Cinders Medium Ballast Bag

Ash and slag in an industrial complex

A dark material of a medium fraction suits places where the waste from furnaces was tipped out for years: the yards of ironworks, the surroundings of boiler houses, the roads between workshops and the heaps behind a works fence. The grains are large enough for a viewer to notice that this is neither earth nor gravel, but something that has been through fire.

Where it is useful

• a slag heap that nobody levels and that is only added to
• a handling area between sheds, made up with whatever was to hand
• the surroundings of a boiler house or a furnace, where the ash pan is emptied
• a dark strip along an industrial spur along which waste was carried away

On heaps it is good to layer: the lower part from a coarser fraction, the upper from the medium one and right at the top a trace of fine dust. The procedure is the same every time, only the order in which the materials are poured changes: dry, level, mist, soak. Misting matters more here than elsewhere, because dark grains clump into lumps when soaked quickly and the surface then looks like spilled coffee.

A light detail gives a scene contrast: a rail with a shiny railhead, a sheet metal shelter or dusty equipment stand out far more on a dark base than on a gray one. The package has a volume of 353 cm³.

Slag was not tipped only onto open areas in works complexes. It filled potholes, formed the base of made-up roads and ditches were lined with it, so a dark material can appear in a scene in narrow strips too, where a viewer would expect earth.

Before fixing, check whether the grains have got onto the rails or onto the running gear of models; they are far harder to remove from a finished layer.