Alternate sources for "filler" fencing?

[velotrain]

I'm wondering if anyone has tried / found alternate, non-model railroading specific materials, that can be used for fencing and/or other scenic elements?  What I'm specifically interested in at the moment is those small fence sections that are used to close the gap between a building or larger/longer fence where it approaches a crossing gate, and similar situations.

 

I was thinking perhaps some kitchen item, or a non-slip pad for rugs - anything that has a tight grid pattern and can be cut relatively easily.

 

There might be similar items that would have good textures for walls.

 

Has anyone found Evergreen styrene sheets that are particularly useful for a Japanese scene?

 

I'm including some images showing the kind of spaces / fences that I'm talking about.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[kvp]

How about mosquito screens, the small hole plastic version? Cheap, can be cut with a scissor and there are many patterns (+,x,etc.)

[cteno4]

Charles,

 

There are metallic ribbons that have a mesh weave that are finer than the screen meshes. You can also make diagonal diamond fencing by cutting at the 45 to the grid. I've played with it an hitting it with a coat of dull coat on either side first helps keep it flat and not unfurl while cutting. I have a few big spools of it I pikced up at the craft store in the close out section, one is 3" wide!

 

I'll pop a few hunks in the mail to you to experiment with.

 

For the rail fencing I would look at the various etched brass rails and such, wide variety that can be repurposed even from HO scale! I've liiked a lot for something from the craft world to make rail fences like this and other railing uses and nothing great has ever jumped out so far. I've seen folks use larger sceen mesh that is fused nylon and they cut off 3 rows with the bottom open to make a two rail fence, but to get the right rail spacing the material loos like 2x or greater too thick for the railing.

 

Unfortunately 3d printing is not great at those thin bits like that. Moulded plastic ones at their thinnest are possible, but etched metal seems to do the best but it ain't round!

 

I did grab a few kits of the old Heljan oil tanks on clearance a few years back as they have gobs of fine railing and stairs in them for easy hack up.

 

Cheers

 

Jeff

[HantuBlauLOL]

Solid copper wire and solder perhaps?

[cteno4]

One way to solder up railing like this is to tape down some painters masking tape upside down on the bench, then lay out your parts stuck down to it and solder away. Singes the masking tape, but will hold stuff well enough to get them soldered w.o rolling around. Do longer legs to help hold in place as well and paint on a tiny dab of flux on each joint to make the soldering go faster. This is how I do SMD leds.

 

Staples are a good fine bit of stiff wire to fiddle with that actually solders pretty well. Thin brass rod also solders well if you clean it first and use flux. Steel rod which you can get down to 0.004" (1/2" scale) can be a bit tougher to solder.

 

The 1/144 dollhouse folks have looked for railing from craft stuff for a long time and I've never seen anything very nice looking be presented, up close it looks pretty clunky, fine if you only ever look at it from 2'+ I guess, depends on how nice you want it!

 

Cheers,

 

Jeff

[kvp]

What i've seen and know that is doable is to use a piece of wood, cut small grooves into it where the wires should be, insert the wire pieces there and then solder them together. For soldering, i think the easiest is tinned copper wire, the one that is used for circuit board jumpers. Cheap and very easy to solder. For slightly thicker constructions, i've used pcb connectors in the past. These are 1 to 8 cm long rows of square pins, that are used for jumpers and motherboard connectors. The 8 cm long ones are the board to board connectors often used to stack circuits, like arduino shields. You can pull the metal connectors out of the plastic rails. They are also very easy to solder without extra flux or cleaning. For soldering i mostly use thin rosin 'no clean' solder wire. (i think it has Wuppertal on it)

[cteno4]

the wrapping wire is pretty good as it solders so easily being pertained. this is the cheapest wire you can get for wiring up low amp things like leds and such as well! less than 1 cent per foot! it also solders so easily for all tasks and strips like a dream with those new strippers i found! 30awg wrapping wire is a little over 1.5" dis scale. it is a bit rough though as its stranded wire that is tinned.

