zstripe You will still need a deck in the towers so You could make the footings part of the deck.
You will still need a deck in the towers so You could make the footings part of the deck.
zstripe It looks to Me that the towers You have made already, may be a little short, height wise. You can make up for that with the deck. I made sure that the inside height clearance for mine would allow Intermodal double stacks......top of rail to bottom inside girders/bracing on mainspan and towers with a little extra at 24' and 1/2'' scale ft.
It looks to Me that the towers You have made already, may be a little short, height wise. You can make up for that with the deck. I made sure that the inside height clearance for mine would allow Intermodal double stacks......top of rail to bottom inside girders/bracing on mainspan and towers with a little extra at 24' and 1/2'' scale ft.
Rich
Alton Junction
Here's a typical, shaky, Youtube video of 21st. Street but there are a few "glimpses" between the chain-link fence of the landing feet and the beefy gusset plates located at the bottom of the movable span and the tower.
At least is gives some idea of the arrangement. Note that there are beams similar to a deck girder bridge that supports the track above the concrete. Probably a good detail to try to incorporate into your design.
Also note: a good look at the "guide plates" that hold the movable span in alignment with the towers.
Here are some detail photos from one of those Calumet lift bridges that may give you some ideas:
Calumet_lift by Edmund, on Flickr
And a crop. Note the spare sheave in the weeds. What is that cut-off lattice column from? Lots of interesting details here. The Central Valley stair and railing kits would be handy, too.
Calumet_lift-crop by Edmund, on Flickr
The blurry figure on the walkway looks like it is the operator or maintenance worker looking over the passing Amtrak train?
Calumet_lift-crop-sheave by Edmund, on Flickr
—and here is a look at the landing of the middle bridge:
Calumet_lift-crop-R by Edmund, on Flickr
Perhaps the Walther's 933-4559 bridge shoe set could have some useful parts for the anchor plates?
https://www.walthers.com/bridge-shoes-adapters-assortment-kit
Thanks again for keeping us informed on your great project.
Regards, Ed
Looking the pictures from Ed's link, it looks like the North foundation is surrounded by sheet pile, and small trees and shrubs.
The South end, looks like the two front legs of the tower are on on a piling/coffer dam type pier, then there is a short section of bridge, and then the rear legs.
No close up of the South end rear legs, but probably the concrete is wrapped in sheet piling like North end.
Frank's foundation is different than your prototype.
I just notice the last picture in Ed's post with the 5 bridges side by side ! Wow. Those iron workers had a steady job!
Tower section is looking good!
Mike.
My You Tube
Rich,
On the last pic' above where the pier bumper pilings are above the light, You could put two on each end of the towers that You just made, but not quite as tall as the ones are above. Sort of like putting legs on a table. Those footings are bolted to the concrete pilings that are sunk into the ground. They are there to keep the girders of the towers off the direct groundand impead rain run-off. You will still need a deck in the towers so You could make the footings part of the deck. Keeping in mind.....to give ample room for clearance, height most important and width. It looks to Me that the towers You have made already, may be a little short, height wise. You can make up for that with the deck. I made sure that the inside height clearance for mine would allow Intermodal double stacks......top of rail to bottom inside girders/bracing on mainspan and towers with a little extra at 24' and 1/2'' scale ft.
Just like how this double stack fits under the end of this overpass, with a few scale inches to spare......there are I-beams under the overpass that also had to be set the same clearance.
Take Care!
Frank
zstripe richhotrain I finished the front side of one tower, so 1 side down and 7 to go. Rich, Looks good so far!...... Hopefully, You mean You only have 3 more to go......remember the inside 4 are different than the outside 4 and are as wide as the mainspan, with height clearance for the equipment. You also don't show any footings on the bottom of the side structure. Are You going to add those? You asked Me to stay with You.....so just asking...... Frank
richhotrain I finished the front side of one tower, so 1 side down and 7 to go.
Looks good so far!......
Hopefully, You mean You only have 3 more to go......remember the inside 4 are different than the outside 4 and are as wide as the mainspan, with height clearance for the equipment. You also don't show any footings on the bottom of the side structure. Are You going to add those?
You asked Me to stay with You.....so just asking......
Yeah, it all depends on how you count the "sides". Two towers, so each tower has a front and back section and two side sections. And, as you point out, the side sections are different than the front and back sections.
I need to consider some type of footings for the towers. I have thought about it, but I have not reached any conclusions. Give me your thoughts. On the prototype, the towers for this bridge sit on concrete piers sunk deep into the ground.
richhotrainI finished the front side of one tower, so 1 side down and 7 to go.
Track fiddler Great looking start on the side tower Rich Good to see your project moving into phase 2. I wouldn't model the right side tower in a parallelogram configuration either That would definitely complicate things, quite a bit. I think you made a good choice in your choice of materials as well. TF
Great looking start on the side tower Rich Good to see your project moving into phase 2.
