Affixing Ballast

    Most people on this site caution everyone to NOT use A spray adhesive because the fumes are not good for you. When I built my last layout I mixed the glue and water 50/50. The kitty litter if you use it and are going to glue it down do not use clumpable kitty litter. It does what it says it clumps up and gets cracks in it and dose not look right. get the regular kitty litter unclumpable and it should work fine. Choo Choo Kenny 

We have had quite a few discussions about ways to save money on ballast.  I am all for saving money, but I think there may be better ways.  The best that I have heard is to use playground sand as a base and use a fine layer of good commercial ballast on the top of it.  There is just something about using an absorbent like Kitty Litter that worries me.  We have expensive track and layouts we have spent a lot of time and money building and then potentially ruin it this way doesn't make much sense to me.

Just my two cents worth.

Art

Yeah, GG1, I couldn't get my (name brand) spray bottle to work satisfactorily either.  I used an eye dropper instead.  This puts the glue mixture right where you want it.  Incidentally, some folks don't glue inside the rails, just outside, figuring that the ties will hold the ballast in place.  Sure saves a lot of work that way.

The recommended method does not involve spraying the water/glue mix.

You apply ballast to the track and roadbed, smoothing and shaping with a small brush or your fingertips. Then spray "wet water" (water with a few drops of dishwashing liquid) over the track and ballast, thoroughly saturating the area. Then apply the glue mix with a large dropper or, as I prefer, a plastic squeeze bottle with a medium tip.

Using a commercial ballast or the more economical roofing granules, solves any caking problem. Kitty litter is meant to clump up when either you or your cat applies liquid.

Jim

Thanks for the suggestions.  I was doing this as an experiment and will probably try wetting the moisture with water first and then apply the glue.  I had no intention of ballasting inside the track in order to avoid the train pulling up any of the loose kitty litter into the housing of the engine.  I may go with fish tank gravel which has worked for me in the past with my Lionel tubular track and allows me to put some inside the tracks.  It is not exactly the right scale, but my tracks aren't exactly authentic either.

I would choose your ballast and adhesive, then glue down a couple feet of it where it is easily reached, let the glue dry, and run some trains. Why, you ask? Because after I glued some ballast down and let it dry, I noticed the noise level on this particular section of tracks increased dramaticlly. May not be a big deal to most, but it annoys me. I started out in a hard to reach area, and to this day, I can tell you from another room when the train gets to that area of the layout.

I settled on the rubber ballast from Scenic express, not glued down for the rest of the layout. I can run two trains at once and still hear music or the tv with their volume at a normal level.

go to the 99cent store and get yourself a few sets of Mustard and Catchup squeeze bottles. No problem when inverted and you can direct either the wet water or glue solutions to the ballast with out spraying the rest of the layout.

Jim -->   

I use chicken grit for ballast. I put a bead of 100% white glue down the outside of the ties.  Then use a Mark 1 plastic spoon (white or black in color) to place ballast between the rails and along the outside of the outside rails on top of the ties. Then spread the ballast with a Mark 2 1 inch wide paint brush, removing most of the ballast from the top of the ties. I use a Mark 5 finger to remove any ballast from the tops of the ties that I did not get with the Mark 2 paint brush. The 100% white glue keeps the ballast near the sides of the ties.  I wait overnight for the white glue to dry.

The next day I spray the ballast with alcohol, then I place a 50/50 mix of white glue and "Wet" water on the ballast using a white glue bottle to apply the glue mix. If I want the ballast a different color I add black, gray, brown to the glue bottle. I have glue bottles for all 3 colors.

An empty Elmers glue bottle makes a fabulous applicator for the glue/water mixture.

This method, exactly, worked for me everywhere, every time.  I used ballast made for model railroads: it's not that expensive and it works well every time, with no lumps, no coming loose, etc.   I use this method and that ballast also for gravel drives, parking lots, and shoulders alongside my country roads, especially thick there in places, and this method gets it nicely glued down.

You can also use iso-alcohol instead of wet water.  It worked for me, just as well, but evaporates more quickly so you have to work fast.

A big advantage of this method (besides it gets the job done well) is that the "wet water" you spray doesn't much hurt anything if you get overspray on nearby scenery and buildings.  If you have glue in the spray -uh-oh!

I agree with Avanti's assessment.  The cheap kitty litter seems to be OK.  Mine clumped yesterday because I touched it while wet.  Today, I sprayed it with water and then applied the 50% glue/water mixture.  Tomorrow when it dries, I'll see.  I also put a bead of glue directly from the bottle on the edges of the ballast for extra stability.  Part of the fun for me is making things from cheap and readily accessible materials as long as they work.  In the past, I spent a lot of money on proprietary things manufactured by companies that weren't as effective as home-made products.  There's more "play value" when I can do it myself anyway.

Be certain to check out roofing granules in the 50 lb tub can, for an economical ballast an many color choices.

Buzz

A point to keep in mind is that is will no longer be absorbent after you have installed it: kitty litter absorbs the glue-water mixture and it then hardens within and around it, sort of sealing it for good.  It works well.

I don't think anyone finds the use of kitty litter offensive.  Many people, including me, don't use it - for whatever reasons they have, rational or not.  In my case it is because I only use the finest grain (smallest size pebbles) of store-bought model ballast in most cases: even if you sift kitty litter you end up with scale 1" or larger  stones, rather than real fine gravel look, whereas the fine grained ballast is about pea- or marble-size by comparison.  

I'm all for economical and around here the roofing granules are much less expensive than kitty litter. I just prefer the look of the granules.

