Hi all. I have to admit that ballasting track is the least favorite part of model railroading. And I have a crapload of track to do. I have been ballasting old school, with a spoon, and it's pretty slow going. I see track ballaster in videos and online but I can't help but wonder if they work as good as advertised? So I'm turning to the folks that have experience with these. Do any of them work worth a darn? If so which one? Or should I just suck it up, quit whining, and keep going with the trusty old spoon?
I have not tried many of the latest gadgets for ballasting, the ones I have tried did not work as I had wished. The best thing for me was to use real rock for the ballast. Also a 1" wood handled brush, shortened to be a bit stiffer helped, after I spread the ballast out to the tops of the ties, I take the bristles in hand and lightly smack the tops of the rails and that vibrates/settles the ballast, made the track look much better. will be looking FWD to folks that have used with success these ballasters. I sure wish and hope, that some work as advertised.
If there were a ballast device that would drop the ballast in place, perfectly and be ready to glue, it would be great but you still have to work with it by hand and so, you might as well just dump it close and finger/brush it. I don't use a spoon. That's a pain. I just pour the ballast into a paper or styrofoam cup, dump it in a line, and use my finger and brush to place it. If you dump a large enough quantity along the middle of the track and then run you finger over it down to the ties, the ballast almost perfectly falls over the rails and forms the two side slopes. At one time, the original way to do ballast was to mix a dry adhesive (casein glue) with the ballast, spread it, and just spray with water. It eliminated the glue-from-a-dropper step. Later, it seemed authors of articles were having problems with the glue interfering with points and getting on the track, etc. I never had that problem when I used that method. Doug
I used gelatin mixed with ballast and when wetted down held the ballast in place. I like not having to spray glue and water over everything. I wondered about the stability but after more than 10 years the ballast is holding up fine.
Interesting. Did you just drop water onto the ballast with the gelatin mixed in? I don't really like spraying water all over, either. Doug
