Woodinville Shops

Discuss park gauge trains and large scale miniature railways having track gauges from 8" to 24" gauge and designed at scales of 2" to the foot or greater - whether modeled for personal use, or purpose built for amusement park operation or private railroading.

Moderators: Glenn Brooks, Harold_V

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Topics may include: antique park gauge train restoration, preservation, and history; building new grand scale equipment from scratch; large scale miniature railway construction, maintenance, and safe operation; fallen flags; track, gauge, and equipment standards; grand scale vendor offerings; and, compiling an on-line motive power roster.
rkcarguy
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Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by rkcarguy »

I can see the groundwork coming together, looks good. One thing I really like about this "hobby", is the myriad of freebies you can put to use for them. Reclaimed lumber, scrap metal, 2nd hand parts, and so on.
So are you going to embed your wood trestle ends? I would recommend sinking some of those blocks that have the steel brackets into the pour, then bolt the wood to those and cover it with gravel if you don't want it to show. I've had wood posts set in cement below grade not last every long, even treated.
Glenn Brooks
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Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Yes, Its quite satisfying to be able to recycle much -indeed most- of the construction material. All the turntable material, for example, was Craigslist freebies, including some very nice creosote impregnated, broken off, County sign posts I resawed into first class RR ties.

Also, yes, I plan to leave the mud sill and post ends exposed, above grade. I've been reading that early day RR bridge designers ideally wanted to keep the top of footings and associated post ends above the annual high water mark in gullies and canyons, to prevent rot I suppose. As you suggested I thought about embedding steel brackets in the concrete footings to anchor the vertical posts. But priced the brackets north of $15 each at Home Depot. So around $450 or so just for 28 brackets for posts. I don't have $300 in the whole structure at this point, due to judicious scrounging. Also it's an odd post size - 3" x5". - so they don't fit the existing brackets very well. Instead I've decided to follow 1906 construction practice and bolt the 4"x6" sills to the cement foundation for each bent. Then mill and drill a bunch of angle brackets to secure the posts atop the sill from (recycled) 3"x4"x 1/4" angle iron. I plan to initially spike the posts to the sill, then thru bolt them to the brackets. Again, probably overkill. But I want to model prototypical practice to the extent I am able.

I do plan to post my construction sketch of the trestle structure, and the elevation diagram on the thread. However, I need to redraw it. I decided earlier today to eliminate a bunch of unnecessary longitudinal bracing between bents. Maybe in a day or so I can get a new, simplified drawing up on the board...

Glenn
Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
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NP317
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Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by NP317 »

Glenn:
I admire your ambition! And I've learned that you do carry through on your ideas.
Most impressive!
~RN
rkcarguy
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Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by rkcarguy »

That should work fine Glenn. I just found that even if I sealed the embedded part of the post, water would still get into the wood and it would shrink/swell with the seasons, and crack the concrete around it, or quickly "eat" up the post.
I wrote the Kitsap live steam guys regarding some standards and stuff, the President says he knows you.
Would you happen to know what kind of vacuum pump and hose connection between cars those guys run for their brakes?
Glenn Brooks
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Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by Glenn Brooks »

rkcarguy wrote: Would you happen to know what kind of vacuum pump and hose connection between cars those guys run for their brakes?
Not sure, but I will ask at our Wednesday breakfast meetup and find out the details. Also Al Von Ruedan (now 94 and still going strong) drew up a vacuum cyclinder for 7 1/2" ga many years ago, that a lot of people are using. I have a copy of his drawing somewhere- will try to find it and copy and send along.

Glenn
Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
Glenn Brooks
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Location: Woodinville, Washington

Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Here are a couple of photos of the design I am going for. Read where the Southern Pacific eschewed use of cross bracing between bents to a large extent. Iam guessing cross bracing between bents was employed more often by the Northern Pacific for high trestles in deep gorges, with multiple courses stacked on top of each other.

I plan to replicate the more minimalist design features shown in the bottom photo.
IMG_1614.JPG
IMG_1615.JPG
Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
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NP317
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Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by NP317 »

rkcarguy wrote:[snip]
I wrote the Kitsap live steam guys regarding some standards and stuff, the President says he knows you.
Would you happen to know what kind of vacuum pump and hose connection between cars those guys run for their brakes?
The steam engines use a steam ejector to create the vacuum.
The "other guys" use electric reciprocating pumps and a reservoir "accumulator." I don't know specific manufacturers' brands.
~RN
rkcarguy
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Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by rkcarguy »

Glen, feel free to visit your local laser cutter. Ours has been a valuable resource for free lumber. The sheets of metal they receive come on nice big pallets with 4x4's and/or 2x6's in the 8' to 12' long range. It's pallet grade stuff for sure, but its great for a trestle. Our local cutter was stacked 6' high and 4 rows deep, and was happy to get rid of a truckload which I used for another project and some campfire wood.
Glenn Brooks
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Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Decided to revisit this post and add photos that show the layout a little better.

