Wordless Wednesday #279

 

Central Valley Bridge Assembly Tips

 

I want to get the scenery completed across the "front side" of the layout - that means I need to tackle two big projects on either side of the support pillar. One of these is Main Street, the second are the bridges crossing the Missisiquoi River immediately to the right of the Junction scene. I'm using Central Valley bridges for the river crossing - I put together a short video sharing some tips on assembling these somewhat finicky kits:

Available on my YouTube channel:

https://youtu.be/1PlVLtegLco

Wordless Wednesday #229

Wordless Wednesday #228

Wordless Wednesday #217

Replace a steel bridge with a wood trestle?

One of the most familiar scenes on my old layout was the Williams Creek* bridge. It was featured on the blog header several times. I also blogged about it on many occasions, including this post, which illustrates how it was actually in three locations (and two heights) on the layout. I also wrote a whole series of posts showing how I built and moved (and then moved yet again) the thing. So I've gotten lots of mileage out of it. 

The Williams Creek bridge was built on it's own benchwork, meaning it was fairly easy to save when the layout was dismantled. In fact, it's the only piece of that layout I saved. As you can in the photo at right, it's been installed on the Richford Branch layout. It's just a little too long for the spot it's sitting in, but it does fit, although there's going to have to be some extensive and tricky blending of the river into the wall to fill a triangular-shaped gap. But it could be done. The question is should it. 

What the Richford Branch had plenty of is wood trestles - right up to the point it was abandoned. What my layout has none of at this point are wood trestles. And precious few places where they would fit. However, one location that would be ideal for a trestle (or two) and some pastureland is the section where the Williams Creek bridge is currently installed. But as much as the Williams Creek Bridge doesn't really "fit" on the Richford Branch, a scene like the one in the George Corey photo below would truly capture the essence of the prototype:

Although I'm making every effort to avoid the "do-loops" which produced nothing but lack of progress on the previous layout, I think this one change may be appropriate. I can always keep the Williams Creek Bridge as a photo diorama. 

*The name Williams Creek is not the prototype name for this bridge - it's named in honor of my college roommate and best friend, Brigadier General Zeb Williams, USA, Ret. 

Wordless Wednesday #187

Sheldon Junction Bridge

Richford Local crossing Missisquoi River, John Krause photo

It's been a number of years since I've bought bridge kits. The scenic highlight of the new layout, as on the prototype, will be the crossing of the Missisquoi River at Sheldon Junction. The railroad crossed the river on three through truss bridges. At least it was three until June 29, 1984. On that date the last four cars on a B&M/CP detour train derailed, and in the process destroyed one of the spans beyond repair. 

Ian Stronach photo

That derailment was really the end of the Richford branch as a railroad line - as the tracks were abandoned east of that point and the damaged span removed. 
I've seen photos of the bridge - such as John Krause's photo above and Ian Stronach's photo shown to the right. 
I figured the bridge looks close enough to the Central Valley Truss bridge that I'd simply order three of them and build them up. 
But in the years since I've bought a bridge - or seriously looked at bridge kits - Central Valley has added to their product line by offering their "classic" bridge as an Eastern Gusseted or Punch Plate bridge. Great, knowing my luck I'll pick one of the three, guess wrong and find out only after it's installed on the railroad!
Google to the rescue. 
Even the railroad tracks are long gone the Richford Branch right-of-way is still there - as a bike trail. And Google Maps

Google Street View of the Sheldon Springs bridge. 

offers a street view from the bike trail taken from the bridge. 
A few quick clicks and I was able to determine the original Central Valley Pratt Truss bridge is the closest to the prototype. I was also able to use the map

to determine the length of the span - the Central Valley bridge is 150 feet long, meaning three spans measure 450 feet. Google Maps indicates the river is about 370 feet or so across - but that's today's bike trail - as shown in the John Krause photo above, the abutments weren't located on the edge of the river, meaning 450 feet or so should be close enough, and ought to make for an impressive scene. 
Naturally, guess which version was nowhere to be found at Timomium last weekend!

Finding virtual (and actual) stuff ...

N-5-a 463 on the Richford local, George Corey photo. 

Moving is ... well I was going to say "is an adventure" but frankly it just plain sucks....
But the weirdest part is the unboxing - it's like Christmas morning - especially when you find a few months have passed before you're reunited with your stuff. 
Of course there's a fair amount of "what did we save this for?" Followed by the amusement of discovering the movers carefully wrapped and boxed up everything - even the plastic knives and forks from the local fast food place that happened to be sitting on the kitchen counter on moving day!
Then there's this file folder of papers that I'm constantly loosing and finding again. I swear it has legs. In my case it's copies of three typewritten booklets listing the industries served by the CV.  I thought I'd included the folder in a small file box of reference material I brought to the apartment. Went to look for it a few weeks later only to spend most of a frustrating Sunday afternoon looking for them, concluding the folder must have gotten boxed up (maybe with the plastic knives and forks?). 
Of course yesterday I was emptying a few more boxes in the office, including that box of reference material I'd taken to the apartment. Sure enough, there was that stupid file folder with list of industries. It wouldn't be so bad except this isn't the first time this folder has gone rogue. It disappeared in the old house a couple of times. And I wouldn't be surprised if I went home tonight to find it's gone over the hill again.
In addition to the "analog" unpacking, there's also the fun of virtual unpacking. I'd packed up my large Mac desktop since there simply wasn't room for it in the apartment. Saturday I unpacked it, plugged it in, and turned it on for the first time in months. Thankfully, she fired right up - and I ran across several Richford branch photos George Corey had emailed me a few months back, including the one above. I think it nicely captures the spirit of the Richford Branch in the late steam era. 
It also reminded me I need to include a few wood pile trestles on the layout. 
And speaking of the layout, for ease of reference I've added a tab just below the header that should take you directly to the most current CV Richford Branch layout design. 

Wordless Wednesday #134

Wordless Wednesday #41 - Prototype inspiration for 'Williams Creek' scene on my layout

Photo courtesy Bob's Photos

Re-Locating Williams Creek: 3

After a long afternoon (and most of the morning) I've got the Williams Creek section in its new home. Obviously the mainline needs some realignment! But at least a favorite scene is back on the layout and not sitting on a shelf!

Wow! That turned out to be a lot harder than I thought but I'm happy to report the Williams Creek bridge scene is securely fastened in place in its new location between Waterbury and Essex Junction. 
Next step - getting the sub roadbed reinstalled and laying the mainline in place.