You made THAT out of WHAT? Let's see more!

[galaxy]

There may be some similar threads, but: 

Lets see how creative and resourceful (or "cheap"?!) modelers are.

Show us something you made out of the strangest thing(s)!

Or even the most mundane things!

Coffee creamer containers, for example, make nice trash cans in G scale.

The larger silica gel "pillows" make for feed bags for G scale. The canisters of silica gel can be used to represent drums of whatever...oil, kerosene etc. in O and HO scale.They come in different sizes too.

If you can, post pictures of your handiwork please!

[csmith9474]

This isn't something that I did, but I definately took note. In the last issue of Realistic Layouts from Kalmbach, there was an article where the modeler used a toothpaste tube cap as part of the roof details on a gas station he did. I thought that was really interesting and creative (looked great).

[engineerjoey]

Oh Jeez, you've hit on my specialty...

 

Porch light dome = sand pile

 

 

Dish washer impeller becomes coke retort

 

Ribbons = window treatments

 

garbage bag ties = siding

 

 

 

 

 

[Grampys Trains]

Hi G: I love these kinds of threads.  Here's one of mine. This is a transfer pump and filters in my loco service area.  The large filter on the left was a flared copper fitting with styrene glued to the top and rounded.  The pump in the center was the center section of an Atlas switch machine. The filter on the right was a short piece of plastic tubing with styrene glued and rounded on top. The concrete base is .080 styrene.  The roof was a left over piece from another project. The timber frame was out of the goody box. The pipe and fittings were from Walthers pipe kit.  The big valve was cut from a HO lamp post. I've also included a picture of what this pump was based on. This was in Kalmbach book "Locomotive Servicing Terminals" by Marty McGuirk.                      

[Southwest Chief]

I made some flags/bunting for a Walthers HO gas station out of red, white, and blue star confetti and dental floss.  Cut the points off of the stars for the triangles and used dental floss (unscented) for the line.  Pretty simple and dirt cheap, but effective when all done:

 

[R. T. POTEET]

I'm not sure if this qualifies or not but I once assembled a horse transfer car - I believe that's what they were called - and I put some real horse transfer inside; it took six weeks to air out the club room!

[doctorwayne]

Mine is only partially creative:  I made a standpipe (on the right) from some old pen parts and stuff from a disposable lighter, although the spout is from Grandt Line.  The one on the left is by Tichy, but I needed one with a longer spout to service two adjacent tracks.

Wayne 

[Heartland Division CB&Q]

I really like the standpipe, Dr. W !!!!!

R. T. P.  ... funny about the horse thing.

Southwest ..... What.... No mint flavor?

Kyle, I like the bag tie idea.

Gramp ... great scene

Below is a scene in an small area near where a branch line connects with the main line in Prairie View. From the left you will see a stack of rail in front of the caboose. The rail is obsolete brass rail. The shed was made from kit-bashing left overs and scrap plastic. The interlocking tower should look familair because it started as a badly broken Plasticville tower. The oil tank at the tower was from an old broken N scale European tank car.

[galaxy]

Amazing work from all!

Kyle I never woulda thunk an old dishwasher part for much! And I, too like the twist tie siding!

Grampy- nice work on the pumps

Southwest- swell idea for floss and confetti

Dr Wayne yours is a match for the "real thing"

Nice ideas Garry

Swell guys! Keep the ideas and pics coming! The pics really help to display your ideas! This is exactly what I had in mind for this thread! 

[UP Chayne]

well, dont have a picture right now, but i built a water tower out of two 3-liter coke bottle caps.  just glued them together and put some styrene legs on it.  stoood it up and painted it. 

[myowngod]

Some great ideas here!

I made these bridge piers from cheap chip brush paint handles.  I cut them down to height.  They're available in widths 3/4" to 4", so you can make a variety of bridge sizes.

Below they are to the right side.  I needed to widen the bridge.  Tha back story is with the increased traffic in the city, a wider bridge was need.  The modern techinques are being used next to the older supports.

The next 2 shots are where they will be install at the club I belong to.

[xdford]

well, dont have a picture right now, but i built a water tower out of two 3-liter coke bottle caps.  just glued them together and put some styrene legs on it.  stoood it up and painted it. 

 

Hi there UP, I presume that you are talking N scale for a water tower? And I assume that your caps are about the same size as they are here is Australia?

Thanks

 

Trevor  www.xdford.digitalzones.com FYI

[CSX_road_slug]

Kyle, you've got to write a book sometime about your uses of everyday objects, that's just a fraction of what I've seen you do!

DJ - I always wondered if those Atlas above-ground switch machines could be made into something useful, you've just proved that they can!

Dr. Wayne - I never would've known the difference if you hadn't placed those two columns side-by-side!

Garry - I sure wish I'd saved some of my old brass track to do that kind of stuff.

Ron, I never woulda thought old paintbrush handles were useful for anything - until I saw what you did!

