I’ve included both names as I have seen folks address them with either name. I think what I am trying to create is principally a viaduct, but yesterday I inserted a bridge in a portion of it. I did it in a straight track portion, so I could alternately allow for it to be included in the final trackwork, or perhaps not.
The bottom deck of my layout is to represent principally the city Baltimore, home of America’s start with the railroad industry. There is a neat stone arch bridge there in the suburbs, the Thomas viaduct that is even more famous as I read more about it. I wanted to include such a viaduct on my layout as a landmark representative of Baltimore.
I recently became aware that I had several photos I had posted of this viaduct that were not actually the Thomas viaduct, even thought they look very similar. One was a double track affair, the Thomas one, and one was a single track affair located in another state. I’ll get into that later.
Turns out I have need of both a single track portion and a double track portion. How to construct them is another big question mark for me. I am making a mock-up using foamcore board right now, and it is presenting even more challenges than I originally anticipated.
I think I would use extruded foam. I have seen stone piers made from it, that were scribed to look like stone. The foam is easy to cut and form, also strong enough to hold trains. Hot wire/knife make smoother cuts, carving and and sanding make a mess, but don’t create noxious fumes.
I was following a guy that built a massive viaduct out of extruded foam, it looked really good. The pier on the right is one I made out of extruded foam while watching the hockey game.
Once upon a time, when I had time, I built this viaduct using 4” x 2” pine covered with 1/8” MDF, and card. I was lucky enough to have a fellow model railroader with a commercial laser engraver do the top brick work for me. I did the stone work with a dentist’s drill bit and a Dremel type hand tool.
That is a great piece of modelling! The accuracy of the joint lines is amazing!
I have to build some stone piers for the club because the commercial offerings aren’t tall enough. I don’t think that my hands are steady enough to carve the joints myself so I’m hoping I can find some suitable molded styrene sheets. If it looks half as good as yours I will be happy.
Thanks Dave. I drew the lines with pencil before I started “carving” but if you click on the photo to enlarge it, you’ll see that my hand was not that steady at all!! Which actually aided me in obtaining that slightly irregular quarried stone look, I was trying to achieve.[(-D][(-D]
Cheers, the Bear.[:)]
I grew up not far fron the Thomas Viaduct, and used it as a basis for my model. My (previous) model RR is long gone, but my abandoned blog lives on:
…and a couple of under construction shots:
I made hydrocal castings from silicone molds, using CAD modeled & 3D printed (SLA) masters. More (and larger) photos and a complete how-to on my blog (the how to posting is on the second page, dated Jan 13 2013):
First, nice layout. You should post more often. And second, I just noticed your avatar: The Ruthless Toothless Broad Street Bully. They don’t make 'em like that anymore.
Thanks Robert and Kevin for the kind words. The only pictures I have of the defunt layout are on my old blog, so nothing new to post. I guess I could look for suitable ones for “Show Me Something”.
In the benchwork stages now on a smaller HOn3 layout, so I’m sure I’ll become more active as I move along with this one. This forum has been a great resource for me, I do try to give back when I can.
One of my hockey heros from my teens! I also can’t wait… preseason begins Sept. 15!
In those days I was more of a Howe/Hull/Esposito fan . . . Jesus saves! and Espo scores on the rebound. Then that scrawny kid from Brantford showed up, and it was like “Gordie who . . . ?”
Post photos of your new layout. Start a build thread. Photos of raw benchwork under construction and in progress count.
