Inspired by videos on clever uses of left-over, ready for the rubbish bin, throw away plastic sprue frames after removing all the possible useful bits, I gave it a quick thought and came up with using sections as iron beams in construction of a bridge.
My newly made “iron” bridge. Scratch built (obviously!!)
All the girders?, joists?, umm, the ah?…well, the iron bits anyway…. are cut from discarded plastic sprue frames and the bolts/nuts are thin sections of unused plastic medieval spears. Note the use of “discarded”, “unused”. While I might say it is to see what creative uses can be made from scrap, one could also say that I be just too cheap to get a good model. But then, I can say that I had good fun for only a few pennies of cost.
The photos show some of the construction. The length of the bridge was limited by the longest frame available. I was not willing to try to shave down all the nobbly-nibbly bits (see his YouTube vids for more ideas: youtube link ) as this would compromise their widths and thus construction - and frankly a real pain in the *blank* to do! So only certain lengths could be used. Also, only half way through the cutting did I notice that the outer frame and inner connecting sprues could be different widths. Hmm.
The construction was done for effect and certainly not to any engineering specification. It is sort of a cross between Bailey Bridge, a Tress Construction, and an Iron Girder form. Civil engineers might have a chuckle but it does bear the weight of a tank, so it can’t be that poor a design!
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| the napkin might be there to soak up any blood from cuts. Went unused ...this time. |
Like the news anchor who is all suit-and-tie above the desk, but out of sight of the television camera is wearing comfortable sweatpants beneath, I don’t usually bother about painting that which is not normally seen. But the following photo does show my use of discarded sprues.
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| I hesitated about using the rather glossy and very non-military green plastic primer but managed to cover with a dry brush of a lighter matt color then matt varnished (twice!). |
The deck was made by using wooden coffee stir sticks on a card backing. I used PVA/white glue down the middle and a slow settling epoxy along the edges; an idea to limit warping. While it worked, I used too much PVA which, once touching the top surface of the wood would not take any staining, and the epoxy seeped through to the surface creating a yellowish stain. Well, darn. So I just used some earth-coloured paint and covered up the stains and dry-brushed some tread wear on the surface. Quick and easy and looks OK-ish. I think of it as a newly built bridge so not much wear on it yet.
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| The width of the model is about 7.5cm or 3 inches, wide enough anyway to take a 1:56 tank |