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/1x-0-25mm-Wire-Wrapping-Wire-30AWG-Cable-305m-Yellow-good-quality-/261830363531?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item3cf64e498b

 

other option as well is to get a bunch of 1/8w resistors and use their leads as they are about 2" dia scale as well.

 

yeah if doing a lot of something the wood jig can work well, but for the uber tiny its hard to get them to stay in place as the cohesion of the solder to the wire will easily move it. an old ship builders trick for this is to take a print out of your pattern and put double stick tape on top and then place the parts onto the tape where indicated on the plan. never done that for soldering, but expect it could work as well.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[kvp]

 

other option as well is to get a bunch of 1/8w resistors and use their leads as they are about 2" dia scale as well.

You can usually get the parts lead wire on on a spool, that's the jumper wire i was talking about. They come in the same thicknesses as the ones attached to the parts, so quite a large variety. For low amp wires i just use normal ribbon cables, since if they are good for Tomix accessories, then they should be good for me. Thicker ones can also be sourced, those are the same as Tomix high current (turnout and traction) wires. The colored ones are used for things like servos and stuff, but the standard black or gray is good as well.

[cteno4]

yes you can get the "lead wire" in spools, but turns out to be about >3x the price of getting a pack of 1000 resistors on ebay cheap! i use resistors for jumpers all the time. I got a spool of lead wire and i found it was harder to make the jumpers from the spool as i would end up kinking it up and having to straighten it all the time. with the resistors they are usually nice and straight to begin with and the resistor itself usually gives you something to hold onto close in that does not get hot fast like the wire does. I usually get two small jumpers out of each end of a resistor this way. don't usually run an un insulated jumper longer than the end of a lead on a resistor anyway.

 

i love the wrapping wire as its sooooo inexpensive, tough, and thin for led stuff. nothing comes close to the price (except magnet wire) at all and if you are wiring in a bunch of leds its very cheap and sturdy stuff. magnet wire is great, but fussier to solder, insulate and have to be careful with it while running it. in some structures like a parking garage the 30g wrapping wire just looks like conduits or pipes on the ceiling as well! down side it is single stranded, but upside is that you can get like a dozen colors to easily color code your wiring.

 

cheers

 

jeff

[velotrain]

Given the scale, I don't see a need to differentiate between shapes (i.e. I don't need round), and would be just as happy with the squarish fencing in the last two photos - not to mention the easier paint job ;-)

 

However, the H-beam and rod in the top photo is attractive, and could be made from styrene and any rod of the right diameter - preferably metal or wood for more stiffness than styrene.

 

I don't think I want to mess with soldering anything this tiny, but the upside-down U-shaped barriers in the second photo might be a candidate for anyone who wanted to try.  These actually seem fairly common, as I've noticed them on multiple lines - I notice they're reinforced when next to traffic.  If you made up a mess of them, they'd be handy for spotting as needed.

 

Jeff - instead of steel wire, how about phosphor bronze - Tichy has a good assortment (down to .008).

https://www.tichytraingroup.com/Shop/tabid/91/c/ho_wire/Default.aspx

 

Another fence type I like, but more complex to build, are these along the Toden-Arakawa - very similar (identical - maybe thinner rods ?) to the Setagaya in the top photo.  Clearly not as safety-oriented, but quite elegant with that color paint.

 

 

[cteno4]

yeah phosphor bronze does solder well and is pretty stiff. I've got it down to i think .005" actually. finest steel I've seen is 0.004". the steel is stiffer stuff, but bronze does solder easier!

 

yeah the above fence could be I beam and wire. only problem is the smallest beam is 1.5mm like 9" scale so probably too big so just use 040x015 styrene stock for the upright. drilling tiny holes and stringing something like .004" rod would be a tiny task but once drilled it would be easy to string out then. could make a jig to help drill holes in the same place in each.

 

hey toni, maybe this is a place to make just the I beam upright with the holes via 3d printing then user slips in their own rod in for the cross pieces!

