Foam Carver Suggestions?

[DisneyDellsDude]

Hello all,

For the carving of my tombstones, I'm looking for a new "hot wire" foam cutter, but don't know which brand to buy. (My old one became lost - I believe it just stopped working with age and someone at my house threw it away) Does anyone have any suggestions? Or is there something even better for carving foam out there?

The foam I use for tombstones is usually the pink stuff that goes behind drywall.

What are your thoughts?

[RoxyBlue]

Take a look at this thread:

http://www.hauntforum.com/showthread.php?t=27213

[Bone Dancer]

I have never had a hot wire cutter so I had to find something I did have that worked. I found that a jig saw works ok for cutting tombstone out of the 2 inch foam. I have even used a electric kitchen carving knife to cut up thinner foam board. Not as messy as you might think it would be.
I plan on making a foam cutter to use on my blocks of foam (12x12x18). The Garage of Evil has a design that I will be using.
I have looked at foam cutters before but the cost is to much for my budget.

[Jaybo]

http://www.harborfreight.com/media/catalog/product/cache/1/image/370x/9df78eab33525d08d6e5fb8d27136e95/i/m/image_1713.jpg

$20 Hot Knife (http://www.harborfreight.com/130-watt-heavy-duty-hot-knife-66182.html) from Harbor Freight.

[DisneyDellsDude]

Take a look at this thread:

http://www.hauntforum.com/showthread.php?t=27213

Didn't even see that... and only posted a week ago.:o

Thanks everyone for the suggestions as well!

[DisneyDellsDude]

And Jaybo, does that knife work well for you?
It seems to have many bad reviews on it's website.

[Allen H]

That knife works great for me- I have three of them. One that i bought didnt work at all, so I returned it with no issues. Its meant for cutting industrial plastic thats the market they made it for, and for that its crap. But it works great on foam.
Check out these guys-http://www.demandproducts.com/ They are the Home Depot to foam sculpting and
http://hotwirefoamfactory.com/home.php?cat= Are great for the hobby home use crowd (I love their stuff too- I used the heck out of their 4' bow today sculpting a zombie seal).
I recommend building your own table- you can get alot more heat out of them and cut much faster- pink foam really drags on the hot wire table.

[Doc Doom]

I made my own hot-wire foam cutter from an old pistol style soldering iron. I simply replaced the soldering tip with a longer piece of regular #10 copper wire. Works great. The best part is you can bend the wire into different shapes.

[flesh1031]

I agree with Allen H. That little blue knife works great. I am using 1'x1'x19" blocks of low density foam that we found at a tractor supply store. I also agree with Allen H that making a table is the ultimate way to go, you can straight cut or scroll cut, it's the coolest toy. I was sick of cutting one side and then the other because this knife is only 6" long, so a buddy of mine made a table for me. He happened to have a 0-120 volt variable transformer laying around (I have it set on 10-15 volts thats all you need to make the wire glow) and we just hooked up the positives and negitives to a wooden bow saw that had a something gauge piano wire spanning the gap instead of the blade. You know what, I'll try to get a tutorial out about it or at least photos... I had such a hard time finding a way to cut these blocks, I can certainly appreciate the frustration, most really awesome knifes and table heat saws are for those with really awesome budgets, not me...

[DisneyDellsDude]

That's good to hear Allen. Flesh, a tutorial would be very nice! It's something I'd be interested in learning about.

Now I did check out hotwirefoamfactory, but why in the world are they trying to charge me $12 for shipping of a $25 item! I am not in that huge of a rush. I do not need it to leave within 1 business day...

That deterred me, and I'm rethinking my strategy. Being half way done with college, I defiantly have a tight budget! But I also don't want something that's going to die on me after my first use.

A fine line I must walk.:D

[trishaanne]

Do you think that Harbor Freight knife would work on a massive block of foam? I mean, 8 feet tall, 4 feet thick and 4 feet wide? I know I would have to chip away at it a little at a time, but if this would work, it would be SOOOOO worth the 20 bucks. I even posted an ad on craigslist looking for someone to carve this thing down for me, and I found 3 people but they wanted about 400 bucks. That's a bit steep for a party prop! Well, at least for my budget it's steep. Oh, I should add, it's the white beaded foam, not the pink or blue stuff. The one guy that contacted me works with this stuff all the time, he's a professional foam carver, believe it or not, but he's got an 8 foot hot wire cutter. Not something the average home haunter has laying around!

