Garden Railway Forum

Thanks chaps. I think that I can SBR with confidence then!
Impressive results there Peter.

Having been delayed for various reasons with my ballasting, I've now managed to complete the bulk of it and now that the SBR is fully cured/hardened I'm now putting back the various buildings and lineside features on my railway. Generally speaking I'm pleased with the way it looks, although time might change my view, but the best bit for me is being able to keep the track clear of detritus with the careful use of a small leaf blower, which obviously I would not have considered if using loose ballast.

Sorry for going off topic but is that a Pendle Valley 'railway Inn' I see?. If so it would be greatly appreciated if you could get the floor plan dimensions for me. I was thinking of getting one but before I invest money into it I would like to know if It would fit on my railway (there is no dimensions on the website).

Thanks, George

Phil, you have done a fine job laying your ballast and I am pleased you are satisfied with the result. From the pictures it looks as though you have used water washed (smooth) stones, possibly aquarium grit, and I would be interested to hear how it performs in your area compared to where I live.... West Wales has a reputation for being rather wetter than some areas.
I understand Tom also experienced issues with similar materials using SBR, just as you have, and he is Kent based which is less prone to high rainfall.
I refer you to my earlier suggestion on page one of this thread based on my own experiments and experience.....

Peter Butler wrote: ↑Sun Apr 14, 2019 6:22 pm
The important thing is to know your materials and my experience has taught me this.....
SBR works well on fine grained, rough surface, crushed stone and oyster shell..... it does NOT work on large or smooth surface stone eg. aquarium grit etc. Initially it appears to hold but the large or smooth surfaces will not bind together as the SBR needs to be able to form a skin around them.
After a while weather conditions of wind and rain will eventually remove the skin and the grit will become loose. I know this because it happened to me.

I sincerely hopes this helps and avoids further failures now my experiments are recorded.

Phil. Your station area ballasting looks really good, it will be interesting to see how well it lasts.

I've just completed a reballasting exercise that turned out to be much more extensive than originally anticipated. Once I started there was no obvious place to stop, because the blind eye I had been turning to the defects that have been developing for ages suddenly saw reality!
The defective areas were all originally laid with a Rowlands-type mix which has crumbled away over the years, so I'll also be interested to see how well my new SBR replacement lasts. I used the baster again to apply the SBR, which was much faster to do, so thanks again for the idea.

Nice job Phil. Well done.

Thank you all for your kind comments, that's one of the benefits of this forum that others can see what I'm trying to achieve, most of my friends and family seem to think to I've got a screw loose to want to do anything like this.

George, yes it is the Pendle inn and my model measures 200mm deep x 340mm wide.

Peter, the stone that I have used is a horticultural grit that I got from a local garden centre and what is surprising is that is actually quite a sharp grit. I know that it looks quite rounded in the photo, who ever said the camera never lies? I will endeavour to take a close up shot of it later.

Philipy, I'm also quite keen to see how well this lasts, unfortunately this is the one part of my railway which I won't be able to take inside during the winter months

pandsrowe wrote: ↑Fri May 31, 2019 10:37 am I'm also quite keen to see how well this lasts, unfortunately this is the one part of my railway which I won't be able to take inside during the winter months

Well, my initial trial area has survived 2 winters out of doors and its under trees where it spends a lot of time buried under soggy leaves, and thats still as solid as a rock. I noticed the other day that the moss is taking hold there as well, now.
My ballast is 2-3mm granite, but I've also use chicken grit along the edges in places, and that has held as well.

That looks excellent!

I'll be carrying out ballasting myself this weekend - I've already dry ballasted and levelled the first siding, will add SBR to that this evening then do the rest of the station site. I've purchased a turkey baster for the job, thanks for the tip - the large syringe I used last time I did this soon got gummed up!

All the best,

Andrew.

I gave up cleaning up stuff after each SBR application.

Particularly spray bottles, no matter how much I cleaned and pumped water through them on next use they were all gummed up!

This is the horticultural grit that I've used straight out of the bag before washing. I estimate that the average grit size is 3 - 4mm, as can be seen some of the grit is a bit larger at maybe 5 - 6mm but they are few enough to pick out if they cause a problem.

Yes, I've got some of that in the garden for potting grit. It's a little larger than my granite, but I've had it in mind for when I run out, although it is a different colour - red rather than greenish.

Sorry to say this but I covered that one too!

Peter Butler wrote: ↑Sun Apr 14, 2019 6:22 pm Personal experience of using SBR and a variety of ballast materials has given me an insight into what works and what is less likely to.
My own first attempt was to use horticultural grit, which I took a long time to sieve out the larger lumps and only use the smaller. I quite liked the appearance of the grit but it failed in service after a couple of seasons.

I just hope you have more luck..... please update as time goes by.