All but one of the footings and mud sill foundations for the trestle are poured and set. And 5 of the 6 mud sills are in place. I think I have exhausted my enthusiasm for pouring concrete. 30 bags of cement and motar mix so far. Soaks into the earth like water on a sponge.

The little stakes in the pictures mark the ROW centerline. My major learning point from this trestle building thus far, is that everything depends on establishing and rigorously measuring from the centerline -e.g. The exact middle of the track. Height of bent, curve radius, positioning of footings, future location of the ties and trestle structure even the positioning of the rails, all orients around the centerline. I stumbled on this quite by accident, trying repeatedly to fix the curvature and elevation of the bed as I excavated footings and laid in the concrete and blocks. I have reset the centerline stakes maybe 8 or 10 times so far. Once more will fix the exact height of the bents - so the trestle structure will lay at grade, with 1/2" of superelevation around the outside rail.
IMG_3462.JPG
Today, finished up setting some Craig's list freebie 80# retaining wall blocks on the intermediate slope of the hill adjacent to the southern revetment.
IMG_3471.JPG
The real cost is carrying these down the hill and lifting 4 times each to set and level in place! Good for a hundred years, hopefully. Wonder what the homeowner will think in 2117 when they clear out all the blackberry bushes and find these footings, moss covered and stoic, laying across my "Grand Canyon".

In the photo below, the white stakes at the top of the photo, mark the centerline of a small earthen island I decided to build up, to anchor the trestle at mid point. I plan to span the far side with a shorter section of clear span bridge - probably 8 to 10' of welded I beam structure, anchored to the north revetments and the far side of the island. A bit more work but I was running out of materials. The island eliminates need for four additional bents and footings.
IMG_4278.JPG
Just had a flash! Maybe I could plant a 'time capsule' beside one of the bents. Throw in a drawing and some photos on a flash card or disk, some railroad spikes, and a few spare parts. Make a real treasure chest out of it, and mark it with a capstone! Something obvious, like "Dig here for Treasure!"

In fact, we could bury this thing during the Golden Spike Ceremony. Ahahaha. Love doing this stuff.

Technical notes:
1) mud sills are 4"x6"x 7' long. Bolted to the cement blocks with 3 galvanized 1/2" cement anchor bolts per sill

2) 2" cement cap stones mortared in place on top of the cement blocks to keep out winter rain.

3) stone foundations set into 4" cement footings, buried beneath ground level ( this is an underground spring area, so went down 12" to find decent soils for the footings.-no frost heaving in Seattle -just saturated soils for half the year)

4) tall white stakes show initial grade at centerline: marked for bottom of tie, resting on 2" ballast

Bents to follow this week and next!

Glenn
Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
Glenn Brooks
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Location: Woodinville, Washington

Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by Glenn Brooks »

A little late in the process, but finally consolidated my construction sketches into a set of drawings for the trestle. Of course, used the latest CAD design tools for the drawings. Nothing but the best!

The trestle is designed to be built at 1/4 scale. This mostly replicats the size of materials and design standards specified by the Northern Pacific RR Engineering Department in 1906. A number of railway historians report that railroad construction crews usually followed two inviolate rules: 1) design standards for bridges and trestles shall never to be altered in the field, and 2) alter the engineering design and materials list at will to suit availabile timber and terrain. The Southern Pacific bridge gangs seemed to take particular delight in reportedly, never following their design standard!

So, taking that to heart, I substituted modern timber dimensions and used slightly oversized sills, vertical support timbers, and stringers for added strength. For example, my 4" x6" sills and cap timbers would be a massive 15" x 22" timber in full scale. Way bigger than the standard 12" x12" beams called out in the original drawings. I just couldn't see using 3" x3" lumber for the trestle. Plus it's not available anyway. So went with 4x6's throughout, with 3" x5" vertical posts (some 100year old old growth, salt brine soaked cribbing from a salmon cannery - very fine tight grain wood!)

