"If You Mix WOOD FLOUR And ACRYLIC FILLER, What Do You Get?" Topic

These two videos got me wondering …

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What if, instead of adding sand or grit to the brown acrylic caulking/filler, one were to add brown wood flour?

auction

Could that alternate mixture be used to add texture to a canvas gaming mat, perhaps with a little stippling with a wire brush?

Would such a concoction remain flexible if spread out thinly over the canvas? Or would the addition of wood flour make the acrylic filler/caulking stiffer and brittle?

Dan
PS. And, if not used for the texturing of a canvas game mat, where could that mixture be put to use then? There has got to be some application for that mix, right? Perhaps as a clay-like or sculptamold-like material? :)
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OK Dan, just how much of the wood flour did you buy?

Firstly, I believe that this is actually fine (very fine) sawdust.

Secondly, I have read that it can be mixed with wood glue to produce groundwork – I think this came from Henri Lion and was written about in his book My Way – selecting and painting model soldiers.

Thirdly, There is a method of getting this product free. Find a woodworker with a table saw and ask him for some of his sawdust! I got mine from a well-known DIY store with a board cutting machine, the sawdust is extremely fine and contained in a huge vacuum bag attached to the saw.

Fourthly,I would suggest that there are better (more modern) materials for texturing canvas – silicone based products would (in my opinion) be better wearing and easier to apply (wear gloves).

My own supply of fine sawdust is used as an additive to PVA Glue and used to ally fine texture to the walls of my scratch-built terrain pieces. I also use Sahara sand (brought back from Egypt) as a souvenir, it is very, very fine almost powder.

I hope that this helps.

Tony

Dave

LOL. The neighbor had some left over from working on his boat.

He normally mixed it epoxies and fiberglass and all kinds of other smelly stuff, to seal the bottom of the boat and to patch up joints. Apparently, if mixed with those things it doesn't shrink when it sets.

He offered me the little bit of wood flour that he had left over, and I really can't think of how I could put the stuff to use, if at all.

Any ideas?

Dan
PS. And I have a tube of acrylic caulking I got a long while back … hence the question about the mix with wood flour. The acrylic caulking on its own barely shrinks when it hardens. And remains flexible if spread thinly.

Tony

My first thought was to mix it with PVA, but I know that PVA shrinks considerably as the water in it dries up, and I really wanted to try something that might be an alternative to our usual warping compounds and materials.

I guess I might need to take the small batch he gave me and split it up, and then put each little pile through a different test, scientist-like. :)

Dan

If anyone needs sawdust PM me. I'll ship however much you need for postage only. I have several machines whose main purpose is producting sawdust. Not suitable for composting, because some of it is from manufactured wood products, but it's good for molding, filling, texturing…

Acrylic caulk is a poor choice. It may be flexible now, but in the long run it will harden and crack. Just look at any painted house.

Like many scavenged products the main difference between saw-dust and wood-flour is size sorting.

For any martial the mesh size of the particles will really affect the results.

Wood-floor should come with a stated mesh size sort of like the fineness of sandpaper. The sizes are spelled out here:
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I got myself a nice set of sieves to size my own finds:

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Good for sand, rock, tea and coffee grounds:
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Could that alternate mixture be used to add texture to a canvas gaming mat, perhaps with a little stippling with a wire brush?

It probably could, but at the expense of added weight and lower flexibility. Caulk will take textures quite readily all by itself, without adding anything.

Acrylic caulk is a poor choice. It may be flexible now, but in the long run it will harden and crack. Just look at any painted house.

Older, plain acrylic caulk, perhaps, but no one makes those any more. The currently available varieties are siliconized, and are guaranteed to last 35 years in all weather. It will likely last much longer than that when spread on canvas (I'm assuming no one stores their gaming ground cloth outdoors, exposed to frost and UV light.) My first canvas-and-siliconized-acrylic-caulk ground cloth is now over 20 years old, and it's as flexible as the day I made it.

I have used siliconized acrylic caulk for basing and terrain for 30 years. I just put the fig and base in a mixture of fine ballast or ballast with small rocks and press into the base. Shake off excess.

Dan, I can improve your recipe.

See, your recipe has been improved.

Bake reproduction bread the Germans gave to POWs?

If you want a flexible and durable terrain cloth, try this:

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Try using elastomeric compound. It comes in a tub, either smooth (knife grade) or textured (silica added). You should be able to find it a a local "painters" paint store. When the product was introduced to the paint shop I worked for, it was said to be 16xs more flexible than caulk. The stuff is great. I've done some amazing work with it. Heh, it is not going to shrink or crack in 10 yrs.

Z

"Red Beard Baron" on YouTube has a video on using wood flour to make a battle mat: youtu.be/r1KCX1tKYZg

Wow, so there IS some use for that wood flour stuff in terrain-making after all!

Thanks

Dan

Use it to build a Pykrete ship?

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pykrete

Ron

Semolina?

Maypo?

Grits?