I ran out of of WS’s scenic cement last night, just as i was ballasting a section of track. (i know what you’re thinking “why not go the your local hobby shop and buy more?” kinda hard at only 14). Now i can’t do any thing till thanksgiving weekend, when we’ll go on vacation to Traverse City, which has a hobby shop right near the hotel. But even so, i had never realized how depent we all are on such simple things, like cyanocrylate adhesive, or scenic cement, or that last piece of wood to complete your award winning structure, things like that. Little things that make a one evening prokect into a 2 week odyssey.
Maybe its just bad hindsight for not buying more when we had the chance…
WS Scenic Cement is Elmers white glue and water. I mix it 50-50 (my recipe anyway) Go down to the local store and pick some up. It will work great for your ballast.
I hear ya, I cleaned out the “stock room” the other day and found things I forgot I purchased, of course only after returning from the LHS with the same items in hand. [D)]
The Woodland Scenic stuff is not diluted white glue. It is diluted Matte Medium. Matte Medium does not dry ‘rock hard’ and does not transmit noise. You can buy Matte Medium at most craft stores - just dilute it 50/50 and you should have something like the Woodland Scenics stuff.
Woodland Scenics ‘Scenic Cement’ is one of the better values. They sell 16 oz of the diluted material for $7. 8 oz of Galleria Matte Medium from Hobby Lobby is $9(diluted you get 16 oz). Walthers currently has W/S Scenic Cement on sale for $5.98.
However, you can still use the diluted white and yellow carpenter’s glue if you wish. It is considerably less costly, and works well…very well. I would agree that, in the right circumstances, it can exacerbate noise transmission, and if the noise is of the unwanted kind…[xx(] It doesn’t seem to be that way on my layouts where all I have every used is the diluted carpenter’s glue. I had quantities of it for gluing spline roadbed and making L-girders.
Funny how that happens. I was going through some storage boxes the other day. Among the forgotten items I found were:
Enough unused Kadee #5 coupler packs to stock a small hobby shop.
Two packs of A-line moldable lead that are old enough to have a price tag less than half of what A-line wants now.
Two unbuilt Gorre & Daphetid commemorative cars from around 1982.
An 80 watt soldering iron. At least it had been used and wasn’t in its original packing. I have two others, a 25 watter and a 40 watter.
Enough solder and flux to last a lifetime.
Two Model Power (made by Roco) E7’s. Man those things are heavy.
A Harold Mellor 415/416 USRA converter kit for the Mantua Mikado complete with instructions.
Mellor rear detail set for Mantua Pacific/Mikado.
9 Six sets of Mantua 61 1/2 "drivers, four flanged and two blind.
Two 12 packs of Kadee 36" wheel sets and one 12 pack of 33" wheels.
A Western Pacific Athearn F7 that I had bought in the 80’s at the Portola Railroad Museum.
A 25th Anniversary boxcar from the Orange Empire Railway Museum in Perris, CA. That was 1983. I’ve now had the car longer than the museum had existed when I bought the kit.
I note a slight vinegar-y smell to Woodland Scenic’s scenic cement so there might be more to their “secret formula” than we know. But Jim’s posting is a good reminder that in many instances a craft store, art supply store, “variety store” type of place can save the day when there is no hobby shop near or where we can not (or no longer) drive distances. In fact sometimes they have some “why didn’t I think of that” stuff when you least expect it. For example a tortillion is a tightly rolled paper stump, shaped rather like a pencil, used to blend drawings but very useful for weathering and for rubbing at lettering you want to remove because it is lightly abrasive (as is all paper)
The point is, he ran out, his hobby shop is far away, but he can run to almost any store and pickup some white glue, mix it with tap water, and his ballast will never move again. [sigh]
Jim, thanks for the facts - good to know. I was wondering what the difference was.
I prefer WS cement, but have used diluted Elmer’s for ballasting and while there’s a slight difference, it’s not unusable at all. I’ll stick with the WS. It does seem to take longer to dry though … hummm
One thing I always do is over stock - budget and the Mrs permitting. A lot of stuff doesn’t go bad, and I really don’t like “needing one more piece” or “a little more paint or glue”, etc. If I know I’ll need 12 Lt hand switches for a pike, I’ll buy 13 - just in case (yeah, and that’s coming from the cheap guy … )
You can always use Modge Podge, a water based craft adhesive that is available in any store that sells art supplies. I’ve found it to be true that there are a lot more arts and crafts stores than model railroad hobby shops, so look and think outside the box. For generations modelers have been doing well by making their own stuff or using something commercialy available at the local hardware store for a purpose for which it was not intended.
Running out of something or not having X component to do the job is just something that we all have to learn to live with. Whether its model railroading or fixing an aircraft carrier, projects are often held up for lack of the correct part to finish the job, and usualy its something simple like a 5 cent rubber O ring.
That never been so true. Like i said earlier about the scale wood, i was talking out of experience. I have a scratch built narrow guage reefer that i can’t finish (yet, at least not till our family vacation) since i ran out of scale 1x10’s half way through the completion of the roof. So know it looks kinda funny with only half teh roof covered.
When I re-entered the hobby 10 years ago, I went to my LHS, saw the WS display, and said, “Cool, I need some of this, and some of this, and some of this…” and so on, and so on. I still like their scenery materials, but I’ve since discovered that there are cheaper alternatives to many of their products.
We’ve already talked about diluted white glue or matte medium for adhesive. Artists gloss medium or gloss gel work extremely well for water, as do many epoxy resin products which are available at craft stores.
So, see if you can hitch a ride to a Michaels or other craft store and look at the products available. Odds are, you can use them quite effectively on your layout in place of things which are specifically branded for model railroading.
If all else fails, search the forums or post a new thread and ask if there are alternatives. You’ll probably get more answers than you can possibly use.
There aren’t any real art&craft stores in my area, but there’s a whopping great Bunnings Warehouse (Home Depot) just down the road - would any of those caulk/sealant things be usable as substitute water?
Depends on what kind of water you’re modelling. Still water would be hard to achieve with a caulk or sealant, but a friend of mine uses clear silicone caulk to model flowing water. I’ve also seen people at train shows who use garden variety polyurethane finish for still water.
Personally, I’m a fan of artists gloss gel and medium. Here in the States, you can get those at WalMart. There’s gotta be some similar big discount store Down Under that sells art supplies.
You can use an underlayer of epoxy. I found a finishing quality epoxy in the paints section of my local hardware store. For a top layer with ripples, I spread gel gloss medium thinly and then stippled it with the flat side of a foam brush.
For more turbid water, you can add a pinch of plaster of paris, and you probably should tint the medium or the epoxy with a single drop of acrylic craft paint. For batches that you will pour less than a cup or so, I would use half a drop of the paint, and a 1/2 tsp of the plaster powder.
Experimenting, or practicing, is always a good idea, too.
Here is how my water turned out. It actually looks much greener standing over it, but for photographs with reflected light, it looks very much like the South Thompson River in British Columbia. I just guessed at the tint and amount of plaster powder, but it seems to have worked out well for imaging it.
I’m just building the station for my Silver Creek. And last night I detected I have only one Grandt Line door. And my station needs two!
I can only get this by mail. A mail order for one Grandt Line piece is out of order. You have always enough stuff to buy, but do you have the money for a bigger order?
