Questions, Answers & Tips -
Ballast profile
Q.
My flex track is mounted on cork ballast but the slope
doesn’t look like it does in train pictures I find on the web.
Did I get the wrong product?
– Ernie G.
A.
Cork roadbed is a perfectly acceptable material for model
track, but your work doesn’t end there. The next step is to
apply ballast, available from companies like Woodland Scenics
and Arizona Rock & Mineral.
There are dozens of how-to articles on the Internet. Search
for “model railroad ballast tutorial” and take your pick.
What the videos and articles rarely tell you is how much bal-
last to apply, and what sort of slope the edges of the finished
roadbed should have. Railroad historians and historical societ-
ies have made this kind of information available, and the pro-
totypical slope is more gradual than what’s usually seen on
model railroads.
2
2: A mainline track profile is wide and deep.
MRH-Jan 2014
