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TIGGERS' TOP MODELLING TIPS |
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The Epoxy Roller. This useful modelling tool evolved through a dual purpose of necessity
and lack of funds. From the early eighties my preferred method of
covering has mainly involved epoxy resin and glass cloth. My first
efforts were reasonable but very labour intensive bearing in mind that
this method was in its modelling early years. I used a brush to stipple
the resin through the cloth which resulted in an over abundance of resin
which required much rubbing down to a reasonable finish. I quickly
picked up the tip of
using kitchen paper towel to absorb any surplus
resin. Whilst satisfactory I was wasting expensive resin. The next
improvement was the use of an old credit card to scrape and work the
resin through the cloth. For me this was a complete waste of time in
that you would distort lightweight cloths and the surplus resin ended up
on the floor. Again very wasteful. I played around with using a roller
on several occasions; this gave very good results but again was
expensive due to the volume of resin that was soaked up by standard foam
paint rollers combined with the need to use a new roller each time. What
was needed was a roller that did not absorb large quantities of resin
and was reusable.
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| The solution
came from an unusual quarter. I have always made model aircraft and my
good lady has always been more inclined towards the textile crafts. I
constantly found or devised alternative uses for her craft tools and
materials much to annoyance. One day she passed the comment that at
least her wool was safe as you couldn’t knit a model. The penny then
dropped and the end result is what you can see here, a home made roller
covered with wool. For me this proved to be a turning point in the use
of resin, here was a roller that held enough resin to wet out the cloth
and by stripping off the wool at the end enabled you to clean the roller
with a simple wipe with some paper towel.
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| The roller
is easily made using either a short length of plastic water pipe
enclosing two plywood discs and brass tube bearing or turned out of some
nylon round bar. The handle is a simple piano wire frame with a wooden
dowel handle. The next bit is probably easier to gentleman of a certain
age, namely those that were in the Scouts/Cubs and learned how to whip
the end of a rope to prevent it fraying. As can be seen in the
photographs the wool is laid along the length of the roller and then
starting about 3mm in from the edge wound back around the roller until
half the length is covered Cut off the surplus loose end, turn the
roller through half a turn and then lay a short separate doubled length
of wool along the roller. Continue winding the wool around the roller
again leaving about 3mm of the roller bare. Cut the wool leaving a 100mm
tail, take this tail and feed it through the loop of the short doubled
length. Use this doubled length to pull the tail of the wool through the
wound section of the roller and trim off the surplus. You should now
have a roller covered with a thin single layer of wool ready for use.
The type of wool can be varied to suit your personal taste, I tend to
use remnants of four ply. After using the roller all that is required is
to simply snip the end of the wool and pull the entire length off the
roller and throw in the bin. The roller just requires a quick wipe.
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| The same technique can be used on
commercially available rollers.
The photo on the right shows other type of rollers that Colin has converted in the same way. The roller with the red handle (middle) is the spindle - inner part of a 3" gloss foam roller with the foam discarded after initial use. This is fitted on to a commercially available handle. The actual roller can be covered in wool as per the technique described and reused time and time again. It can also be removed from the roller handle so if you have a number of old rollers spindles, you can have them prepared and fit / use /remove / replenish as necessary. The roller on the right with the green handle, is the spindle from a 1" foam roller - already wrapped in wool, also fitted to a commercially available handle. All these rollers work out very much cheaper than buying rollers time and time again and are much better as they do not soak up too much resin. |
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| Electricks |
