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Spring time is not just the start of garden season, it's also the start of outdoor railroad season!
In the fall, when the leaves start falling, I cover up my outside railroad tracks to keep the dead leaves from clogging up the rail bed and ballast. It's really a pain to clean all the leaves off the ballast and around the rails in the spring so I just cover up the rail bed. Last Saturday was a nice enough day to get me thinking about uncovering the railroad. I use an assortment of whatever I have on hand to cover up the rail bed in the fall, so it looks pretty junky in the spring.
I started the process of uncovering the railbed at the west end of the rails, by the tree.
As you can see, sections of track are missing from the railbed. That's because I was still working on getting it put back together last fall after rebuilding the raised bed that it sits on.
I had all the sections of track stacked at the other end of the railbed, so I started carrying them out and putting them on the railbed as I uncovered it.
I finally got all the track sections laid out. This is all the track I have right now, I need to build a couple more track sections this summer to add some length to the run. Down at the far end, I have a small pile of ballast gravel that I put there last year while working on the rail bed.
There's a fair amount of dip in the middle of the track right now. I wasn't able to get more ballast gravel to level out the rail bed before it became time to cover up the railbed. In order to make the track level, I have to bring the level of the ballast gravel up to just about the top of the side boards.
Last week, I had only this small pile of ballast gravel to work with.
I started shoveling it between the rails with the flat shovel. After shoveling the gravel between the rails, I tamp it into place with a piece of broom handle. That fills in the spaces under the ties and provides a firm base for the track.
I still have a lot of track to ballast.
I only have a little bit left of the ballast pile that I was using, I'm going to have to get at least one more load with my trailer to finish the job. I can carry about 1/2 cubic yard of gravel in my trailer. That may, or may not be enough to raise the level of the rail bed and ballast the track. I probably won't get to that for another week or 2. I'm not in any hurry to get the job finished right now, shoveling gravel is rather hard on my back, and there's still gardens to prepare.
The next thing I have to do with the railroad is test all the rail joints with my flatcar to see if they are all aligned properly so that I don't have problems with derailments. It's no fun riding on the flatcar and having it derail.
Just in case you were wondering, this is a 7-1/2 inch gauge railroad, which means that from the inner top edge of one rail to the inner top edge of the other rail measures 7-1/2 inches.
Well, that's all I have for this post, I hope you found it interesting!
Thanks for stopping by my page to check out my railroad post!