think i've bought styrene in years. for skeletons and internal structure i use old credit cards and fake ones they send in the mail. my family and friends save them up for me. i've also have a few stores that save me old plastic signage. you have to usually talk to managers on that one. but i also nab plastic garage sale signs that people leave up. i give them a week after the sale date. then the sign is mine. plus it beautifies the area. i also save flat pieces of clear packaging. all of these can come in different thicknesses. i just find one that's the thickness i need and start cutting. if it's not thick enough i stack them up.

putty and sculpting putty will also be your friends. can i also recommend a few other tools if you don't have them. a compass with a point end and a razor end. a dremmel with mill bits. razor saw. pin vice with assorted bits . and a scribing tool. these are my scratching go to tools.just remember with the dremmel to use eye protection. i've seen alot of people use one with out it. that's just asking to loose an eye.especially when cutting away plastic shards, and having to get close to see what you are doing. i've embedded a cutting disk into my safety glasses with a dremmel before. if it weren't for those glasses i'd be seeing the world alot differently right now.

the only other advice i can give you is plan it out. look at where you need to start, figure out what comes next. and so on. look for things that you want to do on that next step and see if there is some thing you need to do in step one to make that happen, so that way your not having to fight something once it's all together. or having to rip something half apart to fix it latter. you don't want the story behind that tid bit. ask your self are you going to light it? if so where do the wires need to run? power supply? what is it? where does it need to go? acces to it for recharge or replacement? are you adding an interior space that will be seen, like a cockpit or shuttle bay. are there going to be people in them? what size? hallway or doors to other rooms? are they closed? or do you need to add something to be seen back there? that should get you going, and give you and idea on questions to ash yourself.


hope all this helps. pics of what your asking about are always good. lots of description if you don't have pics. and there are no dumb questions. we've all been there before. so we like to help out others.good luck.
 
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