Hi all, I am interested in scratch building a wood trestle for the new layout and have some ?'s about it. First off i want to build a square timber type and according to what i have read 12"x12" seems to be a common size for the wood, which according to my scale lumber ruler is a 1/6 of an inch which according to my fingers is some pretty small stuff! has anyone out there built one and is there any scale fudge room here? also does anyone know if there are nut bolt washer castings made for N scale? any info would be helpful, thanks for reading.
Chuck & Heather.
There are several companies that can help you, but one of the best is probably Black Bear Construction Co.. They've got lots of goodies for bridge building. Blair Line has some bridge kits, but I don't think they do seperate parts. The same goes for JV Models and Bar Mills models.
Of course, if you really wanna get hardcore about your bolt detail, nothing beats the real thing! http://www.scalehardware.com/
I don't think 1/6" would be bad to work with, but you won't find that size. I'd go with 1/8". Stock basswood sizes actually go down to 1/32"!
I used basswood dowels for my piles and 1/8" strips for my caps and stingers. The braces were actually made from flat toothpicks:
Depending on the size of your trestle and the level of detail you are after, there can be some room for fudging. I think my stringers are a but thick, but once the track went on, it's hard to tell.
I'm also not sure about nut bolt washer casting detail parts.
In N scale, 3/4 of an inch works out to exactly 10 scale feet. So 12/16" is 10 scale feet or 1/16th square is 10/12ths or scale 10x10.
3/32" square would be scale 15x15".
1/8" square would be scale 20x20".
If you have no "real" train store available, these sizes may be handy to figure what you can might be able to find in the stripwood department at Hobby Lobby or a craft oriented store. But if you have a real train store reasonably accessible (I don't!), you can get scale lumber in actual scale sizes.
I acquired a plastic kit small trestle at a second-hand sale table and used it on this diorama.
http://www.trainboard.com/railimages/data/554/ShotgunStep.JPG
I can't recall building a trestle as such in N. Several in HO.
I have some really small nut bolt and washer casting. I used one yesterday to simulate the generator drive for an electric coolling fan on an N scale ice bunker reefer. It seemed a little small for the purpose. If I wanted nut bolt washer casting for an N scale trestle and couldn't find them, I would use a chunk of pin or wire and let just a smidgen stick oiut from the surface.
I have built several n-scale trestles using 3/32 Bass wood as it was easy to get and the trestles were on the back side of the layout and looked OK from that distance.
I used Balsa wood on one but it did not have the strength that Bass wood has.
I used Evergreen styrene for the bents,1/16 round for the piles and assorted strips for the bracing and Northeastern strip wood for the stringers and ties. I painted it black so you cant tell if its wood or plastic.
I used Evergreen for one I built. Can't remember the dimensions, but it was just a bit heavier than the ties on the Atlas c80 track.
Which to my eye worked out okay.
Lee
Route of the Alpha Jets www.wmrywesternlines.net
MAbruce I don't think 1/6" would be bad to work with, but you won't find that size. I'd go with 1/8". Stock basswood sizes actually go down to 1/32"!
Huh? Not available? I have some Northeastern Scale Models scale lumber 6" by 6" for HO scale (close to 12 by 12 in N scale) which is microscopically close to 1/16" square. I'd bet it is still available.
One-eights-inch square would be so gross in N-scale. But what do I know: I'm in HO scale.
Mark