Ever used Fleck-Stone?

[bonnjer]

For my dio, I'm shaping some dryfoam (the green stuff used for floral arrangements) into large granite bricks for stairs and ruins.

I know you can't spray regular styrofoam since it'll dissolve, but how about the dryfoam? Is it necessary to coat it with an acrylic before spraying it as well? I know I could experiment, but I'd rather not waste money buying different sprays and I figured I'd see if anyone had tried this before.

Also, anybody ever used Fleck-Stone spray before? It's the stuff that gives the speckled, rough effect. It looks like it would do nicely for my plan, but I've never tried it before.

[Kylwell]

I've used Fleck-Stone but never on foam. It's purty cool stuff but for modeling needs some serious weathering to finish up the look.

[caveslug]

I would still cover the foam myself, so no matter what paint you use want seap into it.

But I have seen the paint you are talking about, and myself I dont think it looks right. When you are putting it up to a small scale such as a dio.

[SoundEffect]

Both my fiance and I have used the Fleck-Stone spray paint before on the same model. With her Anubis model, check out the center of the StarGate base. The flat plastic was sprayed with Fleck-Stone to simulate sand, and then painted a sandy color.

[Shinnentai]

I know you can't spray regular styrofoam since it'll dissolve, but how about the dryfoam? Is it necessary to coat it with an acrylic before spraying it as well? I know I could experiment, but I'd rather not waste money buying different sprays and I figured I'd see if anyone had tried this before.

Solvent based paint won't adversely affect the dryfoam, but I'd still coat it with something, just for the sake of durability. That dryfoam stuff dents if you just look at it wrong.

Waitaminnit, I've just had an idea. Let me get back to you in a few hours, I've gotta run an experiment....

[bonnjer]

An experiment huh? I can't wait to hear the results of this!

[Shinnentai]

Shux. It didn't work.

I was trying to see if Minwax wood hardener would work to stiffen up the foam. Wood hardener is a laquer-like liquid made for solidifying soft or rotten wood. You brush it on, and it soaks in and hardens for a resin-impregnated sort of effect. I had some left over from a previous experimend (works great on plaster, but leaves little meniscuses on the surface if hand brushed).

Didn't work on the dryfoam though. The foam has too pourous a cell structure (it is make to soak up its volume in water), and it took up the wood hardener without registering any usable increase in toughness.

I think the basic concept is still good though. I'm going to move on to liquid CA. I tried CA last night too, but the stuff I had on hand (Pacer Slo-Zap) was too viscous, and wouldn't soak into the foam. I'm gonna buy and try an extra runny type CA.

This wouldn't work with polystyrene foams, as they have a closed cell structure. The dryfoam is designed to be absorbant though, so my hypothesis is that one could carve it in fine detail, then saturate it with a hardening agent rather than coating with a layer of putty (and all the extra fuss that entails). After it's hardened, a good coat of sandable primer would be all that's needed to smooth out the foam's natural texture.

I figure if I can get this to work, I can streamline out the whole skinning/puttying part of making foam masters.

[bonnjer]

Shinnentai, that sounds like a great experiment on the dryfoam. I'm hoping that it works. In the meantime, I'm still trying to figure out how to seal mine before painting. I might make a trip to Home Depot after lunch and look around for some things to use.

Let me know how that next attempt goes please.

[Bomech1]

Resin or somthing similar?
Brian