Tag: frugality
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Frugal Week Not Finished

Just when you thought the opera was over… I was idly browsing for OO scale building kits on the internet with the specific of Canadian outline. This sounds like a hiding to nothing, as OO is a British size and most of their card kits and other model supplies are resolutely centred on the their…
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Frugal Week Big Finish

The week came to an end on a good note – yet another cereal-box building for a model airfield is complete – making a total of 7 this week – 4 for RCAF Wet Dog and 3 for Wet Dog Regional Airport. This one derives from a Scale Model Scenery download kit – it started as…
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Hut, Hut, Hut…

All three huts, in fact, destined for either the radar station at Wet Dog Regional or the ablutions block at RCAF Wet Dog – wherever they will do the most good. They are the first fruits of Frugal Days – the week in which I do not build an expensive plastic kit, but rather turn…
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A New Superhero For The DC Or Marvel Universe

I don’t know which comic book empire is which, but I can recognise super-talent when I see it. I’m even more delighted to be able to report that it has surfaced in one of my favourite people – me. Captain Frugal. Nicknamed Cheap John. One afternoon I decided to get down to it and build…
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The Five Dollar Model

Earlier in this column’s history I introduced the Glorious $ 5 Plan – the construction of an ICM Polikarpov Chaika in 1:72 scale that only cost me $ 5 to do. It was a one-off opportunity provided by a discard box sale at the annual WASMEX show…and you can be certain that I’m going to hover…
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Tea Tray Mk II

Readers of this column may remember – or can search back – to read about Tea Tray Mk I. It was the adaptation of a cardboard box lid left over from an IKEA purchase that allowed me to bring my plastic modelling indoors when temperatures soared in the Little Workshop. The Little Office has an…
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How Much Does Your Hobby Cost?

And the related question: how much should it cost? Let’s explore the idea for scale modelling by taking it away to another hobby. Let’s choose, oh I don’t know…historical reenacting*. Dressing in period clothing, making and using period tools and weapons, camping and campaigning in a carefully researched old style. A good thing to do and…
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Can You Hear The Cheaping?

No, it’s not the sparrows on the lawn or the dry wheel bearings on the Toyota…it’s the cheaping noise the modeller makes when they want to do something frugally. Put another way, it’s the sound a penny makes when you pinch it. No, this will not be a post on how to crochet a Sunderland…
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The Speed Build – Good Or Bad?

As a kid I was always trying for more models to build. But as a kid I was money-limited – so what I could afford had to fill in the long dry stretches between Christmas, birthday, or other gift-giving occasions. If a relative tuned nasty and presented me with socks…or a card with their best…
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I’m More Eco-Virtuous Than You Are

So there too, hah! Actually all us model builders have an opportunity to stick it to the Facebook/Shopping Centre/News bite saints who scold us daily about everything we think or do – particularly the ones who would deny us everything from plastic straws to bear traps. We are ahead of their game: a. Plastic straws.…
