"Ballast" color?

Also, what color would you suggest for inside the tunnel, since most tunnels are not green on the inside.

Michael,

 

That's what I did on my layout. Your green looks about the same as mine and I painted on ballast under the track and used a slightly different color for "streets."

 

I use Behr Paint from Home Depot. These were the paint tints:

 

For the ballast, "Gray Area" and for the streets "Silver Hill."

 

Excuse me!......................Ballast with Tinplate??

Exactly what I was thinking!

 

Jeff Davis

Why not? That's why there called "Toy Trains."

Mike R

Ps...no relation. Lol!

Yes, "ballast" with tinplate. Painted "ballast" that is.

I also plan on painting:

 

-a brown area where I have my oil derrick (no grass growing)

-more gray roads

-blue water under the bascule bridge

-and painting something inside my tunnel to cover the blue and green inside

 

Back to the "ballast", I have been looking at postwar Lionel Dealer layouts, and I am thinking about a tanish gray, something like they used back then. I believe I saw it done on prewar layouts too, so I thought this would be the best place to ask.

 

And yes, no relation to Mike R. 

It's paint! 

 

Actually, I've seen a number of pics of tin layouts posted here with full blown ballast. But I like the look of it painted on under the track. A total toy train look as far as I'm concerned.

 

No rules, right?

 

 

Gray works real good:

 

Rusty

Well, I decided that I was going to just add the "ballast" as I wanted. I chose a color which kinda looks close to the postwar Lionel dealer layouts. I still have a lot to do, but let me know what you think so far:

 

 

Looking good, Michael.

 

Here's a small shot of my layout (in progress) that shows the "ballast" and road colors I used.

Johnstrains - I like the color of your "ballast" too. I actually saw that picture somewhere else on this forum, and thought about that color a bit, but it would be too close to my road color for my liking. My roads are a lot darker than yours it seems.

 

Please continue to post more pictures as your layout progresses

Looks great.  Your color choice is just great.  I travel the country for work, and notice that ballast looks different all over the place. Near Duluth, MN the granite is purple/pinkish in tone. Down South it is brighter white and sparkles some, here in the MW it is grey tones.

 

On SGMA's "carpeted" modules our standards require the use of 4" strips of "gray carpet" to represent the ballast beneath our three tinplate track mainlines .  I think most would agree that it looks nice against the green-carpeted tops of SGMA's carpeted modules.  I would also note that gray carpet ballast is easier to add, modify, and/or remove than paint.  Lastly, SGMA's use of "carpet" ballast ties us back to the "floor" layout origins of Standard Gauge toy trains.  Consider using carpet as ballast! 

 

Bob   

Thanks for the comments everyone.

 

Overlandflyer- I really like that idea. If I can find some decent sized number stencils, I might just do that. I painted all that white by hand, by outlining it with painter's tape, and don't want to try that with numbers.

Rubber roadbed is another alternative.  A bit pricey, but nice looking and traditional.  Rick Johnson offfers it new in S, 0 and Std.

 

www.roadbed.net

 

Kirk

Those (carpet and rubber) are both good suggestions for roadbed. I’m sticking with my painted-on ballast and roads for now, but freely admit that the downside is you really lock yourself into a layout design with paint. My tin layout (my first) is small enough that I  can live with it for now, but once I expand to something bigger I’ll keep these other ideas in mind.

Rubber roadbed is nice (I actually have it for my American Flyer track), but it can be costly, especially on a college student's budget. I may use it someday though.

I don't have a source, but I have heard of people adding strips of polyurethane flexible quarter round moldings on both sides of the track, and then filling between the strips with ballast.  I think this is the way they added ballast to the Tom Synder layout.

Light gray works for me, but I used 1/8" Masonite as a roadbed and painted it with acrylic craft paint. Also some 1/8" x 1/2" balsa was chopped up and painted for extra ties.

Yeh, since when are there rules? I happen to like real ballast.

 

Well, real kitty litter.