O scale truss bridge – Michael’s

Michael’s been in touch with O scale truss bridge:

“Alistair and all:

I thought it was time I provided an update on my O Gauge Slide Rock Bolter Railroad.

I always include a track plan schematic; it helps orient people to the layout; pictures alone never seem to adequately convey the whole layout.

O scale track plan

In my last update I described how I was experimenting with 3D printed parts to scratch build O scale buildings.

The primary reason for scratch building being the difficulty I had finding suitable buildings that did not cost an arm and a leg. I have since scratch built three bridges for my layout and a large coal tipple.

O scale truss bridge 1:

The entrance to my layout is through a gap spanned by two lift-out bridges.

The first bridge started out as a 1x3x30 inch piece of lumber just to get the tracks working.

I then decided to convert it to a 30 inch girder bridge. All of the girders are 3d printed and then glued according to the bridge design.

The design is from scratch although there are obviously many prototypes and books to copy from.

The original piece of lumber is hidden within the 3d printed parts and provides strength and stability.

For quite sometime the girder bridge spanned the gap without any additional scenery. If you search around on thingiverse.com it is easy to find designs for individual parts that can be easily modified and scaled to fit almost any requirement.

model railroad track

O scale truss bridge

O scale truss bridge

O scale truss bridge 2:

Then I decided to add a second bridge spanning the entrance.

For this bridge I wanted to incorporate a vintage Lionel girder bridge that I have been lugging around for almost 60 years.

The catch was that the Lionel bridge is only 18 inches long and the gap is 30 inches. This required building a combination bridge with two plate girder extensions on either end of the vintage Lionel bridge.

Of course, without concrete supports the plate girders would just be levitating in the air. Therefore, I also had to build some scenery with concrete supports and a river.

The river and the two bridges all lift-out when needed. The moose is 3d printed. The riverbanks need more detailing but they are good for now.
model railroad river

model railroad river

O scale truss bridge

O scale truss bridge



O scale truss bridge 3:

Next, I built a long plate girder trestle, which is really a “bridge to nowhere”.

The trestle is 10 feet long and is used to store up to 12 pieces of rolling stock when they are not actually running on the layout.

At any given time, I have about 75 unique pieces of rolling stock on the railroad and the storage trestle acts as a fiddle yard.

The cars on the trestle sit on original (rusty, dirty) Lionel 3-rail that I have had for almost 60 years. The trestle is located on the wall west of Trinidad.

I am considering building another storage trestle on the wall north of Trinidad. Trinidad is the main location where trains originate, stage, and terminate on my railroad.

The trestle is scratch built from 3d printed parts. Using the printer, once the design is set, you can just crank out parts repeatedly until you have all that are necessary to build something of any length. Nice! (It can take a lot of time to print everything – several days, up to a few weeks…)

O scale truss bridge

Coal Tipple:

The coal tipple is located at Primero. I wanted a fairly large building to provide some “wow factor”. It needed to be customized to my particular layout configuration.

The building is scratch built and has an overall footprint of about 25×32 inches and is 11 inches tall (100 x 128 x 44 scale feet).

It spans three tracks and has coal loading booms to two of those tracks.

The inspiration for my design is the Nuttallburg Mine in West Virginia. I located some nice drawings of the complex and used them as a guide for my design. (Google search for “Nuttallburg Mine Library of Congress”).

coal tipple

coal tipple

My design is only very loosely based on these drawings. I took many liberties to customize the tipple to my exact layout configuration.

For my layout, there is a large processing building parallel to the tracks with the attached tipple spanning the tracks.

The coal booms are covered as in the prototype. In the prototype, the booms could be raised and lowered into the coal cars and conveyors used to fill the cars.

In my version, the booms are fixed at a height that does not interfere with the model trains running beneath the tipple.

I have added two large loading docks at the east and west end of the processing building for equipment and resource loading.

One of the docks is curved to match my track layout. I did not include the coal silo from the prototype, instead I designed in a much larger processing building.

