Yes, the proper blue foam says "Styrofoam* Brand" on it.
Thats like Corning, Owens Corning, Dow Chemical, Coca Cola etc. Thats the brand name.They make other things as well.
-G .
Just my thoughts, ideas, opinions and experiences. Others may vary.
HO and N Scale.
After long and careful thought, they have convinced me. I have come to the conclusion that they are right. The aliens did it.
Some thoughts on the blue foam. First of all it has a plastic sheet layer adhered to each side. I highly recommend peeling it off before you use the foam. I have glued a section of cork road-bed to the foam leaving the plastic film on. After a few months I found that the film had lifted from the foam and my road-bed was essentially not attached to anything solid, but still glued to the film. This was particularly bad on a curve where the tendency for the road-bed / track to straighten out was all that was needed to lift the film.
The white bead foam has been described as a real mess. I concur with this if you have to cut it. However, the blue foam can get quite expensive for a larger layout. I found I could use white bead foam to bulk things out for mountains etc and then use the blue foam for the surface where any cutting is to take place. Since all my white bead foam was free, this proved to help in cost reduction.
You can see what I mean in this photo of the basic structure of a hill.
I had to do this out of necessity as much of my blue foam was salvaged as scraps from a siding contractor, however you can see that several square feet of blue foam were saved by using the white bead. I would never use the white bead anywhere that I might want to shape the terrain.
Simon Modelling CB&Q and Wabash See my slowly evolving layout on my picturetrail site http://www.picturetrail.com/simontrains and our videos at http://www.youtube.com/user/MrCrispybake?feature=mhum
simon1966 wrote: Some thoughts on the blue foam. First of all it has a plastic sheet layer adhered to each side. I highly recommend peeling it off before you use the foam. I have glued a section of cork road-bed to the foam leaving the plastic film on. After a few months I found that the film had lifted from the foam and my road-bed was essentially not attached to anything solid, but still glued to the film. This was particularly bad on a curve where the tendency for the road-bed / track to straighten out was all that was needed to lift the film.The white bead foam has been described as a real mess. I concur with this if you have to cut it. However, the blue foam can get quite expensive for a larger layout. I found I could use white bead foam to bulk things out for mountains etc and then use the blue foam for the surface where any cutting is to take place. Since all my white bead foam was free, this proved to help in cost reduction.You can see what I mean in this photo of the basic structure of a hill. I had to do this out of necessity as much of my blue foam was salvaged as scraps from a siding contractor, however you can see that several square feet of blue foam were saved by using the white bead. I would never use the white bead anywhere that I might want to shape the terrain.
Excellent idea to use the inexpensive/free foam as filler! I can get tons of the white foam for free!!!
underworld
Using the white foam for a filler is what I plan to do also. I saved all the pieces that came in shipping boxes from Christmas. Since the wife bought most everything from online sources I have tons of the white styrofoam I kept.
Places like Best Buy and Circuit City usually throw out the white stuff when they unpack the tv's and computers. Check with them about taking any that they are going to discard.
Recently at a train show I picked up a hot wire foam cutter. It will cut through the white stuff without making a mess. So cutting it to build up an area should be a little less messy.
Bill
Argh! That's the first mention I've seen regarding the plastic lining on the blue styrofoam coming up like that. At least I'm not too far into the whole process of drawing down centerlines and gluing down cork yet.
I do like using the foam as a base surface for laying out centerlines and such. It's very easy to pin down some turnouts and track, or use a ruler with a screw on one end to draw arcs. I've got pics of my progrees in the link in my sig, but sadly it looks like all the recent progress today will be undone.
I just hope the plastic on the side I glued to the plywood doesn't peel up!
Now why didn't I think of that. LOL A year or so ago, while taking a load to the landfill from our last construction project, there were two 18-wheelers unloading 4" thick sheets of the white bead stuff. At the time I couldn't think of a use for them.
Reality...an interesting concept with no successful applications, that should always be accompanied by a "Do not try this at home" warning.
Hundreds of years from now, it will not matter what my bank account was, the sort of house I lived in, or the kind of car I drove...But the world may be different because I did something so bafflingly crazy that my ruins become a tourist attraction.
"Oooh...ahhhh...that's how this all starts...but then there's running...and screaming..."
Simon1966: And I thought I was the only one saving all that white beedy foam that come in all the boxes that arrive here at the house from Mr. Brown!!!LOL I am planning to do just what you have ingeniously surmised.....use the white stuff as filler. Now at least I know the idea will work!!!!
Home Depot in my area is carring the PINK foam, and I have not noticed and film on the surfaces that can peal off. I have the pink as the sub-base glued down on 3/4" plywood bench top. It has remained glues solidly. I will have to check out the blue foam the next time I purchase some. Does it peel right off like one sheet of plastic?
Dick,
yes it just peels off in a film. In my case since the foam I have been using came from the scrap pile of a construction site it is also filthy so the removal of the film also cleans it up.
I've got to the point where every time I see a nice big chunk of white bead stuff I ferret it away. I have more in the stash than I can ever hope to use in my life time unless the my Midwest layout gets a scale model of Mount Everest added to it. (334 ft high in HO)
Simon, I am doing the same.....I hated to just throw it away, I felt it could be used somehow in scenery..and it can.
BTW, have you ever heard of using Gypsonite for scenery? I am trying to find out if that comes in bags that you mix with water like plaster from HD, or, are the guys talking about the board material, like wallboard, and using that as a base for some scenery?
Gypsolite is a brand name for pearlized plaster. There is another brand called Structolite, which is what my home depot had. http://www.usg.com/navigate.do?resource=/USG_Marketing_Content/usg.com/web_files/products/prod_details/USG_Structo-Lite_Plaster.htm
As far as I know they are virtually the same thing, just a different brand. I got the 50lb bag ,which will last me a lifetime. You mix it with water and apply like any other plaster. It has a grainy texture which I think helps with the texture of the scenery.
For further info on the plastic surface film on some of the Dow blue extruded foam, you might want to look at the topic entitled, "foam top" on page 2 of this forum. I have a post there concerning my conversation with a Dow foam insulation tech rep. last week in which they said they put the plastic film on the thinner sheets of their blue extruded foam sheets to protect the surfaces since these are made from less dense foam than the thicker sheets. I have found Dow blue foam in 1" and 2" thick sheets without the protective plastic surface film in my local Lowes.
Bob
Thanks for the infor on the film. All of my foam is the thinner stuff as it all came as offcuts from a siding contractor, which is why 100% of all the blue foam I have ever used had film.
This thread came up just as I'm starting to build my layout.
Simon, thanks for pointing out that the blue stuff has a layer of thin plastic covering it. I glued down several sheets this weekend. I Probably wouldn't have noticed had it not been mentioned here.
I don't know about the 1" & 2" stuff but the 1/2" definately has the covering. That's all that Lowe's had is the 1/2". So that's what I went with.