Ballasting Tubular Track

I have back when I ballasted and had scenery. There really is no way to avoid it in my experience. I generally used the Woodland Scenics cement. I used as much as I needed to soak an area and move on. I also had the dehumidifier going full blast while it dried and that helped. Regardless, when I ripped the track and layout up, there was still rust on the underside of the layout. The trains always ran fine for years. 

There is a great article on this very subject in the current issue of that other train magazine.

 

Art

I don't understand why most everyone glues down their ballast. I have had great success spreading ballast with a Dixie cup, then using a small paintbrush to even out between the ties, then using my finger to make a nice berm running along the right-away. That is it - no glue or anything else.

 

Sure, every once in awhile I would brush stray ballast back to the track, but it made moving track / switches so very easy and no problems with ballast glued to my track when I went to remove, much less rust issues.

 

I don't see the real guys with a tank car of water, a huge bottle of elmers and dishwash soap when laying new track

 

Paul

Because we dont want ballast all over the place later. Real ballast weighs quite a bit more than model train ballast. Wait til one of your locomotives picks up a piece in the exposed gears. How do you clean up dust and other particles if your scenery isn't glued down? Not to mention what happens in a derailment.

Once again, I never had ballast "all over the place". The ballast stays in place quite nicely on it's own. Nor have I ever had an engine pick up a piece of ballast.

 

I typically don't dust my rails or ballast and as far as derailments, I don't understand the issue? If some ballast gets scattered I take 15 seconds with a 2 inch paint brush and problem solved.

 

I have only had three good sized layouts, but none had any issues with the ballast not being glued. Ask me how easy it was to pick up the track later...

 

Paul

Not much easier than it is for me to spray mine with water to soften the glue and then pull it up.

I am ballasting my 0 gauge tubular track right now.  First, some of my track inside the outer loop is 027 which I ballasted with Kitty Litter, using water and white glue.  I deliberately did not place that ballast inside the rails so that nothing would kick-up into the engine housing as it went along the track.  I plan to dab some varnish on top of it for an extra sealant.  Now regarding the 0 gauge tubular.  I am using fish tank gravel purchased from WalMart at about $3.98 per package.  I have mentioned this before.  The reason I am using the large stone gravel is precisely because it fits rather well inside the rails and can be built-up quite easily along the sides to give the illusion that the track is on a roadbed when it isn't.  0 gauge track is rater hefty and clunky and so the stones do not overpower the track as far as scale is concerned.  Sure, it is not totally in scale.  But the difference is really not that significant visually once it is all placed down in my opinion.  The nice thing about it is that the stones fill-in rapidly and can be smoothed easily.  Originally, I used this technique several years ago on just a portion of my layout because it was temporary in nature and I wanted to disassemble it.  It was so easy to brush-up and save the stones for later.  Right now, I am making a permanent layout, and I want to fix the stones down.  This is my technique:  I use double-sided tape and run it along the track that will be ballasted on both sides.  This provides me with an immediate sticky base for the stones on the bottom to adhere.  I press some stones into the tape before pouring more on top.  After I pour more stones on the sides I push them up toward the track level with a plain dry paint brush.  Since the stones on the tape are fixed, the other stones fill into them as I pour and brush them up.  This holds the stones together.  This is how I create the illusion of a road bed.  Since the track is so clunky and large, having big metal ties, the stones can really come up high and cover the ends of the ties that stick out.  Next, I pour some of the stones inside the rails and smooth them out.  If you want the ties to show, brush the stones away from them.  By building up the sides of the track before pouring stones between the rails gives you a barrier to hold the stones inside the rails.  Next, I run a car on the track to ensure that no stones are above the level of the track.  If there are any, the car and wheels will knock them down.  Then I run my engines and some cars as well.  The final step is gluing the stones.  Essentially what I do is take a bottle of the cheapest white glue you can find.  I got some bottles at Wal-Mart at about .35 a bottle.  Yesterday,  I saw the price was .44 but my store was all sold out.  The elementary school teachers buy them up for projects.  Anyway, I twist-off the cap, completely removing it.  If you don't, you'll be squeezing the life out of the bottle just to get a drop out of it (bad for arthritic people).  After the cap is removed you will see that there is a small opening in a tube-like structure that funnels the glue into where the cap was located.  This small structure will allow the glue to flow in a more concentrated fashion and you really don't have to squeeze at all; yet it is in a very easily managed narrow pattern as it flows out of the bottle (this is good for gluing the stones inside the rails).  First, I lay a ribbon of glue along the stones on the edges of the ballast pile on each side of the track.  Next, I lay a ribbon along the sides of the pile closest to the outer rails on each side.  Then I dribble in a scattered pattern over the top of the piles on each side. For the stones inside the rails, I just lay a small ribbon on the tops of the stones, making sure that I don't get any glue on the ties or rails.  If you accidently do so, just take a wet paper towel and wipe it off right away.  After one day, everything will be dry and stationary and hard on top.  While there may be some loose stones with this process, they are not that crucial and can be easily scooped up if they run out below the edge of the ballast.  The stones inside the rails are held together with the glue and the barrier of the stones along the sides of the track.  So there is really no movement of any stones there.  The one advantage of using the double-faced tape is that I can rip-up the whole thing quite easily if I want to change the layout in the future (so it is semi-permanent).  Any stones affixed to the platform by glue beyond the tape can be scraped-up easily with a putty knife because they so few in number and thickness (this would be along the edges of the ballast pile).  I did not see any change in noise level with any stones vibrating against the metal track rails or ties (although originally I inserted some cut foam strips under the ties from a roll of foam that I purchased at Lowe's that is used to insulate along windows and door jambs just for added insurance).  I am pleased with the result and the ease of installation, since one only has to satisfy himself in these endeavors anyway.  If you want to see the results, stay tuned here.  I will be posting some photos once I take them of portions of the layout in which I have used this technique.  

