Trees

“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The next best time is now.” » Chinese Proverb

One of my projects for this year is rebasing the trees.   I had been using irregular shaped foam core board, but storing and transporting them resulted in the trees being squished or falling out.  So in order to fix this I bought 300 of the Litko 50mm hexes.  These were cheaper than the 2 inch/50mm ovals or circles.  

114 hexes completed.

A while back I had purchased 1600 trees from a Chinese Ebay dealer.  These are available in various sizes and are steeply discounted if you buy the 400 piece lots.  the are also available in dark green, medium green, and light green.   I chose dark green.  30mm, 35mm and 38mm tall trees were purchased. 

They can be found by searching for 400pc trees on Ebay.   In addition to the hexes and trees,  Woodland Scenics Blended Green ground foam was used for the hexes

Tools and equipment for the project were 1/16 and 5/64 drill bits (slightly smaller than 2mm), a sharp tool to enlarge the holes if need be,  an old #2 or #3 paint brush, needle nose pliers ,a 6x8 two inch deep container for the ground foam. and white glue.  Most of the tree trunks will fit in a 5/64 hole while about 10 to 20% will fit in the smaller 1/16 hole.   About 1 to 2% are too large for a 5/64 hole. 

The hexes were drilled in stacks of 10 in order to avoid drilling through the bottom of the stack.   six or seven holes were drilled in each stack.   A drop of glue was placed on each hole and the trees were inserted.   Those that fit too loosely in the 5/64 holes were inserted in the hexes with 1/16 holes.   Some needed a bit of persuasion to fit in the holes requiring the use of the needle nose pliers to grasp the trunk and push them in.  For those that were too large the holes were enlarged and then the trees were placed in the holes.   The trunks are twisted wire and the white glue forms a secure bond between the wooden hexes and wire trunks.

After the glue holding the trees had dried, I used the brush to spread a coating of white glue on the top of the hexes.  The bases were then dipped in a thn layer of ground foam in the 6x8 container and the excess was tapped off.  this was done to avoid getting the ground foam in the branches.

It takes about 3 hours to drill the hexes, insert trees, and glue the ground cover for 120 hexes.   I have finished about 240 hexes.   Additional trees have been ordered and some of the finished hexes will have one or two trees added to them.