Make your own Static Grass Applicator - for layouts and Dioramas

[Music] hi everyone welcome to anthony's hobby corner i hope everyone's staying safe on today's video i'm going to be sharing with you the steps that i've taken to build a static grass applicator now i'm sure you've seen many commercially available products out there or commercially available static grass applicators out there uh but they are quite pricey from that standpoint so i figured let me see if i can actually build one myself using some you know available materials and get it done in a much more cost effective manner so how does a static grass applicator work well the principle is that you create a high positive charge on the static grass itself the mini poly fibers and you create an opposing negative charge on the layout such that when you then deposit these uh these highly positively charged grasp particles they will align themselves such that vertically such that uh only one end touches the the negative uh part of the layout in a case that's the principle it's worked it's worked very well because you can see many commercial available products out there that do that for you well any case what i decided to do was create my own static grass applicator and so what i did was i went and purchased a a simple negative ion generator which is something like this and it's basically available on on ebay et cetera and i can put a link out there and it simply creates a very high voltage on on the output end on the input end it basically takes a standard 12 volts and then on the output and this particular negative ion generator can generate up to 20 000 volts on the output on the output end now i think this one set set to around 17 000 volts and these these negative ion generator units are freely available on online online sites including ebay and they go for about 20 odd dollars and so it's very it's very cost effective and so i purchased one of these and what this will do is that you feed the the negative negative wire the output from the negative wire over to your layout where you plan to put your static grass you put some glue there obviously and then this positive end is the one that charges the the grass particles in the little chamber that you put the grass particles into that's the principle that's been used out there as well [Music] all right so what i've done is i've seen some people out there they've actually they've used some plastic pipe to house their generator and they've used like a tupperware container or something to create a chamber for that static grass but what i decided to do was to use an old flashlight i found that these old uh old and incandescent flashlights to be not much use anymore because everyone's using led flashlights and i have a ton of led led flashlights at home so i took this this old flashlight that i had and this is the front part of the flashlight as you can see and i figured this well really has the same shape that of a standard static grass applicator so i figured well why not use a flashlight case because it does two things one it has a decent area in here to house the negative ion generator right it's about the same size so because this one takes two d cells the chamber is designed to take 2d cells but and it's plenty of room to house the negative ion generator and secondly flashlights have two switches they have a stay on push to stay on switch and just a momentary push on switch as well so the switches are already here i can leverage them to turn this unit on and off as well and i don't have to purchase a separate switch and install it so there's already already an integrated switch in a flashlight so i figured well that's the second benefit and thirdly there is the front section here which is an ideal area as a chamber to house your study grass so what i did with the front here is i removed the bulb um chamber and the reflector as you can see here there's no use for this anymore so i can put that aside and here's the remaining open part of the chamber and um and here's the back the the end of of the inside of the uh of the um flashlight and you can see i've leveraged the switch that's already here [Music] so what i did i'll talk about the uh the chamber first and i'll talk about how i'm going to put the generator the negative ion generator inside the flashlight so what i did was to create a chamber since i have a 3d printer i i created this little cup on a 3d printer as you can see i have a slight offset issue here on the cup but it's no big deal it's just uh cosmetic um either way i created a little cup with a with a with a tube built into it um i have the hole here the intent is to pass the positive wire through this tube opening here as you can see it's protected so it's not exposed to all the all the fibers that will be in here and this will then sit here on the corner [Music] and i will then put a a metal screen on top here that will then touch the the the positive terminal here now what i'm using here as a screen is a typical strainer a food strainer and i just cut off the part of the food strainer to use as as the mesh and i also printed a little kind of a washer type ring that goes on the outside um it'll go on like this and hold against the uh against the mesh [Music] so the only unique parts that i've actually created for this for this project are really these two pieces here that i um printed on a 3d printer to match the diameter of my of my chamber here so the intent is to put so i put this ring in here at the bottom and i have a second one that's a slightly less diameter so to create that little uh what do you call a border ring here to get some additional strength then i'm going to put the uh the strainer mesh that i cut out in there and then place the cup as such and now you have a chamber here for your for your grass particles that will you can then shake after and then drop them through and this will be the mesh that gets charged with positive ions and the negative ions from the negative wire goes onto the landscape that you're planning to put the grass onto and of course then this section screws onto the back which then controls the negative ion generator so very simple i'm just using up some household uh discarded items you can actually build your own your own static static grass applicator so i'm going to leave this to the side for a second and we'll talk about this part so this negative ion generator runs on 12 volts this is the one i happen to get from ebay so and i do have a spare 12 volt power supply here and so i figured i'll use this one and of course this one has a 2.1 millimeter uh power jack a male power jack so i figured i will then mount a 2.1 millimeter female power jack on so i can feed power to this one i've made a little insertion a little hole at the bottom this is where the negative wire the negative ions will be coming off coming out of this of this of this out of this structure that's all there is to it to it now if you like you can actually put an led indicator here with a resistor so it turns on gives you an indic visual indicator that you turn the unit on you can do that as additionally i didn't bother putting led this is really more for functional than aesthetics so i didn't bother putting an led in a resistor but that can be done as well so now inside here as you can see i've just i'm