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Cheap Tricks
Low Cost Tips to Improve Your
Railroad Modeling
by John Winter
Originally presented as a clinic at the 1996 MCoR
Regional Convention
Weathering with
Photocopy Machine Toner
I’ll bet you haven’t tried this one! I discovered
this one while changing the toner in our office copier.
Our old copier used a powdered toner which came packaged
in a plastic bottle. What you did was pour new toner
into the holding bin, a very messy job, and then you had
to empty the container which held the "spent"
or used toner. Well, it never failed, I usually got it
all over everything including my hands. As I attempted
to clean up this stuff, I noticed it stuck to
everything, then the light bulb went on! You know, I
said to myself, I bet I could use this stuff for
weathering on my railroad. Well, I was right. I use it
on everything. Locomotives, rolling stock and buildings.
It also looks great on the backdrop to represent smoke
from chimneys and smoke stacks. I also used it on Dee
Joseph’s backdrop.
Paper Signs
The fabulous Franklin and South Manchester of
George Selliois has more paper signs than you can count.
Where does he get his signs? Well, George is always on
the lookout for old magazines from which he cuts classic
advertising. I have found some current catalogs to be of
some use, or at least the ones that sell the
reproduction signs for Coke and Pepsi. First cut the
sign from the catalog over size, that is, leave extra
material around the edges. Then trim the excess with a
new No. 11 blade. After it is trimmed, flip it over and
very carefully sand the edges. After sanding, dilute
some white glue, 50/50 with "wet" water. Apply
a very thin layer of glue to the back of the sign, then
place it on the building. Let the sign dry completely
(overnight). After it is dry, you weather the sign with
white chalk dust to make it look like it is faded. You
can also lightly sand the face of the sign with some
very fine sandpaper so it looks like it is old and torn.
Vines to Hide Your Corners
No matter how hard you try, no matter how careful you
are in constructing structures, plastic or wood,
sometimes you just can’t get the corner just right.
The seam will show because the plastic or wood is warped
and a huge, at least in HO scale, crack appears at the
corner. Well, a time honored cure to this problem is
"cover-up"! What I do is add ground foam vines
held in place with full strength white glue. Apply the
glue along the corner seam starting at the top, working
your way down to the bottom. Continue to apply the glue
along the bottom of the building, trying to visualize
how the real thing would grow along the bottom and up
the corner. Take a look at some of the photos of Tony
Koester’s layout, he has some great examples.
Painted in Place Toilet Paper Roofs
This little gem you may have seen in one of the model
magazines. Go to the library in your house (the
bathroom) and check out the T.P. to see if the wife buys
the cheap kind, the stuff that is single ply and doesn’t
have any designs in or on it. Now if you have more than
one bathroom, like in our house (his and hers), the
cheap stuff will be in the "his" bathroom. Ok,
you got the right kind. After you cut it into ½"
wide strips, lay the first strip, cut a little longer
than the length of the roof, on the roof. Along the
lower edge paint it in place with some Floquil roof
brown or weathered black, or whatever color you want
your roof to be. Continue the process on up the roof
until you have completely covered the one side of the
roof. Repeat the process on the other side. Where the
two sections meet at the peak, cut a thin strip to
represent the cap strip. Use a sharp X-acto knife to
trim the roof edges after the paint has completely
dried. This trick provides you with a very good looking
rolled roofing effect.
Masking Tape Rolled Roof
This idea works just like the one above except you
use ½" wide masking tape for the rolled roofing.
Apply it just like you did the T.P. roof material,
except the adhesive will hold it in place. After the
roof is covered, paint it the desired color.
A side note - masking tape also makes very nice
window shades, and you don’t have to use glue to hold
them in place.
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