Dio water the inexpensive way

This is an display I just finished for a hobby show! I used a product called MAGIC WATER, expensive but awesome to work with!

David

I did a vietnam diorama with the Tamiya Pibber. I used a 3/4 inch plywood base about 20 x 16 inches, and hollowed out where the boat would sit (giving me at least a half inch into the base. I then used celluclay to make the water base giving me about another 3/4"s up on the boat, mixing it wet and smoothing (adding small waves etc.) I waited about a week for it to totally dry. _____I then painted the water area to get the mucky greenish  river water. ________Then used Minwax gloss fast drying polyurathane. Mybe 3 coats to get it looking really wet. The boat depth looked right using this method.

I used the Verlinden vietnamese figures and palm tree and the Tamiya animal set.  Unfortunately when I moved I had to pull the boat out and clean it in order to display on a shelf, so the dio no longer exists. It looked great however. 

The yellowing of the poly did not affect the water in this case as the water was river green. I don't know how this would work in a blue water dio. 

HeavyArty wrote:

Best bet is to cut the boats at the waterline (or wherever you want the water to go up to if the boats will be in action maneauvers), then you only need about 1/8 inch of resin to create the water.  Firberglass resin is the best to use.  Its cheap and easy to work with.  Pour it in thin layers as well, building up your depth.  Polyeurethane is not really designed for depth and will look yellow as it gets thicker and will take looonnnggg time to dry.

  My other hobby is woodworking and Polyeurethane is definitly NOT the way to go. It would be like trying to build up paint. It would take forever. A just a little correction HeavyArty the oil base does turn yellow but the water base does not.

Zip