[billman]

For big projects you need a bow cutter. Make your own for cheap:
http://hotwirefoamcutterinfo.com/Hot_Wire_Foam_Cutter_Info/_LargeHandDesign.html

[Jaybo]

For big projects you need a bow cutter. Make your own for cheap:
http://hotwirefoamcutterinfo.com/Hot_Wire_Foam_Cutter_Info/_LargeHandDesign.html

Nice find. Lots of good info on this site.

[DisneyDellsDude]

Ok. So in the end, I decided on the Harbor Freight blue knife.
I'll let everyone know how it goes...

[flesh1031]

Do you think that Harbor Freight knife would work on a massive block of foam? I mean, 8 feet tall, 4 feet thick and 4 feet wide? I know I would have to chip away at it a little at a time, but if this would work, it would be SOOOOO worth the 20 bucks. I even posted an ad on craigslist looking for someone to carve this thing down for me, and I found 3 people but they wanted about 400 bucks. That's a bit steep for a party prop! Well, at least for my budget it's steep. Oh, I should add, it's the white beaded foam, not the pink or blue stuff. The one guy that contacted me works with this stuff all the time, he's a professional foam carver, believe it or not, but he's got an 8 foot hot wire cutter. Not something the average home haunter has laying around!

not to get away from the original post... and I have pictures of my table I'll post them and see if it helps. BUT to this post, I really dont think that the little 8" knife would do much on a huge a** block like yours, for one you will loose about 1/2 an inch from the center of the cut due to the melt you will get on the lower density foam, and two, the blade is ACTUALLY only 6", there is that cool machine gun looking thing on the base of the blade, well, just so happens that counts as part of the blade apparently.... you'll get, only speaking from experiance with this knife, a 12"x12"x12" blocks. I would use the knife for carving (it is awesome).
I'm sorry to clog up the post, here are the pics of my table... not the best shots but I'm happy with the table. the table has a 1/8 inch cut opposed to the 1/2" cut from the other knife due to the heat it puts out. the table runs at about 10-15 amps/volts (honestly I can't remember which,amps or volts, haha) the table is actually just a pallet with some 2x4's and some vynal on the top for smooth tracking. It has a something gauge piano wire (which is impossible to hand wind) and glows red hot when raised to 20-30 amps/volts (so cool). mine is only a 30" cut so I wouldn't be able to cut through a 4' piece but close. I'll get the specs and post them asap. Again, sorry to clog up this post, I thought this might do more good here than starting a new post. Thanks!

[flesh1031]

oops, ok guess I'll have to start a post for my table, sorry pics didn't show up. stay tuned, i'll put a link here to the post.

[VillaHaunter]

I use a jigsaw to cut foam. Take a old blade that is not sharp, or a new one if you don't have any old ones. File the teeth off then sharpen the edge with a file. Cuts a nice clean line with little mess.

[drwilde]

Interested to know about the hb knife. Read bad reviews and a friend told me they burn out within hours of use.

[ouizul1]

I use a jigsaw to cut foam. Take a old blade that is not sharp, or a new one if you don't have any old ones. File the teeth off then sharpen the edge with a file. Cuts a nice clean line with little mess.

I'm a jigsaw cutter, too. Gonna have to give your idea a try. Thanks for the idea.

I gave up on handheld hot wire cutters because I can't cut a nice perpendicular edge, or a straight-ish line to save my life.

[DisneyDellsDude]

I'll let everyone know how it goes. I got mine a few days ago, and it's sitting in a box in my bedroom right now. Hopefully I'll have time to try it out this weekend.:D

[DisneyDellsDude]

Alright, so I did get a chance to carve with it. It took a little getting used to, but in the end it worked very well - and it has not shorted out yet!

I got the main tombstone structures carved, but in the picture you don't see the ornamental crosses that will adorn the tops of the stones.

http://greywoodmanor.blogspot.com/2011/08/pink.html

[Bascombe]

You can also take the plastic tip and the gripper off an old curling iron for a poor man's hot knife

[HauntCast]

I have the industrial hot knife and the engraving tool from Hot Wire Foam Factory. I just purchased their industrial router which is on the way. The hot knife kit has all kinds of great attachments for carving and routing smaller designs. The big bow style router is used for muc bigger projects. If used many cheaper version of the engraving tool and hot knife and I have to replace the every year.

[DisneyDellsDude]

If used many cheaper version of the engraving tool and hot knife and I have to replace the every year.

How much carving do you do per year?

[HauntCast]

DDD, a fair amount which I don't understand why I have to keep replacing them. I burned through 2 on my mausoleum. You get what you pay for I guess.