On my new HO layout I am uilding I have a couple ov tunnels (one short and one long) I would like some advice on what to use and how to “finish” the inside of at least the short ( about 8’') one. Also I was visiting with Bud Weiser the other night and happened to notice the pile of sawdust under my table saw & thought in might make groung cover, I painted a small piece of board with Elmers glue, sprinkled on the sawdust, let it dry, then airbrushed on a shade of green paint. Looks like it would work foe medium groung cover. Has anyone ever used this method? Thanks for all the support from everyone. Mike[:)]
Before ground foam, sawdust was I beleive the main way that modellers used to simulate ground cover.
As for your tunnels there are several things you can do. It really depends on how you want your tunnel to be finnished. Is it lined with block, concrete, rough cut stone? How visible will it be, in other words, how detailed does it really need to be. For a quick and easy cut rock look you can make a mold out of heavy foil and pour plaster. Cheap acrylic paints to cover it and you can make a rock face that will pass inspection in a tunnel. My tunnel inside is not very visible so I just used some scrap expanded (white bead type) foam and painted it gray and made it very sooty looking.
If you want the inside to look like cut rock, there are a couple of methods - you could crumple up a piece of aluminum foil, shape it with a template, spray paint it with a couple of coats of grey enamel and dullcoat lacquer, and then put it in place. Or you could shape a piece of screen and cover the interior with hardshell. If you wanted a wood lining, you could build one with sheet balsa and then apply scale timbers and lagging to the interior, plunk it down, build a timber portal, and build the mountain above it. This link (http://www.narrowgauge.org/alpine-tunnel/html/auto_tour.html) has a good picture of an 1880s-era timbered tunnel interior.
I’ll leave gunite and concrete to the modern modelers…
I endorse the aluminum foil method. It’s easy and reprodicible. One thing’s for sure. nobody’s going to have the exact same interior as you!
Jeffrey Wimberly, Leesville, La.
I’m out of my mind, but leave a message anyway.
[soapbox]
Back to the Future!! Sounds like you just did some 1950’s scenicking with tinted sawdust. That used to be common, take sawdust stain or dye it green and use as grass. [:O]
WS makes a nice Tunnel liner mold. They recomend their light hydrocal, which works, but I use P of P because it is less expensive.
I mix sawdust with lightweight dry wall mud and latex paint for a version of Goop.
I use ground foam because it looks better to me than sawdust and does not cost all that much more and you don’t have to paint it.