I wouldn't model the right side tower in a parallelogram configuration either That would definitely complicate things, quite a bit.
I think you made a good choice in your choice of materials as well.
TF
mrrdad Rich, That looks fantastic! Being a former Chicago area resident, I know the area you are modeling. I love what you're doing. Thank you so much for sharing. Ed
That looks fantastic!
Being a former Chicago area resident, I know the area you are modeling. I love what you're doing. Thank you so much for sharing.
Ed
Before retiring, I rode the Metra Rock Island downtown to work each day for years, crossing bridges in Blue Island and passing by the PRR lift bridge and the SCAL/BOCT bascule bridges. Pulling into downtown LaSalle Street Station, Grand Central Station was on the left and Dearborn Station was on the right. A lot is gone now, but the bridges all remain.
Semi newbie HO scale modeler coming from the O scale world
I finished the front side of one tower, so 1 side down and 7 to go. I do like the overall look of it, and I am satisfied with the types of beams that I have selected to capture the look of the prototype.
I am reasonably happy with the fit of the inidividual parts, though not entirely pleased. So, I am going to fall back on one of my favorite moel railroading expresssions, "it is good enough", at least for a first attempt.
I still have to make three more "face" sides, so I will choose the best two face sides to use on my layout, and the other two can be the back sides, away from the camera and layout visitors.
Go easy on me.
mbinsewi Ed's second link shows just about every detail there is for modeling the bridge, wow, what a collection! Great stuff! Mike.
Ed's second link shows just about every detail there is for modeling the bridge, wow, what a collection!
Great stuff!
One thing that I find interesting about the towers is that there seems to have been no set pattern when it came to designing beams or gussets. If you look at a tower as a system of boxes stack atop one another, the types of beams used seem to vary from one box to another. And, even the gussets vary in shape from one box to another. That left me initially bewildered over how to design towers with a more repetitive pattern to simplify construction.
That does make things much simpler. The prototype's limited, if any (??), movement at this point certainly suggests that is a convincing option.
As for the skew, IIRC it was much more obvious why things were that way back in the mid-70s when I first went through them. There were the rail lines that Ed helpfully provided the sketches for, but the water traffic had clearly also been a factor in earlier days. Bringing all those connections together was Chicago's big strength, packing things in densely with things like that skew was how this was achieved.
Mike Lehman
Urbana, IL
This was a pretty tight area, railroad-wise. Engineers probably looked at the additional work to skew the bridge and towers and decided it was worthwhile. As far as material it really wouldn't be too much more of a modification.
Here's everything you'd want to know about 21st. Street Crossing or Alton Junction.
LOTS of great photos!
http://industrialscenery.blogspot.com/2015/02/21st-street-crossing-or-alton-junction.html
...and a gallery of detail photos here:
https://historicbridges.org/bridges/browser/photosviewer.php?bridgebrowser=illinois/sblift/&gallerynum=1&gallerysize=1
PRR_S-Branch-Alton-Jct by Edmund, on Flickr
There are three skewed lift bridges over the Calumet River, side-by-side. Talk about a modeling challenge!
Thanks for the effort you are making to document your work on this project, Rich
Cheers, Ed
ROBERT PETRICK Side note to OP Rich: glad you decided to ignore the skewed aspect of the prototype. No sense driving yourself nuts; plenty of other things to worry about. My goal is to try to capture the essence of the scene, and modifying reality to suit is not really a big deal.
Side note to OP Rich: glad you decided to ignore the skewed aspect of the prototype. No sense driving yourself nuts; plenty of other things to worry about. My goal is to try to capture the essence of the scene, and modifying reality to suit is not really a big deal.
mlehman Rich is wise to make the piers non-skewed. The twin lift towers will still be tricky, as they must be both vertical and parallel. Is there a nice solid base to build on here yet to hold all in alignment, mount the drive mechanism on, etc? Then have the whole shebang drop into the location to then attach to the approaches?
Rich is wise to make the piers non-skewed. The twin lift towers will still be tricky, as they must be both vertical and parallel. Is there a nice solid base to build on here yet to hold all in alignment, mount the drive mechanism on, etc? Then have the whole shebang drop into the location to then attach to the approaches?
One, I do not intend to make the lift operable. That bridge will just sit motionless on my layout.
