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I am trying to make some craters out of the solid style foam but I dont have a hot wire gun to mold it. Is there a good way to cut solid type foam thats inexpensive. Never tried it before but hoping to make some craters for drop pods.

You could get the box cutters with the break-off retractable blades and fully extend it. It might work. Otherwise you could make your own: http://www.instructables.com/id/Hot-wire-foam-cutter/

Quelles wrote:You could get the box cutters with the break-off retractable blades and fully extend it.

This works very well and won't stink up your home, you just have to watch yourself when cutting and make sure your angle is right. If you live near a dollar store, they sell box cutters there for, well, a dollar. Pick up an extra set of blades if they sell those, if you cut foam with anything but a razor sharp blade, you'll just chew it up with the knife.

I don't have a hot wire cutter, either. Any old craft knife will do the trick, but the cheap ones are actually better, in this case, simply because of how quickly you'll need to replace blades dulled by the foam.

Thanks for the ideas, I dident know solid foam tore through blades like that, good to know.

Do you own a hot glue gun? You should go get one if you dont.
You can use it without glue, and use the cone shape to carve in detail, or even go to the hardware store and get metal doweling that will fit inside the aperture of the glue gun.
If you choose the second option, be careful not to burn yourself, but you should be able to rig up something that works very effectively.

I used a dremel tool with a couple different size sanding drums…. Messy, very messy but it worked great.

Another option I've seen people do is to go to the supermarket kitchen tools aisle, and get a wire cheese planer. You know, the thing you drag through cheese to cut it. Then take a old cell phone charger, strip the wire down, and attach the positive to one side of the grater and negative to the other.

WARNING: Make sure the thing has a rubber, plastic, or wood grip (best) to it. All metal ones... Well, it ends very poorly. For you and the tool.