Definitions

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License.

  • adjective Describing a building built ad hoc, with whatever materials are to hand, and often just from ground level.
  • adjective Describing a structure, e.g. a car, model or toy, built with minimal cost and at short notice, with rudimentary materials.

Etymologies

from Wiktionary, Creative Commons Attribution/Share-Alike License

As from scratch.

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Examples

  • The transceiver had been scratch-built using components obtained from a variety of sources, and designed with a single task in mind.

    Star Trek: Typhon Pact Paths of Disharmony Dayton Ward 2011

  • The transceiver had been scratch-built using components obtained from a variety of sources, and designed with a single task in mind.

    Star Trek: Typhon Pact Paths of Disharmony Dayton Ward 2011

  • Messrs. Baldwin and Harder have built 35 or so "flying towels" and act as scratch-built evangelists, teaching others how to build and fly the planes at three-hour free sessions at the Brooklyn Aerodrome.

    Recycling Takes to Air 2010

  • Miss Monster has sculpted these scratch-built steampunk animal skulls that blow me away.

    Boing Boing 2008

  • A scratch-built crew from the 29th Group was downed on May 5, and met horrid ends.

    Whirlwind Barrett Tillman 2010

  • Mr. Harder, who is an audio engineer, and Mr. Baldwin have developed a side avocation of teaching fellow New Yorkers to build and fly these "scratch-built" airplanes, contraptions they call "flying towels" or "paper airplanes on steroids."

    Paper Airplanes on Steroids 2010

  • A scratch-built crew from the 29th Group was downed on May 5, and met horrid ends.

    Whirlwind Barrett Tillman 2010

  • The plan is to cut the thing out of cardboard, reinforced with wire and coated with a layer of epoxy resin to stiffen it, with straps cannibalized from two women's watches to secure it; the round thing will probably be scratch-built with added blinkies.

    Barbarella costume construction slowly beginning frankwu 2007

  • This 13-foot scratch-built beauty features a carbon-fiber fuselage that houses four flight computers, four parachutes that will be deployed by compressed carbon dioxide canisters, and four solid-fuel motors that pack more thrust than a cruise missile.

    Pyro Geek Hobbyists Experiment With Homebrew Rockets By Preston Lerner 2008

  • My brother-in-law, Tony Harwood is a keen modeller and has scratch-built numerous steampunk models and his site is definitely worth taking a look at.

    Steampunk Bob Lock 2008

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