DUNGENESS SHINGLE BALLAST, how to model?

[fulton]

Have experimented with Brick Paver Sand to represent SECR shingle ballast, looking for tips and comments, yes the rail heads need cleaning and maybe heavier weathering, the grey is my try for a walk way at the side, 4mm scale.

Edited September 28, 2022 by fulton
added more

[fulton]

Another view.

[john new]

Budgie grit perhaps. (Available from pet shops).

Edited September 28, 2022 by john new

[fulton]

18 minutes ago, john new said:

Budgie grit perhaps. (Available from pet shops).

Good tip, but what I have seen is too coarse, needs to be 0.5mm maximum.

[Fat Controller]

Golden linseed, perhaps leavened with some brown)

[Nearholmer]

Yes, I would go and look at the seeds and spices in a good Asian grocer’s shop. They often have a huge variety, in big bags that work out at about a twentieth the supermarket price.

 

To me, that sand looks too yellow for Dungeness, but it depends on the weather!

[burgundy]

Go to the pet shop and try chinchilla dust.

Best wishes 

Eric

[HonestTom]

You might try an art supply shop. Look for textured medium - this is basically a kind of paste that comes in many different, well, textures, ranging from coarse to very smooth. It can be mixed with paint and dry-brushed when dry to add variety and highlights to the colour.

[zarniwhoop]

Call me mister conventional, but I use products sold for model railway ballasting!

 

I'm not familiar with Dungeness, but for the Sussex Coast brownish ballast that used to be visible in the 60s and 70s I would use a mixture of brown ballasts, some red, maybe a little grey. Anything that is shingle-based is unlikely to have a single colour, nor a narrow range of shades. And probably in sizes claimed to be suitable for N gauge.

 

Of course, if there is enough traffic to cause the ballast to be stained by oil etc then the colour will darken after you weather it.

[wagonbasher]

Is there something wrong with what the ballast in the first photographs.  I don’t know what colour / texture the OP is trying to achieve?

 

if you can find a good texture then the colour can be changed.  If you take smallish batches of the material (kiln dried sand, chinchilla dust) dampen it and add some cement colour.  
 

Cement colours come in Yellows, Browns, Reds and Black.  Mix to get the colour(s)  you are trying to achieve (note, the colour will be darker because it is wet, it will dry lighter).  Once mixed,  spread out thinly on a board to allow it to dry.

 

Once dry, bag it up and apply using your preferred ballasting system.

 

Cement colours are used to change the colour of mortars and concrete and are available at Builders merchants and some DIY stores.

 

Andy

[Harlequin]

 

Stone size about 2in, 50mm. on average. That's about 0.67mm in 4mm scale.

 

You can get some very small pebbles for use in cactus planting and for aquariums that look like this (rounded and similar colour) but the particle size is usually about 3-6mm, which is too big. A diligent Google search might turn up a smaller particle size product.

 

[t-b-g]

One of the biggest factors in making that sort of ballast look right is the variation in colours. Trying to use ballast of any type and then painting it makes it very difficult to get that variation in colour from stone to stone.

 

I would suggest mixing some brown sand (that in the opening photo would be a good starting point) with a couple of different shades of brown and grey. The Woodland scenics fine ballast has a range of colours and at the size we are looking at, I think the colouring is more important than whether the stones have a rounded surface or not. The Woodland scenics fine ballast "granules" are too small to see things like that anyway.

 

Painting the track first, then mixing the colours and laying the ballast onto thick pva glue or even thick paint, so the stones keep their original colour, can produce lovely results. Soaking the ballast with varnish or using dilute PVA dripped on tends to darken the natural stone colours.

[phil_sutters]

Island Line appeared to be using shingle ballast until 2013 at least. Now it seems to be uniform grey chippings.

[Harlequin]

This is the closest I can find so far by searching for "aquatic shingle small":

https://resinbound.online/product/aggregates/golden-pea-1-3mm/?mh_matchtype=&mh_keyword=&mh_adgroupid=134304350366&mh_network=g&gclid=CjwKCAjwp9qZBhBkEiwAsYFsb6z-NfwfesjzamJG3QyPKej_BqV5rGjwnPVKVhPDvgIdgFTNmABUQRoCCnIQAvD_BwE

 

Perhaps you could forgive the slightly overscale particle size because it shows the pebbly effect clearer in the model?

 

[wagonbasher]

Ok, some insider knowledge.

 

Tarmac branded  Kiln dried sand (B&Q and Wickes), Tarmac Play Pit Sand (B&Q, Wickes and Smyths Toys).  All use a very light coloured quartz sand quarried in Cheshire.  The partial grading is as follows:

 

31% below 0.25mm

66% between 0.25 and 0.5mm 

3% over 0.5mm

 

Andy

 

 

[C126]

Is it worth mentioning that the problem with modelling shingle is that it is sea-washed rounded pebbles, rather than angular small 'rocks'.  So if one is determined to achieve a 'rounded' effect, one needs some sort of bead.  I have pondered modelling Phurnacite for my coal-yard, needing an oval 0.5mm. at its longest, and could find few substitutes, so have put the project in the 'deferred' tray.  There was a medical supplier of 0.5mm. beads I found at a high price, which suited me because I was going to paint them all black.  However, with ballast one needs, if I remember Newhaven east beach correctly, at least three base-colours mixed: orange, flint-grey, and chalk-white (as per photo above).

 

Personally, I think the first picture looks rather good, and I would be happy with that on my layout!

Edited September 30, 2022 by C126
Grammar.