Here are some of my own applications...

First, an old gasoline funnel to serve as the top of my blast furnace's precipitator:



The stoves (3 tall cylinders toward the left), stack, and most of the piping started as PVC pipe scraps from Home Depot:

A look at some of the un-painted components: 

 

[MisterBeasley]

Not as imaginative as the ones above, but this plank fence is made of coffee stirrers:

I'm saving some of those things that pop up when the turkey is cooked to use for outdoor tables at a restaurant.  I've also got a couple of bottle caps which I've painted and decalled to use as a sign on top of my Strumpet Brewery.  Yeah, I had to eat the turkey and drink the beer to get these items, but sometimes you've just got to take one for the team, y'know?

[dale8chevyss]

I made some flags/bunting for a Walthers HO gas station out of red, white, and blue star confetti and dental floss.  Cut the points off of the stars for the triangles and used dental floss (unscented) for the line.  Pretty simple and dirt cheap, but effective when all done:

 

 

 

You must have some of that 5.00 a gallon gas- no visitors  

[dknelson]

Dish washer impeller becomes coke retort

This borders on genius, Kyle.

Dave Nelson

[steamage]

Here's a great material to make HO freight car steel roof walks.

[Autobus Prime]

Folks:

This is a great thread. By the way, this month's RMC has an article on the very same subject.

It's great that we're seeing that good old ingenuity coming out again, after a few years where buy-and-plop seemed to get all the attention. I'm seeing some really neat and really original ideas here.
Mine have been pretty dull by comparison. I have a water tank made from a mushroom can wrapped in a scribed cereal-box cardboard wrapper, a Life-Like Teakettle remotored with a tape-player motor, and a small house made of cereal-box cardboard with grocery-sack shingles. I used to use cereal boxes as my standard building material, but lost most of the buildings over the years.

[jjackso8]

Steamage

They look great but what is the material? did you have to paint/weather it to get that real rust look?

[cwclark]

  I usually use kit parts for my odds and ends, but here is an original. I made the hay bales from scotch brite cut to length and rolled and glued in place. I then painted it a yellowish tan color and then cut the bristles from a paint brush and glued them all over the scotchbrite. Sure did make for some convincing bales of hay..oh yeah, and the fence was built from electrical wire stripped of the insulation soldered to brass tubing....chuck

 

[Packers#1]

Very interesting stuff here. It's a laugh, seeing how great modelers turned odds and ends into these great models.

[PASMITH]

My sawdust burner is a tea strainer on top of a cardboard Christmas tree. ( The cladding is made from small thin brass rectangles that have been dipped in Blacken-it, glued to the cardboard Christmas tree with contact cement and weathered with Chalks.)

Peter Smith, Memphis

[steamage]

Steamage

They look great but what is the material? did you have to paint/weather it to get that real rust look?

No, the steel screening from the old broken TV tube was already well rusted when I found it. Just cut the steel screen into strips and made all the roofwalk I will ever need. Don't want to pay ten bucks for a pair of etched metal roof walk's for box and reefer cars are not the top of the line, but want to make the oldies look better.

[doctorwayne]

Steamage

They look great but what is the material? did you have to paint/weather it to get that real rust look?

 

I almost missed it, too, but simply click on the blue link for an explanation:

 

Here's a great material to make HO freight car steel roof walks.

 

Lots of great suggestions here, and it's nice to see that we're still a resourceful bunch in this age of ready-to-run.

Wayne 

[timbob]

Wow.  I wish I was as resourceful as you guys!!

 -Tim

[DavidGSmith]

I'm really impressed. I have all sorts of junk and never seem to see the use for it that you all have. Great!!

Dave 

[doctorwayne]

I'm really impressed. I have all sorts of junk and never seem to see the use for it that you all have. Great!!

Dave 

Sometimes, the "junk" is just junk, so, might as well treat it as such: 

Torn-down electric motor armatures -

And the wire from the same motors -

 

Scrap Rivarossi metal wheels and axles -

Assorted modelling junk -

More modelling junk, and some parts from disposable lighters -

And more of the same, with some rusted metal from an old car -

Scrap brass rail makes a good gondola load, too -

 

The plastic rolls from office paper can be useful, with a few added bits of detail and some paint, as flatcar and gondola loads -

 

And finally, a load of stakes from Athearn flatcars, after a trip through some HobbyBlack -

Wayne 

[Kenfolk]

Great thread! This one's  bookmarked. Thanks everyone.

[Randall_Roberts]

Here's a temporary Christmas layout I threw together in a couple afternoons.  It's Unitrack on plywood, and the structures are MTL's Micro Seasons North Pole Village.  Don't look to close at the "snow", it's kitchen trash bags.

 

[doctorwayne]

Hah!  I wouldn't have noticed had you not mentioned it: it looks good, and certainly would save a lot of "shovelling" when cleaning up.

Wayne