has anyone on this site used saw dust for scenery or can it be used for scenery. i thinking it can as being the stuff you buy from the store is similar to it. all you have to do is paint it the color you would like it to be and you have the stuff that you can buy in the store.
H i Reggie ! Yes, & years ago I got some from a fellow for grass, & all he did was put it in a nylon stocking or such & dyed it green with Ritt dye. That should be a pretty inexpensive way to go !
Thanks, John
never used sawdust but have used sand mixed with white glue for good results. you maybe on to something . mark
Used the rit dye trick on sawdust for a couple of model dioramma’s. Ony caveat it is takes a while to dry.
thanks i was wondering whether it has been used or can be used and you have yet fail to let me down again with fast and reliable answers to my questions. where can i get the dye to dye it green and are there different colors/shades of dye that way i can have that effect of realism as if you are traveling and looking at the grass it is not all the same color. if you know what i mean.
I think you can get Rit Dye at most super markets. Now to get different shades, you would have to experiment with maybe, the amount of dye you use or add another color of dye to get what you need. Probably also have to experiment with nylon stockings or some sort of little metal container with some small holes in it ! Could be a fun project !
Thanks, John
well im going to try that once i get my tracks running and screwee down now when that happens who knows. because i didnt even do any work today at all either. as i walked up there looked in the room and said ahh i got all my life i’ll wait a few more days, because i think i wore myself out by staying up till 4:00am the day i got my track plan laying track. is there a such thing as “track sick” because if there is i think that i am. is there any type of medicine that can help with this type of sickness. since i got this idea of the saw dust in my mind the past couple of days i have went to these construction sites and collected 2 wal-mart bags full of sawdust. plus you know the siding they put up on the house then they cut it to place the windows in there well the stuff that falls to the ground as they cut it seemed like it would be great to make the bushes and trees with just my opinion as i collected a bag full of that but i will first experiment with a couple to see how it looks.
I use sawdust for layout landscaping, but make it specificly for that purpose.
Different blades will make different “grits” of sawdust. Rip blades produce a courser dust, crosscut blades a finer dust. A DADO blade makes course “chips” that look like undergrowth and brush. A cut across the grain produces a fine dust. A cut with the grain makes course chips.
I clean out the underside of the saw, cover the hole and turn off the dust collector. My saw has a rubber snap-on cover that closes the motor opening.
I use scrap 2x4 stock. Use pieces at least a couple of feet long for easier, safer working. Set the blade depth so it doesn’t go all the way through the stock so more sawdust goes inside the saw. Deeper rip cuts make larger chips. Saw enough for a bag full, recover it from underneath, then change the blade for the next grit.
I make up a mixture of sawdust and yellow wood glue well thinned with water. Apply it to the layout with fingers, putty knife, or what ever works. Finer dust can be sprinkled dry over courser dust for different effects. It takes a while to dry.
I then spray it with a green base paint, adding highlights in green and brown shades with artist brushes or an airbrush.
John Kerklo
www.Three-Rail.com
Using sawdust is something that I’ve always known about but quite never figured out, in my mind that is, how to dye it.
I like the hosiery tip. Now all I gotta do is find me a girl willing to give me hers (hmmmm).
John, great lesson you just gave there!!!
QUESTION: Doesn’t it all stick together when it dries though? That’s the part that I haven’t be able to get past. Even if you spread it out to dry it would seem that it will still clump together.
Can someone offer some comments on that aspect of doing it?
thanks - walt
Walt, I’ll be right back with a picture !! I still have 1 bottle of the stuff left !!
Thanks, John
Well, here it is, kind of hard to get a good picture for me, but I think you can make it out. I hope !!
I put a ruler next to it.
Here’s another one.
I know when I glued it down a long time ago, then went to get it up, I really had to scrape !
Thanks, John
You used to be able to dry it out on newspaper. I don’t think that will work anymore as the newprint is now water soluable. I spread it out on cheap paper towels that were lining the el-cheapo disposable aluminum cooking things (you find it in housewares, disposable cooking sheets). Get the water hot enough to disolve the dye, wear good rubber gloves, and mix colors or mix the dired batches. Don’t try to use mdf as a source of sawdust, the resin based glue used to glue that stuff together will probably interfere with the dye. The stocking trick is probably the best way to keep the sawdust from floating away and makes it easier to fish out of the pot. I use old cat litter tubs for “science projects” like this. Good luck!
