I made a little more progress on the house model today. The first photo shows the main layer of thatching material after it dried. This drying process took a bit longer than expected. My man cave work table isn't in the warmest room in the house and the colder weather means the mixture takes its own sweet time to set. In any case, it did dry in the end and shrank to about half its bulk and made a nice tight coating on the roof. I'm pleased to say the cardboard beneath wasn't affected by the moisture at all.
I applied a second coat of mix on the top half of the roof, creating a step where the layers of thatching overlap. In real life the length of the plant material used for thatching (reeds, straw or whatever) dictates where these layers go and how many there are on any given spread of roof. I used a wooden medical splint to get the straight edge by laying it lengthwise along the roof and easing the mix up to the splint with my fingertip.
Once this is dry the final layer will go on atop the ridge line to about half an inch either side. The chimney will still be slightly above the roof. Once all is dry, I'll move on to the painting stage.
1 comment:
It won't be long now A.J.
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