Reputable online stores to find wood modeling supplies

[Capella]

I have purchased items (planks and blocks) from Modelers Central and Model Expo before, but I'm wondering if you guys can suggest any other good online stores to purchase supplies specific to wood model ship building.

 

At the moment I'm looking for the oft-recommenended Vallejo Matte Varnish; a good, quick-seting PVA glue; and a good, natural/brown-colored wood filler.

 

I've googled them, but I come across online stores that I'm not sure that I can trust (quite possibly due to my just not being familiar with them) - not necessarily because I don't trust them right off the bat.

 

I'd greatly appreciate any suggestions!

Based on Mark's (need to point out: same (real) first name!) reply, I should point out that I live in rural Minnesota - very rural, and don't really have any stores nearby that are stocked very well at all with quality modeling supplies, so my best bet is to rely on online stores except for commonly-supplied items such as Exacto knives/blades, threaders, and other such basic crafting items.

Edited January 7, 2023 by Capella

[mtaylor]

Check out our sponsors on the front page.   Is there a hobby store near you?   Even if they don't carry ships they usually have models and along with paints and tools.  We have one in our town that does that.  Ships, they don't carry but will order.

 

Also, you might call some local artist supply stores but kind of doubt they would have model paints unless they sell models.  

[Capella]

12 minutes ago, mtaylor said:

Check out our sponsors on the front page.   Is there a hobby store near you?   Even if they don't carry ships they usually have models and along with paints and tools.  We have one in our town that does that.  Ships, they don't carry but will order.

 

Also, you might call some local artist supply stores but kind of doubt they would have model paints unless they sell models.  

Thanks, Mark. Please see the paragraph that I added to the end of my post. I'm in a location where I usually have to rely on online purchases for anything but the most basic items in regards to modeling.

Edited January 7, 2023 by Capella

[mtaylor]

I see the problem now.   From one Mark to another.... you are really rural.      Do look at our sponsors then.  I seldom use Ebay unless it's something I'm really looking for.  Last time I was looking for specific tool and Ebay came up a lot so I used them.

[allanyed]

6 hours ago, Capella said:

blocks

Syren.  I would add rope as well as it looks like rope rather than thread.

Allan

[Jack12477]

Mark, for paints, glues, kits and other supplies I use ScaleHobbyist   He is in New Hamphshire, service is very good, prices are very competitive. 

Edited January 7, 2023 by Jack12477

[Maury S]

for glue, I prefer Luthiers Musical Instrument glue.  It's just like Tite-bond but has a dye in it that shows up under black-light so you know if you've smeared any where it doesn't belong.  Similar cost as Tite-bond.

Order direct:  https://www.lmii.com/

Maury

[Roger Pellett]

The things that you are looking for are not specialized.  For these, I would look on Amazon.  For example, they or their affiliated suppliers carry Vallejo products.  For a wood filler, I keep a can of Durham’s Rock Hard Water Putty on my shelf.  This is easily colored with a dab of poster paint powder; the stuff used for grade school art projects.  I bought the last can of water putty from Amazon but our local Ace Hardware Store also carries it.

 

For specialized items; blocks, rope, fittings, etc. I defer to others.

 

Roger

 

[Gregory]

4 hours ago, Roger Pellett said:

I would look on Amazon.

I 2nd this..  All of the items you mention can be found on Amazon.

[javajohn]

I agree with the Amazon recommendations. One caution though: check the reputation of the store if buying from a third-party on Amazon; try to see if there is a "fulfilled by Amazon" store for what you want. I got burned once - a shady Chinese distributor was not honoring Amazon's return policy and wanted me to pay $40 to ship it back to China! It was a $15 item. I didn't even realize the store was in China. Most of the Chinese firms are reputable, but there are many of the pop-up stores that sell junk.

 

[Keith z]

I always use Aileen’s High Tack Pva it sets up in about a minute and is in my opinion stronger than CA. 

[Capella]

1 hour ago, Keith z said:

I always use Aileen’s High Tack Pva it sets up in about a minute and is in my opinion stronger than CA. 

I'll look for it!

 

Right now I'm using Titebond Quick and Thick Multi-surface. It sets in 15 mins. I just started using it for the first time gluing the bulkheads in my current project, so I can can't yet comment on whether I like it or not, but I like the idea of a 1min set of time!

[Keith z]

just remember to apply a wet coat but a thing one i apply it with a artist brush

[Bob Cleek]

Just some opinionated general observations to add to the good advice above, offered for what it's worth. Others' mileage may vary:

 

Since the internet and especially the Covid pandemic, we've begun living in the age of mail order. That has opened up much wider and more easily accessible sourcing options than we ever had before. However, the catch, particularly for those living outside of major metropolitan centers where a few "brick and mortal" shops struggle to survive, is that the costs of shipping and handling are added to online purchases and these added costs have risen exponentially in recent times. That fact has to be factored into the equation. "Amazon Prime" and "free shipping and handling" are significant considerations in making online purchases these days. 

 

You can rely on any of this forum's sponsors for the best of whatever they sell. They've all been thoroughly vetted and their customer service is top notch. You won't go wrong looking to them for specialized ship modeling products and their prices are very reasonable. If I needed an airbrush, I wouldn't consider looking any further than USA Airbrush Supply or for after-market blocks any further than Syren Ship Models. This is a no-brainer for me.

