An Idiot's Guide to Static Grass

After attempting to use static grass on our logging railroad we realized we were not getting it right! What went wrong????? Well, we figured that out...

After watching like 25 videos on static grass here on YouTube we felt we were ready to buy the Woodland Scenics static grass applicator and make great-looking grass on our layout. After a test, we felt good about making long grass on our 1:20.3 logging railroad. BUT the first attempt looked like a haystack!! Total fail! We tried adjusting everything.. BUT still no joy...

THEN the first clue, the grass needs to be made on a mostly flat level surface. As the static grass applicator needs to be close to the surface, and the static grill mostly level, so the rocky hilly terrain of the model railroad was not conducive to applying static grass directly on the rocks.. Trees were also a problem. As were structures. The grass needed to be applied on flat open areas. OR made on a sheet and cut and applied.

Long fibers were a problem. They want to fall over. How to keep them standing tall? Our friend and wonderful Sn3 scale modeler, Doug Jolly put us onto a clue... You can "pull" the grass up with the applicator after shaking some out into a THIN layer of glue. We also found that thin passes of grass were better than one big pass of a lot of grass. AND long fiber can be pulled up with a vaccume while the glue is still wet. Then stray fibers removed with the vaccume after the glue is completely set.

Applying long grass fibers over a layer of short fibers is a great way to get natural tall grass. BUT the same techniques need to be used when adding the tall grass. Except in this case, small "lumps" in the glue work best. So the tall grass is only in clumps between the areas of short grass....

ANYWAY, we now have a system and the skills to make reasonable, passable scale grass on our large-scale railroad.

   • Building the logging railroad on our 1:20....