Where can I find fine realistic looking HO embedded rails on road like on RR crossings. Which vendor makes good ones?
If you go to www.walthers.com and use the “Advanced Search” feature to look for “grade crossing,” you will find a number of manufacturers who make inserts that go between the rails at roads.
People generally use the term “grade crossing” for a point where a road and railroad meet and cross. The term “street running” is often used for rails which are actually embedded in a roadway for some significant distance.
I personally use Durhams Water Putty for my roads. It’s a powder which you mix with water to a thick soupy consistency. I bring it right up to the outside of the rails on either side of the road. I use a piece of styrene between the rails, and paint both the putty road and the styrene the same color, with some additional weathering on the part between the rails.
http://www.walthers.com/exec/productinfo/176-4105
These are even on sale. But they have others.
Consider the many many different types of road crossings. And many of them can make for enjoyable and fairly simple modeling projects that do not necessarily involve spending much money.
I can remember when most crossings were heavy timbers, creosoted like ties or telephone poles, bolted down (but often working loose due to heavy traffic and lack of maintainence). there are several lazer wood kits available to model those, but craft stores sell bags of craft sticks that can be stained and used as well.
Then crossings where the timbers are on either side of the rail but there is asphalt (or gravel) between them. That can be modeled with craft sticks and the Durham’s water putty mentioned above; some guys also use sheet styrene, or the Walthers commercial product. There are some country crossings which are pure gravel, no timber parallel to the rails. Ballast is too big for this purpose, although maybe Z or N scale ballast in HO would work OK.
There are crossings consisting entirely of retired rails laid parallel to the running rails and closely spaced. Imagine trying to ride a bicycle over that! Yikes. That would be a good use for the old brass rail from retired snap track.
There are concrete crossings where steel frames contain the concrete. I think they might be prefabricated rather than constructed on site. The steel gets rusty and it would be possible to simulate this with sheet styrene and some masking (i.e. the steel frame is simply paint). Or a simple frame made of structural styrene with sheet styrene in between.
And there are also those rubber crossings you see with a nubby texture cast into the rubber. More than one manufacturer makes that.
Dave Nelson