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We've scaled the cartopper model up to about 17" and are trying to saw it out of 3/32 plywood & 1/8 balsa. Neither wood will work with our coping saw without splintering. Same goes for x-acto saws. What does one use for building a model that small?

A fresh #11 x-acto blade with several light scoring passes. One layer of 1/16" or two layers of 1/32" balsa will bend around the sides far easier than 1/8". Use strips of the 1/8" to form the gunwales.

Hi,
I have always had better success using basswood than balsa or any other type of wood for modeling. Midwest Inc (http://www.midwestproducts.com/) sells a wide variety of modeling woods. Basswood has almost no grain, does not tend to split, and bends relatively easily. I use 3/32 and 1/16 thickness sheets of basswood and for just about everything, using 1/16 x 1/16 and 3/32 x 3/32 strips for chine logs, gunwales, etc.

Midwest's model boat kits are very good, and were a great way for me to learn the basics of model building. They have very good tips for how to do everything from make rigging look authentic to drawing lines on basswood to look like a planked deck.

Bluejacket Shipcrafters (http://www.bluejacketinc.com/) in Searsport, Maine is also an amazing resource for model boatbuilders--they are a veritable ship chandlery for the model builder, selling basically everything you would ever need to build a model boat and then some! I haven't tried their kits, but suspect they are a bit more difficult than Midwest's.

-Trevor

Hi Levi and others,
The type of wood that would be suitable certainly depends on the size of model you're aiming to build. If you're doing very small scale, I think the irregularity of Luan and the voids, etc could present problems. However, if you're building a 1/4 scale model (4 feet long for a 16 foot boat) I think 1/8 inch Luan would be the only way to go.

Most of my models were in the range of 1/20-1/16 scale (my model junebug was 16 inches long). I posted some pictures of my models a while back on the model building blog page, and they're still there.

Working with such small wood requires a different set of tools, but fortunately they're lots cheaper! To cut basswood sheets without splitting, you need to use an exacto knife and a sturdy metal ruler as a guide. A small razor saw is also critical for cutting the other pieces--something with tiny teeth!

I got into model building after building a couple of kits from Midwest, which had excellent directions and taught me some good tricks about how to make sails look realistic and how to draw pencil lines on sheets of basswood instead of planking decks, etc. (but that kind of stuff really doesn't apply to models of instant boats)!

Hope that helps.
-Trevor

Trevor, thanks for the info and this is the first time I have looked in on the model building page. Glad you told me. This looks to be a long winter and time spent in the barn will be cold so I think I will do some model work in the warm house. Thanks again.