ways fill two or three boxes at a time be- fore proceeding to the next step. Allow the glued-on foam to dry overnight. The next day, spray all the lichen
with clear flat enamel. An hour later it is ready to plant.
In the time I took to write these pro- cedures, I could have easily made two boxfuls of brush. I plant the lichen with a hot glue
Place the ground foam coated lichen into a shallow, wax paper lined box and allow it to dry overnight (above). Spraying on a coat of clear flat finish (below) will make the brush stronger, which is especially good for modules that are subject to a lot of handling and storage. If you use fast drying enamel, lichen can be planted within 15 minutes (bottom).
gun, putting a dab of hot glue on the layout and pressing the lichen in place. I put the darker brush towards the bot- tom areas and lighter-color brush to- wards the top or rear of the layout to add the impression of distance. Next time you are out railfanning, take a look around. You will be sur- prised how much brush you will see. We should duplicate that on our layouts. There is also a certain satisfaction in making some of your own scenery mate- rials, and this one is “a natural.” It will provide one more texture and variation in your model landscape, an important aspect of realistic scenery.
You will need: Spray glue. I use Krylon®
or 3M®
.
Clear flat enamel spray paint. Krylon is a good choice; make sure its not water based. Three grades or colors of ground foam. Woodland Scenics light and medium green and Scenic Express fine spring tone green will give you a nice variation. I also occa- sionally use Woodland Scenics Burnt grass. Shallow containers to hold the ground cover. Anything from disposable aluminum foil pans to “paper plate bowls” will work. Storage boxes. Any low sided box is fine. Wax paper to line the boxes. An old window screen or newspaper for a drying rack. Latex or similar protective gloves. Tweezers.
piece of lichen. Wear suitable gloves, either painters’ latex gloves,
kitchen gloves or the
black “chemical handling” gloves avail- able at good hardware stores. (I usual- ly just wear a glove on my left hand.) Following the philosophy that, if you can smell it, it cannot be good for you, a disposable dust mask might also be in order, if not a respirator. Lay the lichen on a piece of newspa- per and apply spray glue to it. Next, grab the lichen with the tweezers and place it face down in a container of ground foam. Now take the back of your gloved hand and flatten the lichen into the foam. Don’t skip this step. Pick up the piece with tweezers, shake off the excess ground foam, and place it face up in a wax paper-lined box. I al-
RAILROAD MODEL CRAFTSMAN 75
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