Ritt dye and sawdust was the standard method of making grass for decades until Woodland Scenics became popular. Older scenery how-to books describe how to do it. Lots of good methods posted here. Ritt dye comes in a variety of greens and tans. It is non advesive and will not stick the sawdust together. I like to sprinkle it on and spray it with a 50/50 mix of matte medium and water. Matte medium is an adhesive and dries flat. White glue/water mix leaves a sheen.
A recipe from a tinplate site:
Walt, I guess I wasn’t clear.
The sawdust mixed with glue goes directly to the layout. A courser mix fills crack in the foam landscaping or provides terrain and underbrush. Finer mixes are spread thin for fields.
For smooth lawns, paint the thin glue on first, then coat with the finer sawdust. Vacuum any excess, then paint. I also use the commercial sawdust in places that are already painted.
I haven’t tried using the Ritt Dye to color first.
John Kerklo
www.Three-Rail.com
I have used sawdust as scenery ‘dust’. First I tried dying it, this was a royal pain. It clumps up, takes ages to dry and doesnt dye consistently, also you get a lot of chunks in it.
Next I tried sifting it with a flour sieve to get a consistent size and lose the lumps. This was also a royal pain because it took forever and I still had the dying and drying to deal with plus dust gets everywhere.
The most sucessful scheme, for me, was to apply it to the still wet scenery as a way of absorbing the extra glue and finally to use spray paints to simply color the surface. This works well and the only snag is if you knock it, it ‘scars’ and reveals the plain sawdust under the thin skin of paint. However this way of painting sawdust would only work if you made your contours the way I did, which isn’t a popular method I suspect.
I have tried them all, wooden blocks, plaster impregnated cloth, chicken wire, screening etc but what I prefer is to use cardboard and paper, newspaper or paper towel.
VERY IMPORTANT! FIRST MASK YOUR RAILS WITH PLASTIC SHEET! USE MASKING TAPE TO ENSURE NOTHING CREEPS UNDER THE PLASTIC!
I make up cardboard verticals spaced about six inches apart. These are the basic contours. I hot glue these down fairly sloppily because they only have to provide temporary support for the following hard shell. Next I connect them with criss cross strips of thin card like cereal boxes and shirt stiffeners hotglued to the verticals. Finally I take sheets of newspaper torn into fairly big pieces, about hand sized, then quickly dip them into a mixture of white glue and water (about 80/20) and lay them over the criss crossing until the subframes and gaps are all covered. Don’t put too much on, keep it as thin as you can, leave it for about 24 hours and at summer temps it should be dry. You now have a fairly ugly looking thin shell which is surprisingly strong already!
The way the wet newsprint sags and lays is usually more 'realistic
Thor, what you describe is strikingly similar to what I did as a kid, about 50 years ago. Mine was even simpler: I made sandwiches of flour-water glue and two sheets of newspaper, then draped them over a temporary assemblage of boxes and other objects with the rough shape that I wanted. When it dried, I replaced the junk underneath with an occasional wood-stick prop where it wanted to sag. As you say, it formed all sorts of natural-looking wrinkles and bumps as it dried.
If I ever get to the point of putting scenery on my present layout, the first thing I’ll try is that same technique.
Thanks for the replies back. Appreciated.
- walt
I agree about what was said about the different types of sawdust for different areas ex: a lawn vs. a field. Reggie keep the different types seperate. I like to use foam board that way you can take it outside easier and spray it with paint or spray adhesive then sprinkle the sawdust on it and it will stick shake off the excess and do as many coats as you want. You can do it in sections assemble the foam board with the hot glue on your platform then pull the sections apart and take them outside. Spray whatever you want (foamboard, cardboard, plaster) then put the sawdust on and it will stick. when you spray your final coat of paint use green straight down on top of it for the grassy/weedy look and spray from the side of your creation (verticall edges) brown or grey for the rocky areas that may have been dynomited for your rail line to pass though.
I mentioned on the coffepot that I use golden rod its a weed that keeps its weedy foolage and spray paint it and add the sawdust while its wet it acts like glue or use spray adhesive from “3M” that works great if you cant get cheap spray paint. then spray it the shade you want. and stuff it into the foam board or drill a hole in your platform and put it in there you can do a whole forest of them side by side for the cost of the spray paint![soapbox]
Have not used sawdust for scenery, have used saw dust inside quad hoppers and put a cardboard cover over and add some small rocks for detail. Looks like the real thing when pulling a load of coal hoppers.
Lee