HO Barbed wire

[Anonymous]

QUOTE: Originally posted by BXCARMIKE

In Lou Sassi's book, he used ultra lite fish line and tied knots in it. He used a jig for spacing, someone on this forum might have the details for correct spacing, I don't have mine handy right now.

I'm not sure where the writer saw that I used fish line with knots in it for barbed wire but in my "Basic Scenery" book I listed the "Scale Link Company" in Dorset , DT11 8QN, United Kingdom, (0044) 1747-811817 as a source of etched brass barbed wire. I believe you can still contact them over the internet at (www.scalelink.co.uk). I have purchased items from them using a credit card with no problem.

Lou Sassi

[Anonymous]

For an electric fence I'd use the round electric fence posts instead of T posts,because it'd be easier to get them straight, and you could probably find some brass rod. However, to be exactly right it'd have to be a scale 3/8".

But, when I built my fence I used bamboo skewers for posts and tied a knot about every 1/4 inch in gray thread. You really can't see them, but the barbs are there.

Greg

[Anonymous]

My appologies to Lou Sassi,it was Frary and Hayden book, using fishline and cutting every other tooth from a comb as a jig, but I think just fishline would do.

[AztecEagle]

Sounds Interesting.

[Anonymous]

Hi all,
Here's some information I have gleaned on modeling barbed wire.

I have a Scale Link barbed wire fret SLF062. It costs 8.5 pounds plus a 17.5% VAT. In US$, that works out to about $17.45 for the fret (shipping not included). You get 33.57 actual feet of "wire" which works out to 52 cents per foot. I bought mine from Neal's Engaging Trains in '95 for $13 US. It has a "wire" thickness of about .005" and quadruple barb spacing on 4" centers. From a distance the barbs disappear, yet the wire still looks like barbed wire.

I picked up several HO scale Yesteryear Creations barbed wire fence packs on ebay in '00 for around $5 each (retail was $19.95 then). You get 15.24 actual feet of "wire" at a cost of $1.31 per foot. Their "wire" is .01" thick with double barbs spaced at 8". It is fairly coarse compared to the Scale Link material. If I were going to use this material, I'd recommend the N scale product for HO scale.

I ran across a chain link fence kit by TLH Scenics. Based on the photo, their barbed wire looked pretty realistic. The actual kit, close to $10 with the shipping, was a bag containing steel wire (for posts), a plastic mesh for the fence that looks like window screening, and some metallic thread for the barbed wire. There are no barbs on the "wire". It consists of a stranded thread with a metallic foil spiral wrapped around it.

I showed it to my wife and asked her if she had anything like it. "Sure", she said, and produced a 200 meter spool of the stuff. I just checked at Hancock Fabrics and it runs from 0.4 to 3/4 of one cent per foot. Granted, theirs may not be the #40 size that matches what came in the kit and it sure isn't going to come in rust or weathered zinc, but for my money (and I've spent a fair amount of it buying products on spec) this may be the way to go. It is certainly cheap enough to warrant a try.

I don't feel that plain wire is a realistic substitute. Real barbed wire is a twisted pair and just looks different than plain wire to me. The only barbed wire I have actually modeled so far was made from thread sprayed with adhesive and sprinkled with iron filings as per the instructions in an Alloy Forms chain link fence kit. Hmmm, not real happy with that either. I think I'll try the metallic thread on a stretch of the fence and compare.

FWIW,
Ron Ferrel