Conrail Windsor St Yard (York PA) Engineering Report

[Ed Kapuscinski]

I'm not seeing a lot of difference, at least in the photos.

Not sure if you can still find it, but Highball's N scale ballast has that same fine texture with no coloration problems.  I use Highball cinders in yards and it looks like the same grain size you have.

What you're seeing on the yard tracks is a mix of sanded and unsanded, so you get the unsanded "pigmenting" and the sanded texture.
The pure unsanded stuff is like a powder, and it looks GREAT for use for "yard muck". The problem is that it also dyes stuff it touches.

The sanded stuff doesn't do that. The industry track and the mains are done with pure sanded and it looks just like ballast.

As for the coloration, I agree, there's still some grout coloring going on, but there's also some brown showing through on the rails. It's subtle, but subtle is my goal.

[Dave V]

Fair enough, but to be honest it's not doing a thing for me visually.  Then again, it's not about me!

[Ed Kapuscinski]

Fair enough, but to be honest it's not doing a thing for me visually.  Then again, it's not about me!

Well then, F off! hahahahahahahahaha

[mu26aeh]

I can't see it from my house !     Excellent job !

[MichaelWinicki]

Send some mainline shots through please Ed...

[OldEastRR]

I won't use ballast on my tracks either. Neither did Jim Hediger on the Ohio Southern. I won't put water on my track. It gets into rail joiners and switch points (sometimes wiring), and that is no good. The ballast rarely sits where it's supposed to once you start spraying fixative and you wind up with "breaded" ties and rails in places.  Ed's grout method is OK for old spurs and degraded mainlines (so OK for PC I guess) but it fuzzes out the ties too much for a well-maintained mainline. In prototype pictures the delineation between the edges of the ties and the ballast is as sharp as a knife edge. That is a very hard look to duplicate in N. Some people have come close, tho.
For me it's good enough to paint the cork roadbed flat top a ballast color, let it dry, and put down the track. Then I go back and paint (don't get it on the ties!) only the sloped sides of the cork gray and sprinkle on a light coating of N scale ballast while the paint's still wet. It only sticks to the side of the cork and not the ties. It gives the impression of ballasted track.
But I use ME track and switches which have low-profile ties. Obviously track with high (thick) ties doesn't look as good with this method.

[MichaelWinicki]

I won't use ballast on my tracks either. Neither did Jim Hediger on the Ohio Southern. I won't put water on my track. It gets into rail joiners and switch points (sometimes wiring), and that is no good. The ballast rarely sits where it's supposed to once you start spraying fixative and you wind up with "breaded" ties and rails in places.  Ed's grout method is OK for old spurs and degraded mainlines (so OK for PC I guess) but it fuzzes out the ties too much for a well-maintained mainline. In prototype pictures the delineation between the edges of the ties and the ballast is as sharp as a knife edge. That is a very hard look to duplicate in N. Some people have come close, tho.
For me it's good enough to paint the cork roadbed flat top a ballast color, let it dry, and put down the track. Then I go back and paint (don't get it on the ties!) only the sloped sides of the cork gray and sprinkle on a light coating of N scale ballast while the paint's still wet. It only sticks to the side of the cork and not the ties. It gives the impression of ballasted track.
But I use ME track and switches which have low-profile ties. Obviously track with high (thick) ties doesn't look as good with this method.

Agreed.


Not a great idea to spray the whetting agent and the fixative... I used Testor's Pipettes and that not only kept everything at tie-level, I had control of the whole process so beading and such didn't occur... And it kept "stuff" out of the rail joiners and the switch points.

[davefoxx]

I won't use ballast on my tracks either. Neither did Jim Hediger on the Ohio Southern. I won't put water on my track. It gets into rail joiners and switch points (sometimes wiring), and that is no good. The ballast rarely sits where it's supposed to once you start spraying fixative and you wind up with "breaded" ties and rails in places.  Ed's grout method is OK for old spurs and degraded mainlines (so OK for PC I guess) but it fuzzes out the ties too much for a well-maintained mainline. In prototype pictures the delineation between the edges of the ties and the ballast is as sharp as a knife edge. That is a very hard look to duplicate in N. Some people have come close, tho.
For me it's good enough to paint the cork roadbed flat top a ballast color, let it dry, and put down the track. Then I go back and paint (don't get it on the ties!) only the sloped sides of the cork gray and sprinkle on a light coating of N scale ballast while the paint's still wet. It only sticks to the side of the cork and not the ties. It gives the impression of ballasted track.
But I use ME track and switches which have low-profile ties. Obviously track with high (thick) ties doesn't look as good with this method.