In the future, I plan to add a conveyor from a mine shaft-head building located elsewhere on the layout and feed it directly to the processing building. A similar arrangement exists on the prototype.

coal tipple

O scale coal tipple

O scale coal tipple

O scale coal tipple

model railroad o scale

As a final note: the vast majority of the trees on my layout use 3d printed armatures of my own design – I’m using the 3d printer for as much modelling work as possible.

One of the huge advantages of using the 3d printer is the cost savings. I spent less than $20 on materials for each of the three bridges and less than $40 on materials for the coal tipple, even when considering all the trial and error necessary to get the parts to fit together perfectly.

I can print and fully flock 13 inch trees for about $1 each. You just can’t touch prices like that using pre-made parts. And with a good paint and weathering job, I can’t tell the buildings are plastic.

The coal tipple was a bit tedious every once in a while and did take a lot of time to print.

However, it wasn’t very difficult in the final analysis – everything is just squares and triangles scaled to the right size.

Throughout, I used the very simplest brain-dead piece of freeware software that came with Microsoft windows – nothing fancy at all! Anything the slightest bit complicated I probably found on thingiverse.com and modified to suit my needs.

Background info: the Slide Rock Bolter Railroad is named after a mythical backwoods creature that barrels down steep Colorado mountains feeding on unsuspecting miners, hikers, hunters, and tourists.

The layout is 3.3 scale miles of O gauge track over a 38.5’x17.5’ footprint.

I run vintage Lionel stock and prefer Santa Fe and Denver Rio Grande roads.

I have the Lionel 736 Berkshire and associated vintage railcars my grandfather gave me when I was five years old.

The cities on my railroad, Primero, Segundo, Jansen, and Trinidad, are real locations on the Primero Branch of the now defunct Colorado and Wyoming Railroad. The printer I use is an Anycubic Viper.

Enjoy!

Thanks,

Michael”

(You can see Michael’s last post here: 3D printed O scale.

A huge big thank you to Michael for sharing his O scale truss bridge pics – you all know how much I like an update.

It seems 3D printing is becoming a bigger and bigger part of this hobby as time rolls on.

That’s all for today folks.

Please do keep ’em coming.

And if today is the day you get started on your layout, the Beginner’s Guide is here.

Best

Al

PS Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

PPS HO scale train layouts here if that’s your thing.





Model railroad grass

Andrew has been in touch with his take on model railroad grass:

“Dear Alistair,

Please find attached photos from my new inglenook shunting layout. My first was sent to you and you kindly featured it on your site. Subsequently I sold it on Facebook and have started again.

I wanted to create wild overgrown grass areas without purchasing static grass etc.

Much of the enjoyment I get from building a model railway is doing so for as little or no cost – I am retired so my budget is limited, my time is not restricted and hopefully innovation will keep my mind active.

When mowing the lawn (yard here in Oz) there are always cuttings on the blade guard.

These dry out with the heat of the engine. These are collected and sorted to remove leaves and other detritus.

model railroad grass assortment

A selected amount is placed on cling film and soaked with PVA glue and allowed to dry.

It easily peals off the cling film when dry and may be glued into place on the layout.

model railroad grass in between tracks

model railroad grass by tracks

Best wishes to you and all who follow your blog.

Andrew

P.S. It’s work in progress as you can see. The cattle pens are from used matchsticks cut into 4 lengthwise”

A big thanks to Andrew – model railroad grass comes up a lot on the blog for the simple reason most scenes have grass on them somewhere.

The one that springs to my mind by a country mile is John’s grass ‘how to’:

Add grass to layout.

add grass to HO scale

Then there’s Gary’s:

Model train grass which also looks great.

model railroad grass

And there’s Rob’s and Dave’s posts also:

Static grass.

Static grass applicator.



Now on to Peter, because you all know how much I like an update:

“Many thanks for posting by first layout about 18 months or so ago, a 18” x 8” shelf – switching layout that I had a lot of fun building.

Your constituents appeared to like it and I mentioned I was going to build another bigger and better layout. It’s about time to share my progress.

I’ve stayed with the fictitious town of “Amaranth Falls”, this time around it’s much bigger and better.

It is again inspired by the TH&B – the Toronto Hamilton and Buffalo Railway – which was eventually absorbed into the Canadian Pacific railway network in 1987.

