I use individual wood ties when I handlay. The ties I use currently are standard crossties for HO, from Mt. Albert scale lumber. Mt. Albert is now owned by Fast Tracks, but there are a couple other places that supply ties, if memory serves.
The ties are made from sugar pine, and are fairly soft, so you have to be a bit gentle when you spike, as if you slip, you can easily crush the tie and leave an unsightly mess.
You can stain before you install them, via soaking in stain, or you can stain after you glue them down.
I use plain white Elmer's glue, straight from the bottle, to glue ties to either cork or homasote. I put down a bead, and then use a finger to spread it out nicely.
I've installed ties one by one, which is doable, but super slow, and keeping consistent spacing can be tough.
Fast Tracks makes a couple of jigs to help with this, so here's two shots of the jig in use.
I do have a spot motion style video of me placing ties in the jib, but as I'm still learning the camera, it is only a second long, so seems pointless to post. Going to have to continue to experiment with that.
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| Ties placed in the jig |
Final step is to you a thin strip of blue painter's tape to get the ties out and have a tie roll to quickly install them.
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