Ballasting turnouts or tight spots

In my last post, I promoted an idea for avoiding track cleaning by Joe Fugate, publisher of Model Railroad Hobbyist Magazine. Another idea of Joe's that I have found extremely useful pertains to applying ballast around turnouts, in particular around the moveable points. In this area, it is critical that no adhesive or ballast gets in between the moving parts.

The solution is to apply full-strength adhesive between the ties using a micro-brush. In this way the adhesive goes where you want it and not where it would go if it was watered down in the way ballast cement is applied on the rest of the track. Once the adhesive is in place simply scatter ballast on top and leave it to dry. Once dry, vacuum away the loose ballast and you will be left with ballast in only the places you wanted it and not stuck to the moving parts. Ballast can then be added to the track either side of this area, wet with isopropyl alcohol or "wet water" (water with a few drops of dish detergent to reduce surface tension) followed by a diluted mix of your favourite ballast adhesive.

Here are pictures showing the technique:

This technique is also useful around holes left around feeder-wires. Apply the glue and ballast in these areas so that the more watery mixture of ballast adhesive applied later on will not result in adhesive dripping through to the underside of the layout. It also works well on the track at the ends of Free-mo modules where you have installed PC board end tie plates milled into the shape of railroad ties. This technique prevents ballast from sticking to those places where you don't want it.

Never Clean Track Again

Large quantities of printer's ink, as well as bits and bytes in more recent decades, has been used to describe innumerable solutions to cleaning model railroad track. This has included ideas on numerous liquids for track cleaning, abrasive pads and several designs of track-cleaning rolling stock.

One idea that I came across several years ago was graphite. The suggestion was to purchase a stick of 4B pure graphite from an art supply store, such as Michael's. A graphite "lead" pencil is no good because the graphite in such pencils has been combined with a type of clay to reduce breakage when sharpened to a pencil point. The article said to use the graphite sparingly, just in a few places around the layout, and all of your track cleaning problems will be solved. I tried this and it worked - perfectly. There was no problem with traction degrading because the amount of graphite used is extremely small.

One of my favourite model railroad authors is Joe Fugate, publisher of the excellent digital publication called Model Railroad Hobbyist Magazine. Joe has written several articles about track cleaning. Recently I was listening to a video by Joe on Trainmaster's TV which is an excellent service I subscribe to. Joe's explanation made so much sense that I now understand why graphite is so effective.

Joe Fugate pointed out that the grime that accumulates on the model railroad track is mainly caused by what he calls "micro-arcing". Below is a picture of a railroad wheel on a rail. On a model railroad, it is this wheel-to-rail contact that completes the electrical circuit to both sides of the locomotive motor as well as any other electrics and electronics that are on board. As a wheel rotates along the rail there are minute sparks or "arcs" that occur at the point of contact (see the yellow star below).

These arcs are much too small to see with the naked eye, even in a darkened room but they are there. Similarly, if you complete an electrical circuit by touching two conductors to the ends of an AA battery there is a minute arc which again is not visible to the naked eye but it is there. Repeated micro arcs between the wheels and rails deposit a layer of metal oxide on the rails and wheels.

Joe's presentation went on to point out that the commutators on virtually all motors (aside from brushless motors of course) are made of graphite because this creates very little arcing compared with metal-to-metal contact. Even the arcing that does occur between the graphite motor brushes and the armature does not create a metal oxide because it is not a metal-to-metal arc.

The advice given in the presentation was to take the above-noted 4B stick of graphite and rub it very gently along the inner corner of the rails. This location helps keep the graphite off the railhead which reduces any potential traction issues, combined with the fact that it must be applied very sparingly - so sparingly that it is not visible. Here is a picture of how to apply:

After listing to Joe Fugate's presentation I now understand why I have had so much success with my track from using graphite. If you don't read Model Railroad Hobbyist or subscribe to Trainmasters TV I recommend you give these a try.

Completed tourist excursion railway Free-mo module - Part 3 of 3

My post of June 21, 2020, described the completion of the last structure on my new tourist excursion railway Free-mo module. I am pleased to report that all scenery including static grass, parking lot, gravel paths, signage, fencing, trees and people have been added.

The trees are all deciduous and are made from Saskatchewan sagebrush harvested in roadside ditches a couple of hours south of Regina. The sagebrush was sprayed with Raid to kill any bugs and left in a container for a couple of months because I wasn't yet ready to build trees. I then trimmed away excess material and put the future tree armatures on a couple of cookie sheets in the oven at 200 degrees Fahrenheit for 90 minutes to make sure I wasn't bringing any hitchhiking organisms into the house. I attached Supertrees branches with tacky glue and then spraypainted the trunks and branches with light dustings of various shades of matte colour, ranging from grey to black to tan with grey being the predominant colour. I then sprayed the branches with unscented hair spray and sprinkled on various shades of Scenic Express green leaf material. In nature, there are significant variations in colour and shape between trees which is what I was trying to capture.

Here are a few pictures: