I am in the process of modeling some of the tall hills and quarry in Model Railroader’s series on how to build a quarry. My question is how do I support the cardboard strips? The cliffs will be about 16" high and come out at their base no more than 5". Any thoughts, ideas, advice and photos or drawing would be greatly appreciated. Just getting back into the hobby after an absence of 25years.
How vertical will your strips be? If they are fairly straight up and down, I’d think hot glue or staples would hold your web in place. If you have more of a slope and don’t feel the strips and plaster cloth (or whatever shell cover you use), will be strong enough to hold the weight, you can ball up newspapers underneath the strips.
You could also use some extruded foam in place of the strips, your castings can be attached directly to it. You can also carve the foam, apply plaster and carve it or use broken pieces of ceiling tile for your rock faces.
Good luck,
Richard
Several layers of plaster gauze over the cardboard strips should be strong enough to support the castings even at a slope. Plaster is remarkably strong, and don’t forget that as long as the castings are secured at top and bottom, they will support their own weight, even at a slight angle.
Having built some steep embankments or cliffs on my last layout, I would recommend you measure things out and build the ‘cliff’ on its side and lay it into position when the time comes. I don’t mean the finished and scenicked cliff, I mean the strips, cloth, more goop, and some rocks added so that you can lift the cliff, maybe in two parts, and set it in place for later completion.
I advise this because building vertical scenery with plaster-like compounds is very difficult. The wet stuff likes to sag. The less steep the face, the less sagging and troubles.
Crandell
I don’t use the cardboard strips and plaster as I don’t like the mess. I use styrene foam which you can stack as high as you need and cover surface and joints with Sculptamold or other rock castings. For your particular application foam works really great and fits flat against your backdrop without fear of sagging, etc.
What will the vertical cut or slope be attached to at the top? Is this to run near vertical and to or close to the backdrop? If the “hill” is to be mostly free standing and side/s will have the rather tall cut, there are various methods to accomplish this. I needed a near vertical base to attach about 10 ft of Cripplebush rubber rock to extend almost 14" . I found it better to use a strip of 1/2" plywood to secure/ glue the molds to. This method will also work for other castings as well. The remainder of the rather large hill is done in cardboard strips. You also could use support ribs of sort from 1xs or cut plywood. There is another thread “Cardboard strips or screen” now on Pg2 that also shows pics of this large cut… I opted to use the “rubber rocks” as attempting to blend all the individual plaster castings and have the shale strata/ detail look right would have been somewhat difficult.
The 1/2" plywood is barely visible @ the already installed rubber rock feature. The rather stiff cardboard strips are self supporting and in only a couple spots were some temparary 1x2 strapping supports needed. These were removed after hill was completed.