I use the long Q-tips with the wood shaft. Break off the cotton tip, add cross arms from wood or cardstock, paint, then weather.
Check out the telephone pole set from Rapdio. Very nice and realistic looking.
http://www.rapidotrains.com/poles.html
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JeremyB Hi Guys I am wanting to upgrade my telephone poles from the plastic ones to something that is a little more realistic. Is anyone aware of a company that makes wooden HO scale poles? or would anybody have plans for making my own? Jeremy
Hi Guys
I am wanting to upgrade my telephone poles from the plastic ones to something that is a little more realistic. Is anyone aware of a company that makes wooden HO scale poles? or would anybody have plans for making my own?
Jeremy
"I like my Pullman Standards & Budds in Stainless Steel flavors, thank you!"
Boise Nampa & Owyhee You can get 1/8" birch dowel that scales out to 12" at the base and then taper them a bit as noted above. see ya Bob
You can get 1/8" birch dowel that scales out to 12" at the base and then taper them a bit as noted above.
see ya
Bob
Sorry, Bob - A 1/8" dowel is only 10.9" in HO scale (0.125 x 87.1 = 10.89). A phone pole tends to be in the area of around 18" across. If the OP can find 3/16" dowels, he'd be pretty close at 16 1/3".
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Gary M. Collins gmcrailgNOSPAM@gmail.com
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"Common Sense, Ain't!" -- G. M. Collins
http://fhn.site90.net
Careful paint and weathering can make your plastic poles look just as realistic as wood. Start with a dark gray and layer on dry-brush applications of lighter grays and gray-browns. Finish by painting any simulated metal parts appropriately for your prototype, and paint the insulators last. You might be surprised how well they turn out.
Rob Spangler
Go to any large grocery store and buy a package of those disposable wooden skewers that they assemble kabobs on. They are cheap, wood, and there are lots of them in the package.
Dave
Lackawanna Route of the Phoebe Snow
These would be rather fragile if you are doing operations and these are in the foreground.
If that is the case use 1/8" hard red brass rod available at a welding supply for those that would be in easily damaged locations. They are springy compared to just soft yellow brass from Midwest or someplace like that.
I made all of my trolley poles from this stuff and they are very durable.
For color on the birch dowel oil stains won't want to go in very well and they will probably stay too light for creosoted poles used in most areas of the country.
Experiment with colored india inks in alcohol or find aniline dyes at a good art supply store. They are ground coal in various colors and also go into alcohol.
You would need to paint the brass poles with something like Poly S roof brown or like that.
LION made his own. 1/4 dowels work fine. Stain them, or maybe rough them up with a razor saw. You can get some dimensional wood for the cross arms, use some slivers of wood or metal for the braces. LION used 4pt brass spacers from the print shop, but then nobody has used moveable lead type in this century, so lots of luck finding them. Use slivers of plastic.
I used sewing pins to hold seed beads to the poles or cross bars to represent the insulators.
I cut up a length of common zip cord to recover single strands for use as the wires. (I even put voltage on them to illuminate LED street lamps (that marked the locations of track magnets).
The second photo on the website of my old railroad shows these in use.
The Route of the Broadway Lion The Largest Subway Layout in North Dakota.
Here there be cats. LIONS with CAMERAS