I have a structure that’s approx. 4 by 7 inches I want to place on top of a raised area, which is really not a mountain peak, something like a mesa, but with Eastern US foilage, etc. The ‘mountain’ hasn’t been built yet; I have a couple of different ways to go in that direction, and that’s the dilemma. I have plenty of corrugated cardboard that I can use to make the ‘weave’ method of mountains. Making a flat area with that stuff seems like it could be a problem. There’s also the possibility of using a foam base which makes it easy to do a flat area. However, I have no foam at hand. And I don’t need so much that I could really use up a whole sheet from the local Home Depot. No foam inserts from shipped items either.
The area is not terribly huge; it’s trapezoidal with a bottom of approx. 15 inches on one end, 3 inches on the opposite end, and 18 inches on each of the sides. I hope to go no higher than 6 inches (excluding building height). It is also in between some tracks on the 2 sides so I have no wall to anchor anything to. I have the Joe Fugate video where he uses masking tape over the cardboard web. Would something like this work? I really don’t care about showing a foundation, as I plan to cover up to that with foileage and so forth.
If you plan on using the cardboard strips covered with plaster for the main scenery, you could build a table using the foam and then cover the perimeter with the cardboard.
By this I mean a flat foam base for the structure, and support this using foam legs, or if the foam wouldn’t be sturdy enough, make the table completely out of wood. L girders for support are another option, treating the area as a piece of roadbed.
It would be easier (and cleaner) than carving a solid mountain of foam.
I did something similar to what you want to do…only my structure was a water tank. I used some wood dowels to support a plywood platform that the water tank sits on. I then proceeded with cardboard strips to form the shape of the terrain, covered the strips with masking tape and then applied plaster. See the photos:
Since you’re using cardboard strips (under plaster-impregnated fabric, I presume) why not simply incorporate a “flat” cut from the side of a packing box into your cardboard bird’s nest.
While we tend to think of cardboard as flimsy, the multi-layer corrugated brownboard used to box up major appliances is quite rigid and should prove more than adequate.
p.s: square drive = Robertson, though the proper name isn’t often used in the U.S. and is becoming less commonly used worldwide due to Chimese manufacturing of these fasteners (long story, in short: thank Henry Ford).
