Do Railroad Sidings Use Much Ballast

The sidings use a darker color.

Do railroad sidings use much ballast.

And if that work is done by a railroad contractor and not the railroad itself there is no reason they d use the same ballast source as the railroad itself. Then some aditional ties are stained light gray to simulate rotten ties. I also change grain sizes using ho ballast on the mainline and n scale ballast on the sidings. It s a pain but it makes a differance.

Having said that covered hoppers are among the cars that have gotten bigger and heavier in recent years so perhaps a food based industry would have had its siding get new rail and thus. I pretty much like how the roseburg yard appears on joe s siskiyou line layout. So the wuestion is now do i just use the same thickness for mainline and siding or should the siding and spurs be the same thickness which in turn would match their height. In most photos i see mainline sidings are distinctly lower than the mainline while spurs in comparison to the sidings don t seem that much higher above the spus.

It also helps to know how things get the way they are. When i ballast yards i don t use ballast per say. The mainline here is code 100. Track ballast forms the trackbed upon which railroad ties sleepers are laid.

While for mainline and sidings i have used woodland scenics fine gray ballast i have yet to decide what to use on yard tracks. The typical model railroad approach of using lighter ballast on the main represents some prototypes ok but definitely not all. The n scale ballast looks better with the code 70 and code 55 rail on the sidings. First i nip off ties about every 5th one on each side of track to cause ties to look uneven.

I then paint my track floquil rail brown. Ballast also holds the track in place as the trains roll over it. Industrial spur ballast or lack thereof is another matter entirely. Passing siding would get stone ballast but that track was rarely cleaned so the stone ballast soon was hard to distinguish from cinder ballast.

Sooner or later i will have to deal with ballast in my yard. It is packed between below and around the ties. Many industrial sidings started with cinder ballast but over time dirt built up around the rails so if you look at most industrial. Maybe the main and siding looked much alike when first built as it isn t necessarily cost.

Sidings often have lighter rails meant for lower speed or less heavy traffic and few if any signals. A siding in rail terminology is a low speed track section distinct from a running line or through route such as a main line or branch line or spur it may connect to through track or to other sidings at either end. It is used to bear the load from the railroad ties to facilitate drainage of water and also to keep down vegetation that might interfere with the track structure.