Model Railroading > Onondaga Engine Terminal - Filthy!

While weathering focuses mostly on our rolling stock, on the Onondaga Cutoff I am working to also weather track and structures. It is a gradual process, working in layers. This past week was spent adding base ballast and a thick coat of 'grease', grime and details to the engine terminal on the Onondaga Cutoff.

1. I used painted hardboard to represent the concrete apron across the front of the engine house.

2. Once that dried, I spread a dark gray sanded grout base layer, with a large amount of 'Black Cinders' from Arizona Rock & Mineral mixed in to simulate oil-soaked grit and ballast.

3. Another layer was added to simulate oil-soaked locomotive sand, based on photos of Dewitt and Selkirk, NY shops. Again, Arizona Rock & Mineral came through - their 'Asphalt Paving Powder' is a perfect match for oily sand when piled near the rails around the sand and fuel racks. Finally, some of the same firm's 'Gray Base Powder' is a nice stand-in for HO scale locomotive sand.

More photos and methodology are on my blog at http://onondagacutoff.blogspot.com/

Thanks for looking, and enjoy!

~RGDave

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If that was the engine house at Helper Utah, there be a heck of a lot more sand around the rails! They used to refer to it as "Butters ballast" named after Mr. Butters in the Rio Grande engineering dept. - liberal amounts of sand applied on the rails for climbing grades.

Cheers, Jim Fitch

looks great just like most diesel shops

I've worked in places that looked much worse than that, Dave. Nice job. Subtle...not overdone. The piles of sand are really convincing. The old Katy shop at Parsons, Kansas was about the worse I ever saw in terms of ground conditions. It was gross. It's probably better everywhere now that air box drains are vented to a tank instead of onto the right of way. No more black stripes down the tracks. Keep it up, dude. See you in a couple of weeks. --Sully

The ballast is much too course for what would be seen in an engine terminal. I've seen this mistake over and over in posted photos of model railroad engine terminals.

I was thinking that most of them I have been around had gravel.

Good discussion, thanks all!

For you, johnsweeter(?), I'm always open to constructive criticism. The larger 2-1/2" sieve HO scale ballast close to the camera in the foreground of my last photo above is actually adjacent to the East Lead on the OC, which isn't part of the engine yard. For the engine house, there is some finer 1" scale sieve gravel (see the areas around the rails and beyond the first lead track), but it's not exclusive.

In any case I'd appreciate a few photos of Conrail Albany Division engine house lead tracks circa 1994 or so that show what you're writing.

For reference, I refer to my own photos, the written specifications and standards from my place of work (all former CR territory), as well as a variety from the usual online sources. In those cases there's some gravel, but there's quite a bit of actual 2-1/2" sieve ballast too, especially on the leads. I included gravel closer to the tracks but the gaps between, like the photos, are a mix.

Here's a few:

1. The sanding racks at Selkirk in 1995, R. Bonnano photo.

2. The 'ready' tracks at Selkirk, in 1998, R. Goddard photo.

Thanks again for the discussion!
~RGDave

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Talk about engine servicing areas not being clean. This is the SAL Gary shops in Tampa, FL of their wash rack trackage. No sign of any ballast at all. plenty of dirty soil. Taken on 08/1969.

Stanley Jackowski
Valrico, FL

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Stanley,

No kidding! Yes, most of the shots I've seen from engine terminals in the later 1960's and 1970's show a pretty incredible layer of sanded grease and oil everywhere, on Conrail predecessors as well.

Many Conrail terminals were upgraded, including new ties and ballast, in the early 1980's. Tighter environmental standards also have cut down on the amount of grease and oil that got dumped on the ballast. They're still plenty filthy but not anything like they used to be.

~RGDave

And I've seen engine facilities with large, crushed granite ballast--the same laid under the Transcon Mains. A bitch to walk on but if its abundant...

Anyhow, OP, another killer presentation of the Onondaga! It was a dirty business then.

Posted from Android

The quagmire at Elkhart back in the late 70s. I'm scared to attempt to model anything of this magnitude but will try to to do something close--maybe without so much standing water.

THAT-L-DO

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