I have a wood chip car and was wondering about a good way to make a good wood chip load. I probably could find a bunch of wood chips and drop them in but they could wind up all over the place. Plus they would have to be rather fine to be scale. I was wondering what I could use to “solidify” the load. Kind of how a coal load is in a tender. I thought about lining the car with plastic wrap, then filing it with chips and then doing some kind of process to solidfy it. I would then have a load I could take in and out. So what kind of ideas do you have to create such a load?
Just a thought. Can you take one of the foam based coal loads and glue sawdust on top to cover the coal. I guess you could make a foam insert of your own.
I think you’re correct in using a fine grade of wood sawdust to simulate scale wood chips. Plus a certain amount of larger grade sawdust and some splinters mixed in would make the load quite realistic. Cut out a block of styrofoam to fit the cars interior then shape the top to aproximate the top of the loads contour. Sprinkle the sawdust mixture over the styrofoam top, soak with “wet” water then bond with the usual matt medium/water mixture commonly used for ballasting. For added “fluffy” texture sprinkle more sawdust over this and let dry. Blow off the excess sawdust and drop in the load. Hope this helps.
Try to get someone to save you the chips that a nicely sharpened chainsaw makes !! Then do the process Roy & Bruce mentioned to secure your load ! I think they may be the right size !!