I was sitting at my workbench last weekend and my dear wife brought me some used wood matches. Those long ones that one uses to light fireplaces with. Tip burnt and about 12" or so of unused wood.
I used one to stir some paint I was mixing and wow … that brown looks pretty good on it. These, or at least the ones I have, are 1/8" (.125) square. .125" x 87 (HO scale) = 10.8".
Anyone used this stuff for lumber before?
-Tom
Tom…
My goodness yes. I save everyone I use to start the grill. I have a retaining wall for my coal tipple made of these. I painted them black and will weather them as time goes by.
I built a wall about 20" (actual inches) and it looks great
Go for it
Rich[:)]
Shades of model railroading in its infancy when ordinary household stuff was all fair game for the modeler to use. I look long and hard at anything made of wood or plastic before throwing it away. For example, the empty spool of scotch tape looks like fabricated steel for a load if painted the appropriate colors
What that size of match is also really useful for, at least in HO, are the timbers used to support big flat car and gondola loads, such as machinery. They build up a cradle to hold the piece using these big timbers, and attach the timbers to the wood deck with big steel tie rods.
The smaller wood matches are useful too. I don;t smoke but always load up at a restaurant that has a big bin of them for smokers 
By the way craft stores sell bags of wood sticks that are about the size of a match stick, quite cheaply in fact, and someone more consistent in size.
Dave Nelson
don’t forget wooden coffee stirrers,they 're also great for all sorts of projects
So do I! Every time I unpack a new item, I look over the plastic and foam, and try to figure out if I could possibly use it. Sometimes I rely on intuition and figure that my subconscious has an idea that won’t come to the fore, so I sta***he item away.
-Crandell
Over the years I could never figure out why my wife held on to so many things. I tended to tra***he stuff - no more [tup]