Drilling Pink Foam

A good way to do that is to chuck a piece of music wire in your electric drill just larger than the feeder wire, it will easily drill the hole needed

Jor

Skewer

Use a wooden skewer and push it through.  If you drill the right size hole in the end of the skewer, you can thread your track feeder wire in the end and pull it through the foam.  I use 24 ga track feeders. Anything larger might not work.

Aircraft bits

Long twist drill bits like these work for me. They are available at any decent hardware store.

pqe

I've also used a piece of

I've also used a piece of hanger wire that I flattened on one end an chucked in a drill.

Careful there

I can't recommend chucking any soft wire into a drill. If the free end gets loose, the wire will bend at a right angle and become a surprise buzz saw.

pqe

Be careful - agreed

If you use soft wire use low speed and care.

Brass tube

I use a 4" (apx) small brass tube cut on an angle. I turn it with my fingers. No "high speed" issues here.

Thanks for every ones

Thanks for every ones input!

Best, Scott

I just...

...Push a piece of brass tubing through. No drill at all. Then I insert a coffee stirrer  (small straw type) in hole to keep it clear.

Brass tube

I too use a brass tube.......but I use a piece about 3/8" diameter that I used a round file to sharpen the inside of...........press down on the foam with a slight twist .......and you have a hole.

After I run my wires thru the hole I use a little DAP Dynaflex 230 to cover the hole.

Brass ntube

Use the brass tube to make the hole , while the tube is still in place feed the wire through the tube, pull the tube out leaving your feeder wire in place. Then there is no need to keep the hole open.

Do what Jeff said

It is what I do and it works well. I forgot to say that in my post above...DOH! 

I also use brass tubing...

...but I go a step further.

I used a Dremel cutoff disk to make a long slot in the tube, about 1/2" longer than the thickest material you'll be boring through. Then I sharpen the OUTSIDE edge of the tube with a file as mentioned above (just chuck it in the drill you'll be using...) , but also cut some "teeth" in the end with the Dremel tool again, making it look like a regular hole saw. (The teeth don't have to be fancy, or particularly accurate or symmetrical...)

Then I chuck the thing in my 3/8' screwdriver/drill, and bore as many holes as I need. You can make these for any size up to the max your drill will handle, and in lengths as long as the tubing you can buy (12" or so in most hobby shops). I use the drill/screwdriver because it's MUCH slower... and safer... than a 10,000 RPM Dremel!

Now, when you bore the hole, the tube will be full of the foam plug. This is why you cut the slot, and sharpen the outside edge of the end of the tube! By sharpening the outside edge of the tube, you leave the inside a smooth cylinder so that the plug won't get stuck, instead of jamming up inside it... and the slot lets you slip a piece of stiff wire or rod into the tube above the foam so that you can slide the plug free without having to take it out of the drill and push it out after every cut.

I use the same tool and technique for cutting popper bodies from (much denser) foam sandals and kneepads for fly fishing, though that's production work and usually done on a tabletop drill press.

Err...

... how are you pushing wire through a tube full of foam?

If your hole is the right size, push a straw or coffee stirrer through the hole, then slide the wire through that. You can cut the stirrer to length and leave it in place if you're anticipating the need for future repairs.

Code 100 rail

One end is filed to a sharp point and the other end has a notch filed in it to pull the wire.

I spin the rail (manually) until it reaches the channel (on the side) where the wires are run in my foam.

Drilling foam

Thanks guys, great stuff 

Scott

My solution:

What would Uncle Buck do?