Real Water


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dpeterson3

Member
I have been toying with the idea of building a real waterfall for a layout and possibly real rivers and streams to follow. I know it is not common practice and I know that some people have real issues with it (scared of shorts, humidity, cleaning, etc). I would still like to try. I just like the look of real moving water and the sound of it better than acrylic. For those who have done this before, what did you do? Mainly, how did you make the stream bed. I am thinking make it plaster, paint it correctly, and then cover it with clear plastic shrink wrap to seal it. Thoughts?
 
I have a good friend that has a big G scale layout indoors & he has running water & real lakes in his trainroom. he has a lot of problems w/corrosion on all moving metal parts. The water also affects all of his electrical parts on all of his buildings. All of his bridges are steel & they have almost rusted away. next year I am helping him do away w/all of his problems w/corrosion. We are removing all of the real water he has on his layout.
he has lost 2 real nice steam engines that have rusted out underneath. He's had them repaired many times. So, real water is not the way to go.
All of his rivers & ponds are made from 2 layers of plaster over a screen base w/metal & wood substructure. And another thing, he has Gold Fish in one of his ponds.
 
Used distilled water if you do use real water (and I too recommend against such action) as distilled water reduces corrosion.

Here's a fun partially related project.

http://scottpages.net/SpiritiNgAway.html

I found that while searching for some other cool stuff pertaining to logging railroads running through flooded tracks. Good clean fun :)
 
The Carnegie Science Museum's famous O scale model railroad in Pittsburgh, PA (Formerly at Buhl Planeterium) has used real water for most or maybe all of it's long existence. Not only do they use real water, but they have boats that move through the water, pulled by magnets mounted on trains running under the bottom of the river bed. It looks really cool, and is very popular with visitors.

I've heard of some layouts using light oils like mineral spirits. They look just like water, but don't evaporate and cause the humidity problems that water would. That may be something to consider.

In both cases, the general concept is the same, you have to build a waterproof trough. I don't know how they do it. I would suggest building a trough out of plywood and using a rubber liner like those used in ponds and water gardens. Then I'd cover that with some sort of scenicking material. I don't know if plaster would work, or if you'd have to use something different.

However... That's just my idea. I have not tried it, and have no idea whether it's practical or not.
 
I looked at it too originally just to see if it had been done, but couldn't find anything outside of G scale. As Larry said it's just going to give you problems anyway.

Regardless, even if you could get it working without any negative effects, the scale would be all wrong. As an example let's say a real river was flowing at 1m/s. If you recreated that river in 1:100, the water is not going to start defying physics and flow at a 1 scale metre/sec, it would be moving way too fast to look realistic. The same thing would happen with ripples on the surface of a lake. The way I see it, the only way to make it look even remotely realistic would be to use some sort of liquid with the visual properties of water but the physical properties of something more viscous, like a silicone of some kind. Of course you may have to invent this magical liquid first. :p
 
For me, the greatest problems would be those associated with scale. Flow rates, wave/ripple rates, they would all be much too fast to be believable. It may be okay in still imagery, but in videos and in person, they would get in the way of my enjoyment.
 
As Crandell said, actual water does not scale well. On HO or N layouts, moving water just looks weird -- way out of scale. Even still water such as a pond looks a bit odd.

The problem is that due to its surface tension, real water has texture. At 1/87 or 1/160, that texture is 87 or 160 times too large.

The corrosion problem is a whole other area of concern!

- Jeff
 
I didn't want to do this because it looks real. I have just always like the sound and look of a real water fall vs. a plastic one with recorded sound. I know the scale isn't going to be quite right, but oh well. I am not talking a room full of G-scale trains either. I am talking about a single waterfall and maybe a small stream on an HO layout. I am thinking that a three gallon reservoir is being generous. The stream would disappear into either a culvert or a sink hole to get back into the reservoir under the table. I would put a cap on that so there shouldn't be too much of a humidity problem when the pump isn't running.Either way, a little extra humidity wouldn't hurt. We have to run a humidifier in the winter anyway. Basically, I am thinking of something like a table-top fountain rather than a room of rivers and streams.
 
The sound would be way out of scale too though...your waterfall will sound like a running tap, and a river won't make any sound at all!

I'm not one to tell others what to do so go for it if you really want to and more power to you, I just think that you're setting yourself up for disappointment is all.
 
Not sure what kind of sound you are looking for exactly. A waterfall is a roaring noise.....a waterfall on a layout would sound more like a dog peeing in a mud puddle. More of a dripping than roaring. Even a real life small waterfall doesn't sound like that with the exception of rain running off of a roof or gutter, then thats more of a splatter sound.
 
Just a thought. How about finding one of those decorative table top fountains where the water flows down the side and building it into your scenery? They can be fairly cheap and they are self contained so the water would stay put and recirculate. Make it removalable (from the back?) so it can be serviced and cleaned. Again, just a thought.
 
with a real flowing water, it will have some problems with electricity and rustings but it does sound like a very good idea since it will make your work even more realistic plus the fact that sound of flowing water does help have a more relaxing ambiance. It does add to the scenery of it though it might be a little off scale. Its really up to you if your up to try it though I suggest that if your not quite sure with it, you might want to ponder on the idea first.
 
TrinityJayOne said:
The way I see it, the only way to make it look even remotely realistic would be to use some sort of liquid with the visual properties of water but the physical properties of something more viscous, like a silicone of some kind. Of course you may have to invent this magical liquid first. :p
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If I'm not mistaken, Hollywood effects artists used to use alcohol for miniature shots involving water because the lower surface tension of the alcohol allowed it to form waves that were closer to scale.

Steve S
 
Steve S said:
If I'm not mistaken, Hollywood effects artists used to use alcohol for miniature shots ....
Click to expand...
That sounds incredibly risky. What a fire hazard that would be!

There are a few interesting articles and book excerpts on the web about the difficulty of working with water at small scales. A Google search for special effects miniature water provides some interesting reading.

- Jeff
 
I used to build real garden ponds and waterfalls for a living. I tried this for a waterfall on a project. Here is what I did.

I formed the waterfall using a frame built from 1/8" masonite and screen wire. I lined the "streambed" with black vinyl lining that I used for the real things. I then took a waterproof paint tinted with earth tones and painted the lining. I took small pieces of thin sandstone and made my waterfall ledges and sides and filled the cracks with caulk. Once I was sure everything was waterproof and leakproof, I added polished pebbles to the remaining area using caulk spread over the vinyl to give a creek bottom. The end of the stream ran behind some bushes and trees so it just drained into a resevoir underneath. I used a 30-50 gallon fish aquarium pump mounted at the top and hidden with scenery to pull the water out the resevoir and down the waterfall. Worked and looked great for my "PROJECT". No splash and minimal water loss.

Now for the problems. Water ran twice as fast as my locos do. Even with a smaller pump, the flow rate would be high. My fall was 12" high with a run of about 2". The flow rate I had would scale out to about 90mph in HO scale and 155 in N. I could give you the whole mathmatical equation but I will spare you. My fall was also 9" wide at top down to 6" on the bottom. Thats about 110 scale feet in N at the top. Too big. Any smaller then you have splash out. Not good if you are running electrical items near it.

My advice would be try it off the layout. Build a waterfall the size you want, set it up how you would do the layout one, waterproof/leakproof it and put some water to it and try it. Look for spray from the water running off the rocks and such. If it doesn't seem to be a problem, tear out a section and add your waterfall to it and scenic it in. In the end, its your layout so try it if you want.

Jeff
 
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