Easily solved with a feeder to every rail section, if you're truly worried about losing electrical continuity through rail joiners.  That's a problem I haven't experienced yet (and I'm too lazy to solder a feeder to every piece of rail), but I did have some turnouts on my last layout where the points had lost electrical continuity.  There's several methods of addressing that, my favorite being the replacement of the hinged points with solid points.  For these reasons, in addition to the wetting method suggested by @MichaelWinicki, I think you can safely ballast your track.  Believe me, if I can't find a good excuse to avoid ballasting (Did I mention that I hate ballasting?), then there's probably no good reason not to.

DFF

[Dave V]

I solder almost every joint.  Then I carefully ballast, ensuring no stones stick to the rail web or in switch points.  Then I use a "pre-soak" of 70% isoporpyl alcohol before applying the glue (also thinned with isopropyl alcohol).  This keeps the ballast exactly where I put it.  This method has been more or less foolproof for me and allows me to go for any look from well-groomed Pennsy main to rails sticking up out of a cindery muck.

It works, and works well.  But you have to be willing to solder a lot first.

[davefoxx]

I solder almost every joint.  Then I carefully ballast, ensuring no stones stick to the rail web or in switch points.  Then I use a "pre-soak" of 70% isoporpyl alcohol before applying the glue (also thinned with isopropyl alcohol).  This keeps the ballast exactly where I put it.  This method has been more or less foolproof for me and allows me to go for any look from well-groomed Pennsy main to rails sticking up out of a cindery muck.

It works, and works well.  But you have to be willing to solder a lot first.

I only solder rail joiners on curved tracks sections to avoid kinks.  I like to leave room for expansion and contraction and hope that I leave enough with unsoldered rail joints on the straight sections of track.

DFF

[Dave V]

I only solder rail joiners on curved tracks sections to avoid kinks.  I like to leave room for expansion and contraction and hope that I leave enough with unsoldered rail joints on the straight sections of track.

DFF

Years ago over on the Model Railroader forum a metallurgist calculated just how much nickel silver rail expands and contracts within the normal range of temperatures experienced in a train room or even a non-climate-controlled garage.  It was essentially negligible.  What we do experience is expansion and contraction of our benchwork due to humidity changes.  Out here in Colorado our indoor humidity is pretty much also negligible year-round, but when I lived in Florida I could see the cycles in the Juniata Division's expansion joints.

As long as you keep either side of each rail expansion joint wired to the bus wires you're still free to ballast...just keep the ballast bits out of the joint.  FWIW, to ballast well requires very tedious work, but I find visually it goes a long way toward establishing a prototype feel.

My biggest advice?  Don't use water.  Use rubbing alcohol.  Yeah, the fumes are kinda a hassle but water beads up; alcohol soaks right in without disturbing a single stone.  And I can vouch that Elmer's Glue dissolves quite happily in 70% isopropyl.

[svedblen]

My biggest advice?  Don't use water.  Use rubbing alcohol.  Yeah, the fumes are kinda a hassle but water beads up; alcohol soaks right in without disturbing a single stone.

I second that!

Great picture! Really looks like those houses in the background are on the other side of the valley.

[MichaelWinicki]

My biggest advice?  Don't use water.  Use rubbing alcohol.  Yeah, the fumes are kinda a hassle but water beads up; alcohol soaks right in without disturbing a single stone.  And I can vouch that Elmer's Glue dissolves quite happily in 70% isopropyl.

Agreed. Rubbing alcohol makes it so much easier for the glue to soak into the ballast without causing issues.

Also real rock ballast like Arizona Rock & Mineral, Scenic Express and Highball seem to be less prone to problems than walnut-shell ballast.

[coosvalley]

I won't use ballast on my tracks either. Neither did Jim Hediger on the Ohio Southern. I won't put water on my track. It gets into rail joiners and switch points (sometimes wiring), and that is no good. The ballast rarely sits where it's supposed to once you start spraying fixative and you wind up with "breaded" ties and rails in places.  Ed's grout method is OK for old spurs and degraded mainlines (so OK for PC I guess) but it fuzzes out the ties too much for a well-maintained mainline. In prototype pictures the delineation between the edges of the ties and the ballast is as sharp as a knife edge. That is a very hard look to duplicate in N. Some people have come close, tho.
For me it's good enough to paint the cork roadbed flat top a ballast color, let it dry, and put down the track. Then I go back and paint (don't get it on the ties!) only the sloped sides of the cork gray and sprinkle on a light coating of N scale ballast while the paint's still wet. It only sticks to the side of the cork and not the ties. It gives the impression of ballasted track.
But I use ME track and switches which have low-profile ties. Obviously track with high (thick) ties doesn't look as good with this method.

Sorry Oldeast, but this whole post makes my brain hurt

[amato1969]

+1 on the isopropyl technique !  It truly makes a world of difference when ballasting.

  Frank