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I'm not interested in making the models fro you, but I am interested in how much you would expect to pay someone to make them. Several times in the past I've received solicitations from modelers who have seen my models in the magazines, and they asked if I would make one for them. Each time I told them it was a hobby for me and I wasn't interested in working for others. I later thought that I should have asked them how much they would have been willing to pay, just out of curiosiity. I always wondered if they expected to pay $50-$100 for a scratchbuilt or kitbashed model, or did they have a realistic idea on how long such projects would take and were prepared to pay accordingly. Of course taking on such a project, one would need to have an idea on how much time and effort would be involved. Like most people, I don't count my hobby time so I wouldn't have any way of estimating a project. It so happens that I did kitbash a model for a friend. He did work for the real Canadian Pacific Railway, and they wanted a model of a new diesel they had on order - an SD40-2F. This was the widebodied version of the standard SD40-2. An article on making such a model had recently been published in RMC, so armed with this info I volunteered. I kept a log of how much time it too me to kitbash and scratchbuild a part of the model. This included painting, decorating and mounting the model in a display base with acrylic top. The project from start to fini***ook me around 53 hours. Now when I did stuff to earn money in my free time, I always figured I should make at least as much per hour as I made in my full time job. Maybe more, because if I worked after my standard work week hours, I would have been paid at time and a half rate. I didn't really know how much to charge for the SD40-2F, so I made a deal with my friend - he bought me a $500.00 lens for my camera out of his expense account. So I made a bit less than $10.00 an hour for my work. This was quite a bit less than the $25.00 per hour I made at my full time work. I looked at it as a learning experience. So if someone offers to build these models for you, are you willing to pay $25.00 or more per hour for them? Say $400-$500 or more? Bob Boudreau
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