I found a picture of the kind of road I want in my town. Is this a dirt road? Is it gravel? I would think it would be gravel. Sorry if this is an ignorant question. It’s hard to tell what the colors are in a black and white photo.
From looking at the pic, I would guess is is dirt or fine gravel. If it were asphult or concrete there would not be any tracks from the traffic. Good luck. Mike
As a kid (I’m 65 in 9 days) we had dirt roads that were oiled! In the spring the town would level them with a road grader, and then spread black oil (used motor oil?) on the road to keep dust down!! The center of town was asphalt, but many of the outlaying roads had the oil treatment, often repeated during a dry summer - the tree huggers would sure like this!![:)]
That’s what I was looking for! I’ve seen pictures of this kind of road everywhere I look. I didn’t want asphalt, but a plain dirt road didn’t seem right either. Unfortunately, I have aready made my roads gravel. Maybe I could do my own version of oil over the gravel.
When first put down, the oil was basic black with a reddish/brown tinge. In a fairly short time (days, not months) it would wear off the top of the gravel and the stone color would come through.
Ran into this in Texas in the early '60s. We used to joke that driving over a freshly-oiled road gave the car a free undercoating.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Anyone have any ideas on how to model that look? Sorry, this is a major roadblock for the design of my town. Thanks for the help.
You posted at the same time as me. Do you think a diluted mix of reddish brown/black paint over tan ballast would work? I already have the ‘gravel’ down.
Roads were built that way in southern Illinois in the 1940’s, too. My earliest recollections are of a caterpillar tractor pulling a road grader with a scarafier ahead of the blade. Another piece of equipment that was something like a farm harrow with rotating teeth ground up the pieces. After the surface was ground up, the blade was used over and over until it was fairly smooth.
A steam roller (actually steam powered) followed the grader and compacted the surface. Next, thick, hot asphalt was sprayed on the street and allowed to set for at least 24 hours to soak in. No one was allowed to drive on the street during this time.
Finally small crushed gravel that appeared to be granite was spread onto the oil, the steam roller made one more pass, and the street was opened to traffic. After about a month, the street looked like the one in the photograph as the gravel was mashed into the surface and oil was worn off the gravel by the traffic.
Some years, they used sawdust instead of gravel, probably as a cost saving measure.
I used some HighBall Products fine cinders to make similar roads a while back. It’s a light black/medium grey color and super fine. I was real happy with the way they turned out.
Do you have any pictures?
Ballast is too big. Best to just plaster and paint.
David B
I was afraid of that. Man do I like to waste money!
Something you might consider is using fine sand or real dirt (Sifted to get the really fine stuff, I have used the screen from a old clothes dryer and it gets the really fine stuff). Mike
Thats the issue…the prototype has Fine dirt, so using Fine dirt does NOT mean that you are modeling Fine dirt. It will be TOO big, no matter how much you sift it. It will look completely out of scale.
David B
Terrific thread! [:D]
There is a source of sand that would be fine enough to use for this purpose – sand blasting grit. You might be able to find it at a better Home Depot, Lowe’s, or similar store that handles air compressors and sand blasting equipment. You can get it in different grades in, I believe, 50 pound bags.
Sanded or unsanded tile grout is another possibility, and even comes in shades of gray.
Just after WWII I was a passenger in a car that was driven over a MacAdamized road where the builders had used ballast-size crushed stone. It was rather like riding on square wheels!
The Texas gravel wasn’t fine dirt. It was 3/4" and down.
To get that effect on a road that has already been “ballasted,” try sifting some fine dirt through the smallest screen (opening size) you can find. Bake the resulting screenings (to kill off any microscopic spores that may be present, then spread them over the ballast rock and brush (cheap bristle paintbrush - don’t ruin a good one) to get a reasonably smooth surface. Spray on black or really dark gray paint (rattle can) or, if you have an airbrush, mix a few drops of oxide red into black and thin well.
Chuck (modeling Central Japan in September, 1964)
Thanks everyone. I’m going to try to cover the ballasted road with very fine earth colored ground cover. Maybe I’ll achieve a believable color and texture. Has anyone modeled this look before? If you have , do you have pictures?
I can remember when bout the only hard surface roads were US-40, IL-1 and IL 49 here in Clark county, IL. All the county and township roads were gravel, what everybody called brown sugar. It came from the county pit along the Wabash River. The bigger hills had ¾ white rock from Tarbles limestone quarry.
A main county road ran through the town [Clarksville] I was raised by and it was gravel. A couple times a summerafter the maintainer came through. The county would have an oil tanker spread a coat of oil through town and in front of the houses along the road. Then they’d drag a harrow through it and kinda stir it up a bit with the loose rock. Helped cut down on the road dust.
It remained that way up into the mid 60’s, when the county finally started a black topping program [Clarksville road was one of the first].
I’ve never tried to model it, but it does sounds interesting to try.
I remember when thet used to pour oil on the surface of a pond to keep the mosquitos under control.