Preparing to put up an around the room shelf. I know a lot of people (myself included) use 2" foam over 1/2" plywood for a layout base. I am wondering if anyone has used 2" foam without something underneath it?
Most of the walls have 16" centered studs to which I will attach a bracket. Each bracket will have a length of 1x3 for the foam to set on and be glued to.
I know the stuff is quite strong and have plenty of scrap for landscape changes. Just wondering if anyone has ha success or failure using just foam.
The layout will be at least 40" off the floor, so I won’t be likely to be sitting on it.
I framed my 4 x 8’, 2" extrude foam base with 1 x 3 and supported the foam underneath with four (4) 1 x 3 wood slats laid flat - 24" on center - and perpendicular to the long side. The foam was well supported so I had no issues at all with that configuration.
I put 1/8" luan plywood under my 2" foam I thought I might use tortoises, but I have not. Still it’s useful for attaching buck voltage regulators and terminal strips.
I’m building a WS Modu rail lookalike. It’s not the foam but what holds it up that matters. I’m using pilaster type double track cantilever shelf supports like this:
very robust, 2" thick foam is overkill. It’s the total design of the shelf sections that matters. WS creates a box section by completing the top with hardshell plaster cloth. Foam is not very rigid but making a box section out of foam and plaster cloth is very rigid.
1/2" foam is strong enough if you use it to make a box section. WS uses 1/2" thick bead styrofoam as the basic structure. Bead styrofoam is much weaker than extruded but WS stuff is very accurately moulded for thicknes unlike standard extruded stuff which varies in thickness a fair bit at 1/87 scale. I’m using standard Dow blue 1/2" extruded styrofoam which is close enough to accurate to work with the WS foam products. The end result is light, very light.
I’m using WS profile boards to add rigidity. These are effectively 1" thick but grooved. It’s easy to laminate lengthwise using the included joiner pieces or fabricating your own from scraps of profile board. You can easily dovetail the corners for strength. Using 1/2" extruded styrofoam ls even stronger and I’m using standard woodworking designs to add rigidity. Fitting foam stringers and blocks under or on top of the 1/2" foam base sheets makes for very lightweight and reasonably rigid supporting structure.
WS recently partnered with Kato to create a new version of modurail. These modules appear to include strategically placed pieces of hardboard presumably to add rigidity. I’m adding hardboard fascia to each module which substantially strengthens each module lengthwise.
The loading imposed by model trains is very, very low. A heavy locomotive might weigh a pound or
I know you’ll be fine with 16 inch centers and 2 inch foam Richard. I’ll have to agree with Tom and the way he did things on his layout is plenty support. The only thing I would suggest, which you’re probably going to do already, is put a sub fascia board on your 1x tails before the finished contoured one to protect the edge.
I only used one inch foam and have bridges on four different elevations with no grade over 2%. Plenty of support for what’s up there.
The more elevations the more rigid it gets, especially when I start gluing the contours of foam to the sides of the risers.
Foam is more rigid than people give it credit for. I’ve broken fine detail on a locomotive just taking it out of the case before. I tend to be more careful these days. Let’s face it, everything on your layout is delicate so not much abuse is happening on the table top up there. It’s not like I’m going to jump up there and put my hockey skates on or anything[(-D]
I engineered the table top out of inverted quarter inch luan grid construction so it’s ultra light.
The eight inch centers I chose we’re not for support but to make things simple to string wire so they ain’t sagging all over the place. I’ve never been too keen on sloppey wire jobs even if you can’t see them. They may need to make sense when I access them one day.
Since my ridiculous idea of cantilever construction off the wall, I have re-built my benchwork on wheels, is what I should have done in the first place[:S]
Enjoy your shelf build Richard as your way good with your plans[Y]
Just build a 1x4 box and set it on the suports and glue on the 2" foam. The 1x4’s make sure there ane no sags and provide a place to attatch the facia to. Also a place to attach wires and panels and in my case throttle holders, drink holders, uncoupler pics etc.
I think this is a good point that should not be overlooked with a new layout.
I recently finished building the framework for my layout - 1/2" plywood with 1" foam in some areas on top and 1 1/2" foam on other areas. A hard surface underneath is really helpful to attach the plethora of electrical items as well as switching mechanisms that will no doubt be needed for your layout.
