Latest Additions

[Spooky]

[avalonman]

one word

genious

[Spooky]

Thanks

I'm just doing some more cut outs at the minute so will have some more pics to post in the morning

best wishes

Dave

[PhillyDee]

Oh, they are good! Yet again!

[Daven]

I like the way the tabs become part of the design - excellent!

Best

Dave

[bobg]

Brilliant! Like the extra detail engraved on various parts and the way they fit together.
Bob

[Spooky]

Thanks guys

I'm not very good with a camera but Gary (the-Engraver) and Jen are helping with that cutting and building 700+ models takes time though (and quite a lot of space) the biggest and most complex design is going to be the German 800mm railway gun I'm working on, close to 1200 pieces though so not easy to make sure it all fits.
I'm quite lucky though, I have the help of a draughtsman called Liam Biggs whose work has been flawless and takes a LOT of the load off of me.

When time permits I'll post up the full method from idea to finished model so anybody else who wants to give it a try can on average a complete model takes 3 months but I do rolling starts of 3 - 6 models per week and switch between them, for nearly a year I didn't have anything finished but now new items are comming out at an average of 4 - 6 per week. It means I can provide a big price range from cheap to bloody expensive and still keep new items comming out to prevent market saturation and pointless competition. (50 people all selling the same thing doesn't help my sales or theirs).

I've done my best to keep prices down based on initial cost divided by rough number of expected sales so pretty much all the stuff I do is under £150 but has an open *make as many as you like* licence. Most items recover plan cost in the first hour of cutting so from hour 2 onwards clients are in to profit. The more money my clients make the more plans they buy.
The *pay per item* model one of my few compeditors uses in the states to be honest just takes the mickey,I don't buy a car then pay the same garage to drive it each day

time to work

best wishes

Dave

[PhillyDee]

Would love to know how you work out optimal tab placements etc. I know how I would do it, but I am guessing you have the quickest and easiest way that I may not have thought of!

Can't wait until your website has all the model lists, and prices etc. Would be interested in some of the smaller ones!

[Spooky]

Hiya Phil,

Based on load figures in a similar way to the actual items I'm modelling, Take the expected maximum load a particular piece will have to withstand, divide that by the number of tabs that fit the deisgn , from there work out surface area of glued parts and multiply that by required load to see if the figures match or are above requirement.
The worst ones are doll houses, the amity doll house has to withstand a 6 stone child standing on it on one foot so any given part has to take a load of 6 stone per 6 square inches on any verticle.Then failure has to be calculated so in the event they can actually break it the amount of injury caused has to be catered for at the minimum possible while allowing for no sharp protrusions or possibility of penetrating injury aka if it breaks no big shards sticking up or out.
All my current doll houses are designed to pancake flat in the event of breakage.

On the series of missiles, the tab and slot system has been standardised and is held on a template, it means I can keep them down to 25 quid and yet still get the same strength on each finished model.

A lot of it is due to having a good few years as an architectural draughtsman and being able to visualise the final piece before starting. After a while it becomes second nature what to do rather than an actual thought process.

Gary is doing some fantastic work with different color plastics, I'd love to be able to do it but time prevents me doing so as well as having no real flair for art or design (I'm not artistic, the models are a function of requirements rather than a piece of art) in essense it all comes down to pure logic and numbers, kind of like 1 + 2 = 3,an artist needs to *understand* "1" and *feel* "2".....I just need to know they add up to 3.

best wishes

Dave