 

another bit that is useful for thin cross pieces is paint brush hairs of various sizes. they are usually pretty stiff, straight, and round. I've used them for things like this and even for thinner bits for vegetation scenery.

 

jeff

[katoftw]

Don't Kobaru and Greenmax do these?

[velotrain]

hey toni, maybe this is a place to make just the I beam upright with the holes via 3d printing then user slips in their own rod in for the cross pieces!

 

 

I suspect Toni could provide some sort of (hopefully recessed) dimple, but couldn't come close to consistent holes, so the buyer would need to drill them out.

[velotrain]

Don't Kobaru and Greenmax do these?

 

I don't know - do they? 

 

Product numbers?  Links?

[katoftw]

I'll have a look later and go through the bowels of retailers listings.

 

In the mean time.  The aqua fence example could be reproduced using rails cut to length for the uprights with drilled holes and 1mm wire fitted through the holes.  Paint aqua, done.

[katoftw]

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10311317 There is some pieces in this kit that could easily be modified to suit.  I'll keep looking.

[cteno4]

there is a slew of commercial products out there in both japan and us for fence materials. kabaru, casco, kato, sankei, platz, tgw, prohobby etc. but not always in stock or production all the time! several etched metal from us sources as well.

 

Charles was asking for non model railroading sources of materials to use as fences in the thread though so didn't mention those at all...

 

yeah the holes would probably not be perfect, but at least simple just pin drill the hole clean for the wire to slip thru. this could work with bendable wire as well to do the chain style fencing you see between rails.

 

jeff

[velotrain]

Initially I wasn't interested in Hantu's suggestion of soldering copper wire, partly because I feared it would be difficult to keep the wire intact in the heat.  CA seemed a more reasonable adhesive for this operation.  The copper would certainly be easier to shape and cut than harder wire of the same gauge.

 

I then ran across a small spool of 18 gauge, and thought it looked a reasonable size for the upside-down U-shaped barriers.  I'm just building some Greenmax #2155 tram station platforms, and this wire was about the same size as the uprights they used.  I discovered that 18 gauge is just a hair over 1 mm wide.

 

 

 

 

I had guessed the U-barriers were something like 3" or 4" pipe, and was hoping the wire would scale close to that.  I found a very handy conversion calculator, although some may grouse that it's 1:160 Vs. Japanese N-scale.  In this case, I could have simply multiplied by 150 and gotten much the same result.

 

http://www.model160.com/scale-and-unit-convertsion-tool/    [sic]

 

This site seems not to be maintained, but look at Photo of the Week for an exceptionally realistic snow scene - with falling snow.  I might object that the rails wouldn't be clean while the snow was actually falling.

 

I plugged in my 1 mm and got:

 

 

 

 

6" !  I couldn't believe it.  I can only think that the Greenmax railings are way over scale, although I would understand it, and like all castings are slightly wider (and uglier) on the back side.  Although oversize, I suspect the 18 gauge wire would look OK - for this type of installation, which is certainly far more sturdy than station fencing.  It's all a question of what kind of force they expect might bump into it  ;-)

 

 

At the Toden Arakawa line Asukayama station, the fences look to be 2" frames with 1" uprights. 

 

 

 

 

Those at the Arakawaitchumae station appear to be much thinner.

 

 

 

 

It's possible that etched products approach these measurements, but I won't be producing any proto-sized fences of this sort at home.

 

[velotrain]

The aqua fence example could be reproduced using rails cut to length for the uprights with drilled holes and 1mm wire fitted through the holes.  Paint aqua, done.

 

Ummm . . . 1 mm wire is 6 scale inches.  There wouldn't be any rail left after you drilled the four holes.

[velotrain]

 

Charles was asking for non model railroading sources of materials to use as fences in the thread though so didn't mention those at all...

 

 

Jeff - I'm not against using commercial products, but they (especially etched) tend to be very expensive in terms of actual layout space covered.

 

Maybe OK for a small super-detailed area, but hard to justify for extended use.  

Toni's walls look great - and unique among suppliers, but are likely in the same category.  I will probably get some (and Torii, and planters) to use in a "foreground" situation.

