PE?

Jeez , BARON !

 So that was your cave where the obnoxious smells came from ? Boiling Mammoth Bones is smelly work .The glue worked good though !    T.B.

Right ! T.B.

To add on to the question another step, and since this thread is still going...

Are there suggestions for kits/PE combinations to start with for people who haven't used PE before to do without having to jump without spending a whole lot of money only to use 1/3 of the PE fret?

PE, Public Enemy ?

the Baron

Then a friend of mine who is an experienced shipbuilder said, "Just cut a section at a time". It made perfect sense, and made it much easier to work with.

A tip I picked, for working with PE, is to use a curved blade (a Nr 10) and a piece of plate glass, to cut the pieces from the frets.  Use a rocking motion, instead of dragging the blade across the "sprue gates".

And when I started working with ship's railings, I cut whole sections and tried to bend and shape them--for example, adding the rails to the forward section of the Pennsylvania, or adding the rails around four sides of a platform on a mast.  It was a real pain, but it's what I took away from the instructions in the kit.  Then a friend of mine who is an experienced shipbuilder said, "Just cut a section at a time".  It made perfect sense, and made it much easier to work with.

Cat Daddy

 

 

the Baron

Try some and see what you think.

Old-timers like me remember a time before there was such a thing, and the more grizzled of us will squint at you, direct a stream of tobacky juice into the spittoon and say how a real modeler doesn't need it, etc, etc.  

 

 

 

And let me guess... back then you had to primer and putty uphill in the rain.  Both ways. Right?

Airbrushes?! Back in my day we were happy to just have air!

 

Putty?  Why, you smart-aleck kid!  We didn't have putty!  We would have killed for putty!  We used the marrow from a wooly mammoth.  And we were glad to have it!

Sprue?  You had sprue? Back in my day, we had to grow the tree, then chop it down with a stone axe, then carve our ships with X-acto blades made by stone-knapping pieces of shale, then glue on parts carved by hand with glue made from pine pitch, and rigging made from braided flax.

Heck, most of mine wound up as firewood... 

Seriously, though- I only recently started using photo-etch, it's great, but a caution for you... start simple, and don't get frustrated. Invest in good tools first.

Randy

the Baron

Try some and see what you think.

Old-timers like me remember a time before there was such a thing, and the more grizzled of us will squint at you, direct a stream of tobacky juice into the spittoon and say how a real modeler doesn't need it, etc, etc.  

And let me guess... back then you had to primer and putty uphill in the rain.  Both ways. Right?

Airbrushes?! Back in my day we were happy to just have air!

95% necessary and 110% detrimental to your mental health. And it's soooooooo shiny!

Now I know why my hair fell off!! 

Tojo72

And it's not 100% necessary to the enjoyment of the hobby

In many cases it may be detrimental to your mental well being.

 

Yes, i did forget to add that there primary purpose is actually to test the nerves. I believe its now being considered as part of SAS selection.

Try some and see what you think.

Old-timers like me remember a time before there was such a thing, and the more grizzled of us will squint at you, direct a stream of tobacky juice into the spittoon and say how a real modeler doesn't need it, etc, etc. 

But in all seriousness, it's one of the great developments in kit design, that was made in that time when many of us left the hobby when we graduated high school and focused on girls, beer, military service, etc, and came back later.  It does put very nice results within the reach of many more modelers than who might otherwise have to do things like make stanchions and rails for a 1/700 ship model out of stretched sprue.

In that regard, it's akin to aftermarket resin detailing sets ("We used to scratchbuild all that stuff!") or even the ready-made washes and weathering products from vendors like AK Interactive, Mig, and so on.  You can try making your own--and in the case of washes or weathering powders, it's not difficult at all--but again, for those who have no experience with it, and even for those of us who do make our it, the commercial products take the guesswork out of it and ensure a certain level of consistency in your results.

I'll add that for ship models, I've come to look on PE rails, if no other PE details, as a necessity for my builds.

But try it, see what you think, and if you find it enhances your fun with the hobby, pursue using it.

Hope that helps, and best regards,

Brad

And it's not 100% necessary to the enjoyment of the hobby

In many cases it may be detrimental to your mental well being.

Okay thanks. 

As mentioned it stands for Photo Etch. It is shets of metal parts used to replace kit parts which may be to thick for scale and can include parts mising in the kit.

This is just one example.

Photo Etch