 

If the online outfit advertises itself as a "hobby" anything, you are often better off going directly to an online supplier of professional supplies of the same type and see if you can do better. A "hobby shop" can get away selling lower quality tools and supplies at a higher price to a broader spectrum of customers, while a professional supply house will soon die on the vine if the professional customers aren't satisfied with product quality and service. Approach hobby outfits like Model Expo and Micro-Mark with caution. These two online retailers have an excellent selection of products for the modeler, but in many instances they are priced significantly higher than other sources catering to professional clients in allied fields. (It's a good idea to get on their mailing lists, though, because they often offer great discounts on clearance items.) This is particularly true with respect to tools. For example, Micro-Mark sells a pair of crudely scaled six-inch proportional dividers made by Tacro for $140.00, but you can find models of the finest rack-and-pinion adjustable, Verniier decimally-scaled ten-inch proportional dividers ever made, used and in good shape, for half that price or a higher-quality set of seven-inch dividers than the Tacro six-inchers for as little as $25 on eBay. The same goes for surgical and dental instruments. The "hobby shops" sell poor-quality tweezers, forceps, scissors, hemostats, scalpels and blades, and so on at higher prices than the mid-range quality stuff the medical and dental supply houses are offering on eBay or Amazon.

 

There is a wealth of model-building tools and materials that can be found in higher quality and lower prices from professional jewelers' supply houses. This is where to look for pliers, cutting tools, files, tweezers, rotary tools and burrs, soldering supplies, and such. A couple of the most popular are Rio Grande (https://www.riogrande.com/) and Otto Frei. (https://www.ottofrei.com/ ) Cheaper files can be had from hobby supply houses, but, for example, cheap files are a waste of money. The same goes for pliers and cutters. When buying tools, the cheapest quickly becomes the most expensive when you have to buy another to replace it.  

 

Medical and dental supply houses are also a great source for ship modeling tools, although many of these companies sell "to the trade only" or in large lots to institutional purchasers. eBay is a good place to find used medical instruments useful in ship modeling, but caution has to be exercised because there are a lot of Asian manufacturers unloading poor-quality instruments on eBay. The upside of this is that they are often so inexpensive that taking a chance is worth the gamble. Carnegie Surgical Co. sells a range of professional quality ear polypuses, a type of forceps for working in very confined spaces that I consider to be an invaluable rigging instrument) ranging in price from around $100 to $250. Micro-Mark sells a 12" ear polypus for fifty bucks. eBay, on the other hand, has tons of different versions ranging from ten to twenty-five bucks (and up) that are quite acceptable for modeling use because we aren't going to be using them deep inside a patient's ear canal. The same applies to tweezers. If you're looking for an 8" or 12" pair of tweezers to reach inside the shrouds on your square-rigger, eBay is the place to buy them.

 

As a footnote, there was once a time when you could get lots of used medical and dental instruments from friendly medical professionals. Forty years ago, I worked in a large state institution that had a big dental clinic and I was friends with the chief dentist there who was an avid HO train modeler. He kept me supplied with all sorts of worn-out instruments: probes, dental chisels, drill burrs, forceps, pliers, and the like. (I still have an oddly shaped pair of pliers designed to extract molars which comes in handy now and again.) Sadly, a combination of the trend to disposable instruments which are more cost effective because autoclave sterilizing and sterile repackaging labor is no longer needed and heightened "biohazard" prevention protocols now mandate the controlled disposal of used instruments. Few doctors and dentists consider it appropriate to deviate from the biohazard disposal protocols and save a "goody box" of used instruments for their modeling friends. If you are lucky enough to find one who will still provide you with some, go for it!  

 

Finally a word about paint.  Ship modeling very rarely requires exact color matches. What we do need is quality paint with good archival qualities and a high content of good pigment ground finely that will produce good opacity. Most all the pre-mixed modeling paints marketed as such will meet these requirements... at a very high price. Bottled modeling paints are very convenient if one needs to get an exact color match and for this reason they are the favorites of armor, aircraft, and railroad modelers who need the exact shade of field gray used by the Wehrmacht in early 1943 or the exact shade of boxcar blue Conrail paints its boxcars. Ship modelers don't have the problem of that level of color accuracy and I don't think we have to pay five bucks an ounce and another five bucks in shipping and handling for a bottle of generic black, white, or bottom paint brown (which is the same as "boxcar red.") So I'd urge anybody who doesn't want to go broke collecting a couple of hundred one ounce bottles of modeling paint to display on their shop shelf while the paint dries hard in the bottles to learn to mix, condition and use quality tubed artists' oils or acrylics. Tubed colors have a shelf-life measured in decades, come in as many pre-mixed colors as anybody could possibly want, and, if one learns to mix their own colors, can provide any color in the rainbow out of five or seven tubes. (Black, white, red, blue, yellow, and for convenience maybe a brown, and a green.) There are many YouTube videos on how to use artists' tubed colors in both oil and acrylic for brush and airbrush application in miniature work which are well worth a ship modeler's time to watch. (Many are by the guys who paint fantasy gaming figures and miniature soldiers.) There is also an excellent instructional chapter on mixing your own colors for painting ship models in volume two of Ship Modeler's Shop Notes which can be purchased from the NRG. Tubed colors, as well as varnishes, thinners, and flattening (matte) additives and coatings are available on line from artists' supply houses, or locally from arts and crafts stores much easier than modeling paint is locally available at local hobby shops if you can even find one anymore. Painting and finishing ship models seems to be an aspect of the craft which is often given short shrift yet it is one of the most important factors in the final appearance of a model. There's a lot more to it than just applying paint straight out of the bottle. Once the relatively simple skill of mixing your own paint is mastered, you're free from all the limitations and inconveniences of sourcing pre-mixed modeling paint and can enjoy the benefit of saving lots of money over the course of a modeling career. 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Edited February 17, 2023 by Bob Cleek

[Capella]

A lot to take in, Bob, but I took notes!

 

Thanks for your thorough input. Much appreciated!

[Bob Cleek]

53 minutes ago, Capella said:

A lot to take in, Bob, but I took notes!

 

Thanks for your thorough input. Much appreciated!

Yeah, it was a slow afternoon and I had time on my hands.