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Post by raymbo on Apr 15, 2015 17:00:19 GMT -5
Thanks to Joe Holbrook, who made the hand rails for the bridge at Heavenly Hilltop Railroad. I was able to start welding up the handrail stanchions today. The base is 1-1/4"X12" flat bar and the stanchions are made of thick wall 1"X1" tubing.
The stanchions will be 6' on center on the inside of the radius and the outside ones will be aligned with them with a tape from the radius point. The center cables will be 3/8" cable and the top railing will be 1/2" water pipe. I have not yet decided on whether to use galvanized or just black iron pipe as they cost the same, the galvanized will only need paint at the welds to the stanchions.
The bridge at Heavenly Hilltop Railroad with the handrails built by Joe Holbrook.
The first two are fabricated and one is installed on the end
Close up of the base of the railing stanchion.
Next week should show some serious progress on these.
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Post by silversanjuan on Apr 16, 2015 8:38:23 GMT -5
Those look nice.
On full scale trestles there are usually two safety rails inside of the track to prevent derails from going over the side. Are those used on these size railroads?
Todd
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Post by raymbo on Apr 16, 2015 13:27:50 GMT -5
The stanchions are welded up and grinding of the welds, clean up, and painting is next. I am going to use Joe Holbrook's idea of securing the cable to the stanchions with a chain link cut in two, and welded into a hole in the post. That way the cable can move slightly if needed.
Here is a photo of the finished stanchions.
San Juan, for this size railroad we are not wasting rail by putting in guard rails. We don't run very fast on something like this and the bridges are usually much wider than a prototype trestle, in our case this one is 4' wide.
Here is a photo I took of a Soo Line trestle on the old Brooten line near Avon Minnesota not long ago. The line has been abandoned for some years and this bridge apparently is more costly to remove that to just leave it. You can see how close to the edge of the ties where the rail was located. On this bridge there was a lighter rail guard rail, the spikes are still there in some places. The heavy timber at the outside edge of the ties was not intended to try to keep rolling stock from going over the edge, it was intended to secure the ties so they did not move.
This particular trestle has some interesting timber in it, all of it is treated in creosote which gives it a long life. This bridge was in service when I was a kid back in the 40s and there are some dates on the pilings indicating they were put in place in the 1930s. There are three 12"X24" bolted together below the ties where the rails were located and the bents appear to be about 10' apart. It was incredible to get out of the truck and climb around on this bridge.
Take a look at these timbers and the way they are put together. I am not trying to replicate a prototype bridge, the 4X4 treated timber I used is way over size and I only have 4 legs under each, as you can see there are more on the prototype.
An interesting anecdote about this trestle. Back in the late 50s or early 60s a contractor road crew managed to set fire to the grass near the bridge and it caught fire. It took several fire departments some time to get there and by then about 1/3 of the trestle was on the ground. The Soo Line was still using this bridge so the contractor and their insurance company had to rebuild it. They rebuilt that 1/3 with concrete which is over the interstate highway, and the Great Northern tracks that also went under this bridge were removed some years ago after the BN merger.
Not long after the span was rebuilt the Soo Line decided to abandon the line from Brooten MN to Superior WI, but as you can see the bridge is still there.
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Post by silversanjuan on Apr 17, 2015 10:30:24 GMT -5
Thanks for the great information. When I was growing up, my Dad and I would walk some of the old Rio Grande Southern ROW and inspect the old trestles. Fascinating bit of history.
Todd
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Post by raymbo on Apr 19, 2015 18:01:29 GMT -5
We made some progress today between rain showers. We have one side of the bridge handrails up and I welded the top railing on. We will do the cables in the next day or so.
Top railing welded on to the first section.
Progress 19 April 2015.
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Post by silversanjuan on Apr 20, 2015 7:45:55 GMT -5
Lookin' great! What kind of welder do you have? Does it run off a portable generator?
Todd
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Post by raymbo on Apr 20, 2015 11:14:31 GMT -5
I have a Hobart 140 wire welder and we have a very nice generator that we used on our RV trailer. It worked really well and I will be posting some video on my You Tube channel soon.
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Post by raymbo on Apr 22, 2015 18:50:55 GMT -5
Das Brücke-Gebäude wird beendet. Being interpreted, the BRIDGE CONSTRUCTION IS FINISHED.
Welding the top rail of the outside radius
The finished bridge and railings.
We worked about 4 hours this evening to finish the railings and the cable.
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donw
Gandy Dancer
Posts: 11
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Post by donw on Apr 22, 2015 20:12:48 GMT -5
Great looking bridge, raymbo! You two sure seem to have alot of fun with your railroad. Me, I'm just waiting for the weather and water to warm up so the Vixen (formerly Pictou) can enjoy some cruising. My G Scale live steam engine continues to be a shelf queen. The Missus is not interested in any tracks around the back yard gardens..
Best to you both!!
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Post by silversanjuan on Apr 23, 2015 7:35:37 GMT -5
Outstanding, Ray! Great lookin' trestle.
Todd
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