Chilcott’s Ck bridge assembly – Part III …

Hi all,

Over the last couple of days, I started weathering the Chilcott’s Ck bridge girders and piers.

To refresh the memory, this is the bridge and the weathering effect I am trying to achieve.  Even though the photo was taken in the last few years, and I am modelling 30+ years ago, I don’t think the weathering would be much less.

Following on from the previous post on the subject, the completed bridge spans had been painted with Krylon camouflage brown spray paint.  The plaster piers were also painted with the Krylon.  It is a dead flat matte paint that gives a good surface for the weathering powders to adhere to.

First, a bit of background on the Krylon paint and weathering powders.

At a local model railway exhibition that was held in Sydney earlier this year, a good mate was demonstrating his latest technique for weathering rollingstock.

Rather than me repeating it verbatim, have a read of this PDF as it outlines the technique in detail.  For those readers in Australia, I obtained my Conte crayons from an online art supplier, The Art Shop.

How Aaron sprayed the Krylon over a perfectly good model comes across as a bit drastic, but you can see the results.  The Krylon is purely there to provide a “keying” surface for the crayon powders.

So, both the bridge girders and piers were painted with the Krylon.  The bridge girders then got a good coating of a blue/grey colour then a light hint of various shades of browns to simulate the dirt on the bottom half of the girders.

The plaster piers were then attacked with a light grey colour as a base to get that weathered concrete colour.  Some white was also applied to lighten the grey in certain areas.  Then it was just a matter of using various shades of browns and black to get the streaking effect.

Below is the result so far.

Still have a bit to do, but probably not far off from being finished.  I’ve also been working on the abutments using the same techniques.  Below is a photo of progress so far.

Cheers.

Chilcott’s Ck bridge assembly – Part II …

Hi all,

Work has progressed on the bridge over the last couple of days.

The bridge spans sub-assembly was washed and then some girder support pads were fixed in place at each of the girder section joins.  These polyurethane castings are made from my own patterns.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

The bridge was then sprayed with Krylon camoflague matt brown paint.  This is a super flat finish paint that a mate introduced me to and is used as a base coat to accept weathering powders.  More details on these later.

The spray went on very nicely and didn’t hide the rivet detail at all.

 

The photo below is the look I am trying to achieve with the weathering to come.

 

Cheers.

Chilcott’s Ck bridge assembly – Part I …

Hi all,

I’ve been wanting to start assembly of the Chilcott’s Creek bridge for some time now and finally bit the bullet this arvo.

The five sections are now soldered together.  They were laid upside down on a flat piece of board and against another piece of timber with a true edge.  This ensure the tops of the girders remained true and even and aligned straight.

 

Small pieces of brass strip were then soldered in place as shown below.

 

As each joint was being made, it was checked for straightness.  The finished product is shown below.

 

A close-up shot of the viewable side of one of the joins.

 

The piers are plaster castings done for me by Ian Phemister.

The next stage will involve painting the spans and then mounting the abutments on a piece of 9mm plywood which will form the base of the bridge sub-assembly.  The bridge will then be placed on the abutments.  The piers will then be shimmed to fit underneath.  More on that in the next post.

Cheers.

First bridge girder complete …

Hi all,

Yesterday I completed assembly of the test etch for the 30 foot plate web bridge girder.  It went together pretty well, albeit with some rather fiddly bits, but I am pleased with the finished product.

I’m hoping the rivet detail comes up OK in these pictures.  I hope to borrow Andrew’s sandblasting tool to clean it up prior to painting.

I have a few things to report back to the designer of the etch, but these are very minor.  I look forward to future etches, with only four more now required for the bridge.

The brass etching certainly beats a plastic version hands down.  The resultant structure is very strong.  You just can’t beat metal etching for fineness of detail.

Cheers for now.