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N8's98GT
08-14-2012, 09:18 AM
I made my kid an airfield out of junk I had laying around the house... the entire thing only cost me $10.

I started out with a beat up sheet of 1/2" thick MDF (about 5' by 18") that had been the top of my workbench in the garage before I replaced it. It had screw holes, bubbles where it got wet, etc... anyway, I filled in all of the holes and sanded it smooth and applied a coat of gray primer. I then framed it on the underside using 2x2s, taped it off and painted the grass areas around the runway, taxiway, and parking area with green spray paint.

http://i283.photobucket.com/albums/kk289/N8Dogg98/IMG_20120810_160736.jpg

At this point, I taped off the green areas and painted the runway, taxiway, and parking area with gray spray paint and made runway markings with white spray paint and I hand painted yellow lines with model paint. Once it dried I hit the entire thing with a matte finish clear coat to seal it all in. Finally, I used Elmers glue and some static grass flocking to cover the green grass areas.

As a finishing touch, I capped the outside with doorway trim stained a natural finish and attached it to the wall with shelf brackets. The brackets will support 1,000 lbs so it's really freaking sturdy.

http://i283.photobucket.com/albums/kk289/N8Dogg98/IMG_20120812_182315.jpg

http://i283.photobucket.com/albums/kk289/N8Dogg98/IMG_20120812_195938.jpg

I may eventually re-do the runway numbers and the white lines below the numbers as they got messed up when I removed the tape. I used green frog tape but it still lifted the paint off in a few places and I tried to cover it up by painting gray squares around these areas to make it look like cement patches.

Whatever, the important thing is when I showed this to my 3 year old son last night he was very excited and has been talking about it non-stop. :)

F8LBITE
08-14-2012, 09:39 AM
Nicely done!

MadJack
08-14-2012, 04:53 PM
Looks great nate

p51mstg
08-17-2012, 02:41 PM
That really is cool, and a great thing to make for your kids! I like the runway patches and displaced threshold - wouldn't change a thing.

I love the runway number, too.