Two, I have never fully understood why the engineers designed the towers to be skewed. True, the bridge crosses the river where it runs on an angle, but the towers still could have been built in non-skewed fashion. I believe that a skewed design was selected to avoid having to make the bridge longer (and heavier) if the towers were set further back on solid ground.
zstripe Rich, I forgot they don't have any tips on the ones You have. The ones I used do, 1902-5. I wound up getting all the ones they made for different projects. Used all kinds of sizes in the Rolling Lift Bridge bash
I forgot they don't have any tips on the ones You have. The ones I used do, 1902-5. I wound up getting all the ones they made for different projects. Used all kinds of sizes in the Rolling Lift Bridge bash
I forgot they don't have any tips on the ones You have. The ones I used do, 1902-5. I wound up getting all the ones they made for different projects. Used all kinds of sizes in the Rolling Lift Bridge bash:
Pic' may be clicked on for larger view.
Lift bridge by Bear, on Flickr
Well, there is a submarine that's been sitting dead at the curb in the basement of the Museum of Science and Industry. Could patch the extra holes they cut in it, hotwire it - common enough in Chicago - but getting it out of that hole would be a neat trick.
I want to add one more vote in favor of posting progress photos, mainly for inspiration to others, but also out of curiosity and general interest. Ours is a visually intensive hobby.
Photos!
Robert
LINK to SNSR Blog
I have made a template to faciltate building the towers.
What I simply did was to draw the contemplated dimensions and trace the parts needed to complete the face and rear portions of each tower on a Masonite board.
Then, I clamped wood strips to hold the parts in position. The trickiest part is forming the X-brace across each "box". Gussets will hide imperfections in the fitting process.
zstripe make sure You Read the instructions thoroughly, because they will give You tips on what to use to keep the lattice work even......drill bit sizes.
make sure You Read the instructions thoroughly, because they will give You tips on what to use to keep the lattice work even......drill bit sizes.
You are a card Bear!.........LOL
You will find it much easier to build those CV girders if You build a right angle jig, to hold them square and in place while glueing, I know I did. Also make sure You Read the instructions thoroughly, because they will give You tips on what to use to keep the lattice work even......drill bit sizes. I made my jig out of 1x2 pine and a 5/16ths square piece of pine screwed to the 1x2. Then just brushed a bead of adhesive down the seam, capillary action did the rest. I used Plastruct orange bottle.
After making the jig, I found many more uses for it.
"One difference between pessimists and optimists is that while pessimists are more often right, optimists have far more fun."
richhotrainDave, just be sure to post on your progress. I, for one, love to see all kinds of structure building, especially kitbashing and scratch building.
Will do!
Dave
I'm just a dude with a bad back having a lot of fun with model trains, and finally building a layout!
hon30critter richhotrain I have to say, building an 83" long bridge with an easement in the curve is going to be some kind of challenge. I hope you will post your progress on that project. That 83" long bridge will dwarf my 30" effort. Actually Rich I think your project is much more challenging. The length of my bridge doesn't really make it more complex. You are scratchbuilding. I am simply making some standard modifications to ME components. I think my project will be more tedious than difficult. I have to figure out the instructions for building the bents but once I have those down pat it will just be a process of repetition. I have to shorten the bents by about 1 1/4" so that will require some contemplating. The curve will be easy to duplicate because the plywood roadbed is already in place where the bridge will be. We are going to imprint the track position on a sheet of 1/2" rigid foam so it should be easy to mitre the deck girder bridges to match the curve. Maybe I am being naive. It wouldn't be the first time. Dave
richhotrain I have to say, building an 83" long bridge with an easement in the curve is going to be some kind of challenge. I hope you will post your progress on that project. That 83" long bridge will dwarf my 30" effort.
Actually Rich I think your project is much more challenging. The length of my bridge doesn't really make it more complex. You are scratchbuilding. I am simply making some standard modifications to ME components. I think my project will be more tedious than difficult. I have to figure out the instructions for building the bents but once I have those down pat it will just be a process of repetition. I have to shorten the bents by about 1 1/4" so that will require some contemplating. The curve will be easy to duplicate because the plywood roadbed is already in place where the bridge will be. We are going to imprint the track position on a sheet of 1/2" rigid foam so it should be easy to mitre the deck girder bridges to match the curve.
Maybe I am being naive. It wouldn't be the first time.
mbinsewi caldreamer That is an easy scratch building project using Pastruct and/or Evergreen sturctural pieces. OK then.... nothing like some positive encouragement. Can't wait to see as you progress with the tower build, Rich. And actually, I'm waiting to see some of the Hulett. Mike.
caldreamer That is an easy scratch building project using Pastruct and/or Evergreen sturctural pieces.
OK then.... nothing like some positive encouragement.
Can't wait to see as you progress with the tower build, Rich.
And actually, I'm waiting to see some of the Hulett.
Mike, I just hope that Cal is right. I prefer easy to challenging.
richhotrainI have to say, building an 83" long bridge with an easement in the curve is going to be some kind of challenge. I hope you will post your progress on that project. That 83" long bridge will dwarf my 30" effort.
caldreamerThat is an easy scratch building project using Pastruct and/or Evergreen sturctural pieces.