Large Scale Central

Fill and ballast, better way?

Track and Trestles
#1

There’s has to be a better way! The whole idea was to replace too tight a curve (see T&T, width of ladder track) into the trestle. In doubling the length of the curve I also introduced some significant changes in grade. Grade I don’t want to change because it slopes away from the house.

Since I have over a yard of rock left over from another project, I started lumping them in. Not good.

Then I did a trial of laying out a line of the largest rock and filling in with some junk sand left over from yet another project and repeating two more layers with smaller rock and sand until I am just under the roadbed. Note: the finished layer will ballast, probably #2 poultry grit, Sand is just for trial purposes.

Given I have over 30 feet of roadbed elevated from 4’’ to 9’’ this is starting to look like a lot of work. Is there a better way?

#2

A nice trestle?

#3

I’m in the same boat, Bill, with about 300 feet of ROW. My solution for next season is to buy a couple of yards of 3" riprap, and use that to fill up most of the height, then 1/4 gravel over that, and ballast over that. Here’s a bit of track I did this past fall with the rap, but no coat of gravel of ballast yet

(http://zbd.com/photos/OnePoint20/NewTrackwork/20080913_3.jpg)

#4

Nope, you just need more soil to grade it out more. On my 7/8’s layout (just about done will take pics this weekend) I filled underneath with gravel and graded out the sides with soil and planted up. My local home depot has 1 gallon dwarf alberta spruce in little holiday pots for $5 a piece.

-Brian

#5

You can intersperse retaining walls and/or cribbing to hold back the embankments beneath the track. This will not only greatly lessen the amount of fill needed but shorten up the slope and resulting slides as well. In the photo below the track is at the bottom of the slope but it could as easily be on top.

(http://lscdata.com/users/richard_smith/Visitors/TerryFoley28Sep2008/2008Sep28-45-No3-LogTrainLvgBandon-Web.JPG)

#6

Bill -

Although it’s nice to use on-hand materials, those round river rocks will give you trouble. The finer material you place around them will tend to wash away easily because the rock has no angular surfaces to bite on to. You could always crush them up, but that’s even more work.

I have a short fill, about 20 feet or so. The majority of it was built up from old bricks and broken up concrete and mortar. I used dirt as my primary fill and then stared adding a product called 3/4 Process on top of that. 3/4 Process is 3/4" and smaller crushed stone and dust. Every year for the past 3 or 4 I’ve added more of the process and larger pieces of mortar scraps to try and combat erosion. This fill is directly under the drip line of a 40 foot maple.

Cribbing is a nice idea that I’ve always wanted to try. Someday :slight_smile:

#7

John, Trestle is a good idea but too late after the time, effort, and material invested so far. And too risky an exposure to all the yard maintenance. Twice a year I hire a crew to prune, clean up the yard.

Brian, Sounds interesting, I’ll wait to see the pix.

Richard, That’s a lot of nice cribbing but more work than I want to do. There is a spot close to a sprinkler valve box that I may try to crib around.

Jon, yea, I recognized the trouble with that round river rock on my first attempt (see first pix). Dirt would just wash out in a hurry. Then I saw what Ralph Berg is using on his Sunny View Line and asked him for more info.
He said, “Bill, I’m using what they call “pea” gravel around here. It is not “round” gravel.”
So today I will scout all the landscape suppliers for what appears to be crushed gravel. I keep thinking using it as both fill and ballast will provide enough “bite” around that river rock to stay in place, I hope.

#8

Bill,

You can see most of it here - http://www.largescalecentral.com/LSCForums/viewtopic.php?id=9912

-Brian