"How to mount plastic trees?" Topic

I bought a bunch of railroad trees off E-bay. They are that soft plastic like some army men. I tried to hot glue them to washers but the glue does not hold – a slight tug and it pops right off. I was using hot glue so it would "fill the hole" in the washer. The trunks are straight there is no root ball for the glue to grab either.

I want to use washers so I can store the trees in magnet lined boxes.

I was wondering if anyone makes cheap tree bases like come on the Woodland Scenics tree sprues? Or should I buy a big batch of air dry clay and just make root balls? Smush it on the easher, insert the tree and let dry? Then paint and flock?

Open to suggestions….

I had a similar situation last year, and I used that white clay you heat to harden. I rolled it out flat and then used a bottle top to make round bases, carefully removed the leftovers, and popped it in the oven. Oh, and before that I put a little mound in the middle with a hole in it so the trees would fit right in. I later superglued them just to be sure.
After a year of use, including the Battle of Gettyburg, they are still holding up.

Try sticking a drawing pin up the trunk of the tree, then glue the drawing pin to the washer

I have tried the following and it works very well…it may even be a somewhat over-engineered solution:

-Pre-drill a hole in the base of the plastic trunk

-Shape a scrap piece of styrene (or whatever) so that it covers the washer hole with enough overlap for a gluing surface

Screw a nail with a large flat head (brass wood screws work) through the hole in the scrap piece and into the tree trunk.

Test fit to make sure it's all flush with (or at least does not protrude below) the base of the washer.

Put epoxy on the outside/downward facing edge of the scrap piece and glue onto the washer.

et voilą!

I cut matting board into ovals and other shapes, and then with a hammer and nail, punched holes in the cardboard. This leaves a slight indentation on the reverse side of the base. I pushed the tree's base stem through the hole on the top of the base, trimmed it a bit with a nail clipper and then melted the protruding plastic stem with a lighter and while still hot, mushed it into the indentation. This creates a plug to prevent the tree from slipping out of the base. The base stem on my trees was a smaller diameter than the tree trunk. Then I painted and flocked the bases.

In all, I based over 400 trees this way, but discovered that 400 trees is really not that many. I think I needed closer to 1200 trees to fill my game table. I will be buying more on eBay at some point. I also bought over 800 palm trees and will base them the same way at some point in the future. It took me about 3 hours to base 400 trees, but a bit longer to paint/flock.

The photos are 1/285th Sci-Fi (MAATAC) miniatures available through Monday Knight Productions. Very nice models.

E.H.

Great looking table Greyone.

I have nothing to add to this thread other than my astonishment that hot glue failed to stick to the polythene tree trunk.

I have rarely found anything that hot glue failed to stick, albeit measily.

John T

I'm experimenting with Elmer's Glue-All Max to fix Woodland scenic bases to a CD, then covering the CD with wood putty to have some texture to the base, cover the hole (if I don't have a tree base covering the hole, I use simple Scotch tape on the bottom, allowing the putty to fill in), etc.

They haven't fallen off so far, but it's only been a few days…

Options : Use a candle flame to melt the bottom of the trunk a bit and mash it onto something metal to give a better surface to attach to things.
Also, using two part epoxy putty such as Knedite for the base might be an option.

Have you thought about drinking straw or stir stick tubes mounted to a base that the trunk can fit into?

I mount my trees on CDs in random groupings, but the straw stumps are all the same height allowing me to move trees and let large based figures stand flat on multiple stumps.

Here is a tutorial that shows the basic idea;
PDF link

Goop.

I use hot glue myself and haven't really had problems with it.

Mind you I do use a great big blob of hot glue so that the tree base has between 1/2 & 1 cm up the trunk.

Try heating the bottom of the tree and washer first applying a light coat of glue. Let cool, then glue them together. I find pre-heating like that works on tough to glue items.

Hot glue does not adhere all that well to metal in my experience.

One option is to stick the trees into something, such as a rough cut piece of cork and reinforce the join with some white glue. Then flock the cork. Then use crazy glue to adhere the cork to the washer for you storage requirement.

The cork will appear to hover slightly above the playing surface because of the underlying washer. But this isn't the end of the world and is hardly noticeable.

I used a little ball of Milliput, stuck the tree in it, shaped around the trunk, stuck it down without glue on the base. Let it dry then PVA and flock.

Three years later they are all (90 odd) still in place and good to go.

Cheap ebay trees too.

Put masking tape on bottom of washer to seal hole. Flip over, fill with hot glue, stick trunk in. Use hi temp hot glue after testing to confirm it won't melt plastic. Use the biggest output nozzle. Be careful not to burn yourself, and make sure you have enough glue sticks.

After all are done, change nozzle to a smaller round one, add roots by starting part way up the trunk and painting down. Try low temp glue for this since it sets faster and if you burn yourself it's not as hot.

Prime, paint, flock, seal the glue and washer.

If it matters, peel off the masking tape from the bottom of the washer.

I've done the following. I found some thin plastic sheeting that was used to line a 5 shelve wire rack. (look up wire rack shelving). It was clear with a slightly rough surface and thinner than card stock- about as thick as "resume quality" typing paper. I cut out rounded-edge rectangles from these- about as wide as the tree was tall- and I white glued the base of the trees to these. I then mixed white glue with brown paint and smeared this under the canopy with some added ground-stuff. The outside of that was painted with white glue/green latex paint and some flocking, which sort of matched my wargame tabletop.

IF you think about it there are two ways to get stability- a big weight at the bottom or a wide base.

These work pretty well and can be overlapped with one another for storage or for denser forests.

Some info on my experience with eBay trees here: link