Water Fountain and Train Layouts?

Well that's certainly an interesting idea with potential for a unique scene. Frankly, it's more than I would attempt, I don't claim to be that ambitious with scenery work and I would be especially wary of having real water around my trains.

 

My thoughts are, it's possible to get some interesting effects without the complications of using real water, although they generally have static appearances. However I've seen photos of some waterfall scenes which I think used fiber optics to create an appearance of moving water.

 

Another idea would be to use a removeable section for your real water feature, to make it easier to work on. I've seen some decorative unitized waterfall items that might be adaptable into a model railroad scene. Those are just some thoughts off the top of my head.

In a word  - DON'T!!!!!

Reasons: mold, mildew, fungus, rust from moist air, damage from splashes and sprays, plus all the obvious and some no one has considered. Why complicate something when simulating water safe and easy. After all it is called "model" railroading for a reason; our O scale diesels don't run on diesel fuel inside, nor do we run live steam inside.

jackson

I'm not a big fan of the use of real water, but Roadside America has been doing it for decades. 

Ditto the large layout at the Pittsburgh Children's Museum.

 

However...  I predict you will rue the day you chose to add real water to your layout.  It is a maintenance 'project' all its own.

 

We had an ultrasonic room humidifier years ago.  Quality product...price to boot.  We faithfully used ONLY distilled water...not bottled or 'spring' water.  That was an expense in itself, BTW.  Twice a year we would check the water storage tank and the ultrasonic pre-chamber/valve.  There were the most disgusting, gross, creepy-looking organisms floating about in both areas.  They resembled something out of a cheap 1950's sci-fi B-movie.  Who knows, who cares how they came into being.

 

Later, after we availed ourselves of a new VERY-high efficiency furnace opportunity, we splurged for a top-of-the-line whole house humidifier attached to the furnace...and ditched the room device.

 

Happiness has returned to the household.  And, we're almost past the memory of cleaning that disgusting room humidifier.

 

Do as you chose.  It's just MHO.

 

KD

 

Thanks everyone for your input y’all definitely offered relevant things to consider.

I guess my bullet points make it seem a lot more complicated than it really is. I did include a lot of redundancy in water proofing the styrofoam structure. That’s probably because of my extensive background in the building trades including sheet metal and roofing and a couple years in flood and mold mitigation too.

Everything I already know and everything I read about it tells me not to do it. Unfortunately the seed has been planted and the temptation to water it is almost overpowering.

I have a waterfall that was made for me out of lava rock.  Sitting in it's 15 gallon tub it's about three feet tall and 28 inches wide.  Water is pumped from the tub up behind the mountain and flows from the top of it in a zig zag pattern back into the tub.  I just added scenery to cover up the tub around the mountain as it's all self contained.  It also has a diffuser that creates a fog from the pool at the base of the mountain inside the tub.

 

To keep the water clean I just added a water conditioner and some algaecide, just a few drops each week and it was fine.  The biggest problem I have is with evaporation, especially in winter when the basement is bone dry.  So I just keep an eye on the water level and fill it as needed.

Traindiesel I would live to see pictures cause this is something I am incline to do

Owning an using one of those "ambiance water pieces" in the bedroom has me wincing at the idea of putting it on my layout.

The thing got nasty in a month of evening use.

Dust, pollen, whatever, it was growing a pile of organisms right away.

 

Traindiesel may have the cure.

Water conditioner and algaecide are going to be a must in this project.

Considering his experience I'm inclined to get out the water element again and try it.  I too an intrigued by the thought of real water flowing on my layout.

 

Also I have a caution for you.

WATERFALL? the water is going to splatter far and wide, the splash zone for water does not scale down.  I would go with a steep incline VS a true waterfall and avoid the splatter.

I have a real water geyser(Andrews geyser of the old fort loops) for about 20 years with no problems. I have a button near it so visitors can push it and see it go off. It is a real people pleaser! I used a fish tank pump in a bowl to re-circulate the water and make the water shoot up into the air . I use screen over the water so to not have the water splash when it return to bowl. I have had no rust problems with the gargraves track that loop around the geyser.

