Greetings,
I am working on a couple of 50-yr old craftsman kits that use 3/64" wood angle strips for cross bracing, corner bracing, and top & bottom stripping for ribbing. Most of the kit wood is in VERY good shape but a few pieces of angle strips are slightly splintered and rough. Along with the other wood pieces, I will be attempting to coat those with sanding sealer and sanding them, which could turn out to be problematic because of their delicateness.
I just found and ordered some Plastruct 3/64" x 0.015" angle strips from Hobbylinc, which is virtually identical in thickness to the wood angle strips. If sealed, sanded, and painted properly, would the wood components of the kit match the smoothness of the styrene angle strips? Or, would there be a noticable difference no matter what?
I like joining wood-to-wood parts because I can use wood glue, which allows a decent amount of adjustment time to get things aligned properly. I've found that the even thick CA bonds almost immediately to wood so I would need to have things aligned fairly close - i.e. should I decide to go that route. The plus is that the angle stripping would and should look cleaner.
Thanks for the help ahead of time...
Tom
https://tstage9.wixsite.com/nyc-modeling
Time...It marches on...without ever turning around to see if anyone is even keeping in step.
I will preface my post by saying that I have no experience with working with craftsman kits like you're mentioning. However, I have CA'd my fair share of ties and stripwood to plastic as I build my crossings with stripwood to look like older rail tie crosssings.
For me I find that even using commercial super glues, it takes a fair amount to get wood and plastic to mate. While I've never tried it, have you tried a slower set CA to give more work time? Sometimes, I have CA'd the wood and it won't stick to the styrene but it "seals" the wood and then when I try again it sticks very well.
As for smoothness, I think so. Many non-railroad wood projects are very smooth after they are painted. I can't see why that wouldn't happen on stripwood.
FRRYKidWhile I've never tried it, have you tried a slower set CA to give more work time? Sometimes, I have CA'd the wood and it won't stick to the styrene but it "seals" the wood and then when I try again it sticks very well.
The "thick" CA I referred to in my original post is the slower setting CA and I found it bonded even unsealed wood pieces nearly as quickly as the thinner CA. I have yet to try bonding wood-to-styrene.
The wood will be sealed with sanding sealer. Will that accelerate the bonding time between the wood and styrene since the pores of the wood will be sealed?
tstage Or, would there be a noticable difference no matter what?
"One difference between pessimists and optimists is that while pessimists are more often right, optimists have far more fun."
Hi Tom,
I used styrene to replace a few wooden boards on this set of stock cars.Once painted, there is no way to tell which is wood and which is plastic:
I got a set of four of these wood stock cars for peanuts on eBay. They were craftsman kits from the 1940s. I don't know when they were built but they were pretty well worn and dusty when I got them. The cars were mostly in good condition. Whoever built them was a real craftsman. There was no seepage at the multitude of glue joints and every board was positioned perfectly.
Unfortunately, they had had a bit of rough handling so several of the boards were broken and beyond repair. I found some Evergreen styrene strips that were almost identical in size and glued them in with CA. As I said, after a fresh coat of paint, there is no way to identify the styrene strips.
In your case, if the angled pieces are only cracked or suffering from some grain separation, you could try using thin CA and gently squeezing the grain back together with a pair of tweezers. I would do just one small spot at a time. If you soak the whole strip in CA you probably won't have enough working time to get all the fibers lined up. If you can save the angled strips then you will have a car which is much more 'original' than something with styrene replacement parts, and you won't have to go searching for the right sized styrene.
Cheers!!
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
tstage The wood will be sealed with sanding sealer. Will that accelerate the bonding time between the wood and styrene since the pores of the wood will be sealed? Tom
I honestly don't know as I've never worked with sanding sealer.
I agree with. The Bear that any difference would mostly be noticed in a very close up photo. I'd just add that while sanding sealer plus sanding, followed by more sanding sealer and more sanding, and maybe even a third round, can indeed make painted wood look very much like metal, that is true of flat sheets of wood and not so easy a task with very fine (i.e., fragile) structural shapes made of wood. Usually the best you can hope for is to smooth the wood so that the wood "fuzz" is removed, and perhaps at least fill in some grain. But even then at normal viewing distance, wood and styrene can be mixed successfully assuming the sizes match.
Dave Nelson
The sanding sealer is definitely essential- it puts a surface coating on the wood, which would otherwise soak up the paint. But after sanding and sealing, you should find that the difference between the two is minimal, assuming a color match on the paint (Had to work on this last with those beautiful old Central Valley kits from the Sixties, which were color-matched to Floqulil paints that are no longer made).
http://mprailway.blogspot.com
"The first transition era - wood to steel!"
tstageIf sealed, sanded, and painted properly, would the wood components of the kit match the smoothness of the styrene angle strips? Or, would there be a noticable difference no matter what?
Tom... The Intermountain 41699 General Service Drop Bottom Gondola freight car kit has sides made of real wood that fit into a molded plastic frame with the diagonal supports.
I treated the wood parts with Minwax Pre-Stain prior to any assembly.
I stained the interior boards using an assortment of Citadel washes in various strengths and mixed with various inks.
The exterior was painted as normal. The plastic frame is the steel parts of the freight car, and the wood parts are the wood sides. Since these were differing materials in "real life", I was not too concerned about a difference in the final finish.
However, I did need a good glossy finish on the wood parts to take the decals.
The freight car was painted with ScaleCoat II paint and lettered with custom decals by Donald Manlick.
-Photograph by Kevin Parson
As you can see, there is not much difference between the wood and plastic parts. One more coat of paint probably would have made a perfect match.
hon30critterI used styrene to replace a few wooden boards on this set of stock cars.Once painted, there is no way to tell which is wood and which is plastic:
Dave, I cannot tell any difference at all... amazing model work!
-Kevin
Living the dream.
When I discovered plastic shapes and sheets, I tossed all of my stripwood materials into the garbage. Styrene is much easier to use and less susceptable to warping.
Wayne