Trout Brook Bridge - Official Work Thread

[Bob Holmes]

Guys, what are we thinking to get the walking/biking trail across Trout Creek parallel to the bridge?  That will need some planning with the Mid-Coast Conservancy folks.

[Carl G. Soderstrom]

I like Rick's idea - no anachronisms. Sliding rather than swinging doors.
Less likely to get hit?

And rather than a 1/4 scale model a 1/8 scale would be easier to put way for the winter.
Iron fittings could be welded or made from PVC or some such.

[Alex Harvilchuck]

Guys, what are we thinking to get the walking/biking trail across Trout Creek parallel to the bridge?  That will need some planning with the Mid-Coast Conservancy folks.

The Midcoast trail does not go across the stream. I believe in prior threads on the TOM trails it was stated that Midcoast does not have any plans on putting a trail on the other bank.

[John McNamara]

I like Rick's idea - no anachronisms. Sliding rather than swinging doors.
Less likely to get hit?

And rather than a 1/4 scale model a 1/8 scale would be easier to put way for the winter.
Iron fittings could be welded or made from PVC or some such.

I think we still have the Humason Brook Bridge model. It would be interesting and educational to have the Trout Brook Bridge model be the same scale.....

John M

[Alex Harvilchuck]

I like Rick's idea - no anachronisms. Sliding rather than swinging doors.
Less likely to get hit?

And rather than a 1/4 scale model a 1/8 scale would be easier to put way for the winter.
Iron fittings could be welded or made from PVC or some such.

The nodes are rather ingenious castings, it would be easier to 3D print or cast new parts at the proper scale than to fabricate from flat plate

http://www.woodcenter.org/docs/dayton-conference/MarstonAndrewsMesler_MooseBrook.pdf
http://coveredbridgesociety.org/gorham/gorham-handout.pdf

[Dwight Winkley]

Resize the bridge. Only the two pony trusses have been built. To resize the bridge, new deck timbers etc. will be ordered with a length shorter than standard gauge size.
New deck will be 10 feet wide between Trusses.

[Glenn Christensen]

Hi Guys,

You may want to widen the bridge to about 12'.  A 2' gauge wooden wedge plow is about 9' wide and it may be good to allow an extra foot or two on each side for safety's sake.

You don't want a repeat of the Fred H. Allen incident.  (passenger killed)


Best Regards,
Glenn

[Mike the Choochoo Nix]

I checked the clearance requirements. Standard gauge requires three foot three inches on each side, I think the widest equipment used on the WW&F was 7 foot so 7+6'6" =13' 6". for safety's sake, and to allow the crew to easily walk by a train stopped on the bridge we should not go narrower than that.
Mike Nix

[John Kokas]

I believe Mike's calculations are correct for modern safety code.  Also, the question of FRA rules applying sometime in the future should be taken into consideration.  Better to adjust for it now than redo it later.

[Jason M Lamontagne]

We'll consider a wider clearance, and seek the advice of our railroad bridge engineer.  Everyone's thoughts on the matter are understood and appreciated.

Thanks,
Jason

[Joe Fox]

My thought is this, we can't walk by a train on Humason so why would we need it on this one? The original railroad only designed bridges wide enough for a train, nothing more. In my opinion, to look more like a bridge the railroad would have had, one just wide enough for a train is what we should have.

[Wayne Laepple]

Not to harp continuously on the subject, but I read that the original Moose Brook bridge include two inspection panels on each truss to assess the condition of the timbers and monitor the tightness of the tension rods. Would it be anathema to use a piece of plexiglass or Lexan to replace one inspection panel on each truss?

[Ted Miles]

Folks,
         I read the bridge announcement on the Facebook pages. I think this is a wonderful piece of historic preservation. Just another example of how the WW&F Railway Museum does projects with that extra effort that makes them really shine!  The next day my annul fund letter arrived; I will send a contribution!

Ted Miles, WW&F Member

[Bob Holmes]

Would we ever want to build a replica Maine two-foot wedge plow?  We have rolling stock from other Maine two-footers, so it's not necessarily outside of our mission...

(BTW, I think wedge plows are really cool, next only to D&RG rotaries.)

[James Patten]

WW&F had some wedge plows.  If we ever want to get serious about winter operations, then we need a plow and a flanger.