The problem with real water and a home layout is that the water is not run and circulated every day.  We've had real water on the Choo Choo Barn display for 52 years.  We've never had any major problems except the occasional leak at the beginning of the new season or an overflow pipe getting clogged with dirt and unused fish food causing an overflow all over the layout.  But all-in-all, it's been a great gimmick for us. 

 

Water needs to be run or it gets stagnant and putrid in just a few days.  My water from my overflow pipe runs through air conditioner filters as it falls into the pump tank.  This takes out 98% of the dirt, fish food and fish dirt so it's not recirculated.  One of the first things I do when we close is to empty all the tanks and vacuum out the creek beds and fish tanks.  The creeks get washed down with strong Clorox water right away so any algae is gotten rid of.  I check for leaks and repair what I know about, not always finding them, and then wait until the week before we open to start with fresh water.  As soon as this is done, I run the creeks everyday, even before we are open for the season.

 

Good luck with your project.

Gents,

Try testing out mineral oil...its clear, non-conductive, non-corrosive, and non-evaporating and flows/ripples like real water in reduced scale...a problem that has boggled people's minds in our hobby for years...I have a working prototype at our club layout...took about 6 years of testing...and allot of trial and error...only issue I'm trying to solve is creating/engineering a custom impeller that will boost pressure in the system. This is cutting edge stuff people...give it a shot.

 

I've submerged HO locomotives in their entirety and run them while being submerged on track. With the right setup, this technique can be used to create all sorts of interesting moving "fake water" boat/etc. animations...including waves with mini wave machines set to multi second intervals...I have the drawings drawn up but haven't made a prototype yet.

How cool would that be? The days of static epoxy water or sheet glass from

an old shower door might be a thing of the past in the years to come.

 

Nick B

Boston Metro Hi-Railers

 

Nick,
Now that's cool!   Keep us informed.

Wow some of the coolest ideas come up while I'm away. Thanks for the suggestions Tom. I was pretty sure everything would have to be on a pretty good gravity flow so it all flowed into a single resvior. Haven't figured out to deal with the water treatment yet. Most fountains I just use a 10% solution of bleach to keep the water from goin stagnant. I'm not sure if that would effect thge surounding sceenery.

But than theres Nick's Idea of using Mineral Oil. I never would have connected its non conductive properties with a train display. But after You brought up the subject Nick it's inspired me to reconsider incorporating animation within the water feature.

You mentioned designing a new impeller to increase pressure in the system. I'm wondering if you've noticed premature wear in the parts of the pumps you're using or  have the lift capabilities have been decreased. 

I'm going to start some of my own experiments with mineral oil soon.

Matt,

I'll help you along a bit...The more "brains" we have on this...the sooner we'll be sure to figure it out...Here's the issue I'm having...It's pressure. I've tried various sizes of different submersible pumps and have finally settled on a large fountain pump (couple of hundred bucks at big box store) approx. dimensions 8" length x 4-5" height x 4" wide; rectangular shaped. The pump is obviously designed to push water...but not oil....The pump will push oil through 1/2" inside dia clear hose up about 2.5' from the drainage reservoir....but not at the flow I am looking for to recreate a rapidly flowing river/waterfall. My next move (when I have the time) is to remove the pump impeller and research a couple of different impellers I can create to better push oil. Also I need

to try to reduce the size of the hosing to see if that would also boost pressure.

 

The basis of my original design and the intent of the system is to have only one centralized powerful pump (that is submerged/contained within a 5 gallon bucket) that all "fake water features" drain to/where the oil can be filtered to remove and dust/hair/etc. from the oil. From this the pump a main line would then connect to a distribution block that would have 4-6 separate outlets each with its own ball valve. Each one of these separate feeds could feed a separate water feature on the layout within a reasonable distance from the main pump. All lines would consist of clear reinforced hosing to verify flow w/ appropriate hose clamps.

