Here’s one of my favorite tools – my old adjustable rotary punch. One of the more difficult things to make from paper, especially card stock and mat board, are small disks. With the rotary punch making small rounds is a snap. You have six sizes of cuts from 2mm to 4.5mm. I found the 3.5mm punch perfect for making N scale 55 gallon drums for instance (4-3.5mm mat board disks makes a standard 24″ wide by 36″ tall drum). It is also handy for making vents, chimneys, post and other round items. We don’t like to make use of specialized tools in our kits as we want our downloadable models to be accessible to all modelers, but a rotary punch can be a very handy addition to your tool kit and we’ll be making use of this in some of our kits. If you don’t have a rotary punch, you can find one for between $10-$20 at craft and hobby stores.
If you can’t locate a rotary punch you can still make small rounds out of card stocks by making small cuts using a razor blade. Tedious for sure, but it works in the end.