Here is my bent construction front elevation drawing - which I promptly changed when laying in the mud sills. Found that three anchor bolts, rather than four, were more appropriate to the 7' long foundation.
IMG_1644.JPG
This next drawing shows side elevation -literally elevation to grade for the overall layout, and a smaller scale (larger view) of trestle construction. The north end will actually be ibeam bridge construction. (Meaning not supported by bents). So technically, the trestle is the wood frame design on the left side of the drawing, from the left reventment to the right side of the island in the middle of the drawing. The bridge is on the right.

Overall length: 39'
Trestle length: 24'
bridge length: 10'
'Middle Island' 6'
max height of Trestle : 4' to ground elevation
IMG_1643.JPG
Glenn
Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
rkcarguy
Posts: 1730
Joined: Tue Aug 22, 2017 10:33 am
Location: Wa State

Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by rkcarguy »

That looks good I like it. With my access to metal, I'd be tempted to use a plate girder bridge over that right opening:) You're halfway there with the I-beams.
Glenn Brooks
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Joined: Mon Nov 10, 2014 1:39 pm
Location: Woodinville, Washington

Re: Woodinville Shops

Post by Glenn Brooks »

Working on installing the bents onto the footings for the trestle.

Yesterday I stopped by a fairly small trestle across the Green River in Maple Valley to look at some original construction details- fastenings and straps, etc - that doesn't show up on the old drawings. Renton -Black Diamond route, south east of Seattle. The trestle is preserved now as a rails-to-trails project by the County Parks Department. Although only one course high, (17-20') the trestle was built to mainline standards - 12x12" bent timbers and eight 6x18" stringers - very stout. Also it dates to 1880 -1900, so right in the era Iam trying to model.

Here's some photos showing the detail of the stringers under the bridge deck. Amazing shape for being 110 years old.
General view of the south end of the trestle, retrofitted for bike traffic and a walking trail
General view of the south end of the trestle, retrofitted for bike traffic and a walking trail
Under the bridge deck - each stringer has some dedicated vertical pole support. They must have carried some awlfully heavy loads out of the old Black Diamond Coal mines last century.
Under the bridge deck - each stringer has some dedicated vertical pole support. They must have carried some awlfully heavy loads out of the old Black Diamond Coal mines last century.
Notice the sheet metal flashing laid and hammered over the edges of the cap timbers. Iam told the bridge crews placed tar paper under the sheet metal to help protect the timbers from rot and decay.
Notice the sheet metal flashing laid and hammered over the edges of the cap timbers. Iam told the bridge crews placed tar paper under the sheet metal to help protect the timbers from rot and decay.
Cross strapping, holds the thru bolted stringers to the cap timber for each bent.  4 cross straps to each bent - one outside, one inside the stringers, each side.  4 thru bolts each side, at each bent, to bolt the stringers together.  Actually, all thread, not bolts.
Cross strapping, holds the thru bolted stringers to the cap timber for each bent. 4 cross straps to each bent - one outside, one inside the stringers, each side. 4 thru bolts each side, at each bent, to bolt the stringers together. Actually, all thread, not bolts.
1" x 3" cast metal spacers between each stringer. Thru bolted.  The spacers are called out in original NP drawings to insure air flow between each stringer, to prevent dry rot and ensure longevity.
1" x 3" cast metal spacers between each stringer. Thru bolted. The spacers are called out in original NP drawings to insure air flow between each stringer, to prevent dry rot and ensure longevity.
And finally, aftermarket, County Parks add on footings and steel cleats to hold the vertical posts to,the footings. Notice the original 12" long round nails used to spike the posts to the original mud sill. Two per side. I am guessing these cleats are designed to earthquake proof the foot path use of the trestle. They don't look engineered for a heavily loaded coal or timber train.
New cement footings and mud sill flanges - foot traffic engineering I suspect.
New cement footings and mud sill flanges - foot traffic engineering I suspect.
Oops, missing a few fasteners on the revetment cleat!
IMG_3537.JPG
Anyway, now I've got some authentic construction technique to emulate. I particularily like the crossed straps holding the stringers to each bent. Looking forward to working on the bents.

Glenn
Moderator - Grand Scale Forum

Motive power : 1902 A.S.Campbell 4-4-0 American - 12 5/8" gauge, 1955 Ottaway 4-4-0 American 12" gauge

Ahaha, Retirement: the good life - drifting endlessly on a Sea of projects....
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