 

During construction of the mockup (before I ran an ounce of mineral oil over it) I was overly concerned that the oil would "wick" into the scenery elements so this is what I did to prevent the "wicking" effect:

1. Base constructed of cardboard strips, added fiberglass mesh w/ applied plastic sheeting on one side, hydroactive expanding foam (a technique similar to Bragdon's but a different product used), some carved foam rocks, some hydrocal rock castings at the river bed, clear silicone to mimic rapidily running water and for the waterfall...and then I sealed the river bed, the river bed sides up about an inch, and the entire waterfall with a couple of coats of Minwax water based polyurethane...Once everything dried ran the oil with no "wicking". Even with the oil not rapidly flowing over the silicone reproduced rapids, the moving oil gave the illusion that the water was moving, no only if I could get better flow it would achieve what I am trying to accomplish....

 

When I get a chance...and the next time I'm at our club...I'll bring my digital camera and take a few shots of my prototype to show you what I have up and running.

 

A little while back, Bill Parisi of OGR stopped by our club and I explained the process of what we were doing...I'm not sure if he took any pictures of the setup though.

 

Matt, to answer your original question...no I have not seen any type of degradation of the mechanical parts...it seems that the Mineral oil is also acting as a lubricant for the moving parts. The mineral oil that I am using is non-scented and was purchased at a local Rite Aid.

 

Nick B

Boston Metro Hi railers

Scenery Co-Director/Board of Directors

Pump power is all about head pressure. Fish tank pumps are not designed to move water up against gravity very far. They are designed more for flow than pressure.

I think the mineral oil is an excellent idea. Tom makes a good point about constant flow VS sitting most of the time. And Yes, a little breach will help a lot but may kill the color from your scenery at the waterline.

Pumping oil is going to create a little more drag pressure and about the same weight in a tube as water, perhaps less weight.

Decreasing the tube diameter will increase drag from friction on the sides but decrease the weight of the total to height.

I expect your flow will increase with hose diameter decrease but then dramatically decrease back down when you hit the critical minimum diameter.

Moving your tank up as close as possible to drain height is likely to give the greatest gains. Moving the pump as high as possible in the tank will also help, put a large dia. hose on the intake for low friction to avoid sucking air.

I am also interested in this as I plan a Colorado mountain layout and streams & a river would be appropriate.

Back in the day, like 40 years ago, I worked on a NASCAR pit crew. We used a pump from bait stations to move the oil for rear ends and also transmissions. They would pump the 90 weight oil for the rear ends to the oil coolers and then back again. Granted we had to replace the impellers after each race but they did hold up for 500 miles/laps with the old thick sulfur based oil. These were powered by the 12 volt system of the car. They used a large 1/2" diameter or so hose to do this, so I am thinking that if you used a smaller diameter hose you might get the pressure you desire.

 

I do not know if they still make these or not. I remember seeing a lot of these around bait stations in the 60's & 70's. I haven't got a hook wet since 1974, not proud of this, just saying.

 

I just went online to see if I could find one of these; the brand name is Jabsco pump; looks like they now cost about what a good passenger car now costs....sorry.

See picture below.

 

K-Line made a bridge that utilized real water. Pictures can be seen at the J&C Studios website, and might be something to incorporate into your build.

Gents,

I might have a solution to the pump problem. There is a whole generation of PC builders who dabble in liquid cooling (water & mineral oil). There are various reasonably costing pumps from company's such as Koolance and others. Check these out.

 

Nick B.

Boston Metro Hi Railers 

The oil pump for race cars is a good idea.  We had them on our cars too.  they will move some oil.

 

 

back when I was a kid in the 80's my dad and I used a fake plastic mountain upside down in the layout, cut a slit in near the top and let the water run down a wick into a fish tank, put a pump in ran the hose to the top. we used plastic sheeting behind rocks from the yard. let the water tickle down into the pond. we liked the effect, but we ran a bit of clorox in the water.   I think the fake water is the best method