[john new]

Try opening up the canister of a BRITTA water filter, assuming they haven't changed the contents over the last decade they were/are small round black and white balls. I used them after painting in situ for a seaside based layout around eleven years ago.

[fulton]

Some good responses, for myself the particle size is important, as is the mixture of colours, from normal viewing distance I do not think the particle shape either round or sharp will show to me. When I last visited Dungeness there were still a few sleepers in place, and a point lever, on the line running to the ballast pits, most pebbles seemed to be less than 2". Map just to give an idea of the ballast pit location, the sidings run off the loop at Dungeness station, the ballast from here was used extensively over the SECR system. Have flirted with the idea of modelling this most odd location.

[wagonbasher]

38 minutes ago, fulton said:

Some good responses, for myself the particle size is important, as is the mixture of colours, from normal viewing distance I do not think the particle shape either round or sharp will show to me. When I last visited Dungeness there were still a few sleepers in place, and a point lever, on the line running to the ballast pits, most pebbles seemed to be less than 2". Map just to give an idea of the ballast pit location, the sidings run off the loop at Dungeness station, the ballast from here was used extensively over the SECR system. Have flirted with the idea of modelling this most odd location.

Sorry, my ignorance, what is a ballast pit.  Is that the ‘quarry’ the ballast came from

 

BTW, I also don’t think i can tell a naturally rounded from a crushed / angular particle of sand that is 0.5mm at normal viewing distance, even with my best glasses on.

 

Andy

[fulton]

1 minute ago, wagonbasher said:

Sorry, my ignorance, what is a ballast pit.  Is that the ‘quarry’ the ballast came from

 

Andy

Yes a pit is a large hole in the ground, not sure what the difference is with a quarry, just looked at a definition quarry described as a large pit. I have been referring to a ballast pit but the map above labels it as a gravel pit.

[C126]

11 hours ago, wagonbasher said:

Sorry, my ignorance, what is a ballast pit.  Is that the ‘quarry’ the ballast came from

 

BTW, I also don’t think i can tell a naturally rounded from a crushed / angular particle of sand that is 0.5mm at normal viewing distance, even with my best glasses on.

 

Andy

 

I think the particles' shape - even if so small - reflect the light differently.  An angular 'rock' will 'sparkle' as the light catches it, whereas a round miniature 'pebble' will not, I think.  At least this is the reason I think it is worth pursuing the difference in texture.

 

This is the scientific company I found for 0.5mm. beads:

 

https://www.thistlescientific.co.uk/product/glass-beads-0-5mm-2/

 

I was going to go for the "PRELOADED beads in 2ml screw cap vials", depending upon price quoted, when my personal finances allow.

[Bernard Lamb]

11 hours ago, fulton said:

Yes a pit is a large hole in the ground, not sure what the difference is with a quarry, just looked at a definition quarry described as a large pit. I have been referring to a ballast pit but the map above labels it as a gravel pit.

The wonders of the English language.

Ballast or gravel, as shown on the map, comes from a pit, as does chalk, and clay, but stone comes from a quarry.

Clunch comes from a quarry, but near Dunstable clunch and chalk are extracted from holes in the ground only a short distance apart. Roughdown Common has an old quarry rather than a pit for chalk extraction just to complicate things.

Then just how far underground do you have to go before the hole becomes a mine.😃

 

Regarding the colour. Take a look at Prospect Cottage, the home of the late Derek Jarman. Plenty of images on line. To me the OP has it just right.

Bernard

[Fat Controller]

13 hours ago, fulton said:

Yes a pit is a large hole in the ground, not sure what the difference is with a quarry, just looked at a definition quarry described as a large pit. I have been referring to a ballast pit but the map above labels it as a gravel pit.

Might the difference be that quarrying entails somehow breaking bits off a larger whole, whilst the material in a 'pit' simply needs shovelling?

[john new]

9 minutes ago, Fat Controller said:

Might the difference be that quarrying entails somehow breaking bits off a larger whole, whilst the material in a 'pit' simply needs shovelling?

Unlikely, as for example coal is hacked off a face but the mines/collieries are equally known as pits. I suspect more likely as a generalisation would be that a pit is a hole with sides all round whereas a quarry generally has at least one edge where the access to the face can be gained. The generalisations in language then take over so some materials are always quarried in common parlance. The example for that is gold, even the modern open-casting operations are referred to as gold mines!

[wagonbasher]

8 hours ago, john new said:

Unlikely, as for example coal is hacked off a face but the mines/collieries are equally known as pits. I suspect more likely as a generalisation would be that a pit is a hole with sides all round whereas a quarry generally has at least one edge where the access to the face can be gained. The generalisations in language then take over so some materials are always quarried in common parlance. The example for that is gold, even the modern open-casting operations are referred to as gold mines!

I am a supply chain manager with Tarmc, the UK’s biggest quarrying company. My speciality is bagged aggregates and bagged cement

 

sands may be the bottom of some ancient sea bed, sand and gravel may be the result of  10s of 1000s of years of river deposits, sands and gravels may be the spoil and waste left from melting glaciers, aggregates like Limestone, hard stones like granites can be blasted and crushed.

 

Today they are all called quarries.  I think the pit reference is from a different age

 

The only aggregate source that would not be referred to as a quarry is marine aggregates like sands and gravels dredged from our estuaries and landed at docks.  
 

it is just terminology and the passing of time.  It’s odd but I have no involvement in Clay extraction for bricks but I think I would say clay pit…. Maybe today they would be quarries?

 

 

 

 

 

Andy