Size scaling

I need some help with the scales! I'm not a numbers person, to the point of hilarity, so I'm struggling to grasp them. I know the basic concept of ratios . . . but only barely.

I know Breyer stablemates are 1:32 and traditionals are 1:9, but I only know that because I've heard it before while collecting, and not necessarily because I have any real idea what it conveys about the model, except that 1 is the real size of the animal and the closer the numbers are to each other, the larger the model is. You see, very very basic.

What does the ratio really mean? What are the standard ratios for models, and is there a good visual somewhere? What is the ratio of something like this, which is the size I have been gravitating to most (about an inch and a half tall):


Also, is that scale very different from this one, even though the models themselves are the same height, since a horse is much larger than a cat.


Thank you!

1:32 means that the model is 32 times smaller than the real animal. Breyer stablemate horses usually have a shoulder height of about 5 cm and real horses are about 32 times larger, around 160 cm.

I haven't tried to work out the exact size of your cat and horse, but if, let's say, the cat has a shoulder height of 2.5 cm and a real cat has a height of about 30 cm, then the scale is 2.5:30 (2.5 divided by 30) or 1:12. Perhaps the horse is around 3 cm and a real horse is 160 cm. Then the scale is 3:160 = 1:53.

Most brands don't have standard scales. They tend to make larger animals in smaller scales and smaller animals in larger scales. An exception was Britains, which made animals (and many other things) in 1:32 scale, so their products go well with the Breyer horses.

Thanks so much!! That makes sense. Thanks for telling me the math, too, as I would not have figured that out alone. So people who are striving to collect things in scale with each other are mixing brands and doing the math themselves more than relying on any standardized system. It makes sense that companies would have to make larger animals proportionately smaller, since making a cat proportionate to that horse would mean a very small cat indeed.

For model horses:
1/9 is Traditional scale (the biggest),
1/12 is Classic scale, the same scale is used for dollhouses,
1/20 or 1/24 is a scale of Schleich horses (CollectA are about 1/18),
Stablemates are around 1/32 and micro-minis are 1/64

It's true what Roger said about modern toy brands not really keeping their animals in relative proportions to each other. One of the exceptions was Southlands Replicas, they used a 1/16 scale for all their animals except horses.

Ana wrote:

One of the exceptions was Southlands Replicas, they used a 1/16 scale for all their animals except horses.

Anna, are the Southlands horses 1/20?

Thank you for that chart, Ana!

There are websites where you can put in measurements and figure out the scale, if you ever want to check your math. For example: http://fortressfigures.com/kcontos/scalecalc.html
I track my collection in a spreadsheet, so I just have a column that calculates the scale whenever I put in measurements for the animal and the model.

halichoeres wrote:

There are websites where you can put in measurements and figure out the scale, if you ever want to check your math. For example: http://fortressfigures.com/kcontos/scalecalc.html
I track my collection in a spreadsheet, so I just have a column that calculates the scale whenever I put in measurements for the animal and the model.

Ah, thank you! The less math I have to do, the better, in every case!

I was always told 1:12 scale was one inch of model equals one foot of real horse/building/person etc.

Which makes perfect sense if you think in imperial measurements like me, but probably doesn't help at all if you're from a country or era where you think in metric!

Aah . . . that makes sense. 1 inch to 12 inch. When I think in numbers at all, it's definitely imperial, so maybe I can remember that.

1:32 scale was originally also based on imperial measures: 3⁄8 inch represents 1 foot.

halichoeres wrote:

There are websites where you can put in measurements and figure out the scale, if you ever want to check your math. For example: http://fortressfigures.com/kcontos/scalecalc.html
I track my collection in a spreadsheet, so I just have a column that calculates the scale whenever I put in measurements for the animal and the model.

Thank you for the link :) As I´m not a math expert, could you tell which formula you use? :)

Duck-Anch-Amun wrote:

halichoeres wrote:

There are websites where you can put in measurements and figure out the scale, if you ever want to check your math. For example: http://fortressfigures.com/kcontos/scalecalc.html
I track my collection in a spreadsheet, so I just have a column that calculates the scale whenever I put in measurements for the animal and the model.

Thank you for the link :) As I´m not a math expert, could you tell which formula you use? :)

On the site? Well, to be honest I don't actually use it myself; the spreadsheet I use just calculates the scales from the lengths I enter. On the website, it would depend on what exactly you're working with.

In a spreadsheet, it's fairly simple. If I have the length of the animal in column D, and the length of the model in column E, then column F is just the value in column D divided by the value in column E. In this example, Pleurocystites is in row 2, so the formula is =D2/E2. That's it!

spacelab wrote:

Ana wrote:

One of the exceptions was Southlands Replicas, they used a 1/16 scale for all their animals except horses.

Anna, are the Southlands horses 1/20?

Sorry for very bad picture but here is a Southlands Brumby with the Schleich Sorraia.
For pictures that give justice to the Southlands horses, you have this topic for instance.
For Sorraia this fantastic review.
Southlands horses are 1:20 scale, contrarily to most of the other Southlands that are at 1/15 and the tiny platypus and echidna at 1:12.
Southlands did it well, 1/15 would result too small for animals like a platypus or an echidna so they used a scale that is quite traditional, the dollhouses scale and that is not far from their core scale. The 1:20 scale horses also allowed them to put these figures at the same scale as other popular brands.