Jake,
I recently purchased my homasote from the Tewksbury Home Depot. It was located in the same aisle as plywood and peg board. I think that I paid ~ $28 per sheet. I bought the last two sheets. I don't know how often it is restocked. If is not a hot seller, it might take awhile to get more in, and that might explain why you could not find any.
Ray B.
Homasote's site includes a page for locating dealerships:
www.homasote.com/where.html The material is primarily marketed as a sound deadening board. This site listed a building supply place within five miles of my house. When I went there they said that they no longer stock it, but they ordered it for me and then had their truck deliver the two sheets to my house for no extra fee! I was going to have the lumber yard rip it into 2' strips to fit in my PT Cruiser, but they delivered the whole sheets. I have tried several other bases over the years, and Homasote is definately my preference. This is a new shelf layout under construction for me, and my house is only a couple blocks from the ocean, and I have been very pleased that the Homasote has not shown expansion problems from the humidity (I did let it set in my garage for about two weeks to adjust before cutting it).
I concur with the "cut outdoors" suggestion.
Bill
Jake1210 wrote: Hey all. I was checking out building techniques for various things around the layout, and I found Craig Bisgeier's DIY Homasote Roadbed. (For anyone who is interested, it can be found HERE.) And I found it quite interesting that I could make a 256 feet of 1/4" HOn3 roadbed for $20. But I realized that I haven't seen Homasote anywhere here. (Southeast MA.) I didn't see it last time I was at Home Depot, but, then again, I wasn't there for very long, and I haven't been there for a while. So, does anyone know where I can get Homasote? And I have a question on the process used. Has anyone used this technique? How well did it work?Help is appreciated!--Jake
Hey all. I was checking out building techniques for various things around the layout, and I found Craig Bisgeier's DIY Homasote Roadbed. (For anyone who is interested, it can be found HERE.) And I found it quite interesting that I could make a 256 feet of 1/4" HOn3 roadbed for $20. But I realized that I haven't seen Homasote anywhere here. (Southeast MA.) I didn't see it last time I was at Home Depot, but, then again, I wasn't there for very long, and I haven't been there for a while. So, does anyone know where I can get Homasote? And I have a question on the process used. Has anyone used this technique? How well did it work?
Help is appreciated!
--Jake
Jake, Not shure where in S. Eastern, Ma you are, but I frequent many lumber yards south of Boston. Most all stock the Homosote. I only use it as a protective covering for floors and special woodwork/ cabs during demo work.
Lumber yards So Shore and Cape: Hingham lumber, Cape Cod lumber (Abington/ Mansfield), Sampson(Pembroke), and Mid Cape used to have it(Sandwich)
A few HD and Loews have it also. Could most likely order it if not stocked. Generally near Masonite and the MDF.
I don't know about the 1/4" thickness you mention but then I don't know what Craig does to mill the stuff either. The Homosote is 1/2". If you are planning on milling/ ripping the thickness down as well as the width, you will have quite the mess off the table saw. Those vertical/ against the fence rips with a soft product can be very dangerous- be careful and wear a mask. Use a feather board or other means to hold the stock.
EDIT: Looked back and noticed your link to Craig's tutortorial on the milling process. Very informative and I would suggest not deviating from his safety recommendations.
Good luck in your quest.
Modeling B&O- Chessie Bob K. www.ssmrc.org
SF Bill wrote: Hi: To butt in here, try www.calroadbed.com for info on their roadbed made from Homosote. Looks interesting!.Bill
Hi: To butt in here, try www.calroadbed.com for info on their roadbed made from Homosote. Looks interesting!.
I was actually trying to avoid that due to the price, and so was Craig when he posted the tutorial.
Homasote can be found or ordered through more traditional lumber yards. I've never seen it at HD in my neck of the woods but the local lumber yard has a stack of it. Make sure you pick your pieces carefully, they can vary widely in terms of thickness and can have humps etc. I always take a straight edge with me....
I have studied Craig's instructions carefully a couple of times. His site is pretty good, I've been there lots of times. I cut out lots of homasote but never into road bed like he is doing. I used the cookie cutter method and use fillets of spackle along the edges to create a roadbed profile. Craig is essentially milling the stuff. I would say that if you are real comfortable with, and own a high quality table saw, that his method should work well for you. His plan calls for push sticks and lots of ripping of small sized stock that is dimensionally unstable. I personally avoid this type of saw work.
I used a saber saw with a knife blade (and fine toothed plywood blade) and I also used radial saws with fine toothed blades to do my cutting. Both cut well. This process creates a huge amount of very fine paper dust that gets on everything and will become statically charged. The dust will cling to vertical surfaces. Don't cut inside.....(Don't ask how I know not to do this!!). I also had to do some sanding to even out bumps (grrrrrr). I painted mine with cheap interior house paint to seal the Homasote and to give a solid base color to work from.
Are you hand laying track??? If you are, homasote is great, if not I'm not sure it is worth the hassle. I used it on my latest layout where I have some hand laid, but mostly flex and store bought switches....I'm not sure I would go this route again...Homasote is a lot of work to prepare if you aren't going to use its main advantage: It takes spikes well and holds them just right for hand laid track.
Another option if you are going the hand laid route is wood spline roadbed. It is a very good choice if you can get a ready supply of clear, soft wood stock. On the west coast, I found this prohibitively expensive and it was difficult to find suitable wood at any price. In addition I found I liked the way the spikes went into homasote much more than how they went into wood spline. This was probably due to the wood I used, you might find better stuff in your area. This method also calls for a lot of saw work, with even thinner pieces of stock.
Homasotes' use is controversial among people on this list. You will get posters who swear at it and some who swear by it. You can be confident that there are a large number of good modelers who still use homasote (I know of quite a few). I would suggest if you can afford it, to get some for yourself and judge how you like it based on how it works for you rather than what people say here. Another solution that is more expensive but easier is Homabed which is milled homasote (what Craig is doing). Google them for info.
Guy
see stuff at: the Willoughby Line Site