WS Ballast won't stay on tracks long

[jecorbett]

Haven't tried that but I have found it is difficult to reposition ballast after you have applied the glue and before it dries. Once it has been soaked with wet glue, it tends to clump together. I'd stick with the tried and true methods.

I second most of the suggestions. You need to soak your ballast thoroughly with wet water first. I use 4:1 water/alcohol. I found that those plastic catsup/mustard bottles diners use are great for applying the water/glue mix. You can pick up a set at Wal-Mart and other stores for a couple of bucks. I use a piece of masking tape to cap them between uses.

[35tac]

I have had my best luck with WS Scenic Cement put down with a pipette. My pre soak is a quart botle with 50/50 water alcohal and 2 drops of dish soap. I ballast the sides first, with atleast two day drying time than fish with the track center. No issues to date. BTW I use WS black foam roadbed and not cork. I tried coark and thought it took forever to dry and it had a tendancy to swell. I also think that the particular moisture/temperature mix in your train  layout location at the time of install influences your situation. So thats why there are so many differant recepies.

Thanks

Wayne

 

[bnsf0823]

Like everyone else has stated use isopropal spray it on and then i found out that emptying half of a glue bottle out and adding half water to the bottle it works real well to use the glue bottle to apply the glue use the one's with the orange tips and make sure it is mixed well spray and then sqeeze the glue on immediatly.  The ballast will darken where it is saturated so you'll know what areas are wet enough.  Good luck and happy ballasting show us some pics when your done love to see peoples work.  

Ripping through the rockies

[richhotrain]

All of which makes me wonder if you could simply soak the ballast in a bowl or pan of isopropyl alcohol and then remove it and place it in a bowl of glue/water mix and then form it in place.

At first thought it seems a little messy but then it eventually all dries clear and solid, so why not?

Never tried it.  Has anyone attempted such a process?

Rich

[dknelson]

I suspect it is more or less the "same stuff" but in point of fact I have had better luck using Woodland Scenics Scenic Cement for ballasting than I do using a home-brewed batch of 50% water (or alcohol) and 50% white glue.  Perhaps because I used a dollar store brand of white glue that might have already been watered down!   In any event I now use the WS product just because I know it works for me. 

Years ago there was an article in MR, by a well known author, who mixed dry glue powder in with his ballast, and "wetted" and then cemented the ballast/dried glue mix in place using a sprayer.  He claimed it worked for him so i have it a try.  I had very mixed and unpredictable results.  Some portions of the ballast were fine - very solid.  Others had just the phenomenon the original poster complained of -- a sort of pie crust of ballast that eventually would crack away revealing loose ballast inside the pie.  Perhaps I was too frugal with the dried glue, or perhaps I did not mix the glue and ballast mix together adequately.  More likely it was the spray method of applying the water/alcohol that was to blame.

I have not given the idea a second try (if I did I would use a eye dropper or baster or other more controlled method for an actual solid stream of liquid, not a hit-or-miss spray method) and now use conventional methods BUT -- since I have a quantity of the dry glue left over, I do throw a little in with the ballast.  The ballast tends to dry rock hard.  So I think there is still something to be said for having dried glue mixed in with the ballast regardless of what method is used to secure or bond the ballast.

Turnouts.  With great care you can use traditional ballasting methods to ballast a turnout, but here the application of the liquid cement is even more critical to avoid cementing the points in place.  And the ballast needs to be well below the bottom of the point rails.  I usually use adhesive caulk to lay my track but i do NOT put caulk under the turnout points (I do put it under the ends of the turnout, so the turnout is secured). 

Following advice I read either on this forum or in a magazine, I experimented with a piece of duct tape sticky face up at the bottom of the ties beneath the points and dropped the ballast on the sticky tape, tamping it in place with the eraser on the end of a pencil.  You end up, if you do it right, with just one layer of the stone ballast covering the tape.   It has the advantage of retaining a certain shade and type of ballast beneath the points, even if the ballast is not to the same height as the rest of the track.  Visually it "works."  The downside is, you have to have been thinking of this when you laid the track and the turnouts.

Former MR editor, now publisher, Terry Thompson suggested using those spray cans of stone texture as a sort of quick and dirty ballast-like texture.  I gave it a try on a sample turnout that I mounted on plywood as a "pass around the room" example for tracklaying clinics.  I cannot say I was entirely convinced even though I found a spray can "stone" texture that was pretty close to my ballast shade.  The stone texture interfered with the ties of the turnout sitting flat on the cork roadbed.  But the points did move freely which was the main goal.

