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Foam cutter for making buildings

Posted: Sat Dec 19, 2020 5:04 am
by quitcherbitchen
Foam Cutter
Foam Cutter
foam cutter bottom view
foam cutter bottom view
Foam Cutter Underneath.gif (47.27 KiB) Viewed 5052 times
re adjustment
re adjustment
Reostat Gif.gif (52.45 KiB) Viewed 5052 times
I made a foam cutter to make buildings out of Polystyrene white foam that I dumpster dived out of trash cans. The cutter itself is made with things I salvaged or found. The nichrome wire #26 is the only thing I bought online for $2.65. everthing including the power supply was junk I found in my garage or someone's trash bin. It works really good but the window cuts still need to be done by razor as getting the hot wire into the middle would be too time time consuming to disassemble. I have made many buildings and they all come apart to store using magnets.
Building for targets
Building for targets
magnets
magnets
Doomstown 2015-10-02 005 gif.gif (76.62 KiB) Viewed 5052 times
folded buildings
folded buildings
Doomstown 2015-10-02 006 gif.gif (52.67 KiB) Viewed 5052 times
My latest creation is an Atlantic wall bunker with an FPV 20mm cannon that has an LED muzzle flash as well as sound.
FPV Atlantic Wall Bunker
FPV Atlantic Wall Bunker
I would like to figure a way to wire this up for IR battle with the tanks. I would have to put an IR Receiver on it somehow make it like the pill box targets I see advertised. Still working on it but the kids love it. I have already tweaked it several times to get better focus with higher lenses. The macro 3.6 lenses make target acquisition difficult. We were using it as an Anti aircraft gun against my RC Storch or Stuka that would attempt to bomb it.
1100 mm Stuka D-5
1100 mm Stuka D-5
Stuka Bomb drop mounted 2013-02-09 010 Gif.gif (99.91 KiB) Viewed 5121 times
Loads of fun. Bomb loads. :haha:
Also, what Battle of Berlin wouldn't need a Reichstag to complete the authenticity.
Reichstag
Reichstag
This beauty took about three evenings to make and it also comes apart for storage and transport. It also gave my daughter an A is Greek history class in 5th grade. Little did those people know what it actually was ;) I used wedding cake columns for the front and everything else is foam. I have learned that coating the foam with drywall mud makes them smooth and easy to sand. Also, makes them more durable and heavy which helps with wind. Wind will knock them over without a good heavy base. Just a skim coat of mud makes them heavy enough not to get blown over until the wind gets to 12 knots. I have lots of other foam targets too. I will slowly post them here as I get time to resize the pictures to fit this website.

Re: Foam cutter for making buildings

Posted: Sun Dec 20, 2020 3:45 am
by Estnische
That’s great work. I used to use an electric kitchen knife for my slot car scenery. A bit messy.

Re: Foam cutter for making buildings

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 2022 5:00 pm
by quitcherbitchen
Here is some of my buildings on battle day. Everyone loved the large amount of buildings. The scale seemed just about right. The Reichstag should obviously be higher up on a larger foundation but it looked great.

Re: Foam cutter for making buildings

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 2022 5:38 pm
by Son of a gun-ner
Excellent :clap: :clap:

Re: Foam cutter for making buildings

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 2022 5:54 pm
by Kaczor
Great!

Re: Foam cutter for making buildings

Posted: Sun Feb 06, 2022 7:26 pm
by Jimster
Very creative and ingenious engineering. Helps bring the models to life with a detailed surrounding.