I’ve incorporated a number of features and industries that the TH&B served, most notably the Port Maitland marine terminal on Lake Erie, the Canada Cut and Crushed Stone facility near Hamilton and the Aberdeen Yard also in Hamilton.

I’m working my way through the layout stages, but I thought your followers would like to see my progress to date.

I’ve included a layout schematic and one overall photo with descriptors – yes a lot of family and friends are featured with business here mirroring their actual careers and business ventures.

It’s a bit whimsical but I do find this part of the fun.

Thanks again for your wonderful work in sharing the great ideas and layouts everyone is working on.

Peter”

model railroad HO scale

model railroad track plan

(Peter’s last layout is here if you want to have a peek.)

A big thanks to Peter – please do leave a comment below on your thoughts!

Thanks also to Andrew for his take on model railroad grass. After all the years I still take delight in seeing the different ways of doing things.

I think Tommy from a few posts ago with is HO scale tunnel said it best:

“There is no wrong way, there is no right way.”

That’s all for this time, except that I have discovered one or two of you missed some mailings last week.

It was my fault entirely because it was just me pressing the wrong buttons. If you missed them, here they are:

HO scenery for model trains

N scale river

Double level HO scale layout.

That’s all for today folks, please do keep ’em coming though because it’s awfully quiet this end.

And if today is the day you stop dreaming, start doing and join in the fun, the Beginner’s Guide is here.

Best

Al

PS Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

PPS More HO scale train layouts here if that’s your thing.





Double level HO scale layout – Don’s

Don’s been back in touch with his double level HO scale layout:

“It has been a while since I last sent you about my new layout.

My Old layout had a few problems. It had three lift/duck unders that just made running no fun. They were hard to keep aligned.

Also the scenery blocked the only window in the room.

The old layout was a continuous incline with a turn around at each end. The new layout is three levels connected with a helix.

The first set of pictures show the lower staging level. This level will be operated by a dedicated switcher.

It will bring assembled trains to and from the main level. there they will be connected to appropriate motive power. The helix connects the staging to the main and upper levels.

The helix also has a turn around for the main and upper levels so they can be run independently.

double level ho scale layout

model railroad track

model train track

model railroad helix

model railroad helix

atlas track plan

These are pictures of the main level. They are basically from right to left off the helix. Much of this level is from the old layout.

Mainline track was completely replaced and grades changed to match the helix. This level was lowered to 30 inches. A floor jack was used.

The new layout was a result of my wife deciding that we needed hardwood floors throughout the condo. Several sections of the old layout were stacked on dollies that the floors installers moved as they put in the new floors.

The bottom track under the waterfall is now only a display as a result of lowering this level.



Double level HO scale layout:

double level ho scale layout

double level ho scale layout

double level ho scale layout

double level ho scale layout

double level ho scale layout

These pictures are are of the window treatment and the unfinished Baltimore area.

The two upper level bridges span 28 inches each with approaches to let in as much light as possible.

The girder bridges cross the main level. The new main level is to the left. It will have the Camden station and the B&O warehouse shown.

model railroad benchwork

model railroad warehouse

model railroad bridge

model railroad bridge

These are pictures of the upper level. They are from left to right. The center is from the old layout.

All The Main line was replaced. There is a branch line 5 inches above, Both corner sections are new to allow the track to cross the window and enter the helix.



Double level HO scale layout:

double level ho scale layout

double level ho scale layout

double level ho scale layout

double level ho scale layout

double level ho scale layout

These show the new branch line bridge to the top of the helix. Tentatively the top of the relix will be a logging camp. Also is a picture of Harpers Ferry that connects the upper level to the helix

double level ho scale layout

double level ho scale layout

Don”

A big thanks to Don for sharing his double level HO scale layout.

Don’s last post is here – it’s been quite an evolution: Atlas flex track layout.

I have no idea why, but Don’s starting pics reminded me of David’s: HO layout 7 x 10.

That’s all for today folks.

Please do keep ’em coming.

And if today is the day you get started on your layout, the Beginner’s Guide is here.

Best

Al

PS Latest ebay cheat sheet is here.

PPS More HO scale train layouts here if that’s your thing.