Freelanced steel viaduct - Part 2

This is the conclusion of a two part post on the building and installation of an over 300 foot long steel viaduct made from Micro Engineering bridge parts.  These were some the things I added to complete the steel viaduct and the surrounding area.

The code 40 rail that comes with the section of Micro Engineering flex track was used to make guard rails over the viaduct.  These were glued into place with ACC (super glue) being aligned by the small bumps that are on the ties for this purpose.  The guard rails were held in place with clamps and pins until the ACC set.

The track was hand painted with Testors rail brown acrylic paint.  The section of standard track between the viaduct and the skewed through truss bridge got ballasted with Arizona Rock and Minerals ballast.

The bridge and concrete piers got some weathering from a combination of washes and weathering powders.  I added some scribble from a dry transfer set to the bridge above one of the piers and am considering some graffiti in a few other areas but will need to find some very small graffiti decals.

Even desert areas like central Nevada have brush and shrubs.  I use a combination of Woodland Scenics clump foliage and Scenic Express prairie grass tufts attached with a dot of E6000 adhesive on the end of a bamboo skewer.

Adding all those shrubs and prairie grass tufts may seem like a tedious task but it's actually quite enjoyable while running a train around the layout and listening to a ball game or music on the radio.

An area like this on a layout lends itself to many possible mini scenes.  Fishermen, boaters, hobos, bridge painters, and more are all things that would work here.  For now I have my canoes and some hikers admiring the bridge.

Freelanced steel viaduct - Part 1

I have always admired the tall steel viaducts and wanted to model one on a layout.  I don't know of one being anywhere along the line I am modeling but decided to have one anyway.   This bridge will replace a temporary "track on a stick" type bridge that I put in last March.

As there is no prototype to try to model this from it is of my own design using Micro Engineer parts.  After a lot of trial a fitting this is what I came up with.

Turns out that this viaduct did not need to be very tall so I only used the upper section of the towers and even had to carve out the area below to make those fit.

The land contours under the viaduct had to be redone after all the concrete footings and bridge piers were set in the correct places.  Those were all made from wood with joints carved into them.

Once I was satisfied with the shape of the land some basic scenery was added then the bridge was installed and the Micro Engineering bridge track with a couple of inches on each end having the bridge ties replaced with standard ties.   This track assembly was attached with E6000 adhesive.

Here is an end view looking down the line.  The guard timers have been added to the bridge ties.  Next will be adding the code 40 guard rails, ballasting the track at each end, and adding some shrubs and other details in the area under and around the bridge.

Humboldt River rapids

In the Harney section of the layout the Humboldt River runs between the two tracks for about 4-1/2 feet.  The river is relatively straight and I felt it was not very interesting.  Also, at the end of this section near the high bridge the river bed needed to climb up about 1/2 inch.

So I recently created a little rapids area over the spot where the level changes.  I don't know if there is anything like this on the prototype Humboldt River but it seems like a fun thing to have on a layout.

Woodland Scenics water effects was used to give the water some texture in the right places and some of the ridges were highlighted with white paint applied with a toothpick.  All of the water was then given a final coat of gloss medium.