Trestle Part 5: First section complete

Trestle work continues on the PE&A. There were some weather delays due to an unusually wet June, especially as the rain seemed to coincide with the weekends. But summer is now in full swing with no rain in sight so work can move forward. The main section of the trestle, running between the two bridges, is now in place and about 90% complete.

I have to remind the reader that this is quite unusual to build a trestle with the track floating in place. But as I already had the track aligned exactly where I wanted it, both horizontally and vertically, it made sense for me to use that as a guide, and essentially build the trestle from the track down to the ground, rather than from the ground up.

I removed most of the PVC supports, leaving just a couple behind to hold up the track. I created a couple long temporary the same thickness as the stringers will be in order to hold the track just above the supports. I then spaced out bricks where each bent would go and partially buried each one so it was about ground level. This was tedious work to get them all level but it will provide a good foundation for the trestle. I did all this prep work last weekend.

This weekend I put the trestle together. I would first measure the distance from the track down to the foundation brick to the nearest 1/8" inch, then cut a bent to that height minus 3/4" for the stringers that will go on top of the bent and support the track. As I completed each bent, I would place it on the foundation and use two additional bricks as temporary braces to keep it in place and upright.

Once I was happy with the spacing and alignment, I started attaching the stringers on the top of the bents and supports on the sides, both front and back.

Something I learned from my earlier attempt is that I needed to treat each section of three stringers as a group rather than as three separate pieces. So I temporarily bound each section together with a bungee and used temporary spacers in between the stringers to keep them evenly spaced. The spacers will be knocked out once the glue on the stringers sets.

Yesterday I completed the first five sections.

The glue set over night and the first five sections were firmly bound together. This morning I removed the bricks and the bungees.

I then set up the bents for the next ten sections using the same process, proceeding one bent at a time from right to left. As I had a good process by now, work sped up and I was able to complete twice as much today as yesterday.

Here's another view of the work area in progress from a different angle.

And this final picture shows the work at the end of the day. I still need to add most of the cross bracing on the back side and finish up cross bracing on the lower tier on the front once the bricks are out of the way. After work tomorrow or the next day I'll remove the bricks and bungees, knock at the temporary stringer spacers, and continue work on the supports.