Question on starting with Styrene

Thank again everyone for the information.

Harry Woodman's book has a lot on scratchbuilding aircraft. Here is a full copy;

http://www.wwi-n-plastic.com/Book/harry/woodman.html

Mustang8376

I have read some of the posts and I have an idea on the tools one would need to start building with sheet styrene for a scratch building project.  What resources/books would one recommend to have to get started?  I am currently looking into Evergreen Scale Models How to book.  is there anything else out there that is a good source?

There's one book that i used to get started for scratchbuilding..

Shep Paine's How to Build Dioramas. 

If you can find it, try The art of Scale Scratch Building, A Guide to Professional Model Building by Michael J. Dario & Sydney P. Chivers.  It might be available at Barnes & Noble, or at least your local public library... It was published in 1974, so it's hard to find for sale anywhere..

EDIT: Found four copies for sale-  http://www.amazon.com/gp/offer-listing/B0006WZT5I/ref=olp_page_1?ie=UTF8&shipPromoFilter=0&startIndex=0&sort=sip&me=&condition=used

Even without the "how-to" books, you can start small.

Take an existing part, look at the plastic stock you have and visualise how you would go about duplicating that part using the material (and tools) you have at hand. Get a feel for how it cuts, how it shapes.

Thank you for the start.  The planw as to do my own sci fi models in the future.  Everyone again thank you for the help... even on something so obscure.

There are far more books out there on scratchbuilding in wood than in styrene.  Tab publications did quite a few.  They are not the best, but may give several ideas. I would see if you can find some in local libraries, or maybe find cheap used copies from an online used book place.

Most of the scratch building in the Tab books are the old "solid" model type where the outer envelope is whittled out of a big block of wood.  Some though do cover the piece by piece method.  Also, unfortunate for you, I know of few armor scratchbuilding books.  Most scratch modeling books are for airplanes, ships (lots) and cars.

There are two that I know of for Wingate and his cars, who builds in metal.  Many libraries have copies of those.

If you want a book from the library and can identify it well, but your local library does not have a copy, in this day of computerized interlibary loan, they can probably borrow it for you pretty easily.

More along the lines of how to start the process to do a scratchbuild, not a plan for the model(s) themselves. 

Do you need a book?  In a literal sense, you'll be making your own kit pieces and assembling them.