We all love our pink foam insulation for various scenery items, but today it occurred to me that it'd be great for making coal loads for hopper cars (mainly because it seems I'm all out of the foam that I usually use for hopper car loads, and I've got some scrap pieces of 1" pink foam lying around). As they say, necessity is a mother! I'm sure I'm not the first to have this idea, but here's what I did...
I rough cut a piece to fit with a utility knife, but feel free to use anything else you like. I beveled the bottoms of the ends so it'll fit down inside the car. I then cut the top in a cross-hatch pattern, and scraped across it with the point of the knife, removing various chunks of foam. You could probably bevel the outer edges of the top too if you like. The idea here is to create a rough and uneven base for your "coal" to adhere to. Check fitment until you achieve the depth you desire.
Next step is painting the top. Most spray paints will eat the foam if applied too heavily, but as this is just to provide color, and we won't actually see the foam, it should be OK. If you'd rather avoid that, give it a coat of flat acrylic paint.
Then once dry, glue it (either your favorite liquid glue, or spray adhesive), add "coal" (or the hopper load of your choice), let dry, and you're done!
