Respectfully Dave, little by little, a thin slice at a time you can get through that stuff with a blade but foam is tough. Too much retention to cut all the way through it with a blade.
No matter what you cut foam with, once it starts clustering up on a sharp object, it starts shredding for a nasty unclean cut. That even happens with a razor saw.
A fine blade jigsaw has always been the best tool. Heard a hot wire works well but don’t like the fumes and if you pause with a hot wire it just keeps melting the foam unlike if you stop with a jigsaw.
I agree with TF, a fine blade saw works best. Than sand for a finish. Even if you used a knive of some type, you’ll still need to sand to the final shape.
Tunnel portal is done TF’s way, only I didn’t get as elaborate with the stone, I just carved an arch.
Sorry TF, I have to politely disagree with you. I have used a Woodland Scenics hot wire cutter to cut a lot of foam for my ex club’s mountain scenes.
The first thing that I would say is that there are very few fumes created by using a hot wire cutter. Several club members expressed concerns about the fumes, but when I was working with the hot foam cutter right in front of them for at least two hours at a time, nobody noticed anything. If I was doing it every day for years on end as a career I would be concerned. As for cutting foam for a couple of hours at a time, I’m not worried. Other things will kill me sooner! It is up to you to decide what degree of risk that using a hot foam cutter creates.
The second thing I would say is that your contention that if you pause with a hot wire cutter then the foam will keep melting is not correct, at least in my experience. The amount of additional foam that is melted when using a hot wire cutter is miniscule. In fact it is barely noticable. The hot wire cutter does not produce enough heat to cause the foam to melt en masse.
All of the above may be different if you are using a hot knife. I have never used one.
And Thanks Dave, Perhaps the hearsay on a hot wire knife was a bunch of malarkey. Been meaning to try one sometime if it doesn’t fumigate the house[;)]
Here’s the raised sailor course portal.
Time to duplicate it and start the paint washes with the side and top slabs.
It seems pretty quiet around here Time to hang up the modeling shoes and go get Judy a King Cake
She wants to share it with our Friends at Cowboys this afternoon for her day off
Catch up with you Guys later when there’s more modeling time She does go back to work tomorrow No Carnival for that poor southern girl tomorro ya know[:(]
It is amazing what you can do with foam. I got wayyyyy carried away one day looking up foam carvings. Wow is all I can say, about what some create with foam, from tiny to massive!
Wow that looks amazing! I am too hypercritical of my own work to try to attempt something like that. I would never get it right then get frusterated then scrap it. Yours looks great though
That’s a nice little portal, and I admire guys who can take the McGuyver approach and build an ice rink on a desert island with nothing more than a rock, a sharp stick, and a washed-up Port-A-Potty.
I hate to be the bringer of bad news, if for no other reason than I don’t want to be labeled an insufferable know-it-all or I don’t want to simply be rude. But you mentioned it three times, and I feel I have to say that there are no brick sailors in your construct. Sorry. I see headers and stretchers and rowlocks; but no sailors, soldiers, or shiners.