[ncdodave]

Living here in the Puget Sound area of Washington state I have a lot of opportunities to keep huge blocks of Styrofoam out of land fills by using old dock floats for full sized tombstones at 10" thick and 20"wide without gluing additional pieces of foam together. Many times these dock floats are wrapped in plastic which must be cut off to expose the Styrofoam but, to get a huge block of Styrofoam for free off one of several online posting sites its a bargain. I just purchased 4 10" X 20" X 9' long for $25 each. A bargain considering I can make 4 48" tall pillars for cemetery fencing or 4 or more headstones. Just thought I'd share since building for the 2023 season is officially in full swing!

 

[corey872]

You know the rules... pics or it didn't happen! lol.

But nice to hear of some material getting repurposed. I am sort of space limited, so try to make anything big also 'hollow' so I can use the inside for storage. I don't have a lot, but my coffin, fog chiller, witches cauldron, etc all get stuffed with...stuff.. for storage. Sure would be nice to have cheap pre-made blocks for the carving, though!

 

[ncdodave]

ill post pics tomorrow iI daboth of the finished pilars and the dock floats in one of my several storage areas

 

[RoxyBlue]

Man, foam thich enough to make tombstones and pillars without gluing anything together AND for free! That’s a haunter’s dream score

 

[ncdodave]

here you go Corey! Dock floats right off my truck and pilars after the floats were cut in 1/4's. The pillars will be hard coated and painted early summer. I havent hard coated my styrofoam because of the cost and I like how it looks after a couple seasons of use. The pillars on the bottom of the pile are 4 years old and the ones on top of the pile are 3 years old. They will all be painted including the new ones so they closely but not exactly match.

 

[ncdodave]

Man, foam thich enough to make tombstones and pillars without gluing anything together AND for free! That’s a haunter’s dream score

RoxyBlue,
I also look around for construction sites that use thick styrofoam in concrete work and ask the contractors if I can have their scraps. My first tomb stones came from a construction site and I made over 50 from that scavenge. All those were given to my neighbors where they still use them every year for a Halloween block party and trick or treat night for the Tot'ers. where I used to live.

This is one of the houses in my old neighborhood