utilizing the switch that's currently on the on the flashlight so what i'm doing is i'm taking the positive uh from the socket positive wire feeding it into the switch from the switch i'm taking the other end and feeding it to the negative ion generator's positive input terminal and this way i'm controlling the positive of the of of the generator through the switch the negative wire from the power socket it's brought out here and that will connect directly to the negative input wire uh on the generator and these two wires obviously the output wires the positive will go into the the cup with the mesh and the negative will be will be sent out through the to the hole here to over for to be adhered to the landscape okay and that's a simple uh simple scenario here okay so let's uh let's insert the negative ion generator into this flashlight as you can see i've already soldered the positives so and this one barely fits in here it's a snug fit so um bear with me as i uh manipulate this thing here okay so i'm just going to push this inside the flashlight where the typical batteries are [Music] [Music] there it goes recess right in there [Music] make sure the wires don't end up here with the switch [Music] if it doesn't so now i have a a switch that can be depressed and left in the on position if i'm going to have prolonged use or i have a switch that's momentary on that i can use on and off as well all right next you can i'm going to wire up the two negatives of the input and solder them together and then i'm also going to hook up the positive terminal onto the mesh [Music] and then we'll take the negative the output negative which is going to have the negative ounce and i'm going to fit it through this little hole here that's created for it so it's going to go over the layout okay so i've done a few things here i didn't want to uh shoot some footage on me doing the soldering because most people know how to solder so what i've done here is i've just connected the um the negative wire from the socket over to the negative on the ion generator so that's connected good to go um the positive was already connected before as notice through the switch and now i have the negative output negative ion output wire here the thick one that's coming out through here now and it's going to go out to a i've soldered it to an alligator clip so i can now clip it on to a anywhere on the on the um layout landscape where i'm going to have the uh static grass uh and the sufficient wire here for that as well and i also soldered a mini uh piece of metal here onto the positive lead and i'll explain to you what i'm planning to do here is that for the cup i'm going to uh so here's the ring that i also did if it's 3d printing here's the mesh the cup's going to go like that inside i'm going to do is i'm going to put a screw [Music] the tape of the screw that's going to go through the hole here and the face the the front of the screw here [Music] we'll then touch against the meshel metal mesh and then transfer the electrical charge onto here and of course i'm going to connect the positive lead uh on to the back of the screw here of suppose this goes in the front as a retainer to keep everything in place and there's your here's your chamber this way i can just open it up put the grass in here and then screw it back on this will spin but this is going to stays stay stay permanent without moving and of course back here i'm going to put the uh [Music] here's the positive charge now can get sent across through this insulated section in through this to this uh top top part of the screw which will then connect with the mesh as it's put over here so now let's just uh fix the uh put the knot here to hold the positive terminal positive high voltage terminal in place [Music] it's gonna go like this i made a little notch here for the screw to sit in place so all this will stay these tools say fixed and the mesh and the plate the mess and mesh and the outside retaining ring and can actually can actually move with the uh the front uh cover of the uh flashlight as you spin as you screw it back on place in place and then screw this on yep that's solid black lead in here now it's just a matter of tucking these wires back there's one stuck back in here this one's tucked away now it's good there we go open it up like that and this goes on that goes on like this there you go so i'm gonna put these flashlight here like so put the cup in here like so and now i can align this notch with the screw [Music] there you go you have a homemade static grass dispenser all we have left now is to give it a shot got another one here that's seven mil i haven't uh haven't used yet maybe they'll give this one a shot um okay so i put a little bit of uh static grass in here and i can show you what i just did so you unscrew this out here you can see that i've got some study grass inside here not much just a little bit in there maybe it's more visible from this angle there you go [Music] so i put some in there and now basically just uh close the uh and now this is nice and tight against the uh against the rim and we already get applying here applying here so i'm gonna put a little bit of glue on here and uh then we'll uh plug this thing in and take a look all right so i zoomed in here i got some i got some glue um i'm gonna put a little bit of glue on here [Music] just a small little test area [Music] okay and let's plug this thing in [Music] all right so i've got it as you can see i've got it uh plugged in here to my 12 volt power supply and i've got the negative now ready to uh to put on to the foam here since that in there [Music] and uh there we go just hold the button down [Music] let me just use on this side so i can cover the light there's some on there and put too much on there and you can see how they're all standing up so i put some seven mil in here as well and also seven millimeter grass let's see how that comes out there you go so the thing works pretty well uh what i noticed was that this glue is a little too too runny so it's not holding it too much in place once it falls it falls vertical but um i need to use a bit more tackier glue but other than that as you can see it's working really well so i put on a little bit more blue here that's a bit more tack here and let's see how it plays out wow look at that look at that works really well and that's the effect i was looking for and again with a simple negative ion generator and a flashlight case got yourself really powerful static grass applicator all right i hope you uh enjoy the video and you found this useful please don't feel free to uh put some comments uh in the comment section and i'll be more than happy to respond thank you

Channel: Anthony's Hobby Corner - Model Trains -

Views: 16,733

Keywords: static grass applicator, static grass applicator diy, static grass, home made static grass applicator, static grass applicator for model trains, diorama and, diorama and miniature, do it yourself static grass applicator, HO Scale trains, Noch, Woodland scenics, woodland scenics static grass, woodland scenics static king, woodland scenics static grass applicator, noch static grass applicator, noch static grass applicator uk, best static grass applicator, static grass for HO train

Id: INY4VCP13vw

Length: 25min 51sec (1551 seconds)

Published: Sun Jul 04 2021