I just finished a very large (12ft) cut for my club layout. The massive size of the cut and it’s height of 14" really made the use of individual plaster castings difficult. The cut is located at the isle and is in your face. The smaller molds vary too much in rock type, texture and strata to look uniform for the spot. The patchwork quilt look couldn’t be disguised be normal scenery methods. I decided to use the rubber rocks from Cripplebush Valley Models www.cripplebush.net/, The extremely large molded rubber rocks (Santa Fe Canyon) allowed cutting and fitting of the near vertical cut to be done with 6 pieces and in a very short amount of time. The only other acceptable method would have been carving the hydrocal (a real lenthy PITA) for the look desired. I was able to finish the cut in a few working sessions, just in time for display for our show this weekend.
The product was used and reveiwed in the Feb 07 Model Railroader pg 42. These are very realistic and easy to use. They are fairly costly though, may not be in everyones budget.
Well, I’ll be up in the still-frozen (hopefully) north this weekend skiing, so I can’t make the round of shows. Thanks for the invitation, though, and maybe I’ll catch you in the fall.
Now you tell me. I’ve spent the last week, piecing together a 3 foot long cut using various WS molds using plaster of paris. It took a considerable amount of work and mess to fit them together and then blend them to look fairly realistic. I’d have gladly given those rubber rocks a try. I’ll keep them in mind for the next cut I make.
You may have missed the link: www.cripplebush.net/ , These are not for everyone, especially when you find out that they don’t come cheap. I find for those real critical spots spending the extra cost is worth it, otherwise if the area is background or can be disguised by other scenery methods, I still continue w/ castings.
Hehhehe… yeah I saw the link!!! I was looking for other brands; I just saw an add for cripple brush in RMC last week. No biggie… 80% of my rock is casted and done. Although I may complain, I sort of enjoy casting the rocks. Thanks for posting… on layout #2 I will DEFINITELY use some of these. Post pix!!!