Hi ho Gents! Well, stupidity has struck another blow in my life! Have you seen the new line of "Hudson & Allen" buildings? They are spectacular! They are also cast from hard foam and that leaves them a little light for my tastes. I bought their 25mm modular castle a few months ago and it is pretty large with lots of pieces. Being the thorough craftsman that I am, it was decided to give them some weight to hold them on the table better AND provide some protection to that edge most likely damaged. I traced the bottoms onto 1/8th inch Masonite and carefully cut out all the pieces on my reciprocating arm saw (Ian Weekly of Battlements romantically refers to his as a "vibrosaw"). I was being "Mr. Careful" and noticed that the castle segments are hollow. "Now what can I fill them with to make them stronger and give them just a little more weight?" I sez to myself? The best thing to do in cases like this is to take a turn through Home Depot and away I went in search of a solution. Considering water putty I decided it would make the models too heavy. Other products also had drawbacks. I picked up a can of Minimally Expanding Foam that is used to weather seal doors, windows and pipe openings and decided on this route. I had all my Masonite bases laid out, my glue ready and all the castle segments ready to go. There were 14 pieces in all. I had them lined up down my gaming table. I started on the first one by spreading the glue on the Masonite, squirting a little foam in the cavity and pressing the two pieces together to start drying. Going down the line, I repeated the process 14 times. With the last one finished, I turned to look on my handiwork. To my horror, the first one was rising into the air! Now fellows, I work around the construction trades everyday and I am familiar with this foam. I had apparently gotten a hold of some foam that was either very, very fresh - or some funny fellow at the plant had given it additional chemical "zing". The stuff was going crazy! Frantically, I began to snatch the pieces apart and scrap the excess foam out of the cavities and then pressing them back together. I went down the line and did all 14 pieces before I allowed myself to breath. At this point I relaxed and looked back down the line of repaired segments. I will not repeat the words that I uttered. They were climbing AGAIN! The air was blue around me as I started the process all over. Separate, scrape, replace. For those of you unaccustomed to this stuff it also makes a good glue in that is sticks to everything it touches. Thoughts of Brer Rabbit and his Tar Baby ran through my mind and more and more of the stray foam found its way onto my hands, the table and my shop clothes. Worst of all, it began to harden. Now there are those among you that would think, logically, that something cannot continue to expand and harden at the same time. It defies conventional logic (You are way ahead of me here). The simple fact is that this stuff can. I had a mess, literally, on my hands of Biblical proportions. Remember the episode of the Lucy show where she and Ethyl are working on an assembly line in the Bourbon Candy factory and they get behind and begin to eat the candy? I could not eat the stuff, but I sure as hell did wear it! I was expecting to be found on Monday morning glued into a mass of castle pieces and Masonite panels - the whole stuck to the top of my gaming table. Tell you another little secret. Even paint thinner won't cut the stuff! I discovered that too. From the number of passes and repasses I made through those segments, in what turned out to be the entire day, I have very unscientifically calculated that a good fresh can of expandable foam will occupy five times the space it does when you first squirt it on. One of my building contractor buddies showed up during the process and, amidst the tearful laughter, informed me that he had seen the stuff crack and escape from concrete walls when too much was used! It took the next eight hours for me to redress the bad inspiration of a 10 minute trip to Home Depot. Did you know the stuff is difficult to cut even using a buck saw? If you ever find yourself at Home Depot looking for wargames inspiration and a can of that stuff finds its way into your hands, lay it down and run from the store! If anyone is looking for a nice castle with fancy Masonite bases, I have an unfinished one for sale. It will take me some time before I have the nerve to work on it again. Be warned. Here are some comments in another email from that noted Jurist and fellow gamer, David Raybin: RAYBIN here. DUNCAN has lost it fellows ... he really has...please read the following passage copied directly from his recent e-mail about the crazy foam: "Worst of all, it began to harden. Now there are those among you that would think, logically, that something cannot continue to expand and harden at the same time. It defies conventional logic " Well ...... I for one can think of one thing that does this...Duncan has discovered WARGAMER'S VIAGRA!!!! Rub some on the offending member and whoosh it continues to harden and expand at the same time. So what if it turns Blue...TURN OUT THE LIGHTS.. a small price to pay .... I'll draw up the contract in the morning and get Dunacan to sign it...that is if we can prize him out of his workshop....... From Gerald Swick up in WVa: Raybin's message on the discovery of Wargamer's Viagra. The following warning must appear on the label before you attempt to sell the stuff: User will be glued to whatever woman he shares this amazing product with for life. From Neel Woodall in Columbia TN: Gerald has a good point so it should be used with caution so that you don't find yourself in a sticky situation with the wrong woman. Back to Dispatch Sep. 99 Table of Contents Back to Dispatch List of Issues Back to MagWeb Master Magazine List © Copyright 1999 by HMGS Mid-South This article appears in MagWeb (Magazine Web) on the Internet World Wide Web. Other military history articles and gaming articles are available at http://www.magweb.com