Jim

Lee and Jim,  

My comment was directed only at those who seem to object to particular materials only because they are economical. The "ballast" discussions always seem to produce a few comments of the form "you spend a fortune on the trains and track, why cheap out on the ballast."   This line of reasoning drives me crazy.  Sorry if I over reacted. 

Obviously there are many good solutions. Otherwise this would be very boring hobby. And, equally obviously, if someone finds spending lots of money essential to their enjoyment, then more power to them.  But I agree with GG-1fan when it comes to the fun of getting great results using "cheap and accessible materials."

My apologies if I offended anyone.

No problem, Pete. We both approach modeling in similar ways.

Having seen what you've done with the kitty litter, no one could say your results are anything less than spectacular, the way you've blended all your scenery elements into great looking scenes.

Economy just for the sake of saving a few $$$ at the cost of overall layout appearance is not the way to go IMO. But, excellent results can be achieved with inexpensive materials along with a touch of skill, imagination, and practice. In the hands of others, economical materials will not look as good.

If your budget allows, there is nothing wrong with spending freely to produce results on a layout, but making common materials look good is very a satisfying part of the hobby for a lot of us.

Some can insist that cabinet grade plywood is essential for benchwork and all scenery should consist of commercial products, but others of us produce excellent results with CDX grade wood, gather our own natural soils for ground cover, cut twigs for tree armatures, make our own rock molds, make skyscrapers out of inexpensive mat board, grind up our own foam turf, and, in general, approach the hobby as a builder rather than as a buyer.

Either way can work to create a great layout- that's what makes the hobby appealing to so many different people. The balancing act of "time needed for building your own vs. cost of ready-made" is what each of us has to deal with according to our own circumstances.

Jim

Somebody on the forum mentioned the use of aquarium (fish tank) gravel as ballast material because it is available in a variety of desired colors, does not create a lot of dust and is inexpensive. It's an idea i intend to try at some point. 

Yes, I am using fish tank gravel for only a portion of my layout.  In fact, I got some more today.  I've used it on a temporary layout on straight-aways just poured between small strips of wood affixed to the board.  It looked OK, although admittedly it was not as authentic as commercial grade ballast.  But again, my Lionel 0 tubular track isn't authentic looking either.  I also have Gargraves track and some 027 tubular on another line.  Since the 027 track is smaller than 0 track in height, I wanted to use kitty litter  on those lines because the gravel was bit too large to be as effective.  The one thing I did was use double faced tape on each side of the track for both the gravel and kitty litter.  This provided me with a sticky base at the bottom right at the start so that the bottom layers of the ballast would adhere immediately.  The adhesive at the bottom that sticks to the platform will possibly eliminate any slight noise vibrations that could be encountered from any flapping of loose ballast pieces if the glue mixture poured on top didn't work down.  Keep in mind that my entire platform is covered in cork and I do not have a raised road bed.  The ballast only gives the illusion of a raised roadbed for me.  The gravel is more problematical in so far as really gluing it down because of the thickness of the stones and the gaps between them.  I use the double-faced tape again and spread a bead of glue around the perimeter of the roadbed, against the outside of the tracks, and a bead on the inside of the tracks once the stones are laid down  The stones will be looser than kitty litter fixed with glue, but the glued edges will keep it in place as will the rails and ties of the tracks.  I eliminated much of potential vibration from the metal ties on my tubular track by inserting foam strips inside.  Maybe this will help keep the stones from vibrating as much from the train passing over the rails.  I really have to experiment.  Vibration has always been a bug-a-boo for me inasmuch as I have 8 trains running simultaneously on my three platforms.  I've even stuffed pillow fluffing into boxcars and closed hoppers to stifle any possible noise from the wheels and tracks that could be transmitted and amplified by the enclosed car.  To tell you the truth, while that might have done some good theoretically (and maybe practically), I really did not notice any great change in decibels.  The cork covering meant the most in that regard.  I really did not notice a difference of noise by having the stones against the tracks either (But maybe I need a hearing aid anyway). The double-sided tape is also good if you want to take the platform apart because the kitty litter won't have to be scraped from the platform--just pull up the tape and it will all come off.  Others on here have suggested roofing granules.  I have never tried that, but am willing to experiment.  Given the fact that those granules are larger than kitty litter, would the gluing principles be the same?  Again this forum is wonderful for me because I can get some insight from more experienced train buffs and I look forward to any other suggestions

I've be very concerned with Kitty Litter as ballast, it's designed to retain moisture.  It seems to me that would promote rusting of tubular track a lot more than other types of ballast.

A great point for those with non climate controlled spaces.

The thought crossed my mind about the absorbency of moisture with kitty litter.  But after it has dried with the glue mixture, what is there to absorb?  Hasn't it reached its limit as far as absorbency after the initial watering process which is then sealed with the glue mixture?  I mean it's not like the tubular track is in water constantly.

Careful now.  You're beginning to apply rational thought and reasoning on the forum and that could get you demerits.

You tell us after a year or so.   I doubt the glue has so impregnated it that there is no capability to absorb moisture, but I've never used it for that purpose.  I know that it worked well with cats when we had them!

I hope no one thinks that I am against saving money.  My only concerns are trying to make things look as realistic as my talents and budget will permit.  My worries about using Kitty Litter are probably based more on ignorance or at least fear of the unknown than any prejudice toward the product.  I would just hate to see any of us cause problems while trying to save a few bucks.  It sounds like there are enough satisfied users of this product to over come any worries.

Art

Has anyone considered dabbing varnish on dried kitty litter that has been glued down previously?  Would that be an extra seal?

You all have raised very good points in this discussion, what's the best ballast and method to affix for a temp Christmas layout?