perforated tarmac - your thoughts

[jim s-w]

Hi All

I hope this makes sense but I can show you a picture as it aint here anymore.   I vividly remember the platforms at New Street being made of a kind of slick tarmac that had a very regular pattern of small holes in it.  I could reproduce this in model form (at least visually) by overlaying a very dark grey base with fine screentone (you know the dots that make up black and white shade in comics - especially manga)  But there is a hell of a lot of platform (over a scale mile!) so what I need is a very fine screen that I can spray a light pattern through.  (I work in 1;76.2 scale by the way).  Perhaps something from the ladies hoisery isle or something? 

What do you guys think or is there another/more obvious/better way?

TIA

Jim

[marc_reusser]

I would think that something from the hoisery aisle would be to flexible to keep a good straight/consistant pattern. There might be a small perforated brass sheet out there on the armor modeling realm that you could use as a mask.

Two other possible options:

1). Have a mask laser cut out of Friskit or sim.....round circles though are expensive and time consuming to cut.

2). Create the colored surface and the dot matrix in Photoshop. Print the entire surface out of/on paper and glue to the platform subsurface (I am sure the original must have had expansion joints or cold joints, so you might be able to cut the sheets to these sizes/joints), then seal, and weather as desired.

3). A variation of the above would be to do a painted surface finish on paper. Then run the painted paper through the printer, and print the matrix you created in Photoshop, over the painted paper. Seal, glue down, and add additional weathering as desired.



Marc

[jim s-w]

Thanks Marc

I use a suede textured paint for concrete and tarmac normally and want to keep the texture while still having the pattern so I have kinda discounted the printed option.

I appreciate the suggestion though.

Jim

[DaKra]

Using a drill press with an X-Y table, or a laser cutter, you could make a perforated master section and cast as many as you need from there.   If you email me with specs I can give you a quote on laser cutting it, might be less than you think.

Dave

[JohnP]

Small Parts has a variety of filter screen like this: tiny nylon screen.

I have used it for N-scale ballast sifting. It comes in very small sizes. The openings become a smaller percentage of the area as they decrease so it might work for you. The screens are a good product to know about, as is the entire site.

Or just use Dave and get exactly what you need, it does seem like quite a specific requirement.

John