Terry Thompson also suggested using, just for turnouts, those various prefab turnouts that come with plastic ballast and ties all in place - an integral track plus roadbed.  Again I experimented for the purposes of giving a track clinic and the one drawback is that the height of the brand I used, either Bachmann or Life-Like but Kato and others make a similar product, was higher than just cork-- in fact it was double the height so two thicknesses of cork roadbed almost exactly matched the prefab track turnout.  This works best with darker ballasts that approach the same color as the plastic base for the track, and of course you can ballast the sides of the roadbed to match the rest of the track.   With care and some track weathering it was surprisingly convincingly particularly of you weather the rail.

Dave Nelson

[CTValleyRR]

Delray-- I think your having trouble with bubbles precisely because you don't prewet your ballast. I use 35% rubbing alcohol (the 70% stuff you buy at the drug storemdiluted 50%).

[CTValleyRR]

WS scenic cement is basically diluted matte medium with the talc removed. It is meant to be used straight from the bottle. Of course, it's much more expensive than the stuff you buy at art stores (especially if you use that 40% off coupon).

[bobby44]

Hi ALl:

Has anyone used WS Scenic Cement straight from the bottle?  I have on talus around a crumbling wall and it seems to work perfectly.  I haven't used it on ballast yet, but if it works that well on ballast, it would seem to save a number of steps.

Rob.

[richhotrain]

dehusman

I first spray the ballast with a mix of water and a couple drops of dish detergent.  I have never used alcohol as a wetting agent.  The ballast needs to be WET.  All the way through.  Start spraying with a very light mist so it doesn't displace the dry ballast, as it gets wetter the spray can be heavier.

Then a use a squeeze bottle to "dribble' a mix of 50-50 white glue and water (or Modge Podge/matte meduim and water) onto the wet ballast.  Let that dry.  Test the adherence.  If need be, rewet and reapply glue.

I never spray the glue and water mixture, it will gum up switches, cause the rails to be coated in glue and mess up any buildings or scenery it touches.

Dave,

For years, I used water as the wetting agent, and it seemed to work for me.

But, I finally tried using alcohol instead, and it worked a lot better.  A lot better.

Now, the difference may be that I use a light spray of alcohol, followed immediately by the glue/water mix.  I don't try to soak the ballast all the way through with alcohol.

But, whatever the difference, in my experience, alcohol is far superior to water as a wetting agent.

Rich

[rrinker]

 Use alcohol, I never had any luck with the 'wet water' method, but the water around here is very 'hard'. I found a very fine misting spray bottle at one of the craft stores which I use to spray alcohol on the ballast - it's really a mist, so it doesn;t blow the ballast around. Soak it good. I use an old mustard bottle, and dilute the glue 50/50 with 70% alcohol, then carefully dribble it on. You can see it soak in the ballast - if it doesn;t, all you will have is a crust that will crack and expose the loose ballast underneath. I do things in 2 steps like Cody Grivno has explained in numerous videos and articles, that also seems to make everyhing much more solid, and reduces the chances of washing the ballast away while applying glue.

                              --Randy

[stilson4283]

So same thing about wetting agent of 1:1 70% alcohol and water, but I wear contacts so I am using an old Contact Solution bottle for my water 1:3 glue water mixture.

Chris

[jeffrey-wimberly]

I prewet the ballast with alcohol dripped on from an old glue bottle. I then drip on a 50/50 mix of Elmer's glue (not school glue) and water.

[dehusman]

I first spray the ballast with a mix of water and a couple drops of dish detergent.  I have never used alcohol as a wetting agent.  The ballast needs to be WET.  All the way through.  Start spraying with a very light mist so it doesn't displace the dry ballast, as it gets wetter the spray can be heavier.

Then a use a squeeze bottle to "dribble' a mix of 50-50 white glue and water (or Modge Podge/matte meduim and water) onto the wet ballast.  Let that dry.  Test the adherence.  If need be, rewet and reapply glue.

I never spray the glue and water mixture, it will gum up switches, cause the rails to be coated in glue and mess up any buildings or scenery it touches.

[delray1967]

First of all, I use Woodland Scenics Fine ballast on HO Micro Engineering Code 70 flextrack and turnouts.

When applying glue to the ballast, I don't mist it with wet water before I glue; I just drop glue at the bottom of the ballast shoulder and watch it get wicked up.  When applying glue from the top (the ties), sometimes the glue runs over the surface of the ballast, down to the ditches, without soaking in.  Another thing I noticed when I do it from the top down, once the ballast looks soaked (I go over it several times, allowing several minutes in between soakings to let it all soak in), I see dozens (hundreds?) of tiny bubbles.  When dry, the bubbles leave small (1/32" or less) holes in the ballast surface.  I think once everything is wet, the water kind of seals in the air bubbles; soaking from the bottom doesn't seem to have these results.  To fix this, I just reapply the glue; now the top surface is dry, it doesn't need to be misted with wet water.