You and Henry’s point makes perfect sense to me Charlie. I may just have to slide an 1/8" sheet in between the foam and the frame. The foam is still sitting loose on top as of yet.
I gotta tell ya, in all my years I have never seen 1/8" luan though, only 1/4". Have I been missing something here?
I am using 2" pink foam on 1"x3" grids. I have added a layer of 1/4" luan to the bottom of the foam. In my case I will be using Tortoises. The luan will make mounting them and all the other electrical stuff easy.
When I built my layout some commented that i didn’t need anything under the foam. and while it is true you can glue a tortoise to the underside of the foam, if you start carving away foam to create negative elevation, i.e, a river a gulch, a canyon, you need something under the foam.
Ken Patterson uses at least 2 layers of 2" foam, sometime 3. I have an area of 5" foam. It is not easy nor clean to create a grade. Patterson is OK with using an electric chain saw to sculpt his foam. I am not.
My 1/8" luan has terminal strips and buck voltage regulators screwed into it. It’s adequate for that purpose.
Home Depot says they have 1/8" Luan but they say the actual spec is just over .109 " which would probably be 3mm nominal. It is also made in bendable form.
Nothing in this hobby takes more punishment than a portable layout module. I built all five of mine with 2 inch foam with a 1x4 frame. Most of our train shows were in the winter. And sometimes the modules would stay under the cover of the truck bed for weeks. Never a problem. Track, roadbed and scenery was glued down with simple white glue. My longest module is 4 feet long by 3 feet wide with only one support in the center to keep the wires from sagging.
I used 2" foam on open grid. I find working through wood okay or working through foam okay. Working through foam and a layer of wood is a pain. Fixing things to the underside of foam requires a little square of 1/4" ply glued to the right spot.
I would use spline again in a heartbeat for mainline runs. I would not put mainline runs on foam on the next layout, however for yards and/or spur lines track with or without cork on foam is fine.
Thanks for the info on the 1/8" luan Mike and Wisconsin Mike. (Good to see you back from the summer[Y])
From what I determined, …What everyone has been calling 1/8" luan here for years, I’ve been calling 1/4" for years. I do believe they are one and the same as I put a tape measure on mine for the first time and it is 3/16" as Mike pointed out.
I don’t think anyone is wrong with the thickness they call it. It depends on which way you look at it. Rounded up or rounded down.
Kinda like some simple math that has somewhat baffled me a little bit. If you increase the thickness of something by 50% it is 50% more. If you take that added thickness back off it is 33% less. Things that make you go hmmm[(-D]
Gluing a small piece of quarter inch plywood to the underside of the foam where you need to put something like a tortoise is what I was planning to do Brent. I don’t see why that wouldn’t work?
I would have to agree with you, I don’t like foam laminated to plywood. Fishing something through foam with a plywood backer, it always seems to get stuck at the plywood as the wood splinters from the drill bit and foam particles restrict it from going through.
Your spline grades look great. The picture a little blurry on the zoom, I couldn’t tell if they were constructed with masonite, MDF or Luan.
You stated you would not use foam for a main line on a layout. I’m thinking your reasoning for that is due to vulnerability. If not, why?
TF, while I have had no issues putting my mainline on cork on foam, it just isn’t as solid as I would like it to be. It has stood the test of time after 14 years though so if anyone wants to do it I say go ahead.
I used 7-1/4" hardboard 1" strips for my spline. An $8.00 sheet of hardboard can make a lot of roadbed and I just loved building them, it was all over way too fast. I used a glue gun to put them together and then drywall screws every foot on alternating sides.
The two outer edges were beveled to simulate the tapered roadbed. Not needing cork on the spline you just cut a few pieces tapered to get the right look. Again, no cork means less money spent.
On my 4’X8’ pike I switched from a base of 5/8-inch MDFB (Medium Density Fiber Board) under a 1-inch foam base to a 1"X4" frame with cross members on 32-inch centers and a stringer down the center.
The MDFB was extremely heavy and provided no rigidity on its own, as my pike sits on top of the bed in the computer-/spare bed-/train-room.
I used 1/4-inch plywood to support the foam base. The plywood was screwed into the 1"X4" frame.
To attach the foam to the plywood I used wood screws with finishing washers A.K.A cup washers.
These washers allow the head of the screw to bite into the foam without pulling through. I countersunk the washers flush with the foam.
