Evergreen Sheets

[MisterBeasley]

This is a low timber wall I made some time ago:

I used 1/8-inch square balsa wood strips. I used a Dremel to notch the long strips every 7/8 inch, or about every 8 scale feet. Then I stained them with white wood stain to which I added India Ink to get the right almost-black color. After they were dry, I assembled them layer by layer, touched up the cut edges, and glued them in place on the pink foam.

[NSWRDivision80061]

You all are helping me and i greatly appreciate this. Seeing how im only a freshmen in highschool, i dont have much money and cant drive myself to the LHS everyday. Im thinking the matchstick approach is worth a try, while i wait for my strip styrene to come in. Has anyone tried this approach?

[dehusman]

i I prefer - as do engineers - to contain or confine i.e. restrain an embankment.

If you have a Menards or Home Depot or Lowes in your area you might want to look at their ads this spring, I’ll bet at least one of them has a sale on retaining wall blocks, but I bet none of them will have a sale on restraining wall blocks. Here are some other references:

http://www.keystonewalls.com/

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Retaining_wall

http://www.retainingwall.com/

http://www.landscapenetwork.com/topics/rwalls.shtml

http://www.allanblock.com/

OBTW, I have a degree in civil engineering. You know, the engineers who design retaining walls. 8-).

Just to be fair I did search for “restraining walls” but after looking at 2 pages of search results I couldn’t find one where “restraining walls” was used as a noun.

Dave H.

[tatans]

I build retaining walls and loading ramps all the time, I use match sticks from the craft store, they are about the right dimensions as an HO scale rr tie, and you just cut them in half for proper length, since rr’s use what they have on hand, a wall of used ties is pretty common.

I cut the sticks to the desired length,build the wall, and then paint it…put it in place and I’m done. Usually takes a few hours for a fair size wall.

Can you actually buy matchsticks? are they called that? what are they used for in a hobby? you mentioned they are @ the size of a tie, that would be very handy.

[NSWRDivision80061]

I build retaining walls and loading ramps all the time, I use match sticks from the craft store, they are about the right dimensions as an HO scale rr tie, and you just cut them in half for proper length, since rr’s use what they have on hand, a wall of used ties is pretty common.

I cut the sticks to the desired length,build the wall, and then paint it…put it in place and I’m done. Usually takes a few hours for a fair size wall.

Can you actually buy matchsticks? are they called that? what are they used for in a hobby? you mentioned they are @ the size of a tie, that would be very handy.

I just take the time to cut each match head off. Just a regular strike match out of a match book.

[R_T_POTEET]

. . . . . . . . . . the engineers who design retaining walls . . . . . . . . . . .

And here, up until today, I thought that civil engineers were the guys who designed pot holes!

I was too stupid to design pot holes so I had to settle for a degree in the crème de la crème of academia, History. It appears as if my education was a complete waste of money and I hereby avow to retain myself at all times in the future!

RETAININLY/RESTRAININGLY yours

R. T. POTEET

[JON168]

The matchstick retaining walls look great, they look just like timber walls you find along every railroad.

The craft stores sell packs of square sticks, they don’t call them matchsticks it’s just ‘‘craft wood’’.

Cut to the proper length they make great railroad ties, stack them, lay them along your right of way, put a load on a flat car…they aren’t expensive and theres no need to take the time to cut the heads of matches.

I buy them from AC Moore or Michaels, they are in the craft wood section along with popscicle sticks and square flat wood pieces.

[wm3798]

You’re working in N scale, right? Match sticks will be way oversize. Remember, little N scale workmen had to handle those timbers and do the construction! There’s also not much lumber sold that’s 2’ square!

Just a thought…

Lee