Help needed with Water features

[Hu Rhu]

I have used Realistic Water before with no problems but my recent attempts to make some paddy fields have ended up badly wrong.



I have used three different products AK Puddles, AK Still Water and Woodlands Scenics Realistic Water.  All three products have broken up as you can see in the photos.

All were poured and left undisturbed at room temperature for 24 hours. The bases were sealed prior to pouring with pva glue left for 24 hours to dry.   Any ideas of what I'm doing wrong and how to prevent this from happening again.

Thanks

[Pattus Magnus]

 Wow, that’s a disappointing outcome! I haven’t worked with those materials, so can’t really speculate (not that lack of knowledge ever stops me…) on what caused the problem- it sounds like you took all the reasonable steps. The only thing I can think of is that the PVA used to seal the pieces before using the water effects might have reacted. No idea why that would be.

Oddly, I kind of like the piece with the water buffalo - it kind of looks like during a drought and the mud cracked. Not what you were looking for, though!

[MaleGriffin]

I agree with Pattus Magnus that if you were going for a dried mud effect it would be perfect, but as a water effect, I'd send pics to the manufacturers and request a refund!

[BeneathALeadMountain]

Argh! How annoying (although the buffalo one does look like when my mega puppy, 60kg+, recently discovered running and jumping on frozen puddles  ).

My first reaction is that there are two problems:

# The layers you’ve poured were too thick and weren’t allowed long enough to dry (between layers).

# I believe the cloudy parts are bits that haven’t dried fully yet and/or may have reacted badly to the moisture in the PVA (or maybe the paint).

From a brief scan of railway forums it’s seems these are both common problems, certainly with WS realistic water.

What’s your humidity? I ask as I live in a stone cottage in the temperate rain forest known as South Wales and moisture can be a real problem.

What were the conditions you left the terrain in whilst drying? What temperature do you class as room temp? (I ask because peoples ideas on what this is varies - in my house it would be 18°C which is 2/3° less than what some see as the norm). What paint did you use before adding the water effects? Was it the same on all pieces? I can see tiny white patches in the sand/base material on all of them - is that unpainted white base coat or (as I’m guessing) PVA showing? If it’s PVA it wouldn’t still be white when dried.

From the WS faq here https://woodlandscenics.woodlandscenics.com/show/category/Water (bold emphasis added by me).

# Realistic Water and PVA glue are not compatible. Using the two together could cause the Realistic Water to act adversely, causing cracking and/or fogging.

# Residual moisture in the adhesive could be absorbed by the Realistic Water and cause clouding.

# Cure times will start taking longer the more layers you add. 3/4 in will take weeks to achieve with Realistic Water. Therefore, we recommend using Deep Pour Water instead because it would be a much quicker process to achieve the 3/4 in depth.

# If you are using Realistic Water and are not using Earth Colors Liquid Pigments, check with the manufacturer to make sure the paint you are using is 100% acrylic. Most craft paints, including premium brands, contain vinyl fillers. Vinyl in paint could have an adverse reaction with Realistic Water.

Many ex-realistic water users seem to now use Envirotex Lite (looks like a resin) instead.

I hope this helps,

Andrew
BeneathALeadMountain

(Edited many times as I research  )

[anevilgiraffe]

how deep are you going? I did some shallow bogs with UV resin.

[YPU]

Damn, Andrew gave the kind of all encompassing answer I dream of getting when I post a question online (in general, LAF tends to be pretty good).

I can't add any relevant comments to the resins, but I''ll be the ass that goes "why are you doing this anyway?" here.

I've never seen rice paddies in real life, but from media they always struck me as the epitome of murky opaque and shallow water? I was actually planning making a couple myself (granted, in 6mm) and figures they were perfect for just a brownish basecoat covered by glossy modge podge for the surface layer since seeing depth in them would be counter to the prototype anyway.
Not a solution for your resin but maybe an option if you are aching for some finished scenery by now.

[SteveBurt]

For rice paddies, I would just use gloss polyurethane varnish over a brown painted base. No need to worry about fancy water effects, as the water is completely opaque and you only see the surface