"Making Railing and Ladder's."
By Yogi Wallace
I found what I wanted in 1/2" square Hardware Cloth. "You know the wire on the bottom of a rabbit cage." With the 1/2" squares it is ideal for Railing and Ladders in LS modeling. Hardware Cloth usually comes in 3' or 4' width's. If you can find it in roll's, you can buy it by the foot, if not, then you can buy it pre-packaged in pre-cut length's at most hardware stores.
I paid $1.70 a foot when I bought mine. You can make a lot of
Railing and Ladders from a 12" X 36" piece of hardware cloth.
Note: Hardware Cloth is available
in, 1/8" and 3/8" size also. Which can be used by modeler's in
other scale's .
I have used the 1/8" over window's as security
screen's on my industrial building's.
Start by cutting a piece of of hardware cloth four "cells" wide and as long as you need for your Railing. Cut the wires per the example in the picture. Using three of the four cells gives us our stanchion's and three rails . The fourth cell is used to attach the Railing to the model. After installing the Railing the extra length on the stanchion's can be cut off if it shows.
When you make a cut it leave's a small piece of wire and
galvanize, that must be removed.
There are a couple of ways to remove them.
One is to grind it away, "Always use eye
protection when grinding". Another way is to use a
Burns-a-matic torch to melt the galvanize where the wire's cross
and remove the galvanize and the wire at the same time.
If you heat the wire to remove it, be careful and take proper
precautions.
"Caution" Heating galvanize cause's
it to gives off dangerous fumes, always use adequate
ventilation.
You will notice I didn't remove the material between the third and fourth cells on the stanchion's.
I left it on to use as a stop when installing the Railing, after
painting it's not very noticeable, but it's up to the individual
if they want to remove it or not.
After you have made your Railing, you can bend it at one of the
stanchion's to go around corners.
You can paint your new Railing or put it on your model as
galvanized Railing and let nature take it's course, and let it
rust where ever it will.
To start out let's cut a strip form the Hardware Cloth, three cell's wide and about four cell's longer than the you need for your ladder. The extra length will be used as a safety hand rail at the top of the tank or structure. Next cut off every other wire or cut two wire's in a row. The wire's we didn't cut will be used to mount the ladder to the tank or structure. Bend the remaining wire's at a right angle with pliers so you will have a sharp bend. Carefully bend the wire at the top of your ladder to form the safety hand rails.
That is all there is to making a ladder.
Now we need a tank to put it on.
To add the ladder to the tank. Use a pencil to mark two light line's down the side of the tank, about 5/8" apart, where you are going to put your ladder. Mark where the bottom of the ladder will be. Where you mark the holes for the ladder depend's on how you cut the ladder. If you cut every other wire you, put the first mark 1/2" up from the bottom of the tank. Then 1" apart to the top of your ladder. Using a small drill, drill the holes to mount the ladder at the marks. Work the wires into the holes and glue them. When the glue dries, work the safety rails into the top of the tank.
Add some filling, over flow, and vent piping. a platform and inspection plates or anything else you want. Give everything a couple of coats of paint. Add a homemade logo and your tank is ready for the layout.
I have had E-mail telling me that they like this new format, but when they wanted to save it. Each photo had to be brought up and save individually. This takes a lot of time. So for Mark and others. I have added a link to all of the Photo's used in the article, so that they can all copied at one time. Photo's.
