Willy in the creek

  I just wanted to let you know, I gave up on most W/S products a long time ago! for many reasons, mostly the fact that I can manufacture, find in the plant life or any other product for the most part what they have available. Here are some ideas that again apply to any model project from military to railroads.

 1.)Trees, try the tested theory of using roots from weeds, dried out they work the best.

  2.) Water....well you seem to have that one down.

  3.) Matching military colors to craft paint,i.e. the one thing to remember, they all are matched to most military, RR or other model type. Someday I'll post a list of what I have found over the years to be a perfect match with little or no mixing of colors. For bulk painting such as landscape scenery, try buying latex paint in pint of qt. cans, it will save your craft paints ofr detail work and if you like airbrushing.

  4.) Feel free to read through the many threads I have posted on the forum here and Model Railroader, and all of the posts from all the readers are really helpful.

 Happy modeling

 johncpo

Just checked. I got a 5 gal bucket of Thompson water sealer. For some reason I think it's an oil based product.  Heading  to Lowes tomorrow to check it out.  Thanks John, Check back for some picts. I got the base made and I'm really happy with the way it turned out. This is the first Dio I've ever done and I think I may have bit too much off with this water, but we'll wad on though...

BTW: the Woodlands Scenes stuff STILL has not dried. 48 hours since test pour. 

RE: Product name

 Minwax, Polycrylic wood sealer comes in a blue labled can, I just went to the Minwax website to confirm. So build a whole river and enjoy!

 johncpo

Moon Puppy,

  Yes, I think I may have been confusing a bit, I apologize if I did. It is the stuff to seal wood against water and while I used it to act like a clear coat on my 1/35 scale model dioramas on the frames I build for them.

  As I mentioned I experiment a lot with home improvement products and caulking in a tube works well for building up ground on a dio...I use a mix of this to cover foam bases for the RR and any dioramas, heck it's the same thing, just that the RR diorama is abunch of smaller dioramas tied together.

 1.) Mix; tan latex paint, tan colored caulking, and water into a batter like waffle batter.

 2.) Spread over a foam base an old paintbrush, the blue or pink foam works good, florists green foam that is used for fake plants comes in 3 "bricks' to a package and works great and is cheap! As this mess is drying sprinkle on sifted dirt, sand or other "ground soil" and let the whole thing dry over night. As with the acrylic "water" each layer should take about 2-3 hours to set up for the next layer and by the next day be rock solid.

 3.) I built a 1/35 scale dio depicting a beach landing of Army Rangers in WW2 with an amphibious DUKW as the vehicle, the beach and water effects were so realistic my wife almost got seasick. I built up the beach using the green florists foam, the soft kind and after applying the goop mix sprinkled fine grain sand on it. The water was built up with a mix of blue acrylic paints mixed with caulking and set up to dry. I then spread the acrylic Polycrylic over the water effects and the clear coat started to look very real.

 I have posted many subjects on both this and the MRR forum having to do with the advantages of using inexpensive home improvement products, not only are they less expensive for the amount, any product that is acrylic based will most likely mix with another product in that category.

 Try the methods I mentioned and if you succeed let me know.

 The best,

 johncpo (about 50 years of modeling ships, planes, armor and now HO trains.)

Sorry for the confusion, are you telling me the product is Minwax acrylic water sealer? I'm familary with Minwax products. How long does it take for this to setup? Shoot I think I got some of that sitting in the shop!

Moon Puppy,

  I 've been modeling military in 1/35 scale and right along with the same ideas for dioramas I have an HO layout that I have the same philosophy with, use home improvement products, all acrylic paints from the craft section of Hobby Lobby, Walmart, etc. Water is easy too, I use acrylic water sealer in the line from Minwax, a polycrylic finish is one step, quick drying and "water" clean up of tools.

 1.) Pour over a painted surface 1/4 inch in depth or in my case a sandy-bottom river bed as found in the desert areas of the SW USA. The coating leaves a very convincing water look.

 2.) Let each layer, about 1/4 inch deep set up, then pour on a second, third and let this dry over night, I even poured up to 1/2 inch and it dried very well. The set up time is only a couple of hours and there is no, mixing, heating or mess!

 3.) Add white bath-tube sealer to the effect for rapids around rocks and logs and you will have a great look!

  More later if you like.

  johncpo

To build up deep water, I use Liquitex or Envirotex two part clear epoxy. Dries in aout 24 hours. This will give you a hard clear smooth topped base. To add simple waves, I use small amounts of Woodland Scenics Water Effects. This can be moved around a bit. To get foam in the vignette I'm working on, I pulled apart some cotton from a cotton ball and ran it through some water effects. It took some work, but it got the effect I wanted. (Thanks for the idea go to Marion Ball.)

Thanks! I see this calls for a Catalyst, I guess the mixing ratios and instructions are on the product? How quickly does this set up?

Ive used this casting resin before with no problems:http://www.dickblick.com/zz335/20/.

WHen using this stuff, do it in multilayers to avoid air bubbles and too much heat build up at one time if you are filling a deep area.  Also, you can add food coloring to the first layer and then when you pour successive layers it gives an illusion of depth.