But a new problem with this...sometimes the ballast swells up with water, making small humps appear.  I usually pop these and slowly drip glue into the pocket; it kind of mess up the ballast, but it's easily fixable and I'm sure the ballast is secure.  A few places I get big cracks in my ballast.  I used white glue (Aileen's) to glue the cork to the 1/2" foam, and also the track to the cork.  Could the water be reactivating these layers of glue and making them swell, then shrink, causing the cracks?  Some places, I used cork to help fill in the shoulder areas of the roadbed and this resulted in cracks; I should have filled in the cracks before I ballasted but it's ok, I fixed the few problem areas.  Maybe I should have painted the cork before laying track, so the water couldn't soak in?  Anyone done this or is this extra work?  Maybe I'll try it on my next modules.

The other method I used to make sure ballast is thoroughly glued is to ballast between the rails first, the ballast can be soaked from both sides of the track.  When this is dry, I do the shoulders, applying glue from the bottom, letting it wick up until it's soaked (you can see a slight color change).  Once that is soaked, I fill in between the rails (yes, at this point you can't add too much glue) with the glue mixture and let it soak through all the ballast.

Ballasting my 2' x 12' switching layout, I probably used a half dozen different methods.  Every method resulted in a fine ballast job, each with their own quirks.  Use whatever method that works best for you.

[Medina1128]

kasskaboose

I have WS ballat that I put down and sprayed w/ 50% water/white glue.  It stayed fine for while, but now comes off once i start blowing on it.  Should I respray or use something else?  If the latter, what to try?

Glad that some had luck w/ the 50/50 water/glue.  it worked on the scenery, but oddly not 100% on the ballast.

TIA!

Lee

I notice a couple of things about your ballasting process. One has been addressed in previous posts; prewetting the ballast before gluing. I use 70% rubbing alcohol to thoroughly wet the ballast. Then let it soak for about 10 minutes.

My  involves spraying the glue mixture. Unless I'm gluing a large area AWAY from track, I NEVER spray glue. It gets into turnouts and can pretty much ruin your day. I use one of two methods for applying my 60:40 (water: glue) mix. Get a medicine dropper (it's a little larger than a regular eye dropper), or some of those translucent bottles that "mom and pop diners" use for condiments. They work great. In either case, dribble enough on so that you can see that it soaks the ballast. I know some make the case for matte medium, but I like white glue, because I can soak it and remove the ballast with the ol' shop-vac, in case I need to make repairs or changes later on.

[john.pickles87]

Hi Lee,

Don't do what I did, ran out of water based  PVA and borrowed a bit from next door.   I didn't know, it turned out to be waterproof I was not too happy with the results but it was too late.  Ended up using a chisel and lump hammer.

Never went back, always get water-so-liable now.

pick.

[richhotrain]

If you want Woodland Scenics ballast to stay put, you have to spray it first with ispropyl alcohol and then immediately drench it with the glue/water mix.  Use a 2:1 water to glue mix and add a few drops of liquid detergent.  The, leave it to dry for 48 to 72 hours.

Spraying the glue mix is insufficient.  The ballast needs to be drenched.

Rich

[BroadwayLion]

LIONS do not have problems with ballast.

LIONS use GRAVITY same as the 1:1 roads do.

ROAR

[fmilhaupt]

Sounds like you left out an important step.

Once the ballast is down, you need to hit it with a wetting agent (often called "wet water"), which is usually a mixture of water and rubbing alcohol or water and a drop of dish soap. This improves the ability of the glue mixture you apply next to flow down between the grains of ballast and really get in there to hold it all together.

The idea is to pretty well saturate the ballast. Otherwise, you can end up just gluing together a hard surface shell over loose ballast below it. Eventually, the shell will crack and let the loose, un-glued stuff through.

You can also improve the ability of your glue mixture to flow by adding the tiniest drop of dish soap to it. This reduces its surface tension and allows it to flow better.

[2021]

You probably did not saturate the ballast.  You don't spray, you drench.  I use a small bottle with a small opening in the spout.  Apply until the ballast is very wet and it flows.  You only need to do the center and let it flow to the outside.  Once dry in about two days it will last forever.  I use a 4 to 1 mix (water to glue).

Ron K.

[kasskaboose]

I have WS ballat that I put down and sprayed w/ 50% water/white glue.  It stayed fine for while, but now comes off once i start blowing on it.  Should I respray or use something else?  If the latter, what to try?

Glad that some had luck w/ the 50/50 water/glue.  it worked on the scenery, but oddly not 100% on the ballast.

TIA!

Lee