I just follow exactly what Eric Siegel does in his videos.  I use diluted white glue and water, about 40/60, and spray the area first with iso alc to nix surface tension prolblems.  It goes smooth and fast.  No problems, ever. 

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rhBhA_4LLg0

 

 

I hope these photos give you some idea of what I described above.  Good Luck!

Sorry for the redundancies in the reproduced photos......

Good pics above.  I use O27 tubular.  It has a much lower profile.  See the pics below.  I use 3R plastics ties and paint the rails and ties with Rustoleum Camo paint then lay the gravel and wet with water and dish soap.  Finally I soak the gravel, using water, white glue and a brown latex paint mix.  This is all explained by Dennis Brennan in a very well written booklet. 

 

To answer your question about rust.  I recently pulled up a major section of my layout and found no rust on the tubular track.  I chipped off the gravel and reused the track in my upgrade.

 

The first picture is completed and the second shows how the ties and Camo paint came out before ballasting. 

 

    I went to the local asphalt plant and got what is called (DUST) its 1/4 IN. or smaller. I got 4 -5 GAL. buckets sifter it through A piece of window screen to get out the dust. I made A second sifter that was A 10 IN. by 10IN. piece of sheet metal that I drilled 1/8 IN. holes in it row after row until I had A 7 IN. by 7 IN. square of holes in it. I notched the 4 corners 1 IN. and bent the 4 sides 1 IN. to end up with A 8 IN. pan with 1 IN. sides to dump the gravel into and resift. The 1/8 IN. and smaller went into 1 bucket and the bigger than 1/8 IN. went into the bucket of dust to be gotten rid of. This crushed limestone ballast went on the layout and I never glued it down. Worked fine for me and I only had $20 into the gravel plus the gas for driving to the asphalt plant 13 miles away. Choo Choo Kenny 

That is exactly what I was looking for as I already have Brennans Ballast.

Thanks

Mikey