# Lego Track Ballasting


Many posts have been written on [ballasting LEGO](http://www.tnvlc.org/resources/town-train/lego)
tracks. They all mention added ballast is "piece intensive", and the examples I found online use
a lot of LEGO pieces.

I still went ahead and I think I've found a variant that still looks good, and is (slightly)
optimized to reduce the number of bricks. For
[straight track](https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=53401#T=C)
it consists out a two layers of plates.
[Curves](https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=53400&idColor=85#T=C&C=85)
and [switches](https://www.bricklink.com/v2/catalog/catalogitem.page?P=53407#T=C)
have 1 layer and need to be propped up with tiles (when attaching to baseplates).

## Straight Track

For straight track the ballasting is relatively simple. The following pieces are needed:

* 10 * 8x2 plates
* 4  * 2x4 plates (used on the top side)
* 1  * 2x2 plates

8 of the 8x2s will be visible (those should be the color of your ballast), the remaining 2 can be any
color. The 4 2x4's are also visibile. In the example below I used
[reddish brown](https://lego.fandom.com/wiki/Reddish_Brown).

Attaching the ballast to the track is extremely simple:

{{<figure src="/images/2019/track-straight-top.png" caption="Topside of the straight track with ballast.">}}

And bottom:

{{<figure src="/images/2019/track-straight-under.png" caption="Underside of the straight track with ballast.">}}

## Curved Track

For curved track things got some what trickier, because of the, uh, curve. With much inspiration from online designs, I finally
settled on a symmetrical design, piece count is not insane (but still a lot - you will have *many* curves in your setup).

* 3 * 4x4 plates
* 3 * 2x4 plates
* 6 * 2x3 plates
* 4 * 1x3 plates
* 4 * 1x4 plates (used on the top side)

All these pieces are visible so they must be of the same color.

From above it looks like this, the 4 1x4s are only attached with 1 stud and hide the remaining gaps,
rest of the gaps will need to be obscured with tiles.

{{<figure src="/images/2019/track-curve-top.png" caption="Topside of the curved track with ballast.">}}

Bottom is more interesting:

{{<figure src="/images/2019/track-curve-under.png" caption="Underside of the curved track with ballast.">}}

Not shown here ('cause I haven't done it yet) is to use tiles to finish the second layer when putting these track elements
on a baseplate. Figuring out where to put the tiles is a bit of trail and error depending how the curve needs to be
attached to the baseplate.

I'll detail switches in a future post; I've got one attached to a baseplate, but not 100% happy with the ballasting and
the number of pieces used.