The Big Bridge!!

Well, this is an exciting series of photos to post as I have been trying to get this bridge in for about 2 years. You have seen the photos and story about the building of the deck girder bridge, the painting of the through truss, and Alan's work on fabricating the main pier based on a design from Bert Sacco, an old friend up in New England. So, we are now tackling the main project and i feel like I am working for the American Bridge Company, a division of USS Steel. So, as I had waited so long, I just balanced that main pier in place after cutting out the temporary structure that had been in use for about 5 years. I was worried because if that fell over, I was in big trouble!

It certainly look good in the pictures and I was happy that I was building it but still worried about the execution. The big problem was where the main pier would end up and if it would interfere with the main line below.

Checking the height clearance - made for a self portrait and made me happy that there is plenty of head room for a 6 footer.

It does look imposing over the aisle. Now we have to get after the specifics.

I used a long board as a template for the height required - a suggestion from the crew. Stop messing with the bridge and tempting fate! So, I have braced the pier in place and taken a board and placed it on the pier. I drew the dimension of the through truss bridge on it to be sure the pier would be in the right place. It appeared to be high.

To check that dimension, I glued a cleat on the end of the road bed so I could measure down to where the deck should be.

Next, I had to level the pier as it was on a sloped grade. So, I cut the subroadbed and placed offset braces underneath to make the base level. It raised the pier about a quarter of an inch.

Now that the cleat is in place, it was pretty obvious how much off I was.

I had to move the pier to get it located exactly and it is right at the edge of the adjusted grade. With all of that done, I determined I had to cut 3/4 of an inch off the base to make that piece of wood hit the cleat. To do that, I had to brace the pier to make the base perpendicular to the saw. Took some adjustment but it worked. When put in place, everything came out fine.

Now I have to screw in the pier from below while holding it vertical. So, I placed some blocking around it, drilled pilot holes in the subroad bed and the pier and got below the table. Needless to say, I was nervous but it worked and nothing fell down!

Here is the work site just after drilling and screwing. I used that big gold NMRA gauge to be sure we had clearance on the pier and the inner track. It just clears due to the super elevation tilting the track towards the pier.

The pier was perfect and plumb so I was elated. I placed the bridge on it and it fit perfect. Looks good too!

Now I have to put in the deck girder. First I had to trim the roadbed back to make it fit. Then I had to measure where the pier would go.

So, you can see the base of the pier has been attached to the riser. I sanded the pier base to get an exact fit.

Here I am testing the level of the pier with some bridge ties and a straight piece of wood to see where the rail will hit the rail on the hill side. Looks good.