What material best for building scenery buildings.

Bill....I moved this from the 2-rail scale forum to the correct forum.

This will be a minority opinion, but for that kind of structure, I think that balsa wood can't be beat. Most will recommend basswood, but if you want an old, weathered look, then try balsa.

As for tools, beside the obvious, I have three recommendations:  (1) a small hobby mitre box set up to cut multiple pieces of the same length;  (2) a big package of single-edge razor blades. If you buy them 100 at a time, they cost almost nothing. Not as nice to use as X-acto knives, but they are vastly cheaper, so you can afford to throw them away much more often. You can't beat a really sharp cutter, and they all grow dull very quickly; and (3) a nice self-healing cutting board with a grid printed on it.

Opps one gets used to going into the same forums that one can forget there are certain ones for a topic. My apologies.

Pete.

    Would you recommend a dealer to buy the needed supply. I would think that one can buy most of what is in need at one stop and shop.

I used basswood lumber and board & batten sheathing from Micro-Mark to make this lumber shed.  They will also have all the tools and supplies you might need.

Bass wood, or Lazer cut ply wood,  for wood structures. plastics ,for concrete , steel and brick balsa has no strength, and the graining is wrong

Is basswood and balsa wood the same to work with Or is basswood a harderwood ? Also I do have a dowel of balsa and it is very flexible does basswood have the same e flexibility?

Bob .  Very nice . Do u build most of your own buildings? I also need a grain silo to add to a grainery that I bought from MTH some time ago. That should be doable for me. I watched the OGR video on that. I will add lighting and more decor on it. I live by the Palouse in Washington state.

@Bill Grafmiller posted:

Is basswood and balsa wood the same to work with Or is basswood a harderwood ? Also I do have a dowel of balsa and it is very flexible does basswood have the same e flexibility?

Technically, both balsa and basswood (which is really linden wood) are hardwoods, even though both are quite soft. "Hardwood" refers to how the trees reproduce, not the density of the wood. They are both hardwoods because they are not conifers.  Now that you are confused....

Although they are both quite soft, basswood is somewhat harder and less porous, which makes it better for carving. It is also somewhat less likely to splinter on the ends, but this isn't really a big issue if you chop using razor blades. It is also true that basswood has smaller, more uniform grain. But, I consider this a negative for modeling older buildings. Wood grain is one of those features that tend to be lost when viewed from any distance.  Good modelers will exaggerate these features. The goal (at least MY goal) is not to make a perfect miniature, but rather to make a model that looks like a perfect miniature. This often requires deviating from true scale.  In my judgement, balsa is a better choice for this purpose. (Again: I am talking about OLD-looking buildings. Modeling a modern skyscraper would be an entirely different matter--probably involving styrene, rather than wood).

As for strength: Basswood is stronger in an absolute sense, but balsa is stronger per unit weight (which is why it is used in model airplanes meant to fly). In any event, both are plenty strong enough for anything that your buildings are likely to be subjected to.

I especially like balsa for modeling the interiors of utilitarian buildings. For example, this interior is almost 100% balsa:

I warned you that this would be a minority opinion. To each his or her own, but IMO, balsa wood gets a bad rap around here. It is much cheaper than basswood (because the trees grow much faster). Lots of people automatically assume that this means it is inferior. In reality, it is either inferior or superior depending on the effect you are aiming for.

Pete thank you and thank you all that replied to this post. I will start my new experience in model building , I do hope that I can achieve the level that you have shown with pictures. Thanks so much for the help everyone.

I built a lumber yard building to fit into my 364 Lionel Lumber Loader with Poly-styrene, the siding is strips of card stock and the windows are all custom made from Evergreen Styrene Strips, the main roof is sandpaper glued to a Styrene roof. Poly-styrene is great to work with, easy to cut with a utility knife and glue with Weld-on solvent. One of the nice things about working with Styrene is that the adhesion is almost instantaneous. i don't have details of this build but I have others I can show you.

The shell of this building is cut from 4' X 8' sheets of Poly-styrene I buy from a plastics distributor, it is much cheaper than buying small pieces, since I scratch build everything on my layout. The foundation and steps are Precision Board (foam boards I get from scraps from a sign shop) Most of my plans are taken from pictures, photos and blueprints. The windows are from Grandt Windows, with some added trim and the roof is O Gauge Roof Tile. I Spray Painted the exterior, I prime all surfaces in and out, it makes it easier to glue siding and paint with Acrylics. Most of the tools needed to build this should be in you tool box, Utility knife, hobby saw, file, awl, sandpaper etc.

My Hood's Milk factory is constructed with Precision-board. You can cut, sand and paint just like wood, only easier. I rounded the storage tanks and carved the Milk Bottle, If you have a lathe you can turn the board on it. I purchased the windows for this model too. The other storage tanks were made from a piece of Plexiglas tubing I had, the ends are precision Board. I scribed horizontal  lines with an Awl on the building and spray painted it.

@Avanti posted:

I warned you that this would be a minority opinion. To each his or her own, but IMO, balsa wood gets a bad rap around here. It is much cheaper than basswood (because the trees grow much faster). Lots of people automatically assume that this means it is inferior. In reality, it is either inferior or superior depending on the effect you are aiming for.

I generally prefer basswood for a couple of reasons, the primary one being the availability of O scale lumber in basswood (also pine and red cedar). I have not seen O scale lumber available in balsa; dimensional lumber, yes.  There are also differences in how the two take paint.

Gene. Nice job thanks for sharing the pictures.  I will give the styrene a shot also. I would also think one could use good card stock. Not sure how it would take paint.

Bill, I never used card stock, But if you use Poly-styrene strips and windows it's very difficult to adhere the Styrene to the card stock.