I ordrered the cork. Thanks for everyone’s help!! To make the mainline profile a bit higher, I thought to add a thin layer of cardobard underneath the cork. The cardboard I need is about the same thickness as what’s found behind a legal pad of paper. Where to get such a product? I figure Michaels of Joann’s art store. The other question I had was what type of glue to secure it to the styrofoam (subroadbed) and the cork (roadbed)?
TIA!
Lee
My first thought was that cardboard of any type will absorb moisture and may swell and cause problems. I don’t know.
Second thought, use latex caulk and weigh it down until well setup. This may seal it from moisture.
Sorry I cannot be more help,
That card board is called “chip board”. Any local print shop or quick printer in your area will carry it. (not a place like Kinkos. A REAL print shop)They can even cut it to width for you to save you the hastle of doing it. It will absorb moisture, but being secured under the roadbed, I don’t think it will matter.
Eat more Cheerios.
I use a rather thinner product, card stock, between styrofoam roadbed (cork doesn’t do well in my high heat-low humidity layout space) and flex track. Grey latex caulk is my adhesive of choice, both card stock to roadbed and flex track to card stock. My usual ballast is old telephone books, supplemented with full 2-liter soda bottles.
The caulk seems to seal the card stock against moisture, but I don’t know if it could withstand a full-scale soaking. HAVEN’T been there, done that.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Check out the drywall department at Lowes or Home Depot. They have cardboard furring strips used to true up warped studs prior to hanging drywall. These strips are around 3’ long and are 1 1/2" wide. They are around 1/8" thick which is close to 1 scale foot in HO.
Our local art store (as opposed to craft store) had more different kinds of cardboard than I knew existed.
Years ago, I was in the retail business. We used to buy sheets of cardboard material in various colors to use for advertising signs in the display windows and throughout the store. Believe it or not, the generic name for this stuff was “railroad board!”
chicochip