What to use

Ron          Your quite correct, but it is dry at home, and the old favourite way of ballasting, as you know involves PVA diluted with Water and a drop of washing up liquid. And  :???: that is the point of entry for dampness, which worries me. After building a baseboard, laying the track and testing the electrics, point operation, having to start again.               Kevin

I  never had problems with water/PVA as the entire track & surrounding boards are painted with a light brown, etc  after all wiring & testing before any ballasting so the amount of bare timber for water access to create problems is so small,not to n a problem.

Any holes in the boards are filled with cork bits & full strength PVA before any painting.
Below is an example of what I did…..

Belt and braces is my motto Kevin, If in doubt seal it anyway, If you cut it seal the edges again, If it looks at you funny…double seal it ! :thumbs

Cheers

 Matt

Could use marine grade ply for base boards

Hi Ron           I take your point, but, 40 odd years ago I was happy running trains without ballast, as for scenery I didn't take that too seriously;-) either. All that is (I hope) about to change, if I can get it correct?? but there aren't any Mountains in South London.                                       all the best  Kevin

Hi Matt                            Sounds good advice, better to be safe than sorry.             all the best             Kevin

Hi Stuart                      When I went to buy the plywood, I had heard about "Birch Ply" being a good choice, but I didn't bother in the end.You hear so much advice from all sources, you just have to weigh up the pros and cons.                       Kevin

I've never used plywood, Kevin.

I only used MDF - and never paint it.

I'm currently making a new set of baseboard modules . . .

http://yourmodelrailway.net/view_topic.php?id=13674&forum_id=21

This is all unpainted MDF with the scenery built up using PVA.







Hope this helps, Kevin.

Cheers

Hi Max              Nice to hear from you, if I had kept up with model railways over the past 40 odd years, I'd been better off now. But over those years I done other things seen different places, the farthest I travelled "Overland" was a holiday with my Brother to Vladivostock on the Trans Siberian Express (Special Excursion) from London Waterloo in 2005, not quite Australia. And now  I have gone full circle, back to model railways.              all the best  Kevin

Sounds fantastic, Kevin.

I'm sure that you'll catch up very quickly.