 

Since you're a big fan of craft stores, I was wondering about possible materials that might require more work, but yield a lot more fence for far fewer modeling dollars.

 

Also - maybe I'm just not aware of it - among all the manufacturers you mention, but I've never seen the short "barrier" sections that I initially asked about.

[cteno4]

charles,

 

just to clarify, you are looking for the railing type barriers, not any of the mesh types, correct?

 

sort bits of railing style barriers can just get clipped off larger ones.

 

but like I've said I've never found anything that does railings well at all (nor seen it on the 1/144 dollhouse world where they look for a lot of this craft type stuff). unfortunately most stuff is just a bit too heavy to be nice for 1/150 usually

 

you are right it does get expensive for long distances of the stuff using the rr pieces. there were a couple of etched brass 2 rail railing sets from us producers that provided quite a bit of railing for $10-20. if you are doing smaller barriers it would give you quite a few small like 4-8' chunks! also you can find these types of bar/pipe railings on ship model pages in etched brass.

 

gold metal

 

http://www.goldmm.com/nscale/gmnstair.htm

 

sankei makes some railing style

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10092994

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10092995

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10092991

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10092788

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10104944

 

tgw

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10078939

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10075753

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10075751

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10153235

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10080498

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10080497

 

tomix

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10010045

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10150047

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10150048

 

casco (printed on clear acetate)

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10112246

 

platz (unfortunately not seen much from them in production lately...)

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10106260

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10096022

 

http://www.1999.co.jp/eng/10096021

 

jeff

[velotrain]

Jeff - thanks for all of the links.

 

I will take a look at ship supplies, but I recall them being on the expensive side.

 

Hmmm - one thing I didn't consider there is the possibility of add-on sets of etched railings for plastic kits, although there are few of these anywhere close to N scale, so don't know if any of those sets are candidates.

 

Gold Medal - I have some of their products, but they are pricy, and not discounted - certainly not by very much, with each package usually being around $15 from memory.

 

Sankei - HS mentions some of these being cancelled, and while cheap, each is listed as only being ~3" long, and HS doesn't indicate there are multiple pieces per package.

 

TGW - Some of these look interesting, and the first one could be chopped up to use for the U-barriers.  Amazingly, many of them are actually in stock.

 

Tomix - these are interesting, and have potential for cutting into the short sections I was interested in.

 

Casco - I have some of these already, but don't think I've seen this style used around stations - although may have missed it.

 

Platz - That first item is pretty close to what I had in mind, but it sounds like they may no longer be producing?

 

Think I'll need to place a SAL order with HS and do some testing - thanks again for the research.

[cteno4]

There isn't a cheap solution unfortunately. By hand will be work to make nice as well. Sorry no magic bullet I know of.

 

Most etched brass is about the same on a per area price. The railing piece is I think around $18 but it's a big piece.

 

Etched ship stuff I think is in the same ball park.

 

Jeff

[velotrain]

> There isn't a cheap solution unfortunately. By hand will be work to make nice as well. Sorry no magic bullet I know of.

 

My original desire was for the short sections, which I wasn't aware of being offered as such.  I hadn't considered cutting down longer Japanese commercial sections, but will try that.  I wondered if there might be a substitute material, but you say there isn't - and appear to be familiar with the various options.

> Most etched brass is about the same on a per area price. The railing piece is I think around $18 but it's a big piece.

 

It's $18 list, with minor discounts available (likely MTS is best).  They list it as 300 scale feet, or 2' actual for Japanese N scale - 2 rail industrial fence.

[Kabutoni]

I heard my name drop, so I thought I'd drop by. With 3D printing, I can do a 0.6mm minimal thickness for unsupported walls (90mm in real life), etc., etc.: http://www.shapeways.com/materials/frosted-detail-plastic There are limits, but the posibilities are endless. The only thing I'm iffy about is the fragility and the way the material deals (or rather wears out) with friction (not really an issue with fences). Anyway, with this, fences are no problem, depending on the design.