Sealing foam before painting?

Spoox

Spoox

Well-Known Member
I am about to build a Dredd armor out of foam for halloween and I was wondering what the best way to seal the foam is before painting?

I seen dilluted white glue, is that as in Elmers glue dilluted with water?

Also plastidip, but I am worried it might peel? has that happened to anyone?

Any advise for a first time foam builder? :)
 
I did foam carving in Orlando and in the shop I worked at we used elmers straight out of the bottle. Once it was dry we could safely fiberglass it.
 
I know most people want to retain the flexibility of the foam, but I was wondering if anyone has had any luck actually putting fiberglass resin onto the foam to harden it? For a build I'm working on, I'm just using the foam for the simplicity of the raised details, I don't want to glue together all the tiny pieces in pepakura. I don't want my armor to be flexible though and I want it to paint really smooth, even be able to put bondo on it. Has anybody tried it? I saw a video where a guy tested out some resin on craft foam, but it was just a sheet, not an actual armor piece.
 
Thanks for the link. I did that same thing when I attempted a Chief helmet and the super glue did harden the foamies, that's what gave me the idea. After seeing your tutorial series on foam armor building I decided that was the way to go and I'd give it a shot. I'm not sure though if the FG resin will soak in as well as the super glue.
 
a couple of coats of plastidip has never peeled on me.
and i've put some of the armor i have made through a lot of work.
 
As a word of caution, I would try your sealant of choice on a scrap of your foam first. I have had bad experiences in the past where I tried to do exactly what you are talking about and ruined the piece I spent a had carved. I did like you and read on a forum that this would work of that would and it didn't, only to find out later that I wasn't specific enough about the type of foam, etc.
 
We're finding with our foam build that tape does not stick to it at all, so we're testing plasti-dip to see if adhesives stick better to that. It's drying in the basement now, ready for a test of the decal material tonight.
 
roccopeterbilt said:
As a word of caution, I would try your sealant of choice on a scrap of your foam first. I have had bad experiences in the past where I tried to do exactly what you are talking about and ruined the piece I spent a had carved. I did like you and read on a forum that this would work of that would and it didn't, only to find out later that I wasn't specific enough about the type of foam, etc.
Click to expand...

Great advice. I always test products on foam scrap prior to treating the final pieces for the same reason!

Also note, that all foam is not the same - Foamies, floor matts and the stuff GraphicJordan (and I) use are all different so they may react differently to different compounds.

The EVA closed-cell foam that GJ and I use didn't take the fiberglass resin for me very well -- as I use some latex caulking to smooth out seams in the foam pieces. The resin reacted differently to the caulked areas and non-caulked areas so it didn't end up being a smooth or evenly-drying result.

I HAVE had luck with 2-part epoxy as a hardener. I use this and sometimes extra materials (like thick plastic and/or metal washers) to strengthen connection points.

As for plasti-dip, I've never had it 'peel' on any pieces - although I don't have a lot of wear-n-tear on any of this armor yet, so it's very 'untested'. :)
 
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