Having a decent scale sawmill operation is priceless if you like to build with wood. I can remember (mostly) before I had a saw. when you'd go to build something you's never have the wood needed on hand. Often the hobby shop did not have the right sizes or enough of the right sizes.
I got a dremil 4 inch table saw ( they have quit making them, probably on the advise of a competent lawyer). mine has an aftermarket acurizer Kit that greatly improved the performance.
The dremil saw in under powered, but if I work slow I can get what I need when I want it. As it was mentioned a good saw is expensive ( the model ship folks like the saws that Jim Bynes (SP?) produces - He also makes a presision thickness sander.
If you are going to scratchbuild with wood, the cost of good equipment, while high, will rapidly pay for itself. When I start a project I like to try to estimate the amount of each dimension of wood I will use, and cut more than enough.
Invariably, weather you are cutting your own wood or buying it, you misjudge, and run out of a critical size of lumber. If you don't have a saw, this sends you to the hobby store, sometimes to order something that won't be there for weeks.
If you own a saw you just go down to the workroom and make some dust.
If you are going to build with wood (and nothing but wood looks much like wood), like to scratchbuild, and are in this hobby to stay, few items will give you the savings and the satisfaction that owning a miniature table saw will.
If you look at Sawdust's Maple Valley lumber and mill work, and look at my Logging in Eastern Tn on the DGCC&WRR in 1928, and study other threads that don't have our names on them. Look at the use of scale lumber, and you will see that if you have a small tablesaw, scale lumber is almost free.
Being almost free, we are much more likely to use lots of it, and it makes it easy and cheap to build whatever we want to. If you compare it to the cost of buying a couple limited edition super detailed craftsman kits, one or two of that will pay for a good saw, and after that it is all gravy.
and Sawdust, a little constructive criticism here. that scene needs a few more workmen, and at least three ladders.
thanks once more for sharing
Bill Nelson
Note- These things are dangerous, count your fingers before and after use, and devise stratagems to